I smiled because she was charming and I knew she would look good on my arm. “I know you will.” I kissed her softly. “You make me look good.”

She posed and slowly spun so that I could see her amazing dress and heels and how perfect her hair and makeup were. Her auburn hair, when curled and styled, touched her shoulders. Her hazel eyes shifted from blue when she was happy to green when she cried. She was hot, no doubt about it, but I was also getting bored again. I didn’t have time for a girlfriend, but I didn’t know how to tell her that either. Our fights were becoming more frequent.

Tonight, she was being nice. We were going to a black-tie event in downtown Bridgemont where coaches and starters were introducing their charities to the public. It was a big event and tickets were by special invitation only. If you weren’t on the list, you didn’t get in.

“Now, hurry up and get ready. I don’t want to be late,” Lexi said.

I dropped my towel and slipped into the cream-colored double strap one-shoulder fit evening gown that Lexi wanted me to wear. I didn’t have a lot of time to mess with my hair so I blew it straight, applied makeup, and slipped on strappy heels. I stood in front of Lexi when I was ready.

“Well, how do I look?”

She ran her hands down my sides and rested them on my hips. “You look incredible. I’m going to have to fight everyone off tonight.”

“I’ll be the wallflower standing by the bar,” I said.

“You’ll be the one surrounded by all the football players who want to talk shop with you.” She rolled her eyes and smirked. It seemed odd that she wanted to start a fight tonight.

“Well, it is about football. All of this,” I said.

“I’ll just hang back with the girlfriends and wives and we’ll talk about how we never get to see our partners during the season.”

She was in for a rude awakening when she found out the players were home by six or seven. The coaches hung back to talk about the day’s practices and how to improve plays. If we could, we’d stay there all night. A new team was exhausting, but we were all so excited to make this happen. Lexi would never understand.

It also didn’t help that tonight I was most certainly going to run into Parker. It was inevitable. I had managed to avoid all gatherings with her until tonight. As I drove into town, I thought about how I was going to handle seeing and talking to Parker after all these years.