I purse my lips, feeling my temper flare. Feeling my dream slip through my fingers onto the floor at my feet. “Okay,” I grind out.
“Get with travel. Start making plans for the trip to Indianapolis for the Combine. How many clients do we have attending this year?”
“Without Trey?” I ask bitterly. “Two.”
His brow tightens. “Two then. I’ll be on Larkin. Hollis will be with Reed. You can either shadow me or Hollis. Your choice.”
“I choose Hollis.”
“Fine.”
Brad sits forward, bringing his laptop to life.
I take that as my dismissal.
My heels click loudly on the hardwood floor leading out into the hall. They snap decisively with each step as I trudge my way to my office on the far side of the building. It’s a long, angry walk to the other side of the world, the office size shrinking with every step.
Everyone thought when I got hired straight out of college that I’d be Daddy’s Little Girl. That he’d give me the best office, the best clients, the best salary in the business. That’s bullshit, though. That’s not my dad. He’s running a business here and if I can’t prove myself just like every other agent in this building, I’m out. I’m on my ass. If anything, I have to work harder because I’m his daughter. He doesn’t want to hand me anything, and if he tried I wouldn’t take it. I want to make my own name in this business. I even considered changing my last name to my mom’s maiden name, but she pitched a fit. Apparently once she left the low income Greenes behind, she never had any intention of looking back. Ever.
Hollis is waiting in my office. He spins around in my chair dramatically, a bottle of champagne in his hands, a smile on his lips.
It fades the second he sees me. “Oh no.”
“Oh yeah,” I growl low and angry, pulling the white oak door closed behind me.
“What happened?”
“You get one guess.”
Hollis stands; tall, thin, impeccably dressed, and surreptitiously gay. His sexual orientation is nowhere in his appearance. It’s not in his speech, not in the way he handles himself. Not in his clothes or his carelessly mussed black hair. If you sat him down at a table with any straight guy in the city and told a stranger to play Find the Gay, they’d pick the other guy. Every time. Hollis is that kind of sleeper. He’s that scared of being found out.
He frowns knowingly. “He shot you down.”
“With both guns.”
“Because of his hand?”
“Because he’s an old hack who doesn’t follow his instincts anymore.”
“I think we’re talking about different people.”
I sigh, running my hand through my long, blond hair. “Yeah, because of Domata’s hand. Dad thinks it’s going to kill his draft stock because he can’t perform for the coaches and scouts at the Combine. He’ll probably be weak at Pro Day too.”
“He’s got a point.”
I glare at him. “Don’t you start too.”
Hollis raises his hands in surrender, the unopened bottle of champagne still in his left hand. “Hey, I’m with you. I think Domata’s got talent for days. The coaches know that. They know a guy can recover from an injury.”
“But…”
He lowers his hands slowly. “I also think you can be forgotten in the excitement of the Combine. Including Domata, there are twenty-two quarterbacks going to Indianapolis next month. All of them heavily scouted. Maybe Domata was a draw before, but if he can’t prove himself by April, I see him drafting third round. Second at best.”
I collapse in defeat on my couch. “That’s what Dad says.”
“Great men and all that shit.”
“Yeah.”
Hollis sits down slowly, clunking the heavy bottle of bubbly down on my desk. “You still want him, don’t you?”
“So fucking bad!” I cry in frustration. I sit forward, my elbows on the knees of my black linen slacks. “He’s the real deal, Hollis. I swear to God. He’s got the skill and the strength, but it’s his mentality that’s absolutely killer. He has ice in his veins and a computer in his brain. He processes situations like lightning. It’s unreal. And he never quits on a play. It’s not dead to him until the whistle blows. You can’t teach that. That’s instinct. It’s the stuff the greats are made of.”
“Did you tell your dad that?”
I snort. “That I can feel it in my gut that Domata’s a god? No. He wouldn’t want to hear it. He wants to see numbers. How far can he throw? How much can he bench? How much can he contract for?”
“How much do you think he can contract for?” he asks, quizzing me.
He does this sometimes. When I was first hired Brad paired me with Hollis to be trained. We hit it off immediately and since that day we’ve been inseparable, even when Brad would like us to be. Hollis became my best friend in the world, and even though I’ve been with the agency for two years now I still go to him when I need advice or help with a deal. In return, he plays teacher sometimes for the fun of it, drilling me on stats and figures.