“Yes, I think so.”
He straightened and placed a leather briefcase on his lap. “You usually sit in the back with the players.”
She’d always sat in back because by the time she’d boarded, the seats up front had been taken by coaches and management. “Well, I’m beginning to feel persona non grata back there,” she confessed. The incident of the previous night had made their feelings for her perfectly clear.
He returned his gaze to hers. “Has something happened that I should know about?”
Beyond the nuisance calls, she’d found a dead mouse outside her door last night. It had been very dehydrated as if it had been dead awhile. Obviously someone had found it somewhere and left it for her. Not exactly a horse’s head in her bed, but she didn’t think it was a coincidence either. But the last thing she needed was for the players to think she was running to management telling tales. “Nothing I can’t handle.”
“Have dinner with me tonight and we can talk about it.”
She stared across the aisle at him. For a second she wondered if he was one of those short guys who just naturally assumed she’d go out with him because she was short too. Her last boyfriend had been five-seven and had had the mother of all Napoleon complexes, which had butted heads with her own Napoleon complex. The very last thing she needed was a short guy asking her out. Especially a short guy who was also Chinooks management. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want the players to think you and I are involved.”
“I have d
inner with male sports reporters all the time. Chris Evans, in fact.”
It wasn’t the same. She had to be completely beyond gossip. More professional than men. Even though women had been allowed in the locker room for almost three decades now, speculation over women sleeping with their sources was still an issue. She didn’t think her credibility or acceptance with the players could sink lower, but she really didn’t want to find out.
“I just thought you might be tired of eating alone,” Darby added.
She was tired of eating alone. She was tired of staring at the walls of a hotel room or the inside of the team’s jet. Maybe someplace very public would be okay. “Just business?”
“Absolutely.”
“Why don’t we meet in the hotel restaurant?” she proposed.
“Seven sound okay?”
“Seven is perfect.” She dug around in the front pocket of her briefcase and pulled out the itinerary. “Where are we staying tonight?”
“LAX Doubletree,” Darby answered. “The hotel shakes every time one of those airbuses takes off.”
“Marvelous.”
“Welcome to the glamorous life of an athlete,” he said and leaned his head back.
Jane had pretty much already figured out that a four-game grind was just that: a grind. Although she’d already studied it dozens of times, her gaze scanned the itinerary. LA, then San Jose. Just a little over halfway into the road trip and she was looking forward to going home. She wanted to sleep in her own bed, drive her own car instead of ride a bus, and even open her own refrigerator instead of a hotel minibar. The Chinooks had four more days on the road before they returned to Seattle for a four-game, eight-day stretch. Then it was off again for Denver and Minnesota. More hotels and meals by herself.
Maybe having dinner with Darby Hogue was not such a bad idea. It could be enlightening and break the monotony.
At seven o’clock, Jane stepped off the elevators and made her way to the Seasons Restaurant. She’d left her hair down and it fell in soft curls to her shoulders. She wore her black wool pants and gray sweater. The sweater opened on the side of her neck and had flared sleeves, and until Luc had made that comment about her looking like the archangel of doom, she’d really liked it.
Now she wondered if there was some hidden reason beyond her fear of clashing colors that made her gravitate to dark colors. Was she depressed and didn’t know it, as Caroline had suggested? Have some undiagnosed mental disorder? Was she really an archangel of doom, or was Caroline delusional and Luc an arrogant A-hole? She liked to think the latter.
Darby waited for her at the entrance of the restaurant, looking very young in a pair of khakis, red and orange Hawaiian print shirt, and a new dose of gel in his hair. They were shown to a table near the windows and Jane ordered a lemon-drop martini to chase away her fatigue, if only for a few hours. Darby ordered a Beck’s and was asked for his ID.
“What? I’m twenty-eight,” he complained.
Jane laughed and opened the dinner menu. “People are going to mistake you for my son,” she kidded him.
The corners of his mouth turned downward and he pulled out his wallet. “You look younger than I do,” he grumbled as he showed the waiter his identification.
When their drinks arrived, Jane ordered salmon and wild rice while Darby chose beef and a baked potato.