My skin crawls, but I keep my expression neutral. “Thank you. Carry on.”
As Corbin starts explaining the cardio equipment, Finn turns to the other player, a lanky guy on the lat pulldown. “Hey, Sawyer. Think the new boss does spot checks?”
Sawyer snorts as I catch him checking out my ass. “I’d let her check my form anytime.”
A snicker ripples through the room.
Corbin’s ears turn bright red. He glares at them. “Guys. Come on.”
They just laugh. One of them picks up a sweaty gym towel, balls it up, and when Corbin turns back to me,thwack—it hits him square in the back of the head.
Corbin whirls around, looking genuinely pissed. “Dude! Not cool!”
The players dissolve into louder laughter. I file the moment away:Corbin is protective. And the team culture is… frat house adjacent.
We escape the gym and Corbin, still fuming, leads me to The Vault. I'm busying telling him I've already seen this room, and could probably finish the tour now, but when we round the corner, I see the frosted glass doors are open now.
The inside is even more merchandising heaven than I glimpsed earlier, so I follow along.
A girl about my age with a messy blonde ponytail and a nose ring is behind the counter, meticulously arranging a stack of caps. She's very pretty, and she looks up as we enter, her blue eyes sweeping over me.
“New girl?” she asks, her voice dry.
“That’s me. Josie Whitfield.”
“Brooke Kessler. I run this circus.” She waves a hand around the merchandise shop. “So you’re the one they brought in to handle the boys.”
“Looks that way.”
Brooke’s smile widens. “Good luck. You’re gonna need it.” Her gaze flicks past me to Corbin, who is suddenly very interested in a display of keychains. “Hey, rookie. You buying another keychain you don’t need? That’ll be your eighteenth this week.”
She winks at me, and I watch as Corbin goes beet red. “I—no. I’m just… showing Ms. Whitfield around.”
“Mhmm.” Brooke’s eyes twinkle, like this is a little game they like to play together. The shy rookie and the pretty shopkeeper.Interesting.“Well, the tour continues past the register, so move along, rookie.”
The last stop is the media room.
It’s a depressing little box with faded blue carpet and a single sad-looking chair behind a laminate table. A whiteboard on the wall hasFIX THIS TEAMscrawled in angry red marker.
Corbin winces when he sees me looking. “Yeah. This is where we do post-game press conferences. When we have to. Which isn’t often, because… you know.” He gestures to the emptiness. “But I’m sure you’ll, like, fix it. Or whatever.”
The tour ends back near the executive offices. My feet ache, but I think my soul aches a little more.
“Thanks, Corbin,” I say, and I mean it. He’s a sweet guy doing his best. “You were very thorough.”
He blushes again, stammering. “Anytime, Ms. Whitfield. Really. Anything you need. I’m your guy.”
He scurries away, and I’m left alone in the quiet hallway. I lean against the cool glass wall, staring down at the empty ice.
I have no idea how to do this job. This is huge. Harder than I expected.
And even worse, how do I turn an entire team around, when the man I’m supposed to make marketable just publicly humiliated me.
“Rough first day?”
I turn around, and Darcy Madden, the only other woman who was sitting in that room with me this morning, is leaning against the wall a few feet away. Her sharp black bob is perfectly styled, and she has a tablet tucked under one arm.
“You could say that,” I say.
