Page 20 of Out of Bounds

Chapter Seven

The beep of her alarm lazily pulled Felicity out of the blissful dream world she’d been deeply immersed in. Blindly reaching to turn it off, she rolled back over, back into the amazing warmth she’d been so cocooned in. She didn’t know if it was the events of last night making her extra tired, or just her body knowing that she needed to be at her best today, but it had been a long, long time since she had slept as soundly as she had.

Whatever it was, she was grateful. Even now, half-awake from her alarm, she could still feel the glow from her dream washing over her. She’d never been one to remember her dreams, but she knew from how relaxed and content she felt that it must have been amazing. Even this bed felt extra comfortable this morning, and the pillow she was wrapped around was soft and smooth to the touch yet firm, radiating just the right amount of heat to make her want to stay like this all day. Trying to force herself awake, she stretched, running her hands along the ripples of the pillow, until her hand came to rest on a large bulge.

A moment later, the pillow seemed to shift under her, and Felicity’s eyes flew open to find her cheek resting against a well-defined pec muscle. And her hand, some place much, much worse. This was not a pillow she was draped over.

It was Gunnar. And that was his dick she was cupping.

“Oh my God!” she shrieked, pushing him away and scrambling out of bed. This wasn’t happening. She did not spend all night snuggling with Gunnar Gracin. But oh damn, did he feel good up against her. Stop it! Do not think about how nice it was to wake up in his arms. Stop, just stop!

“Morning to you too, Effie,” Gunnar mumbled, his eyes still closed. The smirk on his face, however, told her that he’d known exactly what she had just done.

“You were supposed to stay on your side of the bed! You weren’t supposed to touch me!” she hissed.

“Well, princess, based on the way you were clinging to me, plus the nice little greeting down below I just got, I’d say it was you touching me and not the other way around.”

“Screw you!” she said, storming off to the bathroom. She needed to get her head on straight. Today was a big day, and she was not going to let Gunnar Gracin ruin that.

The rest of the morning flew by in a flurry of phone calls and emails trying to make sure that everything was set for the team’s travel arrangements for the start of the season. A very long, tense conversation with the corporate office of the hotel not only resulted in this stay refunded, but a credit for their next trip as well, which left Felicity feeling pretty good heading into the afternoon sponsorship meeting.

Walking into the meeting room, she was surprised to find both Cowboy and Gunnar sitting at the table talking with her brother. She’d known that Cowboy would be a part of this meeting—as Technical Director he would have a say in who he thought would be a good fit as a sponsor of the team as a whole, as well as which player would be a good fit should any of the companies want to work directly with them or have player appearances. Gunnar, on the other hand…

“Shouldn’t you be out coaching or something?” she asked, sitting down next to Dalton, which landed her right across from Gunnar at the round table. “You know, what we hired you for?”

“Cullen’s got it,” he said, smiling at her like they shared some kind of secret. Her whole body flushed under his gaze, like it wanted nothing more than to drag him back upstairs and recreate this morning. Why did he have to be so damn sexy?

“I invited him. He did run an academy for six years, so he’s got plenty of front office knowledge. Thought it might prove useful,” Dalton said.

“Fine, whatever. Let’s get started,” she said, trying to not let his presence get to her.

“We’re still waiting on Jonah.”

“He was the one who wanted to be here so badly, so he should have shown up on time. Don’t punish the rest of us because he’s special.”

“Touché,” Dalton said, leaning back in his chair. Despite the khakis and polo shirt and his towering six-foot-four frame, he still looked like the same lanky kid he’d always been to her. She knew that in this setting she shouldn’t look at him like a little brother, but sometimes she just couldn’t help it. For all Dalton’s faults, he really was a good guy, and she did love him. And she knew deep down the feeling was mutual. Maybe someday they would be friends again. “You want to start?”

“Sure,” she nodded. “I’ve spent the last month or so researching and interviewing local businesses that have the potential to be a good fit. There is a lot of interest in the community about working with us. Business owners see the excitement from fans and they want in on it.”

“I like the sound of that,” Cowboy drawled, his own Texas accent making a rare appearance.

“The area where I think we have the biggest potential is actually the food industry.”

“Food?” Dalton asked, sitting back up.

“Yes, food,” she said. “Think about it. What do people often do before and after games? They eat. But more so than that, of the thirty-plus games in a season, only half of those are at home. The other half are away. I think that we could establish partnerships with a number of local places to be official sponsors of the team, agreeing to show the games when we play away.”

“Like a pub partner?” Gunnar asked.

“Exactly! We can create a whole program around it, where restaurants get special perks for being an “official sponsor,” we can maybe do meet and greets there from time to time, et cetera. And we can set it up as a tiered system—the base level being just paying to call themselves a partner all the way up to some grand level involvement. Really, the possibilities are endless.”

“Sorry I’m late!” Jonah said, making a grand entrance into the room. “A call ran over.”

I’m sure it did…

Dalton nodded to his ex-best friend before turning back to Felicity and asking, “And you think we can get enough places interested?”

“I already have six that have told me to let them know as soon as we pull the trigger,” she told him, feeling more than a little proud of herself. She was so in love with this idea and really, really wanted to make it a reality. The best way to make this team successful was to engage the community, on both the fan side and the business side, and that is exactly what this proposal did.