Another sharp look. Two nights ago, he and Rebels defenseman Theo Kershaw had walked into their local bar, the Empty Net, and spotted Mia Wallace, sister of their captain with a few of her pals. One of them was Tara who used to date Cal Foreman (before Mia slid into her place, kind of complicated), the other was Kennedy who was currently rooming with Reid Durand and looking after his dog (and man, that defined complicated).
Casey was also there, but not for long.
The moment Erik and Theo showed their faces, she stood and announced her departure before hightailing her hot ass out of there like her yoga pants were on fire.
Yeah, he’d noticed. (The quick departure and the sweet ass.)
“I had to get home,” she said quietly. “I’d been out for a while and my … cat needed to be fed.”
As stories went, that was kind of weak. “So I can tell Theo it wasn’t personal.”
“I’ve no problem with Theo.”
“Just me, then.”
She skewered him with those clear blue eyes, now frozen in contempt. “I don’t have a problem with anyone.”
“Yet you’re happy to gift smiles to everyone but me.”
“I don’t owe you any of my joy.”
He flinched at her words, delivered with such arrowed precision.
“You’re right, you don’t. I apologize.”
Surprise graced her pretty features before the mask of professionalism resumed. “No apology necessary.”
He stood and approached the desk. Where he was sitting was too distant for the intimate conversation this situation needed.
He touched the cap on the Dwight bobblehead. “Did you make this?”
A blush suffused her cheeks. “Yes, it’s just a joke. Well, for my own amusement.”
She didn’t look amused. She looked uncomfortable. “You must really like the show.” He’d been a fan himself ever since the night he … best not to dwell on that. On the heartache of his own making.
Casey moved the Dwight bobblehead a half-inch to the right and went back to her computer screen.
“Casey, you started working here about a year ago, I believe.”
“Hmm, hmm.” Tip-tap on her keyboard, no eye contact, wave lines of derision.
“And I’ve come in here for several appointments and each time, you’ve been sort of … cool toward me. Unusually so.”
She peered up at him through the veil of her dark lashes. Some odd range of emotion cycled through, sadness to anger to the smooth expression firmly back in place. It took all of one point five seconds.
“I’m sorry if you think I’ve been unprofessional.”
“No, you’ve been very professional. But I get the impression—more than an impression—that I’ve done something to offend you. I wish I knew what it was.”
Her lips twitched. She clearly had something to say, an explanation that would blow this tension between them wide open. Five seconds passed. Ten. Fifteen.
“You’ve done nothing. Absolutely nothing.”
A shiver corkscrewed down his spine, like the premonition he sometimes got before a game when the pipes were as wide as a football field and he was as small as a gnat trying to fight off the puck.
Why did he feel like absolutely nothing meant exactly that? He was supposed to have done something, and his not doing it had screwed things up.
“Casey—”
The door to Harper’s office opened and the boss’s ten o’clock walked out.
“Ms. Chase is ready to see you now,” Casey said.
She turned back to her computer, dismissing him with more than words.
Casey Higgins was living the dream.
A job she loved, working for a great boss and an organization that treated its employees as well as the pro-athletes they served.
A cute apartment with a reasonable rent and a landlord who fixed things when she needed (and didn’t leer at her like the last one did).
A grumpy kitty-cat she adored, and while he didn’t adore her back, she knew—just knew—he felt about as much affection as his species would allow.
She was an independent woman, who had thrown off the shackles of servitude to—scratch that.
She was doing just fine on her own, thankyouverymuch. And if sometimes she clutched her cat a little too closely or drank that third glass of wine while binge-watching Bridgerton for the fifth time or got a touch misty-eyed when her boss’s husband sent her flowers just because—well, that was normal, wasn’t it? Merely a smidge of melancholy because everyone longed for someone to lean on.
Then she would snap right out of it and affirm the mantra she’d been using to boost herself for the last year.
You don’t need a special someone to feel special. You don’t need anyone at all.
Except sometimes the positive talk lowered in volume around the holidays.
Sometimes it diminished to barely a whisper at a holiday party, or just prior to one. When you had to get ready, look yourself in the mirror, and assure your lazy-ass brain that once you arrived at said party, you’d have a rollicking good time.
“Casey, why are you still here?” Harper Chase, the Chicago Rebels CEO and amazing boss lady, click-clacked out of her office and stopped at Casey’s desk. “Everyone’s leaving early to get their glad rags on for the party.”
Casey checked the time on her computer screen. Only 4:10pm. “I brought my dress and was going to change here. I just have a few things to finish up.”
Harper frowned, activating a divot between her eyebrows. More of a dimple, really. Anyone else seeing that expression might be concerned that the petite blonde with the ball-busting attitude was about to go off on them. But Casey had worked in the Rebels’ front office for just over a year and she knew Harper’s moods and tics. This was concerned Mama Bear.
“You work too hard. I try to be a good boss and shoo you out of here early on Fridays, but does it do any good?”
“It’s just a couple of things. I was working on the stats report for the trade discussion meeting on the day we return.” Casey enjoyed compiling reports and Harper loved reading them: they were both analysts to the bone. Harper sometimes even asked her opinion. “And Holly in PR called about setting up a meeting with Dex O’Malley.”
Harper sighed. “I hate being such a killjoy before the holidays but that boy needs to be taken in hand.”
Dex was a newly-acquired forward who, since arriving from Nashville a month ago, had jumped into Chicago nightlife with the enthusiasm of a child in a Chuck E. Cheese ball pit.
An E. coli-infected one.
Often photographed in the company of multiple models (usually at the same time) he hadn’t done anything outrageous or damaging to the org yet. But Harper wanted to nip it in the bud before his life—and the team—became fodder for the gossip rags.
“Like I don’t have enough on my plate with Durand losing his shit the other night.” Reid Durand had knocked out his brother Bastian, a player on the Hawks during the crosstown classic game a few days ago. Durand Jr. was okay but it resulted in an ejection and a one-game suspension for Reid, just when he had started to play to his full potential at center.
“I think he might have some things on his mind.”
“Yeah, I heard. The dog nanny drama.” Harper shook her head. “Maybe Remy could chat with him tonight. He’s good at the heart-to-heart business. Takes his elder statesman role very seriously.”