All of that risk and they didn’t even win the game. I was furious with Owen, but I didn’t say anything to him about it. I could tell that he was upset himself.

He was strange after that man left. He didn’t want to talk, and he didn’t even make a single dirty, flirtatious comment to me. Even when I had been trying to put distance between us he had made at least one or two comments a day. It was part of who he was.

But when I returned, he didn’t want to talk. Instead, it was all business with him.

That suited me just fine, but I knew something had happened, and it definitely had to do with that guy.

The next day, Owen had his MRI. I wasn’t around for that, and we wouldn’t get the results of it for at least another day or two, but I knew he’d be stressed. I sent him a text wishing him good luck, but I didn’t hear back.

That was fine. If Owen was going to act that way, then I’d just accept it. We’d been getting too close anyway.

But something kept nagging at me. It was the way Owen’s attitude had shifted as soon as that guy had appeared.

Monday came, and I was at work early. Owen had the morning off, which meant I wouldn’t see him until later in the day for our session. Instead of sitting around doing nothing, I decided to do a little investigating.

I started with the training staff.

“Hey, Michael,” I said, poking my head into the head trainer’s office.

“Morning, Taylor.”

“Can I ask you a quick question?”

“Sure. Come on in.”

I walked into his office and sat down. “How well do you know the staff around here?”

“Pretty well. I’ve been with the team for six years now. Why?”

“I saw a guy yesterday. I’ve never seen him before. He’s pretty tall, wore a suit, dark hair. Looked Italian.”

Michael frowned. “Doesn’t sound familiar.”

“He had tattoos. Brown shoes. He was in the back training room after the game on Sunday.”

“Huh. Really?” Michael shrugged. “Sorry. No clue.”

“Okay then.”

“Why do you ask?”

“I just didn’t know him. He was talking to Owen like they knew each other.”

“Maybe he was someone Owen brought in.”

“Oh, yeah. Probably. Thanks, Michael.”

“Any time.”

I stood up and left his office more confused than before.

That man didn’t seem like someone Owen had wanted to see. I had assumed he was just another doctor, or maybe some coach I hadn’t recognized, but Michael didn’t seem to know who I was talking about. It wasn’t impossible that he just didn’t know who it was, but that would be surprising.

I went into the main office and asked a few other coworkers, but none of them knew who I was talking about. Before I could bug more people, the training staff had to head out to the practice field for the morning session.

Since Owen wasn’t practicing, I didn’t have much to do. I mainly stood around and watched everyone else get to work. I scanned the fair number of people standing around and watching, but I couldn’t spot that man from yesterday. I didn’t see him with the coaching staff, and I didn’t see him with the support.

I felt frustrated as the day wore on. I knew I should just let it go, but for some reason I couldn’t.

It was the look on Owen’s face when he first saw the man. He had looked shocked, purely shocked, and then angry. It was almost as if he hadn’t expect the guy to show up there, and then he was pissed off that he had.

Finally, the morning session ended, and I knew Owen would be coming in for a light session. I hadn’t talked to him yet about his MRI, so I looked forward to finding out what it had been like. I headed back to my desk, and maybe fifteen minutes later, I got called down to the training room.

I found Owen sitting against the wall. He looked up when I walked in.

“Hey, Owen,” I said.

“Taylor.”

“How’d it go?”

He shrugged. “They put me in a big, loud machine, and now I’m here.”

“Sounds exciting. When do we find out?”

“I don’t know. Soon.”

I sat down next to him. “How are you feeling?”

“Annoyed.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m fine,” he said. “My knee is fine.”

“Let’s see it.”

He stretched it out, but I wasn’t watching his leg. I watched his face instead, and I saw what I had suspected I would: a small flinch of pain as he straightened it out.

He wasn’t fine. He was still trying to power through.

“Okay then. Let’s see what we can do,” I said, and I started in on a light stretching exercise.

If he was in pain, he did a good job of hiding it. I had to admit that I was impressed. If he was seriously injured, which he really might have been, there should have been considerable pain.

Either he wasn’t as hurt as we feared, or he was good at pretending.

“So listen,” I said, “about Sunday.”

“We don’t have to go over it again,” he grunted. “I know you were right.”

I paused, surprised. I never thought I’d hear those words from him.

“Really?”

“I shouldn’t have gone for it. All that risk for one tiny play that didn’t even matter in the long run.”

I nodded slowly. “Long-term thinking,” I said.

“That’s not my specialty. I live in the moment, and I live fast. Always have.”

“You’re not a kid anymore, Owen.”

“I know that.”

I bit my lip, and we went through a few more stretches. He seemed a little off, but I couldn’t put my finger on why.

“I meant to ask you,” I said finally as we finished one exercise and took a short break. “Who was that guy?”

He looked at me sharply. “What?”

“The guy who visited you when we were in the training room. He was in a suit.” I paused. “You seemed unhappy to see him.”

“Why are you asking?”

“Well, I’ve been asking around, but nobody seems to know him.”

He stared hard at me. “Why would you ask around?”

“Because you seemed upset. I wanted to see if I could help.”

“You can’t help.”

“Okay,” I said, surprised by his sudden change in mood.

“And you should stop asking. That guy was nobody. Forget about him.”

“Okay,” I said again.

Owen struggled to his feet. “I think we’re done for today.”

“We have a few more exercises—” I started to say, but he cut me off.

“See you later.” He turned and quickly left the room.

I stared after him, shocked at how that had played out.

I had suspected he’d be annoyed, but I had never guessed he’d be that angry. Maybe I was being a little pushy, but I meant well.

Still, the whole thing was bizarre. He didn’t want to talk about it, so I was going to drop it, but I knew something else was going on, something on top of his injury and whatever was happening between the two of us. Maybe it was even more important than anything else.

I sat in the training room, alone with my thoughts, trying to figure out where the heck things had gone wrong.