Two Weeks Later

I sat in the family box every Sunday. I had for the past twenty-six years. Each and every weekend of the entire football season was planned for me. I was either in Warrior Stadium or on the road wherever the team traveled. It never occurred to me that there might be something else I could do with my time on game day. I’d never had the option.

That's what it meant to be a McCade. Football was the family life. The family dynasty. It was what kept us together. At least that’s what we wanted people in this town to think. The McCade bloodline breathed nothing but football.

It ran through our pores, pulsing in our veins as if it kept us alive as oxygen. It was the dominant gene that separated McCades from everyone else.

But all that changed the night my grandfather died. Everything changed with one final heartbeat.

I couldn’t let myself relive those moments. The world was watching me. Waiting to see how I handled the next step as if it was the fourth quarter and the Warriors were down by three. The problem was I wasn’t a quarterback. I wasn’t trained to deal with intense pressure and stress. I didn’t feel like someone had handed me the ball in a well-drawn out play with instructions. Instead, I felt as if I was at the bottom of a pile and the weight of twenty men was crushing the air from my lungs.

I walked into his office. It was the corner room of the executive level in the Warriors’ suite. I remembered when I used to play on the floor as a child. My grandfather didn't want to be bothered with me so he would shoo me into a corner with a box of Warriors’ stationary and tell me to keep quiet during his meetings.

He would leave me there for hours with a collection of pens and pencils. Sometimes one of his secretaries would bring me juice, or check on me when I was left alone. As I grew, the doodles turned to sketches. Over the years, the sketches turned into a portfolio. That portfolio landed me in Texas’s most prestigious school of art. It was ironic how spending time inside the Warriors’ kingdom shaped my true passion. How my grandfather could dismiss it as a little hobby. A small distraction. Something a girl did to occupy her time.

If it wasn’t related to football, it wasn’t important. It was a distraction. It was useless and a waste of time. A silly idea.

I glanced at that corner. It now belonged to me. Everything in this room did.

The Warriors belonged to me.

I took slow steps to the worn wooden desk. Behind it was a wall-size canvas of the last winning championship team the Warriors had ever had. It was dusty on top and the edges were worn. Everything in the room felt dated. Stale. As if the windows had never been opened, or it was locked in some sort of time capsule.

My grandfather liked things that way. He didn’t like progress. He wasn’t the sort of man who evolved and tried new things. He kept them the way they were since the day he bought the team. And now I had to figure out what to do with it next.

What did I know about running a football team? What did I know about running a business?

This day was never supposed to come. There were so many reasons I wasn’t supposed to be the one. It was never supposed to be me.

I was an artist. I had to keep my dreams on a high shelf because they didn't fall in line with the football dynasty my grandfather had created. Maybe if I my half-brother wasn’t an asshole things would be different. He would be the one standing behind the desk right now instead of me. He would know what to do. He would take the reins of the team and lead them to success. To victory. To some sort of championship. But he wasn’t here today. He hadn’t been here for a long time.

Instead, my knees were shaking, my palms were sweaty, and I didn't know what in the hell I was going to do as the only woman running an organization of several hundred men. I needed help, but I had no idea how to ask for it.

I looked up when I heard a sharp knock on the door. "Miss McCade, the waiting room is full of people who need to speak to you. Every single one says it’s important."

I could tell my grandfather's assistant was as nervous and as uncertain as I was.

The first thing I had to do was end this archaic system. "You can call me Vanessa. I'm not as formal as my grandfather was." It was hard to bring myself to speak of him in the past tense. It had only been two weeks since he had died. And it had taken a while for the attorneys to work through the legal matters that put me in this office.

Candy smiled nervously. She had bright blue eyes and a short blond haircut. She didn't look much older than me.

"Ms—I mean Vanessa. Who do you want me to send in first?"

"Well, what are my options?" I had to pray I would recognize the names she listed.

"Coach is here. He was the first to arrive this morning. Then there is the head of marketing. The stadium manager. And even some of the players. You have an audience." Her smile was sympathetic.

“The players?”

She nodded. "Yes. I overheard some of them talking.”

“What about?” I asked.

Candy walked a few steps inside the office and closed the door behind her. I appreciated the extra level of privacy.

“I think they want to talk to you about their positions.” She leaned into the door. I realized she wanted to make sure none of them were aware she was sharing their conversations with me. “Some of them brought their agents. I’m surprised we don’t have a union rep in the lobby.”

I felt my stomach role with uneasiness. I didn’t know anything about dealing with agents, let alone the players. I had met Coach Applewhite several times. My grandfather invited him over for dinner here and there. And he seemed the most genuinely distressed at the memorial service. But he was abrasive, and the kind of man who liked to push people around. I guess he needed that skill as a coach. I didn’t look forward to a meeting with him.

I looked at her for reassurance. “A union rep? They would send one?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s not really my area.”

It was ridiculous for me to lean on her right now. I was expecting too much.

“Right. Of course not.” I took a deep breath. “What are the players’ names?”

I knew every single man on the roster. Twenty-six years in the McCade box had taught me that much. I couldn’t help but memorize them. It was an uncanny skill I had. I catalogued names from movies and books. I could tell you the order of kids at my high school graduation. I also remembered the names of the opposing team players. Once I heard them, they just stuck.

She looked over her shoulder to survey the lineup as if she could see through the door. “Isaac Price was the first one here."

He was one of the team’s top wide receivers. He was as popular in Austin as Luke Canton, the Warriors’ quarterback. I was slightly relieved she hadn’t mentioned him. He used to be a nightmare.

I twisted my lips together, thinking about the approach my grandfather would take. I tried to play out how he would handle this situation.

Then I did the exact opposite.

“Send Isaac Price in,” I instructed.

I could tell she was surprised by my selection, but I knew it wouldn’t be the last time. I was like a new baby deer trying to get my footing. I was going to stumble and make mistakes. I was in over my head. I had already known that for the last two weeks. I just couldn’t let everyone else figure it out too.