“Yeah, I’d better do that,” Will said as he headed towards the front door. “The only thing my daughter insisted on having at Jasmine’s party was lots of balloons. I’ll have her to answer to if I’m late delivering them.”
Callan and Roxy waved him off from the front porch and then stepped back inside. The moment the door closed, Roxy threw her arms around him.
“God, this has been such an amazing day!” she declared. “You’ve found this incredible house—”
“You found this incredible house,” he corrected.
“Okay, I found this incredible house. I just got Will’s Campbell’s business card and a proposal to work with him. And you know what else?”
Her joy was contagious. His smile rivaled hers. “What’s that?”
“Vivian Price finally called me back. I’ve got a meeting with her next week to pitch my proposal for The Siege.”
“That’s great,” he said, pulling her back against him in a congratulatory hug. “You’re going to kill it.”
“Well, you’re a little biased. But I’ll take the vote of confidence.” She once again leaned back, reaching down to take both his hands in hers. “Thank you, Callan. None of these things would be possible without you.”
“Something tells me you would have found a way to meet with both Will and Vivian even without me,” he said with a wink. “But you’re welcome.”
She gave his hands a squeeze and released him. “Okay, Mr. Hockey. I’ve got to call Mr. and Mrs. Alms and ask them to come back so we can talk numbers. Then I’m taking you to dinner to celebrate.” She ran her hand along his chest while holding his gaze. “Followed by lots and lots of sex.”
“Wow. Sounds like we’ll end the day as amazing as it started.”
She laughed as she tapped the screen of her cell to initiate the call and put her phone to her ear. He enjoyed the sight of her pacing with excitement as she got Mr. Alms on the phone. He pictured her there wheeling and dealing future real estate contracts for her clients. He pictured the two of them enjoying lazy summer mornings together in the breakfast nook in the kitchen overlooking the woods beyond the wide bay window.
He pictured them building a future together.
And he wondered how long it would take before Roxy could picture it, too.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Roxy made her way through the arena where The Siege played, following a security guard who thankfully led her through the maze of administrative offices to where she would be meeting Vivian Price. She was sure she would have gotten hopelessly lost if left on her own to navigate.
“Here you are, Ms. Wagner,” said the security guard, a beefy, friendly guy named Neil, as he paused and knocked on a nondescript wooden door. “If you ask Ms. Price to buzz me when you’re through, I’ll come and get you for the walk back.”
“Thanks, Neil.”
The door opened, revealing a smartly dressed brunette in her early thirties with smoky gray eyes. Roxy recognized her as Vivian Price from her photo on The Siege’s website.
“Hi, Ms. Wagner,” Vivian said with a smile of greeting. “Thanks for walking with her, Neil.”
“My pleasure, ma’am,” Neil said with a tip of his hat before turning and heading back the way they had come.
“Please come on in,” Vivian said, standing back and holding the door for Roxy.
“Thanks.”
Roxy came up short just inside the doorway. The office was little more than a closet. There was barely enough room for a desk, a filing cabinet, and a single visitor’s chair. The walls were bare cinderblock lit by the bulbs of a single fluorescent light.
This was the office of the Director of Public Relations?
“I know, I know,” Vivian said as she closed the door and waved Roxy to the chair. “But trust me when I say this is better than what I was dealing with before. At least now I have a little privacy.”
Roxy smoothed the skirt to her favorite suit and sat in the chair. “It seems a hard commodity to come by. I’ll admit I didn’t expect so much activity.”
“Yeah. It’s the week before the first game of the preseason and there’s a concert here tomorrow night. It’ll be chaos for months to come now.” Vivian pulled a document in a clear plastic sleeve from her desk drawer that Roxy recognized as the proposal she had sent her. “That’s one of the reasons I was so eager to meet with you, Ms. Wagner.”
“Roxy, if that works for you.”
“Sure. I’m also comfortable with you calling me Vivian unless you see anyone around. Then please stick to Ms. Price or suddenly all the guys around here will be calling me ‘Yo, Viv.’”
“Oh, like in Pretty Woman,” Roxy said. Then realization hit her. “Oooh.”
“Yeah. I’ll go from a marginally respected female director to the equivalent of a prostitute in two seconds flat.”
“Got it. Well, if it helps at all, I love your name.”
Vivian’s mouth curved. “Thanks.” Her focus turned to the proposal. “I’d like to begin by saying how impressed I am with what you’ve put together here, Roxy. I’ve never been approached by someone with a concept quite like this before.”
“Thank you.”
“You also happen to be in the right place at the time. We’re a new organization trying to make our mark in the NHL and this city. The team’s owners are willing to do whatever it takes to build a championship level team, which begins with attracting the top talent in the league. With the league’s salary cap, we have to get creative in how we attract that talent. What you’re proposing is one way we can do that.”
Roxy’s heart thudded harder with every word. She tried not to get ahead of herself, but optimism coursed through her.
“To that point,” she said when Vivian paused, “it occurred to me that one of the reasons a player might resist a trade is because he doesn’t want to disrupt his family. While my proposal details how my services would make transitioning as painless as possible for new players, I also feel this service could include outreach to the player’s family to discuss things like area schools, clubs and athletics for kids, popular entertainment centers, and things like that. It might get the families more excited about the move, too.”
Vivian picked up a pair of glasses with violet frames that perfectly matched her suit and started jotting notes in the margins of the proposal. “That’s excellent, Roxy. I like that you’re thinking big picture. Any other ideas rattling around in that brain of yours?”
“Well, this one is a little out there.”
“Toss it out anyway.”
“All right. It’s my understanding after talking with Callan that many of the single players prefer living in furnished rentals rather than hauling things from city to city. My proposal is largely based on assisting with full moves, which doesn’t much benefit players like Callan. So I wondered if it might be worth the team purchasing a couple of condos or small homes and furnishing them for rotating players to use.”
Vivian tapped her pen on her desk as she considered that. “Hmm. That’s quite interesting. It would involve a large upfront investment, but over time the team would really only be paying taxes and upkeep.”