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It sounded as if he’d been practicing that part.

I shook my head.

“I’ll take my chances with the other owners. I’m a lawyer, I’m a teacher, I’m even a coach. And I’m a woman, Commissioner. Hear me roar. And take your best shot.”

It was as if he hadn’t heard me.

“You don’t even have to call a press conference,” he said. “All you have to do is issue a statement that this is what’s best for all concerned. We can even write it for you, if you’d rather.”

“My father always told me how often you forgot that you worked for him and not the other way around.”

“He earned the right to think that way, honey.”

I tilted my head just slightly and smiled. “Honey?”

“Oh, don’t start with that MeToo shit,” he said. “Are you really going to fight me on this?”

“I thought we were getting to know each other. But you already seem to have made up your mind about me.”

“Like father, like daughter.”

He slammed his glass down on the table.

“You have to know that if you fight me on this, I will crush you.”

“You sound an awful lot like my brother.”

“The league meetings are in a month or so in Los Angeles,” he said. “That gives you plenty of time to change your mind and get on the right side of this.”

We sat there in silence for what felt like a long time, until I finally said, “You know what? You’re the one who’s right.”

I got up then, walked down to the liquor cart, saw that it held a bottle of Grey Goose. Joe Wolf’s drink of choice. I put some ice cubes in the glass, poured just enough vodka, walked back down to him, and said, “I just thought about it.”

I touched my glass with his.

“Here’s to the National Football League,” I said, and drank.

So did he.

“So we’re good,” the commissioner said.

I laughed.

“Of course not.”

Eighteen

DANNY SAT ACROSS THEdesk from John Gallo in Gallo’s office, on the top floor of the Salesforce Tower. Joel Abrams sat next to him.

“I don’t care how stubborn she is,” Abrams was saying now. “I don’t care if she’s more stubborn than Joe was. There is no way she can get the votes.”

“I was told the Democrats couldn’t win Georgia that time,” Gallo said, “after I spent a vulgar amount of money on the other side.”

Danny started to say something. Gallo silenced him with a finger to his lips.

“You both told me it would never even make it this far,” Gallo said. He looked at Danny. “First you told me it would be handled.” He turned to Abrams. “And then you told me the same damn thing.”

“I thought I had handled it when I went to her house that night. How did I know she was lying to me?”