Page 30 of Mad Rivals (The Bradley Legacy #1)

A Jock Being Handed the Company

After fish tacos and margaritas, we head outside to take a walk. We end up on the beach, and we each take off our shoes. We hold hands and hold our shoes in our other hands, and the moon reflects on the water as we walk slowly in the sand.

The beaches back home aren’t like this, and usually it’s too windy or too cold to enjoy them anyway. But this? Walking here with Kennedy’s hand slipped into mine after sex and fish tacos…this is pure fucking heaven.

I know it won’t last because everything in this life is fleeting, but somehow it feels like San Diego is already our place.

Chicago can’t be. It’s too wrapped up in our histories and our families to feel like ours .

But this feels like a fresh beginning here away from those histories and families, and it’s something that’s just for us.

I have to admit…I already love how that feels.

What kind of woman pushes me into my hotel room to suck me off and then rips her shirt off to tell me she wants to fuck before dinner arrives?

Only the kind of perfect woman I don’t ever want to let go .

I think back to Clay’s question just earlier today when he asked me if I could live without her, and I thought I knew the answer to that.

Turns out I was wrong.

The truth is, now that she’s here, I just can’t see myself here without her.

But that’s definitely a complication. For one thing, I don’t know if she feels the same. And for another thing, I don’t know if she even has the ability to move here. It’s way too soon to be thinking these things, but here I am, thinking them anyway.

It’s late, and we head back to the hotel to get some sleep. She’s going into her office tomorrow, and I suppose I have to do the same since I told my father I would.

When morning dawns, it feels right to wake with her beside me. For a moment, I wish we were getting ready together and going into the office together.

I realize what a ridiculous thought that is immediately.

But then, like the Kombucha girl GIF, I rethink that. Maybe it’s not so ridiculous.

It’s not like it’s something I can bring up now when we’re at the early stages of whatever this thing between us is. She’s supposed to be staying away from me, and it would likely be smart for me to stay away from her as well.

I can’t. I won’t.

Today isn’t the day to discuss potentially merging companies, but if this works, and someday down the road we’re CEOs of competing companies and we’re planning our future…why not?

It’s not what my father would want for his company, and it’s not what her father would want for his. But if they’re leaving us in charge whether we want it or not…we’re free to do whatever the fuck we want.

I head into the shower with those thoughts swirling around. I don’t want to bring it up because I don’t want to scare her off. I also don’t want her to think I’m trying to gain access to her clientele or her company. That’s not at all what this is .

It’s simply a thought about the future and how it could be so much better for us to work together rather than apart.

She’s up when I emerge from the shower, and she’s sipping coffee that she made in the hotel room coffee maker as she stands by the windows and stares out over the view.

“I could get used to this place,” she says as I stroll over and move in behind her, wrapping my arms around her waist in a backward hug.

“The view got better once you arrived.” I drop my head and press my lips to her neck.

“Mm,” she moans, and she leans back into me as she reaches up to wrap her hand around the back of my neck. “You better stop that or you’re going to make me late.”

I laugh. “Then be late.”

She twists in my arms so she’s facing me. “I can’t. I said I’d sit in on a meeting that starts at nine, and I have no idea what traffic will be like during the morning commute to get up there.”

“Too bad,” I murmur.

“I know. We have tonight, though. And tomorrow. I need to go shower.” She tips her chin up and kisses me, and then she heads toward the bathroom.

I get ready to head into my own office, and that idea of merging companies is still swirling. We say our goodbyes once she’s ready, and I head over to the office space I didn’t even know my father had already rented.

I text John, the man my father chose to run the San Diego branch, when I arrive, and he meets me in the lobby. I’d guess he’s in his fifties, and he introduces himself and shakes my hand before he accompanies me up via the building elevator to show me around.

We’re renting half of the top floor of this building, and the space looks like it’s just about ready for us.

His office is, anyway, and we sit in there and discuss the opportunities available here in the greater San Diego and Los Angeles areas.

There is plenty of development to be had despite the already crowded nature of both areas, and they’re both highly competitive markets.

I think Bradley Group can do some really great things here…but I also know one of my competitors is meeting with her staff right now probably thinking the exact same thing.

“Your father said you’ll be around more once you move here,” John says.

“He told me that as well,” I say dryly, and John laughs. “And I will stop in on occasion, but I’m not taking over Bradley Group until I retire, and I’m very much still playing.”

“Good luck to you this season, Madden. We’ll all be watching.

In terms of business, your father trusted me to take on the managing responsibilities here at this location, and I plan to do just that.

” There’s a bit of warning in his voice, as if he’s telling me not to step on his toes because he’s the one running this place.

I realize he’s older than me, but he’s not in line to be the CEO. Part of me wants to put him in his place, and the other part of me doesn’t have enough fucks to give him one of them.

So I let it slide.

We talk until lunchtime, and then we go out for a working lunch as we discuss the goals of this office.

He never says it, but I get the feeling John sees me as nothing more than a jock who’s being handed this company.

And honestly, yeah. That’s partly true, and I get it.

I am a professional athlete. I am being handed this company thanks to that little old thing called nepotism. I didn’t earn it. I was born into it.

I may have focused on football for the better part of my life, but every summer since I can remember, I worked at Bradley Group. I have a vast knowledge of this business even though I spend the better part of six months out of the year away from it.

I’m smart, and I’m capable. And I’m tired of trying to prove that. I don’t need to prove that. But maybe I do need to put this guy in his place .

I don’t. Not today. I don’t have time since I promised I’d meet Clay at the gym for a few hours.

I don’t want to, though. I just want to get back to my hotel where I can get back to her .

And that’s a really goddamn terrifying thought that’s brand-new to me.