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I push open the double doors and enter Gridiron BBQ. A neon sign with the logo of the pro football team that practices across the street blinds me in the otherwise dimly lit restaurant as I walk toward the bar.

I don’t love coming in here since it’s always filled with Vegas Aces fans and I’m a diehard baseball girl, but when I expressed that to my boyfriend, he brushed it off. “They have the best wing sauce in the world,” he told me.

I wouldn’t know. Chicken with bones in it isn’t really my thing.

“Takeout for Victoria,” I say to the bartender once he looks up at me with a question in his eyes, and he nods and turns toward the pile of receipts that presumably carry the other takeout orders.

“Thirty-nine eighty-one,” the bartender says, and I reach into my purse to grab my credit card when I hear a voice beside me.

“Did I hear eighty-one? That’s my number.”

My brows pinch together as I look over at the guy. A man with bright blue eyes, dark brown hair, and a jawline that looks like it needed to meet a razor three weeks ago stands beside me with that cocky grin planted on those firm lips. I immediately recognize him.

Travis Woods, wide receiver for the Vegas Aces.

“Put it on my tab,” he says. He smirks and raises his shoulder as if to say you’re welcome , but I never said thank you .

He’s hot, sure. But he knows it, and even if I wasn’t in a relationship, that would turn me right off.

He’s Owen’s second favorite wide receiver on the team right after Josh Nolan. I could probably recite some of his stats since it’s all Owen talks about, but I’d rather not.

You know why I recognize him? From that cocky smirk. It’s the same look on his face in the photograph of the Vegas Aces team that hangs in Owen’s home office, as if it’s one of his only facial expressions. Maybe he practices it in the mirror every night before bed. Or maybe he uses it on the scores of women he’s rumored to bed.

Unfortunately for him, and despite his efforts here, I won’t be one of them.

“That’s not necessary,” I say, handing the bartender my credit card.

“Sorry, Woods,” the bartender says. “Looks like your line isn’t working on this one.”

“You’re Travis Woods.” I squint at him a little and ignore the little flip my stomach does as his eyes meet mine.

No flips.

Nope. None.

You knock that shit right off, stomach.

“The one and only,” he says, raising a brow like he’s impressed I know who he is. Or maybe he’s impressed by who he is himself. “And you are?”

“Late getting home to my boyfriend with dinner.” I shoot him a smirk right back as I wait for my food. The bartender hands me my credit card, and I stick it back in my wallet. I feel Travis’s hot gaze on me while I do it, but I refuse to meet those blue eyes of his again.

I refuse to allow my stomach the chance to flip again. Nope, not happening. I have wings to take back to Owen.

“That’s a shame,” Travis says.

“That I’m late?”

He shakes his head. “That you have a boyfriend.”

The bartender laughs, and a server walks over from the kitchen with a bag of food.

I roll my eyes at Travis. “And that’s a cheesy pickup line.”

“It’s worked before,” he protests.

I sneer at him as the bartender hands me the bag of food. “You’ve never tried it on me before.” I turn to leave.

“Tough crowd,” he mutters.

“I’ve heard about you,” I say, turning back around. I wrinkle my nose a little. “And I’m not really into the bad boy who tries to get between the legs of every girl who walks into the barbecue joint kinda guy, you know what I mean?”

“Oh burn!” the bartender taunts.

I give Travis one more pointed glance before I turn back toward the door.

He gives it one more try to my retreating back. “Are you an Aces fan? I can get you tickets to a game next season.”

I shake my head as I turn back around. “Unless you’re playing the Cowboys, I’m not interested. I’m less of an Aces fan and more of a baseball girl myself.” I shoot him one last smirk as I hear his friends jeer from the pool tables at the rejection, and then I head out the door.

Traffic is a bit of a nightmare getting home, and when I walk in the front door of Owen’s place, he yells out from the next room, “Finally!”

“I’m sorry!” I yell back as I struggle to kick off my shoes while I fumble with the bag of food, my purse, and my messenger bag from work, which is filled with a stack of reports I need to go over tonight. “Traffic was insane!”

“Maybe you should’ve left a little earlier,” he suggests, appearing in the doorway and glancing at me. He doesn’t stop to help me in the entry, though. Instead, he heads toward the kitchen.

I sigh as I finally get my shoes off and head toward the kitchen, where I find Owen already sitting at the table. I set the bag of food in front of him, and I set my purse and messenger bag on the counter.

He starts taking the food out of the bag while I grab us each a drink, and then I sit down beside him. He’s scrolling his phone with one hand while he attacks his wings with the other, but I interrupt what’s surely an important scroll with my news.

“I got hit on by a Vegas Aces player while I was picking up dinner.”

He freezes and looks up at me, a little wing sauce dripping from the corner of his mouth. “You met a Vegas Aces player?”

That’s not exactly what I said, but I guess it’s what he heard.

“Which one?” he presses.

“Travis Woods.”

“Dammit. I wish that Gridiron place was on my way home,” he mutters.

Never mind the fact that he works from home, so he doesn’t have a commute.

“So you could get hit on by a football player?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “No, so my food would still be hot by the time I got it home.”

I feel more than a little defeated as I blow out a breath. “Sorry,” I mutter.

But I’m really not all that sorry. I hope his wings are cold and the best wing sauce in the world is too spicy tonight.