Prologue

PROLOGUE

Luke Riggs

January

I ring the doorbell by hitting it carelessly with my palm. Not like anything really matters at this point. The iron gates open slowly, and my mood takes a nosedive from just how slowly. I've been here before—countless times actually—so what else was I expecting?

I was already in a shitty mood, losing the Conference Championship against the LA Warriors for the second year in a row will do that to a guy, I guess.

There's also the fact that I'm driving up my boss's boss's boss's driveway, and I expect she's about to fire me.

I wouldn't fucking blame her, honestly.

I just finished my sixth season as the starting quarterback for the Las Vegas Rogues, and I feel like the last two seasons without a Lombardi or even a Super Bowl appearance are my fault .

It fucking stings.

Because I know we have an awesome fucking team. A team that is packed with amazingly talented men— expensive men. As their leader, I take all the blame. Because it's my job to make the plays work. And I didn't, I haven't.

Two years running LA has been able to take the Championship from us.

And now it's a contract year for me.

Now is when I should've shown Gab Darnell that I'm the right person for this job.

Instead, I had an all-time high interception count this season. Seven-fucking-teen.

Instead, I froze at the last second.

So when Gab asked me to come to her place last night about a minute after our plane landed in Las Vegas, I wasn't surprised.

If I'm gonna get fired, then at least I'm gonna be shitfaced while I am—I rarely drink, so getting there definitely won't be an issue. I have reasons for not drinking, and they normally matter a hell of a lot more than they do right now.

I drink a beer or two in the off season, so maybe the expensive as hell bottle of whiskey isn't the best choice, but I know Gab won't let me drive or do anything too stupid if I'm drunk, so I have nothing to worry about.

I carry the bottle and leave my phone in the cupholder of my car. Maybe I'll sell that car. I won't have a forty-seven-million-dollar-a-year paycheck anymore, so it's time to start saving.

Listen to yourself , I think. You sound fucking pathetic.

There are so many people who have it worse, so much fucking worse. I've had my dream job for more years than most people, a handful of friends who will probably wait a year before they ditch me when they get a new quarterback, a big-ass mansion that feels empty, an estranged relationship with my father who's the only family I have, the stupidly expensive Porsche SUV I just parked, and almost three hundred million dollars in the bank—thank you investments.

It could be a lot worse, I consider, as I rap on the wooden door twice. It could be a lot worse.

I could still be trapped in bumfuck nowhere with my father, cleaning up his messes, spending all the savings I made working at mowing grass on his bail, taking the beatings for years and years with no one to help me. Sometimes I still have nightmares of the asshole screaming "Fuck you, Robert" at me at the top of his lungs while he loomed over me with a belt in his hands.

The door opens as that last thought flits through my mind, and the one person who has helped me more than anyone in the world since I left the hellhole I grew up in rolls her eyes when she sees the bottle in my hand.

"We can drink the whole bottle if you want, but I'm not firing you, so you better not cry. You know I'm a sympathetic crier, and we don't have time for that. We've got work to do." At that, she spins on her heels and walks back inside, expecting me to follow her.

Of course I follow her, she's like an army general I would follow to hell.

"What work?" I ask, and I hurry to close the door and walk into her office.

"We're gonna figure out what you had two years ago when we won this thing that you don't have now, and then we'll spend all fucking off season making sure you find it again." She grabs two tumblers from the cart under the windowsill and brings them to the big conference table that has seven tablets and two laptops on it. All are on and showing tape from different games. I recognize a few instantly by the opposing team and the score at the bottom.

All games we've lost this last season.

Won't this be fun?

A projector is connected to one of the laptops and pointed at the white wall opposite the window. "Bring that thing over, and we'll start."

I do as she says. "Always do what Gab says," is pretty much my one unbreakable rule in life. So I sit my ass down in the chair next to hers, pour us a drink each, and let myself feel the relief.

I'm not losing my dream. I have another shot at keeping this life, at doing the one thing I can say I love with my whole heart.