Spread offense, p.1
Spread Offense, page 1
SPREAD OFFENSE
FIONA DAVENPORT
Copyright © 2024 by Fiona Davenport
Cover designed by Elle Christensen
Edited by Jenny Sims (Editing4Indies)
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Created with Vellum
CONTENTS
Spread Offense
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Epilogue
Epilogue
About the Author
SPREAD OFFENSE
Gage Ledger didn’t know Rory Abernathy beyond her online gamer tag, but he still couldn’t get her off his mind. Although he’d never met her in real life, he had a feeling he’d finally met his match in the quirky and intelligent woman who he’d looked forward to talking with every day over the summer.
Rory hadn’t expected to come face-to-face with her favorite professional football player on the first day of her internship for the New York Nighthawks. Or to discover he was the gamer she’d fallen for. As her two worlds collide, she just has to hope the coincidence doesn’t cause problems for her at work.
PROLOGUE
GAGE
Igrinned as the miniature Gage Ledger on my gaming system ran into the end zone.
“Fuck yeah!” I shouted, throwing my hands into the air like a ref calling a touchdown.
“Calm down, slugger. That only puts you six points ahead,” a dry female voice said into my ear.
I chuckled as I sat down and adjusted my headset. “First of all, nerd, slugger is baseball. And second, don’t be bitter because I drafted Gage before you could get your grubby little hands on him.”
AllAboutTheStats gasped overdramatically. “Luck of the coin toss, geek. If this were real life, Gage would definitely have signed with me.”
I held back a belly laugh at her statement. She had no idea she was playing a football video game with the real Gage Ledger, starting running back for the New York Nighthawks. However, even if I could tell her my real identity, I was having too much fun being just another gamer with this chick.
My boss, Lennox Madison, had decided that he wanted to create a new multiplayer football game. One that incorporated requests his team had been gathering from all the fan sites and social media sites for other popular NFL games.
AllAboutTheStats was one of the gamers who’d been offered a chance to beta the game before Lennox’s designers made the final changes. Everyone on my team had been given a copy of the game as well because it helped to have feedback from actual players. But we had to agree not to reveal our real identities.
“You just might be right, stats chick,” I teased.
After playing head-to-head with her in Beaumont Football—named after our head coach, who was a legend in the sport—for the past several weeks, I’d come to crave our time together. She was a complete nerd, which I respected since underneath the big, tough football player, I was one too. She was sharp as hell and really talented. One of the major changes Lennox’s team made was allowing the gamers to play offense or defense. I knew football as well as I knew myself, but to be fair, my instincts tended to lean toward offense—hazard of the job. AllAboutTheStats had given me a run for my moment…if we’d been betting any…when playing defense. Which was why, until a few minutes ago, we’d been tied.
“You know, SpreadOffense…”
She trailed off, but since we were both gearing up for the next play, I figured she’d just lost track of what she was saying.
Then she shocked the shit out of me when she quipped, “You might want to rethink your gaming handle.”
“Pardon?”
“It’s just that people might not take you too seriously.”
“What’s wrong with SpreadOffense?” I asked curiously. It had been my own little inside joke since I was a running back.
“It sounds kind of dirty.” Her voice was low and sultry. It always sounded that way, so it was to my utter disbelief that my body sat up and took notice. What the fuck?
I hadn’t met a woman in a very long time who had sparked enough interest in me to even ask them out for coffee. But after hearing this chick I’d never met say the word “dirty” in that sexy voice, all of a sudden, I was hard.
I opened my mouth to reply, but nothing came out.
“Sorry, was that inappropriate?” she blurted after the silence had turned awkward.
I tried again to reply, but this time, laughter erupted from my chest. This girl…she was fucking adorable, and a part of me wanted to ask if we could meet. But Lennox would probably bench me for the season if I broke the rules he’d laid down for testing out the game.
“I hadn’t thought of it that way,” I lied when I finally caught my breath.
“But…you didn’t do that on purpose?”
“No,” I muttered, another small chuckle slipping out.
“But you’re a guy—I mean—you are a guy, right? Not some girl with a really masculine voice and the mouth of a trucker?”
I almost fell over laughing again, and when I heard her giggle across the line, I went rock hard, making my amusement fade. “Most definitely a guy, nerd,” I responded as flippantly as possible. Then I bit back a very filthy comment that popped into my head. I didn’t want to make her uncomfortable, and I also didn’t want her to pick up on my level of interest. Not when this relationship would never go beyond a virtual friendship. “I guess my mind just wasn’t in the gutter the day I picked my handle.” I grinned. “That sounded dirtier than I meant it.”
“Hmm,” she said.
I smirked and changed the subject. “Ready for me to keep kicking your ass?”
“You won’t get anywhere near my ass, geek.”
I had no idea what she looked like, but something told me that was a real fucking shame.
“Did you see the new update?” I asked, smiling as I picked up my controller and began to sift through my draft options.
“Yes! OMG. I’m so excited to be able to customize my coaches. And switch between coaching positions during the draft!”
I knew she would be ecstatic about the changes. When she found out she could see everyone’s draft picks, I could literally hear her jumping for joy over the line.
They’d made one more change before rolling out the update, and I turned down the volume on my headset before pointing it out.
“You might want to take a closer look at the player profiles, nerd.”
She was quiet for a moment, then she practically screamed. “They added their college stats! Holy cow! This is going to change everything! I can’t believe it!”
After a little more cheering, she suddenly gasped, “That was my suggestion!”
“Was it?” I asked innocently. The feedback from the betas was supposed to be anonymous, but since I didn’t know who she really was, I hadn’t felt any guilt at making sure her suggestion ended up before the right eyes. It was a good call that would attract a lot of players who preferred a numbers-based strategy.
“I honestly wasn’t sure if my feedback was actually being considered. Dang, that is so cool.”
I grinned, her happiness filling me with warmth.
“Okay, geek, you are going down.”
“You wish, nerd,” I muttered before I could stop myself. I’d been very careful not to take things in a sexual direction since our conversation about my gaming handle. My girl—um, she—had become very important to me, and I didn’t want to risk our friendship. Even when the beta shit was done, and we were technically allowed to know each other’s real identity, I doubted I’d go there with her. She was too important, and I didn’t want to do anything to mess it up.
“Earth to Gage.”
My head whipped up at the sound of a voice, and I found my friend and offensive coordinator, Cole O’Hara, standing in front of me.
I sat on a bench in front of my locker, still in nothing but a towel because I’d just come from the showers after a hard day during training camp.
Gia, one of the head designers for Beaumont Football, had sent me a text to let me know that access to the game had been officially closed since they’d finished the closed beta and were moving on to the final stages.
I’d known Gia for years, as a gamer and a friend because she was married to a college friend of mine. She’d worked on some very successful, prominent games, so when Lennox announced his new venture, I’d suggested he recruit her.
She was the only person who knew about my friendship with AllAboutTheStats, so when she messaged me about game access, she also asked if I wanted her to reach out to my gaming buddy and pass along my contact info.
My first instinct was to tell her hell yeah. But then the doubts plaguing me for months took over, and I’d sat down, lost in thought. I wasn’t delusional. I knew I was being a coward by avoiding meeting AllAboutTheStats. If I didn’t know better, I’d think I’d grown a vagina with the way I was acting.
“Something on your mind?” Cole asked.
When we were on the field, in practice, or at business-related team functions, he was Coach O’Hara. But outside the “office,” he was my friend, Cole. And I respected him too much to cross that line. We all did.
I shook my head. “Nothing important.” The words tasted bitter, but I wasn’t ready to talk to anyone about my nerd.
“If you say so,” he replied with a dubious expression. When I didn’t engage, he sighed. “You did great today. Don’t let whatever is clouding your mind affect you on the field. I’m around if you need to talk about it.”
“Thanks.” I meant it genuinely. And maybe I’d take him up on it. Eventually.
“Yo, Brady!” Ames, one of our offensive linemen, called out to our second-string (the heir apparent to Prentice Wright, our legendary quarterback) quarterback as he walked into the room. “My wife called. She said Talia is in labor and to get your ass to the hospital.”
“Son of a bitch!” Brady shouted as he sprinted to the locker next to mine and yanked it open. He grabbed his wallet, phone, and keys and ran for the door.
Cole stepped in front of him and grabbed his arm. “She’ll still be there after you change into something other than a towel, Brady,” he said, looking pointedly at the quarterback’s lack of attire.
“Fucking hell,” he muttered, then spun around and dressed in record time before he was gone.
Ames laughed and shook his head. “At least he put on his shoes. When Dakota had Xavier, I showed up at the hospital in bare feet, all torn up from running across the gravel parking lot. And I still played in the game a couple of days later. But it hurt like a motherfucker.”
I winced, and he shrugged. “It’s what we do for the game and the women we love. You’ll understand someday.”
Prentice snorted from three lockers down and glanced at me with an amused expression. “Gage would have to be willing to be in a relationship first. Or at least interested in a date.”
Maybe I would if I wasn’t such a pussy.
1
RORY
My phone rang as I stared into my closet, trying to decide what to wear. Glancing down at the screen, I saw my eldest brother’s name. I had to be at the stadium in less than an hour, so I was tempted not to answer, but I knew how relentless Russell could be. He’d just keep calling until I finally answered.
“Hey, biggest bro. What’s up?” I asked, switching to speaker mode and setting my phone on the dresser to my right.
“Just wanted to wish you luck on the first game of your internship even though you’ll be working for the Nighthawks instead of a real team like the Nitros.”
Russell was into baseball, so he’d been giving me a hard time about not working for the local pro team ever since I landed my internship.
“Or the Navigators,” Ridley chimed in. “Since hockey is the superior sport.”
I was surprised to hear my other brother’s voice. “You’re on the call too, big bro?”
“Yeah, Russell conferenced me in ’cause he knew that I wanted to talk to you,” Ridley explained. “Even though you’ll be crunching numbers for a football team, it’s still a pretty big deal.”
I was used to them teasing me about pretty much everything, so I didn’t take any of it personally. And I loved it when I had the perfect comeback. “And it comes with awesome perks, like being able to beta the new Beaumont Football game before it officially launches.”
“Yeah, I can’t argue with you there,” Russell muttered. “Being in the beta for a new game is damn cool.”
Although I hadn’t officially started until the beginning of the preseason, I’d landed the internship with the New York Nighthawks before the end of last semester. When my boss reached out to ask if I’d be interested in being part of the closed beta for a new football game their owner was launching soon, I thanked my lucky stars that I’d mentioned to him that I was a gamer during my interview.
I was usually more into doing RPG and sim stuff, but I figured playing Beaumont Football would help me become more familiar with football as a sport, which would come in handy when I helped analyze their statistics. I’d been right about that…but I’d never expected to meet a guy who’d captured my interest in a way no other man had done. One who I had no idea what he looked like. Or even what his real name was since we’d only been allowed to go by our gamer tags while playing.
“It almost makes me wish I was as good at math as you, little sis.” Ridley’s grumbling pulled me out of my thoughts of the guy I’d never get the chance to talk to again because I had no way to contact him anymore.
I shook my head, rolling my eyes even though they couldn’t see me. “Maybe if you’d actually applied yourself, you might’ve gotten better than a C in your college stats class.”
“Nah, that sounds like a horrible idea.” Ridley laughed. “Sorry, but you’re the only nerd in the family who spends more time studying than partying while you’re a college student.”
“She damn well better be,” Russell growled. “The last thing we need is for our little sister to be on her own at a party in a city as big as New York.”
I let out a huff of irritation. “I’m twenty-one. Old enough to handle a party if I wanted to go to one.”
“Thank fuck she’s happier playing video games for entertainment than hitting up the bars,” Ridley groused.
“Don’t remind me that’s a possibility.” Russell heaved a deep sigh. “You’re gonna give me hives or something.”
“Maybe we could get back to the reason you guys called me?” I yanked a pair of khaki pants out of my closet before reaching for a Nighthawks jersey our parents had sent me when I told them about the internship. Luckily, casual dress was perfect for being in the press box during the first preseason game since I wasn’t a fan of dressing up. “I need to leave in about ten minutes, and I still have to finish getting ready.”
“Okay, I guess we better stop giving you a hard time and let you head out.”
“Yeah,” Ridley agreed. “We wouldn’t want you to be late…even if it’s just football.”
“Gee thanks.” I laughed softly. “Love you guys, too.”
After they said goodbye, I finished getting ready and headed out of my teeny-tiny micro apartment in East Village. The subway ride out to Long Island went smoothly, and I arrived at the stadium with about ten minutes to spare. Which was more than enough time since I already had my employee pass and didn’t have any issues getting through security.
I’d already met my boss and the full-time statistician on staff for the team, so there weren’t any awkward introductions before we headed up to the press box. My job during the game was to record player data as it occurred. It was nerve-wracking being near some of the coaching staff, sports broadcasters, and journalists, but at least the task at hand was familiar after the project I did for my Foundations of Sports Analytics class last semester.
I’d taken it on a whim because I needed to fill a hole in my schedule, and the course I’d really wanted had been full. In the end, it had been such a lucky turn of events for me because being in that class had changed the course of my career plans. And my idea to do data visualization for the university baseball team for my final paper was the only reason I’d landed my internship with the Nighthawks.
Although the two sports were completely different—my school didn’t even have a football team, so that wasn’t an option—the method I applied to my project could be easily adapted to football. My professor had apparently mentioned it to someone with the team, and before I knew what was happening, I’d been offered the internship. The opportunity had been too good to pass up, especially since the demand for advanced football analytics had grown in recent years.
By the time the first half was over, my head was already spinning with ideas for how to analyze the data we had collected so far. I’d gotten some ideas while playing Beaumont Football during the beta—especially when I was up against SpreadOffense—but seeing the professional players on the field from the press box was a completely different experience. Something about experiencing the game from this perspective was exhilarating.
I had a feeling my brothers would be teasing me about my new favorite sport for the rest of my life. They could keep baseball and hockey for themselves because I would call dibs on football.
