Down By Contact - Jessica Ruddick Page 0,2

Jaeger in front of my best friend, Connor. He was already half in the bag, but that was what he got for throwing himself a surprise party and inviting the entire VVU football team. Maybe if I had been a better friend, I would have organized the party so it would have been an actual surprise. Knowing Connor, I’d be making up for it by dragging his wasted ass back to our apartment at the end of the night.

I raised my shot glass, and the guys around me did the same. “To Connor.”

He shook his head. “That’s not what I asked to be called tonight.”

Staring at him, I lowered my shot glass. I should have known he was serious about the ridiculous title he’d given himself. “I’m not saying it.” I looked to Marvin and Trey for support, but they were too busy trying not to laugh to help me.

“Say it! Say it! Say it!” Connor chanted. Jesus. He’d walked into the bar a twenty-two-year-old college student and morphed into an annoying eight-year-old kid. But it was his birthday.

I sighed and raised my class again. “To Connor, Possessor of the Golden Foot.” I felt like an idiot saying that. It wasn’t even a good title.

He nodded in satisfaction. “Damn right.” Then he threw back his shot.

“Connor!” Carson Fleck, our star tight end, called. “Get your ass over here.”

Connor did a little flourish thing with his hand and bowed. “My fans await.”

I shook my head as he walked away. Connor had the most swagger of any field goal kicker I’d ever known. Granted, he was good—arguably the best college football had to offer—but he knew it. On the field, that was fantastic. Off the field, it made him a pain in the ass. Good thing for him that I had a high pain tolerance.

“Man, that boy is a trip,” Marvin said.

“Don’t I know it,” I muttered.

Marvin and Trey wandered over to the bar, where Connor was accepting another shot from Carson. Shit. It wasn’t even eleven yet. At that rate, he’d be puking by midnight. Connor liked to talk a big game, but he couldn’t hold his liquor.

I surveyed the room. Bleakers, a local downtown bar, was all too happy to provide their back room free of charge any time the VVU players wanted to gather, and we’d thoroughly taken advantage. It was a mutually beneficial arrangement—our presence inevitably attracted a crowd, which was good for business.

Damn. I was going to miss it. Hell, I already did miss it since my final season was over. Unlike the handful of players declaring for the pro draft, I was looking to stay in the football world in a different capacity—coaching. It was turning out to be easier said than done, though. But I wasn’t going to think about that just then. The night was for unwinding and having fun.

A girl walked into the room and immediately caught my attention, as she always did. Layla was gorgeous, with long dark hair, pouty lips, and intense smoky eyes. And Christ, she was wearing some sort of miniskirt-dress thing with tall leather boots that accentuated legs that went on for days. I exhaled slowly, mentally telling my body to calm the fuck down. As usual, it protested briefly before obeying. Over the years, I had gotten adept at ignoring my deeply rooted attraction.

Layla and I had been friends since freshman year, when I helped her by carrying a TV up to her third-floor dorm room. She and her roommate had barely managed to get the massive thing across the quad without dropping it. I didn’t know how they expected to get it up the stairs.

Or maybe they hadn’t. Maybe they’d worn tight shorts and low-cut tops with the express purpose of soliciting help. Or maybe not. Maybe I was just an asshole for thinking that. All I knew was that I fell for it, which was how Connor and I ended up lugging the thing up three flights of stairs in nearly one-hundred-degree heat.

Connor and Kaycee had played a flirtatious game for a while, but ultimately, the four of us kept things in the friend zone, which was a first for me. Layla was one of the hottest girls I knew, objectively speaking. She was also the only girl I’d managed to stay friends with. Keeping her in my life was worth a few blue balls every now and then. Girls I dated were a dime a dozen, but Layla was one of a kind.

She stopped