“Regardless, it’s a great first step,” Ian said. “When’s the meeting?”

“Two weeks from Monday. At the Bears’ corporate office up in Lake Forest.”

“Ooh, you get to hang out at Halas Hall. Very cool.” Ian rested his hands behind his head. “I’m already picturing myself in the Sterling luxury suite at Soldier Field, right above the fifty-yard line.”

Both the lawyer and pragmatic woman in Brooke felt the need to manage her CEO’s expectations. “You’re getting way ahead of yourself here, Ian. In fact, I think you just lapped yourself.”

“A man can dream, Brooke.”

She chuckled. “Who are you kidding? You barely use our suites at Wrigley Field and the United Center.”

He waved this off. “Yeah, but football’s different. If we get this deal with the Bears, you better believe my butt will be at Soldier Field for every home game.” He saw her fighting back a grin. “What?”

“I just wonder what it is about men and football,” Brooke said. Sure, because of her job she could hold her own when it came to talking sports, but—wow—had her eyes been opened when she’d been down in Dallas, negotiating the Cowboys deal. Those men didn’t just love football, they lived football. “Is it a warrior-metaphor kind of thing? The idea that the strongest, toughest men of the region strap on their armor and step onto the battlefield to face off against the strongest, toughest opponents?”

“As a matter of fact, that’s exactly what it is.”

“I see. And remind me: in what century did it become customary for one’s army to be attended at the battle ground by hot girls with spanky pants and pom-poms? Was that a tradition Napoleon started?” Brooke pretended to muse. “Or maybe it was Genghis Khan.”

“You scoff at America’s sport. I have fired people for less.”

Brooke threw Ian a get-real look. “No, you haven’t. You don’t fire anyone without trotting down to my office and asking me first whether you’ll get sued. And then I’m always the one that has to fire them, anyway.”

“Because you do it with such charm,” Ian said with a grin. He knew she spoke the truth. “You know I’d never get by without you, right?”

“You remember that the next time I’m up for a raise and I hand you another sixteen-page report with charts and graphs.”

“I can hardly wait.” With a wink, Ian got up from the chair to leave. He paused in the doorway, and then turned back to her with a thoughtful expression. “It’s because it reminds me of some of the best moments I’ve had with my father.”

Brooke cocked her head, not following. “I’m sorry?”

“You asked what it is about football,” he explained. “I knew I was g*y by the time I was thirteen. And so did my father. But that wasn’t something we could talk about back then. In fact, for about five years, we didn’t talk much at all. But for three hours every Sunday, while watching a game, we could hang out and yell and cheer and just be a father and son again.” He paused, with a slight smile at the memory. “I don’t know about other men, but that’s what football means to me.”

* * *

IAN’S WORDS HUNG in the air after he left, giving Brooke plenty of food for thought. Admittedly, she’d never paid too much attention to football—possibly because she had a teeny, tiny bias against the sport. Growing up, like in many towns, the most popular kids in her high school had been the football players and cheerleaders, and since she definitely hadn’t been part of that crowd, she’d dismissed the whole scene as too clique-ish.

But now she thought back to that day at the Cubs game, and the way Ford, Tucker, and Charlie had nearly swooned when Cade had walked into the skybox. They’d gone on and on about Cade’s college football days, particularly his Rose Bowl victory, yet it was a part of his life that Brooke herself knew very little about.

And maybe that was a good thing. Since she didn’t want to get too close emotionally, then it was probably better that she didn’t know all about Cade’s past experiences, the things that had shaped him to be the man he’d become.

That settled, she went back to work. But she heard Ford’s voice in her head, distracting her.

It’s only one of the most famous moments in college football history.

On the other hand . . .

She did work with sports teams all the time as part of her job. If Cade’s Rose Bowl win was that big of a deal, then she probably should know more about it. It was research, really. Besides, it was one football game—it wasn’t as if she was going to get weak in the knees from watching him throw a few nice passes.

That decided, Brooke got up from her desk and shut her office door. She grabbed her iPad out of her briefcase, then took a seat and fired up Google. She searched “Cade Morgan Rose Bowl,” and clicked on “videos.”

Voilà.

She scrolled through the various YouTube clips, clicked on the link that looked most promising, and settled in at her desk. It was a fourteen-minute highlight clip, beginning with all sorts of pomp and circumstance and an announcer talking over swelling marching band music: “We’re live in Pasadena, where the dreams, the blood, sweat, and tears, the perseverance, and the anticipation, have all come down to this: the 2001 Rose Bowl, presented by . . .”

Blah, blah, blah . . . Come on people, I’m a busy woman, let’s get to the good stuff.