What the Puck!?

Chapter 1: Heading to the Big Apple

ZANIA

I continued to stare at the ceiling as my usual morning text notifications pinged from the nightstand. Today, I had to fly to New York and meet with some clients. While I usually love traveling for my job, I was not looking forward to this trip.

I am the Director of Sales for the southeast region of Hodges & Burns, a marketing agency based out of New York, but they have offices in Dallas, L.A., and Atlanta. Atlanta is my home office, but I spend a lot of time in New York.

I am flying to New York to finalize a deal with Douglas Activewear. They were a new client and difficult to lock down. The team in New York had failed to secure this deal multiple times, so Michael Burns called me to handle it. And I did.

The founders of Douglas Activewear wanted me to come to New York and go to a hockey game the night before they signed with us. While they had sponsorships with some big names in the NBA, NFL, MLB, and even some overseas soccer players, I know they had their eye on being THE name in hockey.

Did I know anything about hockey? Puck no. But that wasn't going to get in my way of securing Douglas Activewear as a Hodges & Burns client. Plus, I wasn't going to be the account manager. I just needed to get them to sign the dotted line.

Despite my lack of knowledge or passion for hockey, that is not what made me dread this trip. My dread came from Kyle Hodges, the founding partner of Hodges & Burns.

Kyle was the cliche product of wealthy parents. He went to the best schools, had all the right connections, and started his company with the help of his parents' money. Kyle was attractive, intelligent, arrogant, and a complete asshole.

Unfortunately for me, he was also a fucking psycho that has tried to control my life for the last four years. And in less than 4 hours, I would be boarding a private jet with him to New York...alone.

As my phone started ringing, I closed my eyes, wishing it would stop. I knew it was him calling, and I mentally was not ready for Kyle to invade my morning yet. The phone rang two more times before I reluctantly reached over and picked up the phone.

"What took you so long to answer?" Kyle snapped over the phone, "And why aren't you responding to my texts?"

I closed my eyes as I could hear children screaming in the background. I didn't like children in general, but listening to them screaming in my ear along with my boss at 7 in the morning made me dislike them more.

"My phone was on DND, and my alarm wasn't set to go off for another 30 minutes," I grumbled into the phone.

"Why is your phone set on DND? What if one of your clients needs to reach you? And why is your alarm set for so late? You have a flight soon." Kyle barked into the phone. I didn't respond because, honestly, I didn't care to. Wasn't it enough that I was still dealing with his shit? Now he wants to berate me hours before a flight with him.

"Nia?"

"What?"

I could hear him let out a heavy breath. I'm sure he wanted me to ask what was wrong, but I couldn't bring myself to care. I hoped whatever was bothering him was painful. Hopefully, his dick would fall off soon, and he would lose his ability to talk...or text.

"My kids must have caught something at school because they are all sick, and so is Sarah," he said with a less-than-subtle note of annoyance in his voice.

I shot up in bed.

"I'm not going to be able to go with you to New York. I'm sorry," he said in a soft voice.