After packing everything on the carts, they started pushing them down the hall towards the car. After three trips, they had everything packed, and were walking toward their cars when Harper’s phone rang. Elli didn’t even stay back to listen. She kept walking with a wave as Harper cooed into her phone.

Once in her F-150, (hey, trucks aren’t just for boys), she drove off towards the west end of Nashville to get onto the interstate. She’d planned to ask Harper if she could stay the night with her since she was stupid tired and didn’t want to drive for forty five minutes, but it looked like Harper was going to be busy. So she decided to go home. Elli hit the interstate, preparing herself for the drive. It was probably good that she was going home. She had forgotten to call Ally, her neighbor, to let her dog out.

When Elli had purchased the old country home outside of Nashville five years ago, it had seemed like a great idea. The studio had been open for two years. It was thriving and she wanted a home, not some apartment or condo. She bought it without even looking at anything else. It was the house for her. After five years, it wasn’t the old country home she had bought. It was a masterpiece. Everything had been redone: the décor classic and beautiful.

Whenever Elli’s dad came to visit, he would always say that it was like he was standing in sunshine because it was so bright. She smiled just thinking of her home. She was so proud of both her studio and home. They showed the world that she was doing something with her life. They proved that she didn’t need her family’s money, that she was successful after losing her stint on Broadway, and that she could live without Justin, her ex.

She pulled into her round driveway, grabbing all of her bags. Even before getting to the door, she heard her pug running down the hall, and then the barking started.

“I know, Adler. I’m home, darling, hold on.” Elli opened the door and her 40 pound pug attacked her. Well, he tried to, at least. She laughed as she threw her keys in the basket by the door. She bent down to her puppy, who was struggling to breathe.

“Oh my goodness, Adler, honey. Breathe, darling.” Elli pet him until he calmed down, kissed the top of his head, and then locked the door as her house phone rang. She didn’t answer it. She knew it was her mother, and Elli was not in the mood to talk to her. The machine picked up and her mother’s voice rang over the machine, telling her to call her. She pushed delete before going to the kitchen for some dinner. She decided on a frozen dinner, since she didn’t feel like cooking. She went to get her laptop while her food cooked in the microwave.

Elli walked through her bright yellow living room. She loved the décor in here. The gleaming walls accented the black wrap-around couches that had matching throw pillows. The couches brought the room together. Her extremely large TV, a gift from her father because she loved watching the away games in HD, hung above her mantel that held pictures of her nieces and nephews. She smiled as she passed them to get her laptop. She loved her nieces and nephews, and couldn’t wait to take them to the park next weekend for their monthly visit.

After getting her laptop and returning to the bar, she loaded the pictures from her camera as she got a fork and napkin. She sat down at the bar, food and laptop in front of her. She had taken over 3,000 shots of the Assassins which meant she had lots of work ahead of her. She inhaled her frozen pasta meal. She realized she was hungrier than she thought as she looked over the pictures. They were good shots, really good. Only a few were crappy. But with Photoshop, she could fix them with no problem.

As she went from picture to picture, Elli kept going back to Shea Adler’s pictures. Gosh, he was so stinking gorgeous. He had the most amazing eyes she’d ever seen. They were such a dazzling shade of blue: so bright, and so happy. He probably had a beautiful girlfriend, a dog and a nine bedroom house with all the fixings. He just looked like he was happy. When she came to the pictures of him in the suit, he took her breath away. The suit was black, with a purple vest underneath. The hockey stick that he held was so slick looking. But you really didn’t look at the stick or the suit, you looked at his eyes.

Good golly, they were mesmerizing.

Not that Elli would admit this to anyone, but while she worked that night, she kept flipping back to the pictures of Shea, looking at his beautiful eyes, his hard body. She wished that she was the girlfriend at his house waiting for him to get home so they could sit on the couch, cuddling as they watched highlights from the games that night, while Adler lay beside them along with Shea’s dog.

Elli smiled at the thought, and then rolled her eyes.

As if that would ever happen.

“Not only did I run into the goal, but the wall too!”

Shea Adler sat with the side of his face in his hand. His glasses were crooked but he didn’t care. He was beyond embarrassed about what had happened at the Assassins’ photo shoot earlier that day.

“I can’t stand it when I get new contacts. They affect my eyes all to hell. God, it was so embarrassing, Grace. So embarrassing.”

His twin sister laughed on the other end of the phone as Shea rolled his eyes, dropping his hand from his face to get up for a drink of water.

“I don’t know why you’re so embarrassed, Shea. It was only the guys.”

“And the staff!”

“Okay, and the staff. So what?”

“And the photo people!”

“So? You’re never embarrassed about anything. What aren’t you telling me?”

Shea didn’t say anything. He wasn’t telling Grace about the beautiful brunette with the biggest and brightest green eyes he had ever seen. She had the kind of eyes that took his breath away when he looked into them; something that had never happened to him before.