Free Forever Branded (Billionaire Love Series #1) by Jessa Eden

shot he winged by goalie after goalie. He wasn’t super thick, but he was wiry, taking a lot more punishment than I would have thought possible.
    I’d kept up with his career and watched his games whenever I had the chance. He’d been wildly successful for a number of years, playing on the number one line in Toronto before his accident.
    The buzz of my cell phone came to life as Baltimore scored. I prayed it wasn’t the salon. I didn’t need to deal with any more crises for the day.
    “Hey, lady! How are you?” Stacy Obermeyer gushed into the phone.
    She was one of my dearest friends.
    “Stacy! How’s San Francisco?” I asked.
    “Good. It’s hilly and cold, but beautiful.”
    “How’s the new job going?”
    “I’m liking it. They gave me my own column. Can you believe that? Stacy Obermeyer doling out inspiring thoughts and being paid for it. I love it.”
    She’d never had any trouble tooting her own horn.
    “Oh Stacy, you deserve it, but I miss you, hon.” She had just moved a couple months ago and hearing her voice made me miss her all the more.
    “I miss you, too. You should come out to San Francisco sometime.”
    “That would be fun. I would enjoy that, but it would be hard to get away from the salon. Are you coming back to Baltimore anytime soon?”
    “Yeah, I’m coming back out for my sister’s wedding in October.”
    “Yay! Are we going to get a chance to hang out?”
    “Do birds fly? Of course, we will. Let’s do something fun and dangerous.”
    “Oh yeah, because we’re just two thrill seeking gals.”
    “Hey, I remember a few adventures with you,” she wisecracked.
    Oh god, I missed having her around. She knew me so well.
    We’d been friends since my senior year in high school. I didn’t know many people at my new school, but that didn’t stop Stacy from befriending me.
    She sat down next to me on the first day of trigonometry and said, “Ah, I don’t know about you, but trig bites.” Her blonde hair was heavily permed, a pink scrunchy holding up half of her thick hair.
    “I hear you. Math sucks,” I agreed whole-heartedly.
    She smiled, showing off a brilliant set of teeth. “Then let’s stick together and kick this trig bitch’s ass,” she said like she was throwing down in a fight.
    I laughed, loving her boldness. “I’m Marla.”
    “Stacy. Without an e.”
    “Glad to meet you, Stacy without an e.”
    After that, we became fast friends, studying hard to get through trigonometry. We were very different, but somehow we just clicked. She was a social butterfly, flittering around to her many friends, while I stayed buried in my books, determined not to draw any attention to myself.
    Still, we ate lunch together most days.
    One spring afternoon, shortly after I met Beau, I sat in the school’s god-awful cafeteria waiting for her. The room wasn’t so bad, but the smells were what got to me. The aroma, a cross between burnt Tater Tots and overcooked meat, always made my stomach turn.
    I don’t know how anyone ate that junk. No matter what, I packed my own lunch. I ate as healthy as I could on the budget Emma and I lived on.
    The one good thing about the cafeteria was the panel of floor to ceiling windows which filled an entire side of the large, square room, facing out to the quad with all the lush greenery in full bloom. I always tried to sit over there and stare out at the pretty landscape.
    I loved nature and felt better when I was close to it.
    “Are you still eating yogurt and granola for lunch?” Stacy asked as she threw her sack lunch down on the white table I was sitting at.
    “Yep. It’s my fav,” I said as I scraped the side of the Yoplait container with my spoon. “Plus, yogurt’s been on sale for a couple of weeks. I try to stock up.”
    “I know it’s good for you, but don’t you get tired of it?”
    “I will eventually, but for now, I love it,” I said licking my spoon.
    She rolled her blue green, almond shaped eyes at me.
    “Just eat your lunch,