Chapter Twenty-Eight

Cody

“Have you talked to Chelsea yet?”

I took a swing from my third—or was it my fourth—beer and then turned to face Robby. “Nope. She won’t take my calls. Won’t reply to my texts. I went to her house the other night but she turned off the lights and wouldn’t answer the door. I didn’t want her calling the cops on my ass so I took off.”

I shook my head, stewing in the miserable pit in my stomach. Two weeks had passed since the night in LA and I didn’t feel like I’d had a full breath since walking into that hotel room and seeing Summer there.

“On the plus side, I haven’t heard from Summer either, so maybe that problem has finally been solved.” I tried to smile but it faded before it reached my eyes. I took another pull from my bottle of beer, polishing off the contents. The bartender came over to ask if I wanted another but Robby made a motion to her and she left.

“What the hell, man?”

Robby slapped me on the shoulder. “We have a game tomorrow. I’m not going to let you show up with a hangover and a pissed off attitude. That’s not going to help anything. We went four for seven on the road. We need to get back on track. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that two of those losses came after all this shit with Chels and Summer.”

I wanted to argue with him, to yell at him and tell him to fuck off and step out of my business. But I was too damn tired.

He offered me a small smile and pushed off of his bar stool. “Come on, man. I’ll give you a ride home.”

I tossed a handful of bills onto the bar, not even bothering to count, and then followed him out.

“Has she been over to your place?” I asked once we got into Robby’s truck.

“Nah. Paris has seen her once since they got back but it was a quick lunch. Paris said she’s working herself to death.”

I hated the idea of her spending every day and night all alone in her house, hunched over the keyboard, surrounded by takeout containers. She deserved to have someone who’d be there for her, to take care of her, and make sure she eventually shut down her busy mind and slept at night. She wasn’t a child, far from it, but she sometimes needed someone to remind her to stop. I was once that someone—and I ached to be him again.

But I knew that was long gone.

“Her game should be going live soon.”

Robby nodded, apparently having nothing to add.

“What should I do, man? Can you get Paris to tell her to answer my calls?”

Robby gave me a grim look. “Honestly? Man, I think it’s time to let it go.”

A new swell of anger flooded me. “Why?”

“You gotta move on. You can’t be butt hurt about this girl forever. I mean, you’ve known her for what—three, four weeks, right?”

I glowered at him and crossed my arms. My jaw flexed, a million hateful words standing at the ready—but I kept it all to myself. I didn’t say another word the whole way to my hotel, which was thankfully only a few blocks away. Robby pulled up at the curb and I immediately swung my door open, having already unbuckled. I jumped out of the truck. “Thanks for the ride.” I slammed the door shut and stalked into the high rise without a glance back.

Up in my suite, I called Chelsea again. The phone rang but then dumped me into her voicemail.

I hung up. I’d already left dozens of messages over the past weeks. There wasn’t a point anymore. She was done with me and I was tired of acting like a punk.

I chucked my phone down on the bed and then paced around the suite like a caged animal. There were a million things to do. I could go back out and continue drinking without a nanny hovering over my shoulder. I could go to a strip club. I could go the no strings, anonymous route and get a high end call girl. An hour to fuck her sideways and then send her on her way. If I wanted more than that—I could just as easily go to a club and bring back a couple of girls for some fun.

None of it resonated. Each idea bounced off without much consideration. I didn’t want to do anything except talk to Chelsea.

And apparently that wasn’t an option anymore.

* * * *

“Coach wants to see you in his office.”

I nodded at Robby and set down the ball that was in my hand. We had a couple of hours left before the game and I was forcing myself to work through my shit by throwing the ball around with Mike, my catcher, before official warm up would start.

I went up to Coach Robinson’s office and found the door open. I tapped on the wall and stepped inside. He looked up from his computer and took off his thick rimmed reading glasses. “Take a seat, son.”

I threw myself down into the seat opposite him and crossed one ankle to the opposite knee. “What’s up, Coach? Robby said you wanted to see me.”

“I’m gonna cut right to the chase, here, Wright. There have been some allegations made about you. The front office wants me to cut you from the team. They think you’re a liability.”

I dropped my foot to the floor again, my shoe making a loud slapping sound on the stained concrete. My head was ringing with the words. It was like being sideswiped by a semi-truck. “What? What the hell kind of allegations?”

“A woman, on the staff, has come forward and made complaints that you have made inappropriate advances toward her.”

My lip peeled back into a sneer. “Let me guess. The bitch’s name is Summer Pratt.”

Coach Robinson looked surprised, his eyebrows hiked up half an inch. “I can’t confirm that, but what makes you suspect Ms. Pratt?”

“Damn it,” I paused, shaking my head. She’d really done it. She was so pissed at me for something that happened years ago that she wasn’t only going to wreck my relationship but my entire career. “Coach, Summer and I dated for a while back in college. I broke up with her when I got drafted. She didn’t like it and has been seeking revenge since I told her I wasn’t interested in getting back with her. It’s all a pack of lies from a jealous and fuckin’ deranged woman.”

Coach twirled his glasses by the stem. “I see. Well, like I said, the front office takes these matters seriously. They will want to open an investigation.”

I jumped to my feet. “Open it! I’ll go right now. They have no proof. It’s not possible. Because it didn’t happen. If anything, she’s the one who should be punished. She showed up naked in my hotel room when we were in LA and was trying to get at me. When I turned her down and chucked her ass out, she threatened me. This whole thing is blackmail!”

“Wright, calm down. Take a breath.” Coach stood up and snapped his laptop shut. “We’ll go together.”

“You believe me?”

He shrugged. “I have no reason not to. Let’s go see what we can work out. I don’t know what happened with Ms. Pratt, but I don’t want you cut from the team. Despite the last couple of games, you’ve been working really hard to turn things around for this team. I’d hate to lose this momentum over a misunderstanding.”

I scoffed at his use of the word misunderstanding but didn’t bother to correct him. Summer knew exactly what she was doing, but there was no way I could prove it.

Coach took me to the conference room where the members of management were all huddled around the table, deep in discussion. They all glanced up as we entered the room and there was a ripple effect as each of them saw me follow Coach. I was clearly not supposed to be there.

I was just glad that Willis, the team’s owner, wasn’t among them. That would be a disaster. Not that I had any problem telling him exactly who Summer was. He probably deserved to know.

The team manager, Rodd Jameson, leaned forward and waved at two open seats. He cleared his throat when Coach and I were seated. “Coach Robinson. I gotta say, I didn’t expect you to bring Mr. Wright along with you.”

Coach spread his hands. “In my experience, I learned that cutting to the meat of the problem is always the best way to deal with something like this. So, sure, we could all sit here and dance around it, but all that’s going to do is blow this thing up bigger, drag in more bystanders, and complicate things. The way I see it, it’s really simple. You’ve heard Ms. Pratt’s side of the story. Now, listen to Mr. Wright’s and go from there.” He took a long, sweeping glance around the table, waiting for an objection, and then returned his attention to Rodd. “Seems like that might work?”

Rodd worked his jaw. It was evident that he didn’t like his show being tugged out of his control but he wasn’t going to blow up in a room full of execs. He turned his shrewd attention to me, his eyes boring into me with laser precision and intensity. “It probably goes without saying, Mr. Wright, but we take all allegations of misconduct very seriously. I am prepared to launch a full investigation to get to the truth of what happened. You won’t be spared just because you’re the hot new star on the team. Is that clear?”

I nodded. “Yes, sir.”

He kept his gaze trained on me for another long moment and then gave a clipped nod. “Okay then. Go ahead, Mr. Wright.”

I swallowed hard. “Summer Pratt and I dated in college for two years. However, that relationship ended when I was drafted. I hadn’t seen her or heard from her until the day she was introduced to the team at that meeting in Dallas. After the meeting, she came up to me and told me that she was there for me. I told her I wasn’t interested. When I did so, she outright threatened me.”

“And just how did she do that, son?” Coach prompted.

I sighed. “She admitted that she’s fuck—sleeping with—the team’s owner. That’s how she landed the PR job in the first place.”

A scatter of whispers rippled around the table. I couldn’t gauge whether or not the tidbit was new or old news. “Anyway,” I continued, speaking over the hushed tones, “she made it clear that if I didn’t go along with her plans, she would get me booted from the team.”

More whispers.

I clenched my jaw. “The night that she says she was assaulted by me was actually quite the other way around. She was at the hotel in LA, got my room number, and a key. I don’t know how. But she was waiting for me, naked, on my bed, when I got back to the hotel.”

Rodd nodded but then leaned forward. “When this took place, the rest of the team was still back at the stadium. Why didn’t you take the shuttle with the rest of the team? It seems to back up Summer’s story that you wanted to get her alone.”

I sighed. “My girlfriend flew in as a surprise. You can check with Robby Brown and his girl Paris. Paris was with Chelsea. They flew in together. Paris sent Chelsea back to the hotel to surprise me.”

Rodd’s eyebrows went up his unnaturally smooth forehead. He shot a look at the man on his right and the man scrambled to jot down some notes. “Chelsea…?”

“Brooks. I can give you her information.”

“And she’s your girlfriend, you said?”

I cleared my throat and met his gaze. “Was. Sir. We’re not together anymore. Summer took care of that…”

Red hot heat coursed through me. I was just about done spilling my guts for the panel. I didn’t want to talk about Summer and I certainly didn’t want Chelsea getting dragged into the drama. She didn’t deserve that. But, I didn’t know what else I could do to untangle the mess Summer had created.

Rodd waited until his assistant finished writing and then shifted his eyes back to mine. “Do you have anything else you want us to know?”

“Check the security cameras at the hotel that night. You’ll see Summer entering my room, wearing nothing but a long, trench coat type thing. When she leaves, she’s wrapped in a sheet from my bed because I chucked it at her when I told her to get her ass out of my room. Check with the front desk to figure out how the hell she even got my room key. Check with Paris, Robby’s fiancée. I don’t care how deep you have to go. Clear my name and then I never want to see that bitch—uh, woman—again. I don’t care who she’s fucking, get her off this team, or I’ll file charges against her myself and Willis probably doesn’t want that.”

My hands slapped the table top as I pushed myself up. “I’m done here.”