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The paparazzi snaps photos of us while we laugh and eat, and we’re seen arm-in-arm exiting the restaurant. I walk her to her car, and she heads home while I walk across the street back to the office without a goodbye kiss because I refuse to kiss another woman even though Jolene found it fine to allow Graham’s lips on hers.
It was an innocent enough dinner, and I hope it was good enough to fool the people we’re trying to fool. But I can’t worry too much about it. I needed to eat dinner anyway, and the break served me well since my eyes were fatigued after staring at film for the last few hours.
I’m refreshed now, and I put in another couple hours with a glass of whiskey and a notepad beside me. Time ticks on, and I find myself growing tired. Eventually I lay on the couch for a few minutes just to rest my eyes, but I guess I fall into a deep sleep because when I wake, it’s with a jolt as someone shakes my arm and blinding light streams in through my office windows.
“Coach, practice is starting in an hour. Can I get you anything?” It’s Megan’s voice.
I’m groggy as I sit up and run a palm down my cheek and along my jaw. I stretch my neck, and it’s stiff as hell after sleeping on the couch. “Fuck,” I mutter, and she giggles as I narrow my eyes at her. “An XL coffee. Stat. And a number two from the cafeteria breakfast menu.”
“Right away.” She nods and hurries off, and I lean back and stare out the window as my eyes adjust to the brightness here in my office.
Megan returns twenty minutes later with a bag of food and my coffee, and I’m in new clothes thanks to having essentially unlimited options available to me at all times here at the practice facility. I showered down in the locker room and used my emergency toothbrush, and I’m good as new.
It was the first time I slept in my office, and it likely won’t be the last, though I’ll admit my bed is much more comfortable, in particular when Jolene is sharing it.
Speaking of Jolene, I can’t help but wonder what she’s up to this morning as I take the first bite of my bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit. I send her a text to let her know I’m thinking about her.
Me: Good morning. Hope you have a great day.
No reply comes, but my phone starts to ring a few beats later, and it’s her.
“Hey,” I answer softly.
“Have you seen the headlines?” she demands, and I sense something in her tone that both tears at my heart and terrifies me.
I drop my sandwich on my desk as my blood runs cold. “What headlines?”
“Rivera printed the photos of us, Lincoln.”
CHAPTER 5: JOLENE
I’m trying to hold it together, but so far I’m failing.
I woke up this morning to a text from Rivera.
Rivera: You had your chance.
I didn’t know what he meant, but it took me all of five seconds to find the article.
I read it, and just as I finished, the text from Lincoln came through, as if he had some sort of extrasensory perception about what we’re about to face together.
He wouldn’t have done this if Marcus was here. That’s the sole reason he was able to get it in print.
Fuck. Fuck! What are we going to do?
“He did what?” Lincoln roars, and the soft and tender greeting he started this conversation with has transformed significantly.
“They’re on a gossip site but I know it was him and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do now and our parents are going to find out and our credibility is ruined, both of us, and—”
“Stop,” he demands as he interrupts me, and it’s probably good he interrupted me or I might’ve gone on forever.
I suck in a breath.
“Is it just the pictures? Or an article, too?”
“An article,” I say. “The pictures we could’ve probably explained away. But the article is pretty damning.”
“Read it to me.”
