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“Right,” she says, her tone full of sarcasm as she makes a circle with her finger and thumb as if to say okay. She winks at me.
I roll my eyes as Debbie delivers our nachos.
We move onto talking about our boys, which is where the conversation inevitably goes, but my mind is stuck back on Lincoln.
If my own best friend doesn’t believe me where he’s concerned, how am I ever going to get the entire Vegas Aces fan base to believe me?
“You needed my professional opinion about something?” she asks.
I nod, and I grab my phone to pull up the article I saved. It’s from a tiny newspaper local to New Orleans and didn’t gain any traction at all, surprising given the content of it.
I push my phone across the table toward her. “Read it.”
She picks up my phone and scans the article and she looks up at me when she finishes.
“Well?” I ask.
She sets my phone back down as she contemplates what she just read. “I’d need to see his records to back up the claim, but yeah…it’s possible.”
“Would footage of his injury help since I don’t have his medical records?” I ask.
She nods, and I pull up the footage I found online from when the injury occurred.
“God damn, he’s hot,” she says when I slide the phone back over.
“Clearly beside the point, friend.” I shoot her a glare, and she giggles as she watches the video.
She nods, and she winces. “Yeah, that looks painful, but I don’t think it would be career-ending. The article mentioned a post-op infection, and that’s a little trickier. I’d need more details about that to say for sure, but if the surgery went well and the infection was controlled quickly, he could’ve come back. Lots of players do. Like Alex Smith—he almost died and had to have multiple surgeries for an infection, and he still came back. This article says he was released the standard time after his surgery. Have you looked up whether there were additional surgeries?”
I nod. “I couldn’t find anything.”
“I’d imagine it would’ve been pretty well publicized if there were.” She taps her chin with her finger while she thinks. “But if he was healthy enough to return to the game, why would he have lied and said he couldn’t?”
Why indeed.
That’s the same question that’s been on my mind since I found this little article, and I am determined to dig deeper until I get to the bottom of it.
CHAPTER 21: LINCOLN
My mom attacks me with a hug the second I walk through the door. My dad hangs back and offers a firm handshake.
That’s their personalities to a T. My mom is warm and kind. My dad is cold and standoffish. I fall somewhere in between them, I think, though I like to believe I’m more like Mom than Dad.
Maybe because I don’t want to be anything like my father.
Grayson is more laid-back and charming like my mom, the tallest of the four of us and second oldest at thirty-two. He can make anyone laugh, but he’s all business when it comes to the game. He will do whatever it takes to win, and he’s a huge asset to the Chargers in his position as defensive back.
And then there’s me. A natural leader with charisma and ambition. Competitive and obsessed with winning, which often isolates me from others, including my own brothers. As a coach, I have to be careful what I share with them, and if we can’t bond over football…what can we bond over? What else even is there?
To the Nash family…nothing.
What would it be like to bring a woman with me to one of these family get togethers? How would my brothers treat her?
Why am I even thinking about it?
It’s not like I could bring Jolene here.
The thought nearly makes me laugh out loud.
