Offensive Rebound

by Mj Fields

  I sprint to catch up. It’s a damn good thing I’m tall, or she would be even harder to keep up with.

  I throw the mat by the garden as she points at the daisies.

  “Flower,” I tell her, hoping she will start talking.

  She grunts and points, which is a hell of a lot better than those tantrums.

  I point to her and say, “Callie.”

  She smiles a fucking beautiful smile.

  I point to myself and say, “Da.”

  She smiles again, and while I have her attention, I just keep pointing to her, to me, to the flowers, and repeat the words.

  When she finally says, “Da,” my world is rocked and I lose my shit.

  How the hell can I leave now?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Ouch

  COURTNEY

  “MONDAY, WE DO THE TOUR for the honeys,” I say, barely able to stop myself from throwing up in my mouth.

  “We’re sold out!” Christa says, excited that her idea actually worked.

  Word spreads fast when it comes to women and man candy. Word spreads even faster when there is a scandal involved.

  Christa has become queen bee of the hoop honeys. She has over eighty thousand followers on Twitter and Instagram since she started sharing one-minute interview videos that she and James have conducted with most of the players throughout the week following the Vegas game.

  I’m not sure if it’s the players all the followers are smitten with, or watching James and Christa make asses of themselves. Whatever it is, it’s working. The section slated for the honeys has gone from two hundred to eight hundred, and are all sold out for the season after my Vegas wedding.

  The honey tour we have scheduled that will involve a buffet dinner are nearly sold out. We promised seven players will be there and, God willing, they will be.

  “Wednesday and Thursday are press days.”

  “And Friday is the first day of a long weekend before the season starts. Now, let’s go have drinks, Court. You’ve accomplished a lot today.”

  “Why don’t you and James go ahead, and I’ll catch up with you? I just need to make a few more phone calls.” I smile.

  “We can wait,” she tells me.

  “I insist.”

  “Thank God for that. Let’s go,” James says, standing.

  Once they leave, I sit back and take a deep breath. Everything seems to be falling in place, and yes, Trae gets ninety percent of the credit.

  Yesterday, though, he stepped over a line and broke a promise, a big promise that Coach was mine to deal with. It had nothing to do with him. It was all me, yet he couldn’t let it go.

  It wasn’t power play. I needed to do this on my own, because in six months, his season will end, and I need to know that I can, in fact, do this on my own.

  A knock on the door brings me back to the here and now, and I look up as it opens, seeing Gate Guard Bill.

  “Bill?” I stand up and walk toward him. “It’s late; is everything okay?”

  “A package was delivered and—”

  “I wanted to bring it up,” Brock cuts him off, moving past Bill. “Apparently, your husband has Bill watching out for you.”

  I take the package from his hands, hoping he will leave now without incident. “I don’t know what you want, Brock, but Bill”—I give him a stern look—“and Trae don’t need to watch out for me. Please shut the door behind you, Bill.”

  As soon as the door shuts, I realize I have trapped myself in a room with Brock, and I did it because I’m pissed at Trae, and now Bill, for thinking I need a damn watch dog. Talk about cutting your nose off to spite your face.

  I walk around and sit behind my desk, putting space between me and the man who I disliked a great deal when I came here, and now I hate. He sickens me.

  I busy myself with opening the package with a very large, silver letter opener to avoid looking at him.

  “I want you to know that lining those men up was not done to spite you. I didn’t think you could pull this off.”

  He starts to sit, but I tell him, “No need to sit. You won’t be here long enough.”

  “Whatever has happened, I’m still a good player, and I don’t want to leave this team,” he says, sitting anyway.

  “After what you pulled in Vegas, you don’t deserve to be on this team. I had to deal with Coach first, but you’ll be next.”

  “I’d tell you that you’re making a mistake, but that would piss you off. I’d tell you that I’m the best on the team and what draws a crowd, ‘cause I am, but you’d throw me out of here. I’d tell you that those other women meant nothing to me, but you wouldn’t believe that I just needed to blow off some fucking steam.” He looks just as pathetic as he sounds.

  “Courtney Cohen, I am in love with you—have been for years now—and disappointed you drove me to look for something quick and easy. Hurting you these past few weeks was to protect my heart that still fucking hurts.”

  “Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?” I huff.

  “I don’t deserve your forgiveness, but I needed to tell you where I am coming from.”

  I open the box and pull out the little doll I searched the internet for, the one that is an exact replica of the one Callie tries to push into the screen every time Trae talks to her on Facetime when she sees me.

  I sit down and smile at it as I hold it in my hands. I bought it so I can appear to be pulling it out of the screen next time. She might think one of two things: that she gave me a gift, or that all things are possible.

  “You bought a doll?” he asks.

  I set it back in the box and stand. “I’m done here.”

  “You’re in love with him,” he says, standing.

  “That’s none of your business,” I tell him as we walk toward the door.

  “Because of his kid,” he says with disdain.

  I turn around and look at him. “Don’t you ever talk about her!”

  “Because she’s messed up?”

  I reach up to slap him, but he catches my hand.

  “I can promise you that I’ll never say a word about that little girl to him, to you, or to anyone as long as I’m on this team.”

  Is he trying to bargain with me?

  “You can go to hell!”

  “I’ve been there since that little girl was born.”

  No. No, he does not get to be a fucking martyr.

  “The two of you and your women.” I shake my head. “He grew up and got over it. Now, how about you do the same?”

  “He came here to fucking rub her in my face. He came here to fuck with what’s mine!”

  “Why the hell would he rub her in your face, you idiot?” I snap.

  “Like I said, I’ll never say shit about that little girl as long as I’m on this team, not until my contract ends.”

  “Get out! You’ll be done here by the beginning of next week.”

  “Courtney, you may want to talk to him first. Ask him about his daughter. Ask him whose she is.”

  His smug look sickens me.

  “Get the fuck out!” I scream, and the door opens.

  “Let’s go, Boeheim,” Bill says, and I see another man standing beside him.

  “I don’t need your fucking help finding my way,” he huffs then looks back at me. “Ask him.”

  When he leaves, it takes me twenty minutes to go through the few conversations I have had with Trae about Callie.

  “Never gone raw before.”

  “We fell asleep together that night. I didn’t fuck her; I consoled her. And when he came back to the room with another girl, he flipped shit. We got into a fight, and they both left. The next day, the chick he was trying to get with found me and told me she thought I was honorable. Those words meant something to me. They meant something because that’s what I wanted to be—a good man, and not like him, or my old man, or who I was becoming.”

  I stopped him from continuing, begged him to come to bed. Now, a million questions run through my head.

&nb
sp; Would he have told me if I didn’t stop him?

  Is he hiding it from me because he does, in fact, have a sick need to make everything that is Brock’s his?

  Is Callie Brock’s?

  Is he keeping Callie from Brock because of a deeper secret?

  Is he using me worse than Brock has for his own sick revenge?

  I know one person who can shine some light on the situation. James.

  I grab my bag, throw everything in it, and run out the door to get in my car and head to The Bucket.

  “Courtney!” I hear Bill from Gate D call behind me, and I spin around.

  “I trusted you!” I yell at him. “I trusted you, and you side with Trae?”

  He looks shocked.

  I’m so pissed. Pissed at everyone, including myself.

  “I even liked you. I moved you to Gate D because I liked you so much. Are you part of this, too? This game the two of them are playing?”

  “I have no idea—”

  “Save it!” I yell as I push through the door.

  I reach into my bag to grab my phone, needing to call James and tell him to meet me outside, knowing I can’t just go into the bar and question him, not with all the honeys around. The doll drops out of my bag as I try to get my phone out.

  “Get it together,” I scold myself as I reach down to grab it.

  “Look out!” Bill yells.

  I look toward him to see he’s running toward me.

  I turn to run to my car because, right now, I am so confused and overwhelmed. I just want to get away.

  That’s when I see lights, and then feel the pain of the impact.

  I roll over the car and fall to the concrete ground.

  Everything goes black.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Feeling Mixed

  TRAE

  WALKING THROUGH THE SECURITY GATES at the airport, I see Larry pacing. When he sees me, he stops and runs his hands through his hair.

  I rush to him and ask, “Everything okay?”

  “Courtney’s in the hospital. She was hit by a car last night. My car’s outside.”

  “Why the fuck didn’t anyone call me!” I ask, running through the airport toward the exit.

  “I shouldn’t have even come, but I did, so don’t give me any shit,” he grumbles, rushing at my side.

  In the parking garage, he hits his key fob and a gray Jaguar’s lights flash.

  “Get in!” he yells.

  Once inside, he hits start and peels out.

  “Is she okay?” I ask, trying my best not to start tearing him the fuck apart for not calling me.

  “She’s pretty banged up.”

  Control is out the window.

  “What the fuck does that mean!”

  “Watch yourself, Rhodes. You’re walking a thin line with me right now,” he snarls.

  The fuck is his problem?

  “Same to you, Larry,” I growl.

  “I don’t owe you shit,” he growls back.

  “Then why the hell are you here?” I ask.

  “I made a promise to an old friend,” he grits out through his teeth.

  “Charlie.” I nod, knowing there is something more to the reason I was brought on.

  He nods, not saying a damn thing more.

  “Is it bad?” I ask, feeling a wave of nausea roll through my body.

  “She’s gonna be fine.”

  Twenty minutes later, he drops me off in front of the hospital, instructing me not to say a fucking word about him picking me up. Clearly, he doesn’t want want her to know he brought me. Why the hell not? Because of our damn little fight? Ridiculous.

  I run in the doors and to the desk. “Courtney Cohen’s room number, please.”

  The nurse smiles and looks at the screen. “I don’t see a Courtney Cohen—Oh, wait. Courtney Cohen-Rhodes, fourth floor, room 782.”

  “Thanks,” I say over my shoulder as I run toward the elevators.

  When I walk into her room, James, Christa, and...

  “What the fuck are you doing here?”

  I hear a sigh from behind me and turn around to see Courtney coming out of the bathroom in a hospital gown, on crutches, and a cast up to her ass. She has a bruise on the side of her face and looks confused.

  I turn around and pick her up, needing to help her, hold her, take care of her, and this causes the crutches to fall to the ground.

  “Put me down,” she orders. Even her tone is battered. She doesn’t seem to know if she’s confused, angry, or both.

  I put her down on the bed, asking, “What the hell happened?”

  She looks at Brock, and then away.

  I turn toward him and snarl, “Did you have anything to do with this? So help me God—”

  “Brock, leave,” Courtney tells him.

  He stands up. “You need anything—”

  “Just go,” she sighs out, trying to pull her hand away from mine, but I won’t let her. “Christa, James, I need a minute,” she then says to them.

  When they all leave, I bend to kiss her, but she turns her head to the side.

  “Don’t be like that, okay?” I push her hair back. “Tell me what the hell happened.”

  “What the hell does it matter?” she grumbles.

  “Well, Courtney Cohen-Rhodes, it does fucking matter.” I sit beside her. “Now talk to me.”

  She shakes her head. “Just leave.”

  Her saying this is far worse than a kick in the nuts by someone much bigger than her, but it’s not happening.

  “I’m not leaving. I don’t ever wanna leave you again.”

  She scowls at me then looks away.

  “I was pissed, okay? I was pissed that you wanted me to sit back and play bitch when all I want to do is keep you safe.”

  “You sure you didn’t have this planned?” To that, she burst into tears. “That you, Coach, Brock, Bill, and—”

  “What are you talking about?” I ask, confused as fuck.

  “Just go. You win, okay? You and them. You can all come at me with cars, but—”

  “Courtney? Babe? What are you—”

  “Just go! Just go and leave me alone! All of you! Just leave me ALONE!”

  Christa and James burst back through the door, looking just as fucking confused as I am.

  “GO!”

  “Courtney, what’s going on?” Christa asks.

  “And you! You’ve been secretive, too.” She points at James before looking back at me. “You and James, are you part of this?” She is shaking, visibly shaking. I try to hug her, but she screams again, “Get out! All of you, get out!”

  Two nurses run in and look at us. “Please leave.”

  “I’m not going anywhere. She’s my wife,” I snarl at them. “I fucking love her.” I turn to Courtney. “I love you, Court, I do. And I want more than—”

  “Oh, God, I was right.” She holds her hands over her stomach. “Get out. You make me sick.”

  Outside in the hallway, I look at James and Christa. “What the fuck was that?”

  Christa sniffles, tears running down her face. “She’s—”

  “What medications do they have her on?”

  I look back to see Ellen and Ron raging toward us.

  Ellen doesn’t wait for an answer, just storms into Courtney’s room with Ron following.

  Like Court said, her mom’s a fucking tsunami. What she doesn’t want to admit, though, is that she’s a lot like her.

  When they come out, Ellen glares at me, poking me in the chest. “If you had anything to do with this—”

  “I just flew into town. I’m as confused as you are,” I say, trying to hold back my temper.

  “He was out of town, Ellen,” Christa says, defending me. “It was Coach D. He was at The Bucket after she let him go and stumbled out after a couple hours. The police charged him with DWI and assault—”

  “DWI? That motherfucker hit her?” I ask.

  “She ran from the arena. I tried to stop her, but she ran from me, to
o,” Bill interjects.

  Where the fuck did he come from? Doesn’t matter. He has some serious fucking explaining to do.

  “You were supposed to keep her safe!” I yell at him. “You said you’d keep her safe.”

  “He was,” Brock interrupts. “Followed me up to her office when I was taking a doll to her.”

  My head is spinning, thoughts racing.

  I push past them all and into her room, shutting and locking the door behind me.

  “Leave,” she slurs.

  “No. You tell me what the hell happened to you. Jesus, Courtney, I swear I feel like I just walked into a living version of Clue. Brock brought you a doll, Bill chased you outside, Coach was drunk and driving and ran into you. What the hell is happening?”

  “Please,” she whimpers. “Please just leave.”

  “Not until you tell me the truth of what happened, or I’m going to jail tonight because, I swear, I will rip people apart.”

  “How about you tell me the truth? Are you working with them to bring me down, to ruin me? Are you?”

  Am I what? How can she think that?

  “Look at me. I may have left pissed, but that’s because I don’t know what to do with this—her time, his season. I want it all!”

  “I don’t believe you,” she scoffs.

  I walk up to her and hold her face in my hands. “I love you, and I want it all.”

  “I thought I loved you. I thought I did, because you were everything I could possibly want and more.” Her words are slower now and a bit more slurred. “But I don’t trust you. You’re a liar.”

  “I have never lied to you. Never.”

  Sadness washes over her. I see it. And it’s like a deadly infectious disease.

  The door opens and the nurses walk in. Must have had a key.

  “Can you make him leave? Please.”

  This isn’t the end. I know it. I know she’s fucked up on pills and pain, but it still fucking hurts, and I still need her to know the damn truth before I walk out that door.

  “Courtney, I love you,” I tell her, not giving a damn who hears me. “I love you, and I’m team us; you hear me?”

  Her bottom lip quivers as her mom grabs my elbow and drags me out of the room.

  “I don’t like you,” Ellen hisses when she releases my elbow. “And I have no reason to tell you this, but she has a reaction when Percocet and Fentanyl are mixed. It happened once when she had her shoulder set after an attempt to play ball to impress her father. Fucking basketball.” She shakes her head like she is erasing a bad memory. “That’s why my otherwise normal daughter is acting out. Leave her alone for a few days.”