One Shot

by Vicki Tharp

  Being caught kissing and holding hands outside of Black Stallion would have been bad enough, like a lit firecracker in your hand. You know it’s going to suck when it goes off, but it would be survivable.

  Trevor clicked on the link in the story and the video that played on the screen was like being duct taped to the reactor at Chernobyl—shit was about to get real.

  The video on screen had been shot through the open and broken slats of Elijah’s sliding glass door. With those three slats missing, there wasn’t much left to the imagination as Alex plowed into Elijah from behind.

  “I’m so fucked,” Alex said.

  “Actually,” Demetri closed the lid on the laptop, “from the looks of it, it was Elijah who—”

  Elijah elbowed Demetri in the gut. “Not funny.”

  “Why are you here again?” Alex couldn’t drum up enough spit to swallow. He reached into Elijah’s fridge for a bottle of water. Maybe his brain was dehydrated from all the sex, and that was why he couldn’t think straight.

  Straight. There was that word. Mocking him.

  “Niko sent me. He wants to see you at the studios. Now.”

  Elijah leaned a toweled hip against the bar, his arms folded across his chest. There was no question why Niko wanted to see them. “Can’t he fire us over the phone?”

  “He’s shooting today. Besides, he says he wants to see you two in person. ASAP.” Demetri raised his hands and started backing out of the room. “I’m just the messenger.”

  Elijah and Alex followed him to the door. Demetri had his hand on the knob, his demeanor softening when he turned. “This shit’s going to blow over. Don’t let it destroy what you two have.”

  Have? Did they have anything besides the ability to make each other come every time they got together?

  A part of Alex had dared to hope. But that was before.

  Alex huffed out a laugh, but could the sound really be called a laugh when he couldn’t see the humor in any of this? “Too late.”

  Elijah’s face fell, and he had one of those surprised and betrayed looks on his face, the kind actors get on screen when someone they trusted thrusts a knife into their chest. Alex wanted to take his words back, but he couldn’t take back the truth.

  “How bad is it out there?” Alex asked. Maybe they could get to Black Stallion, get their meeting with Niko over with, and then he could steal a few hours to figure out how to dig himself out of the crater that was left of his career.

  Demetri winced. “The group out there makes your last round of press attention look like amateur hour.”

  Demetri left, and Alex and Elijah wasted no time showering and dressing. No way was Alex going through the day smelling Elijah all over him. It would be like holding a bone in front of the starving dog. He didn’t need that constant reminder of what he shouldn’t, or couldn’t, allow himself to have.

  At least not right now.

  Not until he’d repaired his career.

  If that were even possible.

  An ESPN news truck pulled into the apartment parking lot as Alex and Elijah fought their way through the press to Elijah’s truck. The morning-after walk of shame was bad enough when there weren’t twenty cameras and fists full of microphones being shoved in your face.

  “Alex, Alex,” one of the reporters said. “What do you have to say to your fans, to—”

  “No comment.”

  Alex shut the reporter down and plowed his way through the throng of people with Elijah in his wake.

  Elijah beeped his truck unlocked, but the news crews had the truck surrounded. They’d never be able to leave unless Alex made some sort of statement.

  He wanted to acknowledge who he was, allowing room for Elijah in his public life.

  He wanted to tell everyone to fuck off. Tell them that Elijah was someone special.

  Tell the world he was gay.

  But the letters wouldn’t form into words and the words wouldn’t form into sentences. He felt filleted in front of the world and everything he felt for the man he’d spent the most amazing night with was exposed to those who couldn’t open their minds enough to understand it.

  Or worse, didn’t care to try.

  Pressure came from all sides. Alex couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe. The questions whizzing by him one after the other—a flaming, crucifying, media shit-storm.

  Then his eyes locked on the reporter from the night before—the woman who’d sat alone in the bleachers before the game. Her hair was pulled up in a messy ponytail, and her makeup appeared old and smudged.

  And those clothes... Was she also wearing the same clothes that she’d worn the day before? Had she been the one who’d spent half the night in the tree behind Elijah’s apartment filming them instead of running off to her husband like she claimed she would.

  All of his anger, his sense of betrayal, he focused on her. She went to take a step back, but the jostling from the other reporters kept her in one place.

  “You’re a piece of work, you know that?”

  “It wasn’t me,” she said, not into the microphone.

  He plucked the microphone out of her hand. “Bullshit.”

  Turning his attention back to Elijah, he said, “Let’s get out of here.”

  Not that he particularly wanted his ass reamed by a pissed-off Niko, but it beat a scandal-frenzied mob.

  For once, the midday traffic was light. They couldn’t turn on a radio station without news reports of the video. Alex’s phone buzzed, and he glanced down to see his father’s phone number flash on his screen. He hit ignore, and let the call go to voicemail. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have with his father. Not when he didn’t have any of the answers.

  After they arrived at Black Stallion, Rose met them both with a hug and led them back to Niko’s office. She had one of those pained, sympathetic grimaces on her face. “I’ll let Niko know you two are here. He should be finishing up with a scene any minute.”

  They sat beside each other in the leather chairs opposite Niko’s desk. This didn’t seem like the type of amenable conversation to have on the sofa. Elijah leaned forward in his chair, his forearms resting on his knees, his head in his hands. Elijah was about to lose a job. A job that he needed to put himself through school. If it wasn’t for Alex, if it wasn’t for his pseudo-celebrity, which leaned closer to infamous than famous, none of this would be happening.

  Alex reached over and placed his hand on Elijah’s shoulder, his thumb lightly brushing across the back of Elijah’s neck. Elijah raised his head but didn’t look over at Alex.

  “I’m sorry,” Alex said. “This is all my fault.”

  Elijah looked at him then, his brows drawn together. “How so?”

  “If I was anybody else, no one would give a rat’s ass who I saw or who I fucked, and Niko never would have found out.”

  “But you’re not anybody else. I knew that from the beginning. I knew that when I agreed to drive us to the sports complex, and when I took you home, and when I let you do the things to me that I wanted you to do. Does this suck? Yeah, it sucks donkey balls. But I’m not the one who has to live with all the heat. You are.”

  Niko rapped his knuckles on the door jamb as he walked through the open door. Alex released Elijah’s shoulder, and they both sat back in their chairs, bracing for the shouting, the yelling, the recriminations. But when Niko plopped into the chair behind his desk, there was no anger, no malice. Just disappointment.

  “I guess you two know why you’re here?”

  “I don’t think it’s to congratulate us on our new viral video,” Elijah said. One day, Alex would find Elijah’s comment funny. But not today.

  Niko didn’t crack a smile. He leaned forward, his fingers steepled with his forearms resting on the edge of his desk. “I like you two. I really do. And the videos you two shot for Black Stallion have been nothing short of solid gold. But you two knew the rules going in. Black Stallion’s reputation is something I can’t take for granted. With all the hype, there’s
no way I can keep you two on.”

  “We understand. For the record, when I signed that paperwork,” Alex said, “it was the truth. At least as much as I knew it. I never expected—”

  Alex reached over and linked his fingers with Elijah’s and gave Elijah’s hand a squeeze. When he spoke again, he kept his gaze on Elijah when he said, “I never thought I could fall so hard so fast. Especially for a man.” Then he looked back at Niko. “I’m not apologizing for that.”

  Elijah squeezed back and kept his gaze on the floor. The way some of the tension eased from Elijah’s posture made Alex think that maybe some of his words had sunk in. Alex wanted Elijah to believe him. Needed Elijah to believe him.

  Alex dropped Elijah’s hand. With a finger under Elijah’s chin, Alex turned Elijah’s face and pressed a kiss to his lips. A promise. “We’re going to get through this. Trust me.”

  Elijah nodded. Alex could tell Elijah wanted to believe, but the expression on his face made it clear Alex had a long way to go to prove it to Elijah.

  Niko cleared his throat, and Alex and Elijah turned their attention to him. “This goes against my normal policy, but by popular demand, I’m leaving your videos up. And I’m going to continue to allow you guys to earn your residuals.”

  Elijah blew out an audible breath. Alex’s heightened anxiety eased a fraction.

  “I’ve never let residuals continue before,” Niko said. “This needs to be our dirty little secret. But as for a career at Black Stallion, you two are done. Any questions?”

  That sounded like a dismissal. Alex stood. Elijah stood as well, reaching down and taking Alex’s hand. Alex liked that. Liked that there was a public space where they could show affection and not worry about the reaction of the other people in the room. Would there ever be a time in his life that he could be this open with his sexuality everywhere?

  What would hurt more? Losing his career or losing Elijah? And why the hell couldn’t he keep both?

  “I don’t have any questions,” Alex said.

  “Thank you,” Elijah added. “I appreciate your decision. And I apologize if we let the studio down.”

  They shook hands over the desk and Elijah preceded Alex to the door.

  “To be clear,” Niko said. Alex and Elijah stopped and turned. “As disappointed as I am that we’ll no longer be working together, I’m happy for you two. Truly.”

  Elijah didn’t know if the news crews remained camped out in the parking lot of his apartment, so he didn’t mind taking Alex to SFSC for his pitching session. They pulled around back and saw that Trevor had already dropped Alex’s car off as Alex had asked.

  Elijah drove toward the back door to drop Alex off when Alex said, “Do you mind parking?”

  The parking lot at the back of the sports complex was nearly empty, and Elijah picked a spot and pulled his keys from the ignition. He stared at the complex’s back door. Had it only been last night when he and Alex had slipped through that door? He remembered the way his stomach had tumbled and turned with sweet anticipation. How his hopes were as high as his libido.

  Now not only had their private life gone viral, someone had made a GIF of Alex fucking him in the ass. Thanks went to Demetri for texting him that gem.

  No one had laid a finger on Elijah, but he hadn’t been this beat, battered, bruised since a group of kids had ganged up on him in high school and tried to beat the perceived fag out of him. And just when he thought his financial troubles were behind him, being booted out of Black Stallion would seriously put his ability to finish school at risk.

  “Come in with me?” Alex asked. When Elijah glanced over, Alex added, “I want you to meet my pitching coach.”

  Elijah wanted to say no. Not because he didn’t want to meet Alex’s coach, but because it felt like Alex was throwing him a bone, and he didn’t know if he had the balls to chase after it.

  Alex is trying. You asked him to let you in. He’s opened the door a crack. Are you going to slam it in his face? Or are you going to nut the hell up and shoulder your way through that door?

  “Okay.”

  “Yeah?” The most amazed, surprised grin spread across Alex’s face. The type of grin that shoves the weight of the world off your shoulders for a moment and makes it easier to breathe.

  “Yeah.” Elijah climbed out of his truck, and Alex retrieved his equipment bag from the tail bed.

  They came through the back door and down the long hallway. This time all the overhead lights were on. The crack of bats on balls echoed as pitching machines lobbed ball after ball after ball.

  Alex nodded to some and ignored the stares of others. Elijah had hoped they had rented a cage in the far corner, out of the way of people coming and going. But, as luck would have it, the cage Alex’s coach had chosen was at the intersection of two wide hallways, in full view of not only the batting cages, but the enormous two-story observation windows.

  At the cage, Alex dropped his bag at his feet and stuck out his hand, first to an older Hispanic man dressed in athletic shorts and a Grizzlies’ shirt, then to another man wearing leg guards and a chest protector.

  “Elijah, this is my pitching coach, Fernando Gomez, and my good friend, Ethan Locke. Guys, this is Elijah Maddox. He’s staying to watch.”

  Heat crept up the back of Elijah’s neck. From the faked nonchalance on Ethan’s and Gomez’s faces, Alex didn’t have to explain who Elijah was. Elijah shook both of their hands. “Nice to meet you.”

  Gomez handed Elijah a five-gallon bucket with a padded lid on top. “Have a seat and we’ll get started.”

  The next twenty minutes consisted of Alex and Ethan throwing the ball in the cage as they slowly warmed up Alex’s arm before Alex took the mound.

  “Start him off with some fastballs,” Gomez instructed Ethan.

  A low-level buzz filled the sports complex. Once Alex started pitching, more people watched Alex than were working on their own training. Elijah shifted, feeling like the new curiosity at the zoo that no one quite knew what to make of.

  Alex glanced up at the observation window, and Elijah followed his gaze. On the second level, at least three cameras had set up, but luckily, for now, management had kept the reporters to the public areas of the complex. How the hell had they found them so fast?

  Elijah glanced around. Half a dozen people had their phones out, either tapping away with their thumbs or aiming the cameras in his and Alex’s direction. Of course. All it took was one tweet, one post, one hashtag connected to Alex’s name and the press came running.

  To Alex, Gomez said, “Keep your head on straight, boy. Push all that crap out of your head. It’s you and Ethan and that ball.”

  Alex blew out a deep breath and Elijah watched in amazement as the tension dropped from Alex’s shoulders. He’d seen Alex do that several times in the video clips he’d found online of him pitching in the Minors. That deep breath. That roll of the shoulders. That laser focus of his eyes on the catcher’s glove.

  Gomez stepped over and handed Elijah the radar gun. “Hold that. And watch what your boy can do.”

  His boy.

  Elijah liked the sound of that. A little too much.

  Gomez clapped Elijah on the back, walked around the side of the cage, and stood there with his arms crossed over his chest as he watched Alex pitch. Gomez ran Alex through his paces—fastballs, curveballs, changeups, cutters, sliders. Each pitch more impressive than the other.

  Elijah enjoyed hearing the whoosh of the ball as it sliced through the air, the slap of the ball against Ethan’s glove, the occasionally muttered “fuck” when a fastball missed the web and hit Ethan’s hand a little too hard.

  “You’re done,” Gomez said at last.

  Instead of the crowd inside the complex thinning out, more people crowded in.

  Ethan stood, dropped his catcher’s mask, and removed his chest protector, the back of his shirt soaked through. Alex came off the mound drenched as well, and Elijah tried not to think about last night when Alex’s naked body had
glistened with sweat. Ethan tossed him a hand towel and Alex mopped his face.

  The door opened to the ground-floor reception area, and the low-level buzz turned into an eardrum numbing hum as the reporters poured into the aisle around Alex’s cage.

  Immediately, the tension returned to Alex’s shoulders, and the satisfied smile of a job well done tumbled and fell. Elijah stepped toward the cage, wanting to be there by Alex’s side, to support him, to be there for him, to let him know he wasn’t alone in all this. But the look Alex shot him froze Elijah to the floor.

  It wasn’t a look of relief at seeing Elijah coming to his rescue, it was a flash of pure panic.

  A flash that told Elijah that no matter what Alex had told him, Alex wasn’t anywhere near ready to face the press with Elijah by his side. In the melee, as reporters jockeyed for position, Elijah fadded back, unnoticed and forgotten. He leaned a shoulder against a cinder block wall and watched from afar.

  “Aren’t you embarrassed? Do you think any club would be willing to sign you now? More importantly, should they?” One of the reporters from a major sports network asked Alex.

  Alex glanced at the spot where Elijah had been sitting. Was that relief on his face at seeing Elijah gone? Elijah wanted to leave. He should leave. But something compelled him to stay.

  “Embarrassed?” Alex’s voice remained level, civil.

  Elijah didn’t know how Alex did it. Was Alex really that good at hiding his emotions? Or deep down did he really not care about Elijah?

  “I’ve done nothing wrong. What two consenting adults do in the privacy of their home is no one’s business. Unlike the person who took and released that video, I haven’t broken any laws. I can’t control what the clubs do. All I can do is work hard every day and improve my strength, my conditioning, my craft. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go ice my arm.”

  If Alex had apologized or acted ashamed over what they’d done and what they’d shared, Elijah would have walked right out the door and not looked back, so he had to give Alex points for that, but Alex’s lack of acknowledgment of Elijah’s existence stung as if he’d been cleated in the heart.