“How’s Connor?”
His stomach clenched, but he kept his expression blank. There was no telling how they’d found out he was visiting Wayland, but it could have just been a lucky guess.
“He’s fine,” Ty replied. “He’ll be fine.”
Allison got to her feet. “Good. I’m glad to hear it. Rest up.”
“Will do.”
“And behave yourself on the road trip,” she said, turning back. “I’m sending Gwen to Tampa for the series, so make sure there are no PR disasters while you’re down there. I have enough to do as it is.”
Ty’s heart gave a happy little lurch in his chest at the mention of Gwen’s name, but again, he kept his expression neutral. “Yes, ma’am.”
FOUR GAMES IN TORONTO, three in Baltimore, and finally, finally, they were headed to Tampa. Ty was jittery as they stepped off the team plane and boarded the waiting bus to take them to the hotel. He’d felt this way in Toronto, but he’d been able to blame his excess energy on the fact that he’d been benched for the first two games in order to let his bruised ankle heal.
The fact that the feeling hadn’t subsided during the next two games, or the three against the Orioles, and now the flight to Tampa, was an issue. He’d always felt a spike of adrenaline come game time, but now he was feeling it for reasons that had nothing to do with baseball. He was excited. To see Gwen. And as much as he tried to squash the feelings, he couldn’t. He tried to rationalize them away, to remember all the good and noble reasons he and Connor had for not starting relationships they couldn’t give the time and energy they deserved, but right now he couldn’t recall a single one. Every text, every phone call, every time Gwen popped into his brain, it pushed all the justifications out of his head and filled it with an emotion he knew he hadn’t felt before.
And it wasn’t just about sex. A week without was hardly the longest he’d gone, but he’d gotten used to Gwen. He’d gotten comfortable. He liked watching television with her and having dinner together and exchanging secret looks in the clubhouse. He liked her company. Hell. He loved it.
“Would you sit still?” Reed hissed when Ty’s bouncing knee jostled the book he was reading.
Ty tried to calm down. He was like a kid on Christmas Eve, unable to sleep. “Sorry.”
“Is there some reason you’re extra excited to be in Tampa?”
“I’m always like this.”
“No, you’re not.”
Ty wasn’t about to get into it, so he changed the subject. “How’s the book?”
Reed sighed. He was too smart not to know when the subject was being changed, but also too vain to argue when it was being changed to him. “It’s all right. Actually, that’s not true. It’s terrible. It’s all, does he love me, maybe he doesn’t, should I lose weight, should I join a dance troupe? I don’t want my daughter reading this stuff.”
“How do you know she is?”
“Because she picked it.”
Ty glanced over. “She’s speaking to you now?”
“Sorta. In the forums.” Reed was trying to play it cool, but it was obvious it meant a lot to him. “She has a couple of posts,” he said. “This was her selection, so here I am. In the mind of a teenage girl. It’s terrible, but I have to say I like it.”
“Well, at least it’s progress.”
Reed sighed again and opened the book. “The things we do for love, man.”
The words rattled around Ty’s brain for the rest of the ride to the hotel, and only got louder when they entered the marble lobby. It was after midnight but there were still dozens of fans and women hoping for autographs, phone numbers, and more. Ty was exhausted, but he dutifully posed for photos and signed hats and jerseys, shoes and scraps of paper. He turned down a couple of invitations to help him “carry his bags upstairs,” ignored the phone numbers and room keys being tucked into his pockets, and stifled a sigh when a woman wrote her room number on his hand. It wasn’t the first time it had happened, but it was the first time he felt guilty about it. Still, he smiled and murmured, “Not tonight,” and she smiled and moved on.
He rode up in the elevator with half a dozen of his teammates, then said good night and went to his room, dumping the unwanted contents of his pockets into the trash. Back in the day, he’d have looked at the numbers and room keys as though they were trophies, like collecting birthday invitations when he was a kid, proving he was popular, wanted. Now he knew better.
Ty reached for his phone to call Gwen, then paused when it dinged with a new message. Almost embarrassingly fast, he snatched it up and opened the message a split second before recognizing Brodie’s name on the display. Then he read, and a wave of nausea hit him like a bullet.
Brodie’s message was brief. The tape leaked.
Three more consecutive dings, this time from Allison.
Ty, they posted the video.
Say nothing.
I’m sorry.
The phone slipped from his fingers and bounced under the bed, and he left it there as he slumped onto the mattress. He lay back, staring at the ceiling fan twisting lazily overhead, like it had not a care in the world.
WITH THE THRASHERS and Rays in contention for the Wild Card spots, Ty already wasn’t the most popular guy in Tampa, and the sex tape ammunition gave the Rays fans something new to boo him for. Homemade signs dotted the stands, from the low class: You can slap my ass any time, Ty! To the more middling: Tyler Ashe is n-ashe-TY! To the high ground: Tyler Ashe has no morals and no place in baseball!
The jeers were deafening when he took the field, louder still when he walked to the plate, and near earth-shattering when he struck out in his first at-bat. They quieted only slightly when he followed up with two singles, but when he approached the plate in the top of the ninth, bases loaded and the Thrashers down by a run, the fans were on their feet, stomping and sneering, and he could barely breathe. Strip had offered to pull him from the game and take the heat for it, but plenty of players had endured their share of taunts; it didn’t mean he didn’t have a job to do.
Except he didn’t get it done.
He popped out to the catcher in foul territory and the game was over.
Reed, Ibanez, and Blanche were waiting for him in the dugout. His teammates were good guys most of the time, but with the news of the leaked tape, they’d been even better than normal today, which almost made letting them down feel even worse.
“Sorry,” he muttered, avoiding their eyes as he tossed aside his helmet and snatched up his glove from the bench.
A chorus of “not your fault” and “happens to the best of us” rang out, and Ty felt a tiny pang of gratitude. It was easy to feel all alone up at the plate, your teammates on the sidelines, and he appreciated the reminder that they were, after all, still there. Still his team. Still his friends.
And the fiercest guard dogs when it came time to return to the clubhouse, making the trek down the long hall from the field, reporters lying in wait, cameras and microphones at the ready, wielding their equipment like swords and character assassins. There were a lot of familiar faces, but a number of new ones, too, from seedy tabloids and gossip websites that had no interest in his plays on the field and too much interest in his plays off.
“Ty!” someone shouted. “The whole world has seen the sex tape! What do you have to say?”
Not only would he never respond, even without Allison’s warning, but Ty himself hadn’t actually seen the tape, and never wanted to. It was like asking to view the video of someone stabbing you in the back over and over and over again. He already knew what happened. He didn’t need to relive it.
“Back up,” Reed called, holding out his arm like a barricade. Three security guards carved out a path at the front, and Ty’s teammates encircled him like a private detail with dirt-stained jerseys and knee socks instead of dark suits and earpieces.
“Ty! Vixxxen Videos has offered you ten million dollars for your next tape—are you going to accept the offer?”
“He has no com
ment!” Blanche snapped.
“Ten million?” Ibanez exclaimed. “Give them my number! It’s eight-four-three—”
Ty ducked his head and used his hand to hide his smile. The last thing he needed was a picture of him smirking on the day of his sex tape release, like he was amused and not horrified. Not sick and ashamed.
A female voice cut through the crowd, rising over the questions and camera flashes. “No player interviews tonight!” Gwen shouted. “Strip will be available shortly.”
A thousand complaints rang out.
“Deal with it,” she ordered, holding open one door to the clubhouse while Strip held the other and security guards blocked any non-players from entering.
“It’s our job—” someone began.
“Not tonight.”
“We’re entitled to—”
“Not tonight.”
Ty looked up just enough to catch Gwen’s eye as he entered the clubhouse, thoroughly surrounded by his teammates. She’d arrived this afternoon so he hadn’t seen her before the game, and he’d turned off his phone to stop the deluge of calls and messages, so he hadn’t heard from or spoken to her, either. Obviously she already knew about the tape and had made whatever peace with it she needed, but it was one thing to know it was out there, and quite another to hear the whole world shouting about it. To think about them watching it.
“We have questions,” Joanna Liu said, elbowing her way to the front.
“And I’ll be happy to answer them,” Strip replied, the last words Ty heard before the doors closed behind the players.
“God,” Ty groaned when it was finally safe. “That was fucking brutal.”
“It’ll die down in a few days,” Blanche said, slapping him on the back. “Always does.”
Girardi scoffed. “You just want him to come to your bowling fundraiser at the end of the month.”
“Of course I do.” Blanche looked panicked. “You’re still coming, right?”
Ty’s smile was more of a grimace. “Wouldn’t miss it.”
They showered and dressed in record time, slipping out the back and onto the idling bus. It was after eleven and the night was dark, and Ty did a double-take when he spotted Gwen sitting near the front, head ducked as she typed something on her phone. He’d gotten used to seeing her in the clubhouse, in his house, in her house. The bus was new territory. She looked up when the players began boarding, and got to her feet when she saw Ty.
“Hi,” she said, her smile polite and professional. Not exactly the reception he wanted from the woman he hadn’t seen in over a week.
Still, he answered just as politely. “Hello.”
“Have a seat.” She nodded at the empty chair next to hers. “We need to talk.”
A couple of passing players oohed like he’d been called to the principal’s office, but he flipped them off and sat down. The bus was crowded and the guys gossiped like old ladies—and eavesdropped like it, too—so Ty couldn’t say any of the things he really wanted to say. Couldn’t do anything he really wanted to do, like hold Gwen’s hand and scream at the sky about how fucking unfair life was sometimes.
“What’s up?” he asked.
Gwen hesitated for a second, then said, “You know about the tape.”
“How could I not?”
“Then you know the sponsors are complaining again.”
Ty dropped his head back against the padded seat. “So? Let them cancel all my contracts. I can’t control some con artist leaking a tape from eight years ago—one I didn’t even know was being made. Do they think I want it out there? It’s not—”
“It’s not just your sponsors,” Gwen interrupted. “It’s the team’s sponsors. The soft drinks. The gum. The cars. Everything.”
Ty froze mid-protest. Sure, it wouldn’t look good if he abruptly stopped hawking watches and sunglasses. But his bank account could handle the damage. The team, on the other hand, relied on its income to remain profitable and competitive, and if major investors and advertisers bailed because of him, he’d pay the price in other, less literal ways.
“What am I supposed to do?” he asked. He was frustrated and hopeless, and it didn’t help that his closest “friend” in the world was in business mode, and had to be, because not a single soul on the bus was pretending not to listen in on their conversation.
There was such a heart-rending pause before she spoke that Ty knew Gwen was going to end things before she even answered. She took a fortifying breath and gripped the armrest between them.
“It’s been decided that you should date Keelie Karr.”
Ty blinked. He’d heard her wrong. Her saying they were over would have made more sense than what she’d just said. “What?”
“She has a wholesome reputation and—”
“She’s twenty!”
“And being seen together would balance out your reputation and be helpful in putting the tape behind you and moving forward.” It sounded like she was reading a script, which was likely not far from the truth.
Ty dropped his voice so only she could hear. “You have to be fucking kidding me, Gwen.”
She glanced around warily, then met his eye. “I’m not.” There were a million unspoken words in her gaze, but none of them said she was joking.
“I’m not doing it.”
She swallowed and looked out the window, blinking rapidly.
Ty’s heart sank. She couldn’t cry. Not just because it would crush him, but because it would undermine everything she’d been working so hard to prove to the organization.
“It’s my job to convince you,” she said softly.
“It’s sick.”
“It’s my job,” she repeated.
“Well, I don’t—”
Her eyes flickered to his. “It’s my job,” she said again.
And finally, he heard her. It’s my job.
Not, this is my responsibility so I’m doing it. No. It’s my job...or else. Or else they’d both be losing something. Of all the professional reasons for them not to have gotten involved, this scenario had somehow never made its way onto the list.
“I’ll think about it,” Ty muttered, then, across the aisle, he heard Girardi tsk and whisper, “He said he’ll think about it.” The message trickled to the back of the nosy bus and looped around again to the front, like a stupid game of telephone, making Ty hunch in his seat, somehow more miserable than he already was.
They didn’t speak again during the ride back to the hotel, and when they parked, Gwen stepped over him and got off first, disappearing into the crowd that lingered in the lobby. She was already in the elevator when Ty and his teammates made their way through the mob of fans and reporters, murmuring no questions, no autographs, no comment.
Security was tight on their floors, and the hall was clear when they stepped off the elevator. Ty thanked his friends and went to his room, grateful for the first bit of privacy he’d had in more than twelve hours. His silk tie felt like a thousand-dollar noose, his designer suit a straight jacket. He stripped them off and changed into sweats so he could breathe again, then grabbed a beer out of the mini fridge, contemplated the bottle, and put it back. He didn’t need a drink. He didn’t need anything in this room. Nothing from his penthouse, nothing from his cabin. Nothing from his sponsors or his agent or his banker.
There were only two people in the world he wanted right now, and one of them was in prison.
Ty waited until the hall was quiet, then returned to the elevator and rode down to the fourth floor. Gwen had texted him her room number when the reservation was made, and now he strode to her door and knocked, keeping his head down in case anyone passed by.
After a moment he heard the chain unlatch, then the lock clicked and Gwen pulled open the door, looking as tired as he felt. And suddenly Ty wasn’t sure what to expect. Didn’t know if she’d let him in or break up with him or make some excuse to send him away, just tonight, just this once, until it turned into a week and a month of excuses, then nothing.
&nbs
p; She pulled open the door and moved back.
Ty faltered for a second, then entered the room. The door clicked shut behind him, and he turned the deadbolt. He couldn’t look away from her, the blond ponytail, the brown eyes, her Thrashers T-shirt and sweats nearly identical to his. Her toenails were painted Thrashers teal, and her laptop was open on her bed, like she’d left work and come back to the hotel to work some more. She was here for the team, he knew. This was her job.
But then she opened her arms.
Ty stepped into them and she raised onto her toes and buried her face in the side of his neck, and he knew it was more. They were more.
“I’m sorry,” she said, her lips tickling his skin as they moved. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know until this morning, about the Keelie—about the thing. I tried to warn you, but you weren’t answering your phone.”
“I turned it off.”
“I figured.”
“I’m sor—”
“It’s not your fault.” Ty released her and dragged his hands over his face, relief making him weak and flushed. “It’s not your fault. It’s not my fault. Whoever’s been doing this stuff—that’s the problem.”
She grimaced. “There’s more bad news.”
“How is that even possible?” Ty slumped onto her bed.
“They don’t know who stole the video, but they know where they got it.”
“Stole? It’s not the woman from the tape?”
“No.” Gwen sat beside him. “When she first reached out to you for money, she sent that clip, the same one that was leaked recently. And when you guys resolved the problem, she handed over the video to the Thrashers’ legal department. They kept the video and the clip in their system, under layers of security. No one really remembered it was there, but yesterday someone in IT noticed a number of hacking attempts over the past weeks. The person must have stolen the clip, expecting it to be the whole video, then spent the past months attempting to get the full copy. We think that’s why they’ve been quiet for so long.”
Ty shook his head. All these years, he’d thought the story was behind him, when really it was upstairs on some server, waiting for the right opportunist to come along. “But why?” he asked. “Did they ask for money? For anything?”
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