Play Maker

by KB Winters

  I picked up my phone and scanned through to find his number. My finger hovered over the button, but I couldn’t make myself press it. I needed to get my statement done. He needed time to think about what he wanted. There wasn’t anything left to say tonight that could fix it or make it all clear.

  With a heavy sigh, I set the phone face side down and picked up my pen.

  The following morning, I made my way to Harvest House. In the excitement of passing the bar, starting my new job, and the meeting with Sam O’Brian, I’d forgotten to visit Lacey and get the video footage she’d mentioned on the flight back from New York. I doubted there was anything on the video that would help, but I hadn’t seen her since that afternoon, and with all the chaos inside my head over what to do about Ross, she was the one person I knew would understand.

  I’d never been to Harvest House before, but as I pushed through the main doors, I smiled to myself, seeing that it was essentially just the way I’d pictured it in my head. Colorful, cheery, bright, and organized. All very Lacey.

  “Shelby?”

  I turned at Lacey’s chirpy voice and flashed a smile. “Hey!”

  “Hey! I didn’t know you were coming. Did we have an appointment?” She fumbled to flip through the pages of the leather-bound planner in her hands. She was wearing a thick pair of glasses, and I noticed she wasn’t wearing makeup.

  “No, do I need one?”

  She breathed a sigh of relief and closed the book. “Oh, good. I thought I was losing it.”

  “Late night?” I asked, arching a brow as I smiled over at her.

  She giggled, and a red twinge flooded her cheeks. “Yeah. I’m sure you heard about the big win?”

  “Yeah,” I said, a stab of guilt sinking into my chest. “I spoke with Ross last night.”

  Lacey smiled. “Well, we had an after party, and I don’t think I got to bed until three or something. So I’m having a very Monday kind of Monday.”

  I laughed softly and tucked my hair behind my ears. “Well, I won’t take up too much of your time. I was just stopping by to get that video footage we were talking about on the plane.”

  “Oh! Yeah, of course. Come to my office, and I’ll grab it for you. I saved it to a flash drive.” She started through the center, and I followed half a step behind. “I was actually going to pop it into the mail, but this is nice. I’m glad you could stop by.”

  We reached her office, and I glanced around from the doorway as she rounded the desk. It was a small space, a lot smaller than I’d pictured, but it was still filled with Lacey. Artwork that looked like it had been painted or drawn by some of the center’s more talented little artists hung on her walls, a homemade looking clay bowl was on the corner of her desk and held a set of keys, lip gloss, bobby pins, and an elastic band.

  “To be honest, we were expecting to see you last night. What happened?”

  “I uh—I had a work thing pop up at the last minute.”

  Lacey’s eyebrows rose over the frames of her glasses. “Work? On Sunday?”

  “Yeah,” I said, sinking down into one of the two plastic chairs in front of her desk. “He’s another attorney and has been offering advice on Hudson’s case. We’ve been emailing back and forth and were supposed to meet in person today, actually, but he called yesterday and told me he was going out of town and wanted to move it up.”

  “Gotcha.” Lacey straightened and handed over a silver flash drive.

  “Thanks.”

  “Did you get the answers you needed?” she asked.

  I scoffed and rolled my eyes. “Not exactly.”

  Lacey lowered into her own chair and leaned forward. “What happened?”

  “He was an ass,” I said, meeting her large blue eyes.

  She straightened in her seat. “What?”

  I pinched my eyes closed and nodded. “I guess he thought after all the emails we’d struck up some kind of connection. Thank God, Mr. Bennington was there.”

  “Mr. Bennington?”

  “My boss. He didn’t want me there alone. Especially on a Sunday when no one was around.”

  “Does Ross know?”

  “Yeah, and I think I messed up. He was so…” My voice cracked and tears filled my eyes. “Lacey, he sounded crushed when I told him I missed the game. I told him it was a work thing, and he was devastated.”

  “I can imagine, he thought you were there.”

  “I know. But this case is so important to me.”

  “Yeah, so is the Super Bowl.”

  “I know. He wasn’t mad or anything, just really sad.”

  “Which is worse,” Lacey said, more to herself than me.

  “Much worse.”

  “I’m sorry, Shelby. Is there anything I can do to help?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m not even sure I know what I want. My career—the one I’ve been working on for so many years—is finally happening and Ross’s is too. This is his big shot. Hell, this is my big shot. And the fact that other teams are looking at him, I just can’t see it working.”

  “So you’re giving up before you even start?”

  “I’m not giving up. It’s hard enough now that I’m working full-time and he’s in the playoffs. And with the Super Bowl coming up—I don’t know if I can meet his expectations of a real fangirl girlfriend. He could end up in a different city, halfway across the country, and we’d never be able to see each other.”

  “Yeah,” Lacey made a tsk sound. “This lifestyle isn’t for everyone. I’d hate for you to miss out. But if I may, you and Ross are good for each other. I know we don’t know each other all that well, but we don’t have to for me to see how happy you are together. It’s obvious. Chance told me that before Ross met you, he was shut off. The quiet one hanging out in the corner—by himself. Now, he’s more involved and opening up. I’m sure some of that comes with the confidence of crushing it the past few games and leading the team forces him to open up some, but I also think a lot of it has to do with you.”

  I sighed and sagged back in my chair. “I just don’t know.”

  “I’m not saying that to put any pressure on you. Obviously, you have enough of that. It’s just my two cents. Or really, four, since Chance thinks so too.”

  I smiled at her and we laughed together. “Thanks, Lacey. I really appreciate your honesty. I’m sure we’ll figure all of this out. I just…I’m scared. That’s what it boils down to.”

  Lacey gave me a wise nod. “Fear makes us do a lot of stupid things. I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”

  I held up the flash drive. “And thanks for this. I’ll see what I can dig up.”

  “Good luck.” We both stood, and she walked me back to the front entrance of Harvest House. We embraced, and she held the door open for me. “Tell Hudson we all have his back too.”

  “I will. Thanks, Lacey.”

  Back at home, I slipped the drive into my laptop and waited for the files to open. I found the video and pushed play, not really sure what to expect. As Lacey had said, it was shot at a non-profit basketball tournament held at Harvest House’s gym. The coverage showed the players and the beginning of the game. I scanned the crowd as the game went on and slowed down when I spotted Hudson in the stands. He looked like he was sitting by himself, but as people came and went, he smiled and interacted with them. It was apparent, even without knowing what they were saying, to see that he was well-liked.

  But then, halfway through the second quarter, a blur of action caught my eye. “Wait” I stopped the footage and rolled it back a minute. I played it slower and narrowed my eyes to make sure I’d seen what I thought I had.

  Hudson was sitting in the crowd, cheering on the team after a three-pointer, when someone passed in front of him and dumped the soda in his hand. The soda spilled all down Hudson’s front and he shot to his feet, his face red, to confront the guy who’d bumped him. The two got into an argument, and Hudson stormed off. I followed him as long as I could until he walked out of the frame. I watched the rest of
the footage, but Hudson never returned to the game.

  The time stamp on the video showed it was half an hour before the assault had taken place. I sighed and leaned back in my chair. The assault took place a few blocks away from Harvest House, in a rough patch of the city and the convenience store was halfway between the two. I had no idea why Hudson never returned to the basketball game—or, at least, not to his original seat. I did see what had him so agitated when he stopped in at the convenience store, but that still wasn’t enough to prove anything. The prosecutors could simply argue that in his state of mind, he’d snapped and lashed out at the victim who’d had nothing to do with the argument at the basketball game.

  I watched it back a couple more times and then it hit me. When Hudson had originally taken his seat in the stands, he was wearing a backpack. But when he left, there was no backpack. Midway through the game, when the players were off the court, the camera had zeroed in on the crowd and when it hit Hudson’s abandoned seat, there was someone walking away with the backpack. I flipped through my digital files and pulled up the clip from the convenience store’s security cameras that showed Hudson interacting with the clerk—the one that had testified against him at the trial.

  No backpack.

  An idea was percolating in my mind, and I couldn’t seem to make my fingers move fast enough over the keys as I dug through my files for one last video—the dashboard camera when the cops had pulled over and picked Hudson up two days later. He was wearing the backpack.

  I tapped a pen against my lips and tried to fit the pieces together. After a few minutes, I picked up the phone and called Lacey.

  22

  Ross

  The week after the stunning victory crawled by. My life became an easy routine of wake up, scarf down a pre-workout meal, head to practice, drag myself through the drills, and only go home when my body felt like it had been sent through the spin cycle on an industrial-sized dryer. Nothing mattered to me. I didn’t care what I ate or what I wore, or who I talked to. I had to shut that side of my brain down, or else I would fall into a dark pit, wondering what in the world had gone wrong with Shelby. We’d texted a couple of times since the phone call after the game but hadn’t made plans to meet up and talk. It was like an awkward dance around the real issue. She was always busy with work, and I was busy with practice and prepping to fly to LA for the Super Bowl.

  Thursday’s practice was the last one before we’d leave, and as I was leaving, Chance sidled up to me in the locker room. “Hey, Leverette. You all right? Your ass was dragging a little on that last drill.”

  He smiled, but his comments sparked a slumbering rage, and I jumped up from my seat at the bench. “Fuck you, Beauman. Worry about your own shit, all right?”

  Several heads spun in my direction and a flurry of whispers followed the outburst. I raked a hand over my head. “I’m sorry, man. I didn’t—shit.”

  Beauman crossed his arms. “What the hell is going on with you?”

  I slammed my locker and shrugged into my coat. “Nothing. I’m just ready for all this shit to be over with.”

  “This shit? You mean the biggest fucking game of our lives?”

  I groaned. “You know what I mean.”

  “No, actually, I don’t. We all play our fuckin’ hearts out for this chance, this one shot at the big game. I want to soak up every minute of it, and I think that the Ross I’ve been getting to know lately would agree with me. This funk you’re in has nothing to do with the game.” He leveled me with a firm stare. “Tell me I’m wrong.”

  “You’re wrong,” I repeated without flinching. “Night, Beauman.”

  I stalked away but couldn’t escape the smothering feel of the locker room before Chance called after me, “Call her, Leverette.”

  I raced home, going faster than was wise considering the shit conditions of the roads, as though I could outrun Shelby’s memory. Unfortunately, things between us were bad. I wasn’t sure when or where, but at some point, we’d hit the rocks and the ship had gone down. Startlingly fast. I wasn’t sure what else there was to do.

  Once home, I took a quick shower, not letting myself linger on the steamy memories Shelby and I had created inside the glass stall. I warmed up my dinner and pulled a six-pack from the fridge. I had a day off before my flight to LA, and I was planning on spending it drunk off my ass, so I didn’t have to think or feel anything.

  Halfway through a rerun of Seinfeld the buzzer for my door rang. “What the—” I pushed up from my recliner and wandered over to check the security camera. No one was there, but the door was slowly swinging shut. I was about to go back to my dinner, chalking it up to a wrong number, but just as I hit the volume button on the remote, a knock pounded against my front door.

  A peek through the peephole showed me that Shelby was standing on the other side. Somehow, she managed to look beautiful, angry, and nervous all at once. I drew in a breath and swung the door open. She dropped a glance down at my Spiderman pajama pants and pressed her lips together to suppress a smile, but the glimmer in her eyes gave her amusement away.

  “What? They’re fun,” I growled.

  She held up her hands. “No judgment. Whatever makes you feel better prepared to deal with the monsters that live under your bed.”

  I crossed my arms. “What do you want, Shelby? You didn’t come all the way here to mock my choice in sleepwear.”

  She met my eyes for a long moment. “All right, this is ridiculous,” she said, huffing as she pushed past me into the living room. She spun around as I shut the door and planted her fists on her hips. “Let’s talk.”

  “Shoot.”

  She narrowed her eyes at me, all traces of the brief moment of levity instantly gone. “You’re still pissed at me?”

  “I don’t know,” I replied, dropping my arms. “I think I’m mostly confused at this point.”

  Shelby’s face softened, and she glanced at the sofa.

  “Come on,” I said, taking the lead. I grabbed her hand and tugged her toward me. It took every ounce of strength and resolve to keep myself from pulling her against me and kissing her until our problems were erased from our minds.

  But I knew we needed to talk.

  We got situated on the couch, our knees touching as we angled toward one another, and I kept a hold of her hand. “I’m not too tough of a guy to say that it fucking hurt that you weren’t at my last game. That was a big day for me, and I wanted you there. And fuck it, if I’m going all out, I was jealous that you were spending it at work. I wanted you to be there.”

  Shelby dropped her eyes to our intertwined hands. “I’m really sorry about missing your game. I wish I’d have been there. Work was kind of a bust, anyway. Which pissed me off too.” She paused just long enough for me to wonder what was going on inside her head. She lifted her eyes back to mine and a glossy coating shimmered in the soft light of the overhead track lighting.

  “Hey,” I whispered, brushing away a stray tear as it slipped past her lashes. “What’s wrong? Talk to me.”

  “I want to,” she replied, nodding her head. She glanced down again and whispered, “I just don’t know what to say.”

  I slipped my thumb under her chin and tilted her face back up. “Come on, Shelb. It’s me. We used to be pretty good at this talking thing, before we discovered we were pretty damn good at other things.”

  She smiled, and I tallied it up as a small victory. “Pretty damn good?”

  “Yup.”

  Damn it, I wanted to take her in my arms and get my hands all over her body. She was wearing a pair of jeans, black boots, and a black sweater. Nothing fancy or over the top sexy but she could wear a paper bag and look like the hottest woman on the planet.

  “I’m scared, Ross,” she finally admitted.

  “Scared?”

  “I think I’m feeling too much, too fast.”

  My heart skipped a few beats as it sputtered into a triple time pace. “There’s no such thing. It’s not something you can control.”
>
  “Well, that’s kind of the problem,” she said with a watery smile. “I’m a little bit of a control freak and when I feel like this like everything is chaotic and wild, I shut down. And between your busy life and my new job and the case—”

  “I know. It’s fucked up.”

  She nodded. “Really fucked up. We don’t even know where you’ll be playing next season.”

  My eyebrows rose up my forehead. I’d purposefully not brought that possibility up with her, mostly because the idea of leaving her was more than I could take, without telling her and having to have a real conversation about it.

  She shrugged. “I’ve heard a few things, here and there.”

  I grabbed her other hand and held them both tight. “I don’t know what will happen next season, but I don’t want to lose you. No matter where I end up. We can make it work. People do it all the time.”

  She smiled, but it was full of sadness and didn’t quite make it to her eyes.

  “I’ve lost a lot in my life, Shelby,” I started, my voice shaky. “I don’t know who my dad is. My mom’s not in my life because she chooses not to be. I didn’t have a shot at a normal childhood, and I’ve never really let myself get too attached to things or places, and certainly not to people. But that changed when I met you. Suddenly, it was like a wall came crashing down, and I couldn’t get it built back up fast enough to keep you out. And now, I’m thankful I couldn’t. I can’t imagine my life without you. This last week has been hell for me, wondering what you’re thinking and whether or not I’d ever get to see you again. I couldn’t handle the thought that we might have already had our last kiss or said our last goodnight to each other.”

  Shelby’s tears flowed freely as I spoke, and I paused only long enough to wipe them away with my thumb. “I love you, Shelby. I’m fucking crazy about you. Since that first time I saw you at the diner. I think about you all the freakin’ time.”

  “I don’t want to lose you either,” she whispered. “I’ve never felt like this before. When I’m with you, I’m so happy, but when we’re apart, my mind wanders, and all I can think about is you.”