Down by Contact (The Barons 2)

Brayden nodded, still not looking at me, and trailed behind her like a puppy.

“Don’t be angry with him.” Simeon put his hands on my shoulders and looked into my face. “He’s a kid with a pair of parents who are doing their best to put him in the middle of their drama, and he took matters into his own hands in the only way he could. It’s shitty, but . . . I get it.”

“I’m not angry. I’m not anything.”

Simeon took a deep breath. “Adrián, you’re freaking me out.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re not reacting.”

I glanced towards the window again. How many were out there now? Had any left or would they camp there all day?

“We should call Casey and Mel. I bet they’ve been trying to talk to us all night,” I mumbled. “Or maybe not. Maybe they just saw it and found out just like we did.”

“Adrián, stop worrying about our agents for a minute and look at me.”

He looked so fearful—for me. He’d already experienced this nightmare. This sense of helplessness and terror that everything he’d worked to build for the past nearly fifteen years, from the moment we’d started playing competitive football, had been for nothing. The contracts, the comradery, the fanbase and the brand we’d both worked to build—ruined by something neither of us could control. Wanting each other. Maybe even . . . more.

My chest clenched. God, there was definitely so much more between us, and I wasn’t even being given the chance to explore it. To figure out whether we would have continued discreetly sleeping together, or seeing each other, after we got back on the field. Maybe even after the season.

“I’ll fix this.”

I blinked. “What?”

Simeon forced a smile, but it was too big. Too manic. His eyes were a little too wide. “Boo, this is easy stuff. Your face isn’t in the picture. I can squash these rumors with a few words.”

My brow puckered. “Wait, what? Why?”

“Because you’re not ready for this,” he said bluntly. “I can see it in your face. It’s a mistake—”

“Me kissing you wasn’t a mistake. You were upset and I wanted you to feel better.”

The strain in Simeon’s expression intensified. He took a deep breath.

“Adrián, please. Just let me fix this. I don’t want you to go through what I went through for the past few months. Not when you just figured out who you are a few days ago.” His hands squeezed me gently. “And not when I know who you’re going back to in the next few weeks. There’s no way Rocky will let this slide.”

“Fuck Rocky,” I said harshly. “He’s nothing to me. But you—”

Simeon covered my mouth with his hand and closed his eyes very briefly. “Please just let me fix this, Adrián. We can figure out the rest later.”

Could I do it, though? Was I enough of a coward to let him go out there and lie?

“Please don’t expose what we have to those vultures before we can figure it out for ourselves,” he pleaded. “They’ll ruin it.”

And just like that, I caved. “Okay,” I croaked.

Simeon inclined his head in a sharp nod. He smiled bravely. “I got this, baby. But you’ll have to keep an open mind.”

I didn’t know what he meant, and at the moment I couldn’t process it. With every step he took towards the door, I felt farther away from him, and I panicked. My vision went funny, darkening at the sides, and my knees weakened. What was wrong with me? I’d played football in full pads on the field in over a hundred-degree heat. Why couldn’t I withstand this?

My eyes followed Simeon as he headed for the door, and I forced my feet to do the same. He held out a single hand to thwart me from going outside, but I pressed my ear to the door once he was on the other side.

“Well, good morning to y’all too.”

A cacophony of shouts answered his greeting, a jumble of questions about me, him, us, and how long we’d been keeping our relationship a secret. Simeon answered them all with a single booming laugh—a laugh he was famous for, and which quieted them all with the mere power of his charm.

“Come on, now, y’all,” he said in his usual jolly manner. “I woulda shut this foolishness down days ago if my phone hadn’t been dead and electricity out, but you gotta know better than this. A kid tweets because I got him in trouble with his parent, and y’all jump on the first crumb of gossip like some hungry-ass pigeons.”

“So you’re saying it’s not true?” someone shouted. “It sure looked like you two!”

“This is Brooklyn, man. You know how many out-and-proud gay dudes who are all big and jacked up there are round these parts? Get serious.” Another booming laugh, this one tinged with derision. “Now don’t get me wrong, do not get me wrong . . . Bravo is a good-looking man, but there’s a few major flaws with this here rumor. First off—I don’t fuck with football players. There’s only so much testosterone I can take, and I got enough.”