The guys are on my back porch waiting for me. I give them the rundown of my meeting and try my best to figure out what the hell to do. I plan on telling Ari everything but really want to calm down first. We’re discussing Alex’s delusional mentality when Sophie runs around the corner frantically.
“Where’s Ari?” she asks breathlessly, panic written on her face.
“Not home yet, why?”
“This is not good. Shit, shit, shit. Reed, you need to sit down. I need to show you something. I’m not sure what is happening but it’s not good.”
“Can you just spit it out, Soph, you’re killing me. I’ve had a shitty morning.”
“That may explain this. Don’t think I’m crazy, but when you and Ari got back together, I started following your social presence. And today you blew up.”
“I don’t have a social presence unless you count what the team or endorsements put out there.”
“Yes, you do, and today they went balls to the wall crazy. Someone got a hold of Davis’s original birth certificate and posted it. Then there are pictures with you and Alex at breakfast. Most of them are you walking away and her crying. The captions are not good.” She shows me some of the pictures on her phone.
“I guess that explains my last thirty minutes in hell.” Ari says tearfully from behind us.
I spin around and anger builds in my chest. Her eyes and cheeks are puffy. She’s trembling in the doorway. Davis is running around behind her acting normal.
“Angel, what’s wrong?” I go to her and pull her to me. She wails against my chest. Sophie comes up and hugs her from the other side. To my surprise, Luke does the same. She’s shaking so hard, I’m sure he can feel it through Sophie’s small body.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Trey grab beer and water out of the fridge. We stand there for a few minutes until Ari calms down a bit and pushes back. We give her room for some air and she wipes her face several times before speaking.
“The party was going great until the end. The parents were all hanging out, discussing our summer, then it got very quiet. I went to get a drink and when I came back, no one would stand next to me and the looks started. Some of the mom’s I don’t know well, started whispering so I called Davis to go. I had a gut feeling it was about us. When I was putting his shoes on Travis came over and said he didn’t believe a word and to hold my head high. I still had no idea what he was talking about until another mother made the comment ‘It’s women like me that give all women a bad name’. She went on to say intentionally trapping a man with a child, especially when he is already involved with someone is a low blow.
“I got out of there as fast as I could. Davis questioned me the whole way home why we didn’t say goodbye.”
I sit her down in my lap and rub her back soothingly.
“Reed, I take it this morning didn’t go well?”
“No, babe, it didn’t. I’m not really sure how to explain it. It was more than stalker tendencies. She was obsessed with me.” Even though I don’t think it’s the right time, I tell her the whole story.
Sophie’s phone buzzes constantly with news feeds. I finally give her a look and she turns it off.
“You know, Reed, never in a million years, did I expect to be made out as ‘the other woman’. I knew people would make assumptions about us, but I didn’t think I would have to defend myself against someone you don’t even like.”
“Ari, you never have to defend yourself. You don’t say anything and I’ll take care of this.” As if on cue, my cell rings and I see my agent calling.
“Connor, now’s really not a good time.” I don’t even greet him.
“I suspect not considering your local popularity just plummeted in the matter of a few minutes. I’m not sure of all the details, but it sounds like you scorned your longtime girlfriend.”
“That’s bullshit. You know I never had a longtime girlfriend. Until Ari there hasn’t been anyone.”
“What the hell is this then?”
I sigh and excuse myself to walk away and tell him the story; Connor listens without interruption. When I’m done, he is silent for a minute making me nervous.
“Okay, Reed, my professional advice is to make a statement. I’ll have someone call you later and you can say something brief and vague dispelling the rumors and asking for privacy regarding your family. For my personal advice, get your family and get back home. Get a state of the art alarm system in your house and make sure you’re protected. Remember the incident with the player in Tennessee a few years ago? That was nasty and he was seeing that woman. Remember Selena? The president of her fan club claimed to love her and shot her in the back. Obsession does strange things to people.”