Out of Bounds - Quick Snap

“We’ve got some time off between games that we were using for interviews and stuff, but we’re home for a week, so long as we don’t miss training,” Hayden explained as he sipped on a diet ginger ale.

“Shoulda gone into a man’s sport,” Jason snickered, winking at his son then looking at the glass he was drinking from and wincing. “Diet ginger ale, it spits in the face of all that’s holy.”

“Shut up,” he grumbled back. “I don’t want to push Coach’s good humor right now.”

That I could understand, which was why I was drinking a diet Dr Pepper.

“So, how’s this going to go down?” Will asked, smiling when the bartender passed him his sparkling water. What good boys we were. “Meg doesn’t want to lose Ashley from the WAGs, so you need to fix it ASAP.”

The WAGs—Wives And Girlfriends—had been blowing up Ashley’s phone when I left, showing moral support and inviting her to things.

I’d been struggling to leave her after the day we’d had, but then the texts and calls had started and Meg had turned up to keep her company, and it’d made it a little easier.

Still, I had a hand on my phone just in case she needed me.

“She’s not going to be lost from the WAGs,” I assured him. “But I want LaValle and Missy to regret every single cent of the money they were paid for their lies.”

All of the men at the table made noises of agreement with me.

See, for decent men, there was a moral code. Making up a petty lie about your ex-girlfriend cheating on you with a pro football player for money and attention wasn’t unheard of, whatever floats your boat.

But to say in the story you sold about the types of sex the aforementioned ex enjoyed, and how you’d only just ‘pulled out of her’ when she bid on the pro footballer at a charity function for a night of hot sex? And the details he’d added about preferences and inviting other people into the bed… That was just gross and fucked up.

All it would take was one look at Ashley to know it was a lie.

In fact, one look at Cam LaValle and you’d know his micro-dick wouldn’t be able handle that much action—ever!

But not everyone in the world wanted to accept that the stories in gossip magazines were lies, they thought they were nothing but the truth.

‘I was knocked up by an orange alien who came out of the Sound and lay me on a bed of floating petals in the water while we did it’—they believe that shit happened. It was crazy!

There were also enough true stories about high profile sports players in the news, sadly, so especially in cases like ours, people believed it.

He could have put her in danger, wide open to someone attacking her if they caught her out on her own.

That was going to change, though.

And what Missy had said about me, the claims of Ashley outbidding her at the Lust for Life function, how she’d threatened her in the bathrooms, how she’d been ‘inundated’ by hate mail and attacks on social media because of her—it was just nuts and was the shit that should’ve stopped in high school.

“So, what’s the plan of action?” Will asked as everyone gathered around us.

Of course they knew we had a plan. Things like this don’t happen to you and then just disappear, Jason knew that firsthand.

No, fight fire with fire.

And that’s what we were doing, except the goal was to get Ashley’s reputation back seeing as how she’d taken the most dangerous hit, and to get both of them far away from her.The next morning…We were all sitting waiting for Will to ‘bump’ into Cam at the store.

When he’d mentioned that he regularly saw him at the small store he stopped at every Wednesday when they got fresh fruit delivered, which he swore was the best in Seattle, we’d asked him if he’d mind doing this.

Rajesh had spoken to his friends at the Seattle Police Department, and two police officers in sweats and t-shirts would be with him for it to act as witnesses. Recording him without his consent was illegal, but witnesses who happen to be off duty officers?

My phone was currently on a call with Will’s, which was sitting in his pocket, and we were all grouped around it, listening to them discuss how to tell if a cantaloupe was ripe or not.

“If they mention squeezing a cantaloupe one more time, I’ll lose my mind,” Hayden grunted.

Just then, we heard a familiar voice greet him.

“Hey, Will. Nice to see you, man.”

Cam LaValle was trying to sound breezy, but we’d seen him looking through the store’s window to find Will.

“Oh, hey! Cam, isn’t it?”

By remembering his name, Cam would be thinking it was because of his soccer abilities and his ego would be loving it at that moment.