Page 42 of Tiger Lilies and Tight Ends

She thinks about this for a moment and then asks, “How do you fake a relationship for that long?”

“Very easily, apparently. Turns out, she was with someone else the whole time. The two of them planned the whole charade. The night I was drafted, she had gone to the bathroom in our hotel room, and her phone dinged in her bag. I went to grab it for her, and it was a different phone. She had two. The text on the phone said, “Get the watch,” and every alarm in my head went off. Over our time together, random things had gone missing. I didn’t think anything of it, between the locker room, hotels, people coming and going, whatever, but that one second it took for me to read that text, everything I thought I knew changed. It was her.”

Her mouth falls open. “Oh my God. Did you confront her?”

I shake my head. “Not that night. I waited to see if my watch disappeared, and it did.”

She gasps. “What did you do?”

“I went to my agent, Michael, and asked him what to do, knowing there is more than one person suddenly in on it. We planned for me to have meetings at his office in Atlanta, when really, we set cameras up around my apartment and at the front door. While I was supposedly gone, Marissa and the guy came over. They snooped through my things, and he called her Clarissa. This had Michael hiring a private investigator to learn exactly who she was, who they were.”

Redness is climbing up Lily’s chest and neck. She’s upset for me, and I know it shouldn’t, but it does endear her to me. Even more so than she already is.

“Who was she?”

“Someone who, in the end, tried to blackmail me for a lot of money.” Just saying those words has my insides hardening. It’s such an appalling situation, and I hate that it happened to me. That I let her manipulate me so much that I never even saw it happening, and right under my nose too. In my own home.

“Tyler.”

That redness moves to her cheeks and ears.

“They planned the whole thing. From beginning to end. Marissa was not twenty-one, or a student at Miami. Clarissa was twenty-six, married to a guy named Ian, kept a fake fully furnished studio apartment to throw me off, and was a thief. They had stolen from me without me knowing, opened credit cards under my name, videoed her and I together being intimate, all kinds of stuff. Their threats to release it all were quickly squashed by my attorney and his computer forensics colleagues. The whole thing was premeditated, right down to the bar where we met. They saw the dollar signs of the NFL coming from a young ‘hearts in his eyes’ guy, and thought they would be able to capitalize on it. Dumb fucks are what they are. Instead, they landed in jail. It was supposed to be eight years, but both were released early after five. Last I heard, the lawyers slapped them both with restraining orders, and they’ve since moved to Texas.”

She reaches across the little table and places her hand on my arm. Her hand is warm under the sun. “I don’t know what to say.”

“There’s nothing to say now. It was a long time ago. I’m over it, but as you’ve already figured out, I keep my cards close for good reason, and I have trust issues.”

Her hand rubs up and down my arm a few times until she eventually reaches my hand where she tangles our fingers together. Lily’s hand is so small in mine. Her nails are painted a light pink, and I like it. I like her.

“You weren’t stupid. They tricked you in the worst way.”

“Doesn’t matter anymore,” I tell her, tightening my fingers around hers.

“It does. I hope you know I will never break your trust.”

“I know. That’s why I told you.”

Chapter 17

Team Chat

Ryder: Someone needs to explain to me why Tyler always gets his own room.

Sully: Maybe you should mind your own business.

Ryder: What? Why? Clearly, there’s a way to make this happen, and that’s what I need to do?

Sully: Why, Rookie? You room with me.

Ryder: Exactly.

Sully: What’s that supposed to mean?

Dylan: It means he doesn’t like your superstitious rituals.

Sully: There is nothing wrong with my rituals. They mean something.

Dylan: No, they don’t.