Page 38 of The Secret of Emerald Cottage

“Completely bogus.” He pinned her with a potent gaze, willing her to believe him no matter what trash she’d read in the tabloids. “I’m not going to lie to you, Molly—I’m no Boy Scout. As a celebrity athlete, I’m exposed to a lot of temptation, and I didn’t always say no despite Aunt Lilly’s best efforts to keep me on the straight and narrow. But I always drew the line at drugs. Period.”

He sagged back in the chair, one arm loosely braced to the back of his head, the twitch of a smile hovering. “Whether it was Aunt Lilly pounding it into my brain that my body was the ‘temple of the Holy Spirit’ or my own relentless drive to succeed, I knew drugs would only hurt me, so I steered clear.” His mouth took a wry twist. “Until I couldn’t.”

“What do you mean?”

Jaw stiffening, he felt a familiar tic begin to throb in his temple. “I mean I was set up, Molly, by my coach’s wife. I knew what an outrageous flirt Alexandra was because the other guys warned me, and then she always came onto me at team events. But I just figured it would pass”—a nerve twittered in his cheek—“only it didn’t. It got worse.”

He lapsed into a hard stare past Molly’s shoulder, reliving the horror of the coach’s sexy wife brazenly trapping him in their elegant master bathroom at a crowded team party or waiting for him in her car next to his in the darkened parking lot. She’d made it abundantly clear what she wanted, but he’d managed to put her off with tease and innocent flirting. Only he learned all too quickly that it wasn’t innocent to her.

“What happened?” Molly whispered.

He cut loose with a grunt. “I learned just how stupid I was. She called with a personal invitation for dinner under the guise that the coach wanted to talk about making me team captain, but wanted to keep it quiet. As the team star prior to my arrival, the current captain made no bones about his extreme dislike of me. And trust me, I felt the same.”

Squinting at her, he measured a quarter inch of air between his forefinger and thumb. “Came this close to bashin’ the eejit’s head in once, but my temper almost derailed my career when I was rising in the ranks, so I learned to keep it under wraps through sheer grit.” He grunted. “That and an anger-management class, that is, mandated by a former coach. Anyway, the moron kept giving the coach attitude about all the play and press I was getting, and the more games I won, the worse it got. So the reason for the invite didn’t seem particularly far-fetched at the time, which is why I said yes because I wanted to talk Coach out of it to avoid further trouble.”

He kneaded his temple. “Yeah, right. Instead I walked right into it.” Snatching his paper napkin up, he listlessly tore a strip off and then another, barely aware while his mind lapsed back to the worst night of his professional life, eyes wandering into a glassy stare. “I should have run when I realized Coach wasn’t there, but she said he was on his way, so like an idiot, I stayed, opting for an iced tea instead of the alcohol she offered. About a quarter into the tea, I started feeling more relaxed, almost euphoric, so when she joined me on the couch and kissed me, I uh … well, I …”

He felt the shame and disgust even now as he lowered his head, eyes closed while he pinched the bridge of his nose, forcing the words out. “I kissed her back, thinking, why am I doing this? I started to get up, but she pulled me down, begging me to stay. She handed me my glass, then clinked hers to mine in a toast to forgive and forget, so I did. But when I took another drink, I suddenly felt more woozy and willing to give in.” Jaw tense, he closed his eyes. “It didn’t hit me till she began to unbutton my shirt”—his neck muscles spasmed— “that she’d put something in my tea.”

“Oh, Brec …”

He scrubbed his face with his hands, suddenly craving a hot, hot shower. He saw the entire nightmare through a fog in his brain—confused and dizzy as he’d stumbled toward the door, feeling abnormally weak when he tried to fend off her kisses while her fingers fumbled with his belt. She faltered when he shoved her away, her eyes flashing while she screamed obscenities and threats that barely registered as he all but tripped through the door, not really sure how he’d managed to get to his car. But he had.

And that’s when the nightmare really began.

“What happened next?” Molly whispered, and Brec suddenly realized he’d been staring listlessly at his napkin, which was now shredded beyond recognition.

Just like my life.

“I got to my car, but just barely. I was so tired and dizzy, I just sat there half dressed, finally dozing off”—a nerve flickered in his cheek—“until the police hauled me out and took me to jail.”

“What?!” Molly sat straight up, those blue eyes as round and wide as her untouched plate of dessert.

“Yep.” He kneaded his temple again where a headache was just starting to throb, lips skewing to the right. “That’s the day I learned the true meaning of a woman scorned. Because not only did she call the police, telling them I tried to force myself on her when I was high on drugs …” He heard Molly’s gasp as bile churned in his gut, but he held her gaze all the same, one side of his mouth ticking up in a pitiful stab at humor. “But she called the press too.”