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Released from his contract, former Rebels player Calvin Ramsey steps out with a Florida woman currently under police investigation.
Her stomach sank to her toes. She grappled for words and failed, her whole world feeling off-kilter.
What had she done?
Cal’s voice sounded like a stranger’s when he spoke again. “I think you owe me an explanation.”
Chapter Ten
Her response wasdamning. The blood had drained from her face and she struggled to speak.
Was ittrue?
Cal’s agent had sent him the image and caption from one of the more sleazy blogs that followed baseball players’ personal lives—a blog he wouldn’t have checked himself if Dex hadn’t texted it to him with a question mark. His first instinct had been to think it must be clickbait—a lie with no relation to the truth. But Josie’s white face and failure to speak had told him otherwise.
He’d known she was keeping secrets. But not in a million years would he have guessed she’d withhold that kind of bombshell from him. From hismother, for crying out loud, who’d hired her. How could she betray his trust this way? What did that say about her character?
And if she’d cost him his chance at a career comeback?
He couldn’t even comprehend that kind of sucker punch coming from a woman he’d started to care for. He took his phone back from her, shutting off the screen. The image hadn’t appeared anywhere with a big media reach, but little clickbait images like this could turn into major problems within hours in the current culture of social media sharing. He’d seen it happen to plenty of other athletes, and he’d always wondered how a player could put himself in that kind of position.
“It’s not what you think.” She leaned toward him, her fingers touching his arm, but he pulled back, still reeling from this news.
He’d felt a moment’s regret at hurting her, but damn it, he needed answers if he was going to get on top of a potential scandal.
“I don’t know what I think, and that’s not an explanation.” Anger roiled, hot and fast, an acidic churn in his gut.
Hurt lurked underneath the anger, but he tamped that down. Wouldn’t acknowledge it when she’d played him so completely.
“I didn’t think she’d really turned me in,” she said softly, more to herself. Arms wrapped around her midsection, she moved to a window overlooking the garden, her blue eyes focused on some distant point. “I hoped she was just bluffing.”
One of the Labs—he couldn’t keep them straight—ducked its head under her palm and nosed at Josie’s thigh, whimpering sympathetically.
Cal didn’t share the empathy. His jaw clenched so hard he risked his back teeth. Why hadn’t Josie simply denied it, if wasn’t true? The answer seemed obvious. Painful.
He rose to his feet but remained in the middle of the kitchen, not going near her for fear some of his unwanted feelings would get the better of him.
“Would it be easier if I phoned the police and asked them to shed some light on the situation?” He was direct. To the point.
Because he needed answers now. If his career was going to tank, he wanted to know what he’d be facing in the firestorm to come.
She took a deep breath and turned wounded eyes on him, but something in his expression made her spine snap straight again. Whatever vulnerability he’d glimpsed in her vanished.
“My last employer—my mother—owns a building of low-income apartments where I have long held the unenviable position of building supervisor.” She dragged in a breath, pinching the bridge of her nose for a moment, as if to ward off a pain before stroking the Lab’s head with her fingers. “I have zero budget to address tenant concerns thanks to my mother’s habit of spending more than she makes. Which means I am often in the position of fixing things with more duct tape and ingenuity than actual resources.”
“Go on.” So far, it sounded believable. He remembered her ease with the ceiling fan he’d installed. Still, he kept his distance. Not trusting himself to move too close to her and fall victim to the tempting scent of her.
“I do the best I can for the tenants on limited resources. When an eighty-five-year-old widow on a respirator calls me because her air conditioning doesn’t work, believe me, I’m motivated to get it up and running for her, even though my mother’s typical response is something like, ‘well, no one else is complaining.’” Her blue eyes flashed grit and determination, her shoulders tense. And then she huffed out a sigh and leaned back against the window frame. “But I’m not a licensed contractor for that kind of work.”
He’d heard that contracting without a license was a bigger deal in some states than others, but he hadn’t been aware it could be prosecuted criminally. Especially for the picture that Josie was painting him, which made it sound like she’d been doing her best in an impossible situation.
Cal tried to connect the dots in her story, needing to get a handle on how far he would be dragged over hot coals for this. “And someone turned you in?”
“My mother, apparently.” The words rasped from her throat with raw emotion. She shoved a hand through her curls still unruly from sleeping on them.
And he hated how much her mother’s betrayal seemed to have hurt her. But could he really afford to empathize with a woman who’d let him walk into this P.R. nightmare with zero warning? His temples throbbed.
“But you were providing the service on her behalf, correct?” He didn’t fully understand the family dynamic since she’d never talked about her mother before.
