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“What, you want to know ifI’moneof the many women who have made an anonymous post about him?” She crosses her arms and challenges me. The cold air outside is making her already pale skin look ghostly, and her long brown hair is framing her face and forming a small curtain for her to hide behind.
“I’m not here to accuse you of anything, Leah. This is just… it’s kind of messing up my family, you know? I’m just trying to get everything straight.”
“Have you been, like, waiting for me here?”
“Well, you wouldn’t answer any of my messages.”
“Yeah, and I thought that would’ve given you the hint.” She tries to go around me again, but I have to step in front of her path again. I can’t let the conversation end like this. I have to get answers. I have to know what the fuck is going on.
She growls and steps back from me again. “I don’t trust you. And I don’t trust your family.”
This makes my stomach stink, and my mouth goes dry. “Why don’t you trust us? Why don’t you trustme? You don’t even know me.”
“I know you well enough. Especially if you’re Derek Heed’s brother.”
I stick my hands into the pockets of my jeans. “Okay, that’s not really fair.” Just because I’m related to Derek doesn’t mean I’m like him. Before tonight, I had always wanted to be him, though.
She looks away from me, her jaw tense.
So, I continue. “Just—did Derek—You know… do anything to you while you were together?”
My heart is beating so fast that I think it might fly right out of my chest. I just hope she’s willing to answer the question. I hope this is it. This is the moment where I get to decide to fully commit to being on my brother’s team, or reevaluate the situation entirely.
“Brennan, please, let me pass.”
“Why won’t you just tell me?” I beg. My voice is growing angry, but I’m trying not to let it. “Leah, if he did something to you, I need to know.”
“Well, I’m not gonna talk to you about it. Besides, how should I know you and your family aren’t just trying to keep me quiet?”
My mouth hangs open as her words slam into me. They send my whole world twisting on its axis. All of my ideals of Derek. All of my thoughts and opinions. In a single second, they do a one eighty.
Seeing the expression on my face, Leah sighs. She knows she’s told me all I need to hear. Even if she didn’t mean to.
It’s like I have completely turned to stone as the rest of the world continues to whirl around me in a dizzying blur. I feel sick. My lungs have stopped working. The strength to hold myself upright has become almost overwhelming. I don’t want it to be true. I desperately need itnotto be.
But it is. And there is nothing I can do to change it.
Everything those women have been saying. All of those anonymous posts. They weren’t lying. My brother—my best friend—my idol—is a monster.
8
KENNETH
Derek Heed does a pretty damn good job acting like an innocent victim in all of this. Day after day, I keep heading to the stadium, getting interviews with anyone who will let me. I don’t know who Derek hired or what he’s promising people, but I can’t find anyone but Selena to back me up on these allegations, and I’m not allowed to interview her on record.
None of Derek’s teammates seem to have a single bad word to say about him. The only statements that Derek has released to the press are about how he’s not sure who is making these claims, but that they are false. The only thing that seems to have people questioning him is the fact that Selena hasn’t made a single appearance to the public ever since the night she showed up at my house.
Yeah. Selena’s been at my house for a while now. She’s more than welcome, of course. Her parents live across the country, and she doesn’t know anyone else in town. And I honestly would hold her hostage if she tried to go back toherhouse. Fine—not really, but I’m just worried about her.
I don’t know. She’s possibly the sweetest, funniest, most thoughtful woman I’ve ever met, and the thought of her spending the last five years trapped with a master manipulator, who has everyone in his life fooled, breaks my heart.
She’s the last person who deserves this. And I don’t know any of Derek Heed’s exes, but I know they don’t deserve this, either.
No one knows Selena is with me. According to what I’ve seen online and have been told by the coach and the team, Selena has been staying at home, out of the drama, because while these allegations are false, Selena doesn’t want to seem like she’s not an advocate for domestic abuse.
I even tried calling out to Derek the other day—after they won a game, and he came walking through the stadium hallways with a huge cocky grin on his face—to see if he knew where Selena was. He had snapped his head to me so quickly that I almost wondered if he broke his neck. Then the smile was wiped off his face, and he shoulder-checked me as he passed by, obviously refusing to comment.
I do wonder where he thinks she’s hiding, though. And I hope he never figures out that it’s my place. I want to keep Selena safe for as long as possible.
