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“Son,” he replies.
Anger beats like a kick drum in my chest. My eyes say everything to him that I can’t.What are you doing here?
Relax, his say.
Right. As if.
“Alex called me in this morning after the story broke,” he explains out loud, but it falls on deaf ears.
Oakley Hutton is a Vancouver Warriors legend, and even though he retired fairly early on in his career, it was never because he was losing his skill. If anything, he was continuing to get better each season, his age be damned.
His relationship with the organization is tight-knit. The very angry owner watching our encounter at this very moment shared a handful of Saturday dinners with us while I was growing up, his late father being the previous owner during my father’s career. Maybe that means I shouldn’t be surprised to see my father here right now.
It doesn’t even matter. This isn’t my father’s career, nor his business. It’s mine, and I should have been notified before he was brought into the mix.
“Your dad dealt with his fair share of publicity nightmares over the course of his career, Maddox. And considering your brother is also involved in this, I wanted him here. Is that going to be a problem?” Alexander asks me.
Shoving back my annoyance, I shake my head. “No, sir.”
“Good. Then let’s get right into it. The press is swarming like flies on a cow’s ass. This won’t blow over easily. They have video footage of you getting your ass kicked by that guy outside of Ralph’s. They have statements from a few of the people outside who said it was, in fact, a drug deal gone sideways, and the photos of Noah throwing the guy a wad of cash don’t help your case. Now, we know that wasn’t what happened, but I’m going to need you to take a drug test before you leave here today and another before the game Tuesday.”
“Not a problem.”
I’ve gone twenty-six years without touching drugs, and I’m not about to fuck that record up now.
“Then there’s the other matter we need to discuss,” he adds, and my stomach drops.
“What other matter?”
Dad steps up beside me, the air tense between us. “Roy Heights.”
My blood runs cold as memories rattle the walls of the mental box I keep them locked inside. “What about him?”
“I got a call from him this morning. He tried to make it seem as if he were doing us a favour by letting us know beforehand, but we know that was just an attempt at a power play. He filmed a segment on Sports Weekly this morning to ‘come clean’ about what really happened between you two eight years ago. That dirty bastard has been waiting for something like last night to happen so he would have an opportunity to bury you,” Dougie says, his voice tight, strained.
Dad places a sturdy hand on my upper back and moves it up and down. “All he has is lies and a bitter soul. It won’t work, son.”
“This is why you’re here. Not because of what happened last night,” I note as everything starts to click into place. “What did he say on the show? What lies? Did he mention her?”
My boss steps into my line of sight and scowls. His eyes are dark. So dark. “First, we need a plan on how to clean this up fast. There’s not much truth to what he’s claiming, but there is some. We’ve done a good job of keeping it hidden, but there’s only so much we can leave up to chance.”
“What did he say?” I ask again, and even as Dad digs his fingers into my back in an attempt to silence me, I can’t seem to stop talking. Not after I’ve heard Braxton’s father’s name for the first time since—
“He said that you fired him as your agent when you were eighteen because his daughter broke your heart and that because of your arrogance back then, he struggled to find any more clients. When he was asked about the events of last night, he also hinted at past drug use and violence as a reason why the relationship between you and his daughter never worked. He blames you for his terrible career and is proving that he isn’t afraid of lying to get even,” Dougie says.
It’s all lies. Well, almost all of it. His daughter didn’t just break my heart. She tossed it into a shredder and then took the pieces and stomped and spit on them. Still, that isn’t why I fired Roy from his position as my agent all those years ago. That came after he ruined the first year of my career with his fake promises and my misplaced trust.
I draw in a slow breath to try and keep from throwing my fist into a wall. My composure is slipping quicker by the second, and as three sets of eyes watch me cautiously, I only get more wound up.
“When does it go live? What can we do?” I mutter.
“This afternoon. There’s nothing we can do to stop it from releasing. The only thing we can do now is try and deal with the aftermath of it,” Dad says.
“There’s nothing we can do? Seriously?” I look at Alexander when I ask the question, my stare incredulous. “You can’t really be letting this get out.”
His eyes narrow. “What is it you would like me to do? This is your mess, Maddox. You’re lucky I’m not cutting my losses with you and letting you drown in this.”
“He’s right, kid. This story is going to come out whether we like it or not, and we need a way to cauterize the bleeding before your career has the chance to die,” Dougie adds.
