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“I’m not.” She sniffed. “This has all just been a lot.” She looked at Ryan’s two friends and smiled sadly. Humiliation weighed heavily in her gut. What must they all think of her? How was she supposed to work with the team when they’d all seen her like that? It didn’t matter that she hadn’t been aware of the video that didn’t change the fact that they had all seen her. It would have been one thing if she had Ryan’s support, but she didn’t. To the team, she was just some groupie. So much for keeping things professional. What if someone stupidly said something in front of the kids? What if they leered at her in that slimy way Simon had just done? God. The video might be gone, but it wouldn’t be forgotten. Why had she thought getting rid of the video would fix everything? This wasn’t over.
Her ears buzzed and her heart pounded in her chest as panic set in. There was no way she would spiral out of control in the parking lot. She took a deep breath. “Thanks again, you guys. It means a lot to me.”
The sound of a car pulling into the parking lot drew her attention. Ryan’s SUV slid into a stall. She didn’t have the energy to deal with that today. Peyton flicked her hand toward her car. “I’m going to get out of here so you can get to practice. Thanks again.”
“You don’t want to stay and talk to him?” Smitty asked.
“Nope. Not a good idea,” she replied before bolting to her car. Once inside, she quickly threw the car into gear. She caught sight of Ryan staring at her with a look of confusion on his face as she fled the parking lot.
Today had been hard enough without adding a confrontation with Ryan into the mix.
Chapter Eighteen
Ryan stared after Peyton’s car as she fled the parking lot. What had she been doing here? And why hadn’t she stuck around to talk to him?
He made his way over to Gonzo and Smitty. “Was that Peyton?” he asked.
Gonzo scratched the back of his neck before finally answering. “Um yeah.”
“What was she doing here?”
“When we got here she was giving Andy hell,” Smitty replied.
“Because he showed the video?”
Smitty shifted from one foot to the other. “Yeah, that too, but I think mostly she was pissed that there actually was a video.”
Ryan pulled up short. “What do you mean, actually was a video? She honestly didn’t know about it?”
“Didn’t seem to, no. She was pretty upset that he’d taken the video without her knowing.”
“What did Andy say?” Ryan asked. His mind raced as he tried to process what this all meant. “How did he take a video if she didn’t know?”
“No idea, but he didn’t seem too concerned about it, even when Peyton threatened to tell his wife he got all douchey and told her Carm wouldn’t care. Apparently, his wife is just happy to be along for the ride, however that looks,” Smitty said.
“Yeah right,” Gonzo scoffed. “If Carm knew he had a video of him with some other girl and he was showing it around the locker room that would be the last BJ he ever got because I’m pretty sure she’d do a Bobbit on him.”
“No shit,” Smitty laughed. “Whatever agreement they might have between them, she doesn’t strike me as the kind of woman who would be okay with her husband publicly showing a video of him with some other girl.”
“Guys, can we focus here? So Peyton was here to call Andy out on the video. What happened? Did she get it resolved? I mean, she left and you both seem chill, so I’m hoping she did but…” Fuck. Why didn’t she ask him for help?
“Yeah, we helped set him straight. No worries,” Smitty said.
“What does that mean?” Ryan’s body tensed. Jesus, normally you couldn’t shut these two up, and today it was like pulling teeth to get them to give him any information.
Gonzo’s lip curled as anger radiated off him. “It means we helped him realize he should delete the video.”
“Helped him how? Fuck, would you two just fucking explain?”
“What? I thought you broke up and were done with her. You didn’t want to talk about it, blah blah blah.” Smitty rolled his eyes.
Ryan clenched his jaw so hard he was surprised his teeth didn’t crack as he bit back the urge to grab his teammate by the neck and force him to talk. “Just because we broke up doesn’t mean I don’t care if she is treated well. And if Andy took that video without her knowing then he fucking needs to pay for that.”
“Chill dude, we explained it to him and he saw the error of his ways and deleted the video.” Smitty glanced at Gonzo and smirked as the two men exchanged a look.
Gonzo snorted. “Yeah, threats of jail will do that to you.”
“You threatened him with jail?” Ryan let out a harsh breath. How the hell had it come to that?
