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That was a good point, actually, and it made me feel a little bit better.
“Try not to worry,” he said, pressing a kiss to my forehead. Much easier said than done, but I gave him a tight smile. I tried to take his words to heart, but my stomach swam with anxiety as I kissed him goodbye and headed out to my car.
As I was walking down the wide, deserted hallway that led to the arena’s main exit, Kane stepped out from around a corner. He eyed me, his lips curling into that despicable grin.
“Did you bring enough pussy to share with the entire class?” he asked. I stopped short, staring at him in disbelief. Then I found my voice.
“What is your fucking problem?” I shouted. He didn’t flinch at my outburst, and he didn’t back off.
“I’m just asking,” he said with a nonchalant shrug. “From what I hear, your little friend Lola was more than happy to take one for the team. Or onefromthe team, I guess I should say.”
Now I wasn’t sure if I wanted to punch him in his smug mouth more for my sake or Lola’s. My best friend was a sex-positive queen and a dirty rat like Kane shouldn’t even be allowed to speak her name.
“Okay, well how about this,” he said, smirking and taking a menacing step toward me. “If you come in the bathroom and suck my cock right now, I’ll keep what I know about you, Jamie, and Rowan to myself.” I stared at him in disgust. “But if you don’t, I’m going to tell Branson everything. I’ll run my mouth until your name is mud in this one-horse shit-kicker town.” His lips curled. “So, what’s it going to be?”
The part of me that didn’t want Rowan to be fired was wrestling with the part that still wanted to punch Kane in the face. Words wouldn’t come. My pounding heart was drowned out by a high pitch whine as I struggled to gather myself, to tell him to get the fuck away from me.
Now he did take a big step back, and suddenly I could breathe again. As I sucked cool air into my lungs, he gave me that obnoxious smirk and an exaggerated wink.
“How about this? I’m feeling generous. I’ll give you time to think it over. But I expect to hear something from that pretty little mouth before Saturday’s game.”
With that, he brushed past me and swaggered back down the hall toward the locker room. I turned to watch him go with shaking hands, my eyes narrowed to teary slits.
86.
Hope
Speedgoat was booked for three more major events after our success at the Casper Cares gala, but Thacker was just as worried about money as always. At least he wasn’t lashing out at me over it anymore. We’d reached an…impasse. But as my relationship with him changed, I felt more pressure than ever to help keep his costs down.
Still, my mind was elsewhere as I prowled around the kitchen, taking inventory and checking the prep work. I kept seeing Kane’s face, the malice dancing in his eyes.
I couldn’t believe that asshole was so entitled and delusional that he thought he could blackmail me into giving him sexual favors. Fat fucking chance. But I couldn’t let him throw Rowan under the bus, either. I needed a third solution. My brain was spinning like an empty chamber, coming up with nothing.
I slowed to a stop behind Ronnie, watching her chop onions with laser precision while my mind was elsewhere. A few seconds later, I was jolted back to reality when she dropped her knife on the stainless steel prep table and burst into tears. I looked around in confusion at the line cooks and the dishwasher, who were all turning away, pretending they hadn’t been staring.
“Ronnie, what—?”
She pushed past me and fled to the employee bathroom, slamming the door shut and locking it behind her. I ran after her, banging on the flimsy door when I reached it.
“Ronnie! Are you okay?”
She didn’t answer me, but I could hear the stifled sound of her sobs.
“Will you please let me in and tell me what’s going on?” I asked. I had a sick feeling in my stomach. I knocked again, and after a long, quiet pause, I heard the doorknob’s lock click from the other side. I twisted it and poked my head around to see her dropping back onto the toilet. Her face was puffy and tear-stained. She glanced up at me and then hung her head as I stepped into the bathroom and closed the door behind me.
“I’m sorry,” she said in a watery little voice.
“That’s all right,” I said. I thought she was apologizing for running out of the kitchen. She shook her head.
“It’s not,” she said. “I’ll quit if you want me to.”
“Quit?” I asked, confused. “Why would I want you to quit? Everyone has bad days sometimes, Ronnie. That’s part of being human.” She looked up at me again, her bloodshot eyes searching my face.
“It’s more than a bad day. I’m not a thief. I didn’t mean to take so much chicken. But once I started, I couldn’t stop. We were hungry. Really hungry.” Understanding dawned on me, but I didn’t interrupt. I stared at her as the confession poured out of her. “My mom is sick, she can’t work, and with grocery prices shooting up like they have recently, her disability check and my pay here just wasn’t cutting it.” She trailed off, sniffling, and pulled some toilet paper off the roll to blot her eyes.
“Youtook the chicken?” I asked, incredulous. Her head snapped up.
“Of course I did,” she said. “You’ve been watching me like a hawk lately. I was sure you’d figured it out and were just waiting for me to crack. Well, here it is. I tried to take the cheapest meat in the freezer. I thought maybe no one would notice. But obviously, I was wrong.” Her voice was bitter, resigned. And I knew why. Thacker might just throw her bodily from the restaurant if I told him that she was the chicken thief.
