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I blinked at him, playing stupid. I found that as a blonde woman, it was too easy to lure people, especially men, into underestimating me.
“I just don’t see what’s in it for me,” I said. He scoffed and tied his towel back in place before crossing his arms over his chest.
“You don’t care if I tell everyone that the new assistant coach is the bull in your hot-wife relationship with the team captain? Because I think Branson would be very interested in that information.”
I fought to stay calm. I had to keep my cool until he said something truly damning.
“And what is it you want from me to stop you from doing that?” I asked. I’d never been much of a fisherman despite my dad and brother’s multiple attempts to teach me. I realized as soon as the words were out of my mouth that I was trying to reel him in too quickly. His gaze shifted from gloating to suspicious, and his eyes swept down my body and back up. They lingered on my bag, where my phone was hiding.
“I find it hard to believe that you have two boyfriends and don’t know what the phrasesuck my cockmeans,” he snarked. I narrowed my eyes at him, biting the insides of my cheeks to keep in the tirade that was threatening to explode out of me.
“How do I know that you’ll be satisfied if I give you what you want?”
“You don’t,” he said with a smirk. “But that’s what you can do to buy my silence right now. For a little while.”
I glared at him, fighting back a wave of revulsion. He was a disgusting low-life. How long had he gotten away with treating women like this, for him to be this comfortable with blatantly blackmailing me?
“It really was you, wasn’t it?” I asked. I saw doubt creep into his eyes at my hard segue. “That night at Copper’s. Did you drug me? Or did you just see your opportunity and grab it?”
All expression left his face. He stared at me blankly for a long beat. And then his arrogant smile was back in place.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.
“I think you do.”
He took a menacing step toward me, his smile transforming into a snarl.
“Prove it,” he spat. When I said nothing, he smiled again. “That’s what I thought. You can’t prove shit. I, on the other hand, have all the receipts to back up my claims of fraternization to Branson. So, what’s it going to be?”
The world pulsed purple. Rage was like a dragon that had been sleeping in my chest but had just been prodded rudely into consciousness. It reared up, but I kept my face neutral.
“I guess I have no choice but to give you what you want,” I said resignedly, dropping my bag onto the massage table. Back to smirking, he loosened his towel with a flick of his wrist and let it fall to the floor.
I took a step toward him, closing the gap between us. I put my hands on his shoulders, and he grabbed my wrists.
“The only thing I want you to touch is my dick.” He tried to move my hand toward his cock but I clamped down, digging my fingernails into his skin.
“What—?” he started. I took advantage of his surprise and brought my knee up, hard and fast, between his legs.
Kane screamed like I’d stabbed him. He wrenched himself free from my grasp and stumbled backward. When I took another step toward him, baring my teeth, he snatched up his towel and ran out of the room, bare-assed.
I slammed the door behind him and pressed my back to it, breathless and giddy with the surge of adrenaline that was still coursing through me.
I hurried over to my bag and pulled my phone out to see that it had been successfully recording the whole time. The real test would be whether our words were too garbled to make out, with the microphone inside my purse. I pressed the red button to stop the recording, and then I slid the bar back to the start and turned up the volume.
89.
Rowan
I gritted my teeth, my blood boiling as I listened to Kane threaten Hope on the recording. I was ready to kill him just for the way he was speaking to her. A few seconds later, there was a thump and a girlish scream from the starting center, and I smiled with vicious satisfaction.
Branson had his head bowed over the phone and was listening closely. When the recording stopped, he stayed like that, bent over, almost like he’d gone to sleep.
“Sir?” I ventured after several seconds of deafening silence. “I know we’re headed into a really important game, and I know that my job is in jeopardy, based on the information you just heard. But I can’t send a guy like this out on the ice with my players. Fire me if you need to, but at least consider cutting him Kane the team as well.”
Finally, the franchise owner looked up. His salt-and-pepper eyebrows were bunched low over his calculating eyes. And then, to my shock, he chuckled.
“Relax, Rowan,” he said. I stared at him, confused. “You’re not in trouble, and I’m sure as hell not going to fire you.”
