AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“She lied to you?” Sophia sounds horrified.
“If I’d known she was married, let alone who she was married to, I never would have touched her. Which she knew, I guess. Or wasn’t willing to risk. So, yeah, she lied to me.”
“Why didn’t you say that when the story came out?”
“I thought the whole thing would blow over. People hook up in bars every night. I was the star of a team that most people had never heard of. Soccer isn’t as popular in the States as it is here. She married a rich man twice her age. Nothing about it seemed that special. By the time I realized it wouldn’t go away quickly or quietly, the press had already written the narrative. I had a…reputation. Drinking. Girls. Fighting. No one had a hard time believing I’d decided to hook up with the owner’s wife. No one ever even asked me if I had. People only care about the truth if it’s juicier than the story, and it rarely is. I got released a couple of days after it happened. Anything I said after getting cut would have been written off as bitterness. I needed the story to die down as fast as possible, not give it new life while my agent was scrambling to find me another team to play for.”
I rub an old scar on my third knuckle.
“Now, she’s saying we had an affair. She did an interview that’s coming out soon. My agent got ahold of an early copy. I found out on Monday, and it’s why my week was so shitty.”
Sophia inhales sharply. “How can she do that? Just lie about something like that?”
“People lie all the time. The more compelling it is, the better. More people read about it. More people talk about it. More people believe it. And I never challenged her version of events before, how she conveniently forgot to say I hadn’t known who she was. There are rumors she and her husband are getting divorced, so she’s probably trying to embarrass him even more.”
“So, you’re still not going to do anything?”
“I’m going to do something. I’m putting out a statement, saying she’s lying. But that won’t do much. Her side of the story is what people would rather think happened, so it’s what they’ll believe. I’ll just look like the guy who had an affair and is now lying about it. Oldest fucking story in the book.”
Sophia’s silent, and I’m still too cowardly to look over at her.
“I’m sorry, Will.”
Her sympathy burns like rubbing alcohol poured on an open wound. I don’t want it, and I definitely don’t deserve it.
“I’m not the happy ending, serious relationship guy, Sophia,” I tell her.
Something she knows. Something I don’t need to say. But it seems important after what happened between us earlier. I had been so…unprepared, which had never happened before. I wasn’t expecting her to show up here. I definitely wasn’t expecting things to go where they did. I definitely hadn’t anticipated that giving a shit about a girl would feel like this—a rusty saw separating my chest.
“You’re a casual sex kind of guy,” she says softly.
Our conversation in the busy bar that night feels a million miles away from the two of us tucked away from the world on this blue couch, which I picked out because it was the same color as her eyes. Aside from saving my soccer career, she’s the one thing I care about in this country.
“I’m a guy who’s trying to fix some mistakes, not repeat them.”
“You’re comparing me to her?”
“No. I’m comparing me to me. It was a miracle Kluvberg picked me up. It won’t happen again if I get released from here.”
“You said you didn’t give a fuck who my brother was.”
The saw is back, slicing away.
“I don’t. You’re your own person, and you should never feel diminished to less. But…” I exhale. I’m dancing around the truth, and we both know it. “The season’s gone pretty shitty so far. I’m averaging fifteen minutes a game. I haven’t started once. I’ve scored one goal. The guys tolerate me, but I’m not part of the team. If Beck found out what happened between us earlier, do you think he’d pass to me at the next match? Do you think he’d mention to Wagner that I should be out on the field more?”
Right now, I despise Cassandra Owens more than I ever have before. If I’d known she would end my career in Seattle—if I’d known who she was, period—I would never have touched her. But I had no fucking clue that night would collapse my career.
I know exactly how sleeping with Sophia Beck could blow up what little remains. And it’s more than that. She deserves a good guy.
I’ve never committed murder. Never purposefully swindled people out of their savings the way my dad liked to.
But I’m not a good guy. I’m selfish and reckless, and I’ve made no shortage of mistakes. Many of which I’m still paying for.
“I can’t control who my brother is, Will.” Her tone is annoyed, and she has every reason to be.
She’s lumping me in with every other guy who’s pursued her solely because of her last name. Like that asshole who took her to that scrimmage the first time we met without bothering to find out she’d rather spend an afternoon at an art museum.
It pisses me off. I’m not scared of or awed by Adler Beck. Sophia is her own person and has the right to make her own choices.
