Page 2 of The Marriage Playbook

He turned and jogged off down the field before Sandusky had a chance to respond. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Mark drawing his arm back to pass.

Now Sandusky will see who he’s dealing with. I’ll put humility in him. Teach him to respect his elders.

The ball flew through the air. Liam followed it with his gaze, picking up his pace and positioning himself perfectly to make the catch⁠—

Something slammed into him hard from the left, knocking him to the ground.

For a moment, Liam was too stunned to react or even to realize what had happened. He shouldn’t have been vulnerable to a tackle in a practice drill like this. He lay on his back, staring up at the sky.

Then the sound of whooping reached his ears.

He sprang to his feet. Sandusky was prancing around in high spirits, the ball held aloft in his hands. And Liam realized what had happened. The kid had gone for the catch on a pass meant for him and had knocked him to the ground in the process.

Fury swept through him. First the insults and the blatant disrespect, and now this?

He launched himself at Sandusky, knocking him to the ground. His hands balled into fists, but he managed to restrain himself from punching the younger man.

“Hey!” Mark shouted as Liam pinned Sandusky down.

Sandusky was so taken aback by the sudden tackle that he didn’t even fight back. If Liam had wanted to hit him, he could have done so. Sandusky was smaller than he was, too, and Liam was pleased to realize he wasn’t as strong. Liam’s off-season training regimen had obviously been the better one.

He lifted the kid by the shoulders and slammed him down again. “Watch where you’re going,” he growled. “That was my pass.”

“Is that the only reason you’ve caught so many passes?” Sandusky managed through gritted teeth. “Everyone else just gets out of your way and lets you make the catch?”

“During practice drills they do. This is what you did on your college team? Just ran around plowing into people? No wonder you think you’re such a hot shot. People probably started running away the moment they saw you coming, right? That’s not how it’s going to work here in the pros. You aren’t the star of this team.”

Sandusky just laughed. Liam saw red. If this kid wasn’t careful, he was going to get punched. That wasn’t something Liam wanted to do, but he was having trouble controlling himself in the face of such blatant disrespect.

There were hands on his arms, pulling him away. He allowed it to happen without struggling. He’d made his point, gotten his own back against Sandusky. Even when he was up on his feet, Mark kept a firm grip on his arm as though afraid he was going to launch himself at the new kid again, but Liam had done what he’d wanted to do. In fact, he was grateful for his friend’s intervention. This had stopped things from going farther than they needed to go, and that was a good thing.

Sandusky struggled to his feet and backed away several paces. “He’s crazy,” he grumbled. “Old fool. He ought to be retired immediately if he can’t control himself better than that.”

Coach Reeves and a few of the other players had come running over and were now standing around them. The coach looked like steam was about to pour out of his ears. “What’s the meaning of this? You were supposed to be doing a simple passing drill.”

“The old man can’t handle a little competition,” Sandusky growled.

“Competition? You charged into me like a freight train for no reason,” Liam snarled. He looked over at the coach. “He’s completely out of control. He ought to be benched until he can manage himself a little better.”

“It’s football,” Sandusky spat. “Don’t tell me you’re too delicate to take a hit.”

That was enough to rile Liam up again, even though he’d sworn to himself that he was finished with this fight. He lunged toward Sandusky, but Mark held him back.

“Coach,” Mark said, “it might be best if these two warm up separately for the rest of the morning. Hot tempers, you know how it is.”

“I do know how it is, but I wouldn’t have expected it from a veteran member of this team,” the coach said with a frown. “Very well. Sandusky, you continue passing drills with Lawrence. Sims, go do some sprints.”

Liam’s jaw dropped. He was being sent to do sprints while Sandusky got to continue the drill the two of them had been working on? It was outrageous. It was as if he was the one who had been out of line, when it should have been clear to anyone that Sandusky was responsible for what had happened.

But the look in Coach Reeves’ eyes was sharp and dangerous, and Liam could see there was nothing to be gained by arguing. He turned and set off at a run.

Behind him, he could hear Sandusky laughing.

CHAPTER 2

LIAM

“Iwouldn’t worry about it too much,” Mark said, pouring more whiskey out of the bottle and into the glass in front of Liam. “Coach is trying to make sure the new kid doesn’t feel like he’s out of place on the team, that’s all. He’s just trying to show Sandusky that he has his back.”