Page 62 of He Has It All (Boston Brawlers Hockey)
“Ryan, I’ve been looking for you, honey.” Chelsea pulls me by my black tie and plants a big kiss on my lips, nudging the two women aside in the process.
Sam giggles furiously and I wrap an arm around her, forcing her to linger in the kiss longer than she’d probably planned to, but her tension flashes and disappears and she melts into it. Maybe a little too long. She pulls away, forcefully, muttering something about being on the job.
“Just like old times,” she says.
“I owe you. I swear I was about to get mean.”
“You’re funny,” Sam says. “I gotta go—to the little boys’ room. Excuse me.” He ducks away and I’m thinking of dragging Chelsea to the coat room but she backs out of my reach.
“I really am on the job, Ry. I have to go. Stay out of trouble.”
“You’re the only trouble I’m in,” I say for her ears only. She gives me a private sassy smile and walks away in a rush as if someone is calling her. Then I spot the earbud and realize someone really is calling her.
Not alone for long, I’m lucky a couple of the local Special Olympics organizers find me and introduce me to several athletes, one deaf, one without his right arm, and one standing tall on two prosthetic legs. We are talking about the advantages of the super appendages when I spot Ham.
Looking harried and worse than annoyed, he’s heading our way with a full head of steam. This not good. He pulls me aside with only a brief nod at the others.
“We have to talk. In private.”
He leads me to a corner of the room near the exit to the restrooms, away from the main entry. Even when several people he would ordinarily want to talk to try and stop us, he just keeps going and we weave through the thickening crowd.
We end up near a wall almost behind a column.
“I need to give you a heads-up. My assistant called.”
“On a Saturday night?”
“We cover the phones 24/7 for our clients. You now that. Listen—there’s a civil lawsuit being filed on Monday. We were given a courtesy copy. They’re not filing criminal charges because it’s a he-said-she-said situation. But I’m pretty sure it’s going to the press.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I’m suspending my disbelief because he’s not making sense. It’s like I’m in the stands looking at the ice through a fogged-up shield.
“I called the attorney. I’m pretty sure they want to maximize the shame factor and the money, based on my brief chat.”
“How bad?” I’m trying to stay calm, keep cool and rational, but my heart is racing.
“Really bad. Not from a money or rep standpoint—although that’s bad enough.”
“What the fuck—get to the fucking point, Ham.” My fucked-up head goes to Chelsea. But she would never do that to me. No matter how much she hates me, she would never betray me with a lawsuit. My reason is getting short-circuited by his alarm level.
“Your old BC teammate, Tim Fagan—and his lovely wife. Sexual Assault. Says you forced your attentions on her at a wedding.”
“Jesus fucking Christ.” My first instinct is to punch a hole in the wall we’re standing next to, but I’m not that far gone. I take in a shuddering breath, my hands fisted. As it is, my agent backs away a step, putting up his hands.
“Take it easy—I know it’s messed up. You have every right to feel betrayed.”
“You have no idea,” I say. “He’s my fucking accountant.”
“Fuck.” Ham loses it and I’ve never seen him lose it before as he swipes a hand through his massive head of hair with a wild look in his eye. “Any chance there’s something to this? Does he have some kind of ax to grind?”
I can hear the panic in his voice as it rises slightly, and that should unnerve me since Ham is the coolest head I know outside of an ice rink. But his panic calms me, reminds me of the value of keeping a cool head, staying steady and rational.
“There’s every chance he has an ax to grind,” I say. “His wife is a damn whore.” It’s the equivalent of a slap to the face. The shock of my words hits him. He blinks, taking a beat to get my meaning, to understand the score, but it dawns on him and he scowls.
“Shit. Okay. At least I know what we’re dealing with. Your friend’s wife, Ryan?” he asks.
“What? No. What’s the matter with you? Fuck no. She threw herself at me at the wedding. She’s been throwing herself at me since we were all undergrads, always had a thing for me. And I always fucking shut her down. That’s what this is all about. Her ego. Her fucking fragile, insecure ego. And her clueless husband. My accountant. My so-called friend, who’d rather hide his head in the sand and pretend the problem is me and not his fucking wife.”
“Shit. I’m sorry. I jumped to the wrong conclusion. But that’s the problem we have here. Your reputation is going to have any jury in the world jumping to the wrong conclusion.”
