Page 5 of Provoking the Punter
They all shook hands like they were new friends, and he was given a small tour of the facility by one of the coaching assistants and an ID card. His name was already on his locker.
Stevens 0.
There hadn’t been many numbers to choose from. He picked zero. New start. Clean slate and all that.
The coaching assistant introduced him to the equipment guys. They already had his sizes for pants and practice jerseys—his game day jerseys were already on order. He knew what padding he liked. They fitted the helmet. He picked gloves and tried on shoes.
They all acted as though he might dress for Sunday’s game.
He wouldn’t be.
He stood in front of the logos for some photos, recorded a couple of little videos while Caitlin supervised. When he watched them back, he looked happy, as though everything had worked out as planned.
It was only when he was back in the hotel room that he allowed himself the breakdown he’d been withholding.
He gave himself an hour.
CHAPTER
TWO
Chester Monroe checked the replies. Whenever he held one of these fundraising dinners, seventy-five percent of the people he invited attended. Sometimes the plus one they brought was another wealthy friend, looking to make connections and have his or her name added to the list of donors. The main reason he hosted these events, and allowed free use of his venue, was for the same reason. It was all about who he knew and who he needed to know.
With the trade deadline creeping closer, he’d expected a phone call. He’d expected more than a week’s notice. He needed time to look up the new Trooper attending. Garrett Stevens… not a household name by any stretch. Not here in Austin, anyway.
As host, he liked knowing about the attending player. And while there would be talk of football, that wouldn’t be the only thing discussed. Because Chester loved gossip, when he hit the internet, he’d quickly fallen down the rabbit hole of speculation and scandal. Online there were suggestions from turning up to games drunk, to drug use, cheating, and some kind of locker room fight. The people claiming these things backed them up with zero evidence.
He was certain that Mrs. Cole, and her PR team, were all over it. She’d already contacted him with strict instructions and the official reasoning for the trade. While both the team and his business benefited from their little fundraising arrangement, Chester understood the unspoken rule: if things got out of hand, he would lose this privilege.
He glanced over the list again, sure that many of the attendees didn’t care which charity the money went to. He doubted Garrett would, either.
But Chester did.
He wasn’t completely mercenary. He wanted impoverished children to have a chance because if his best friend’s dad hadn’t given him a chance, he was damn sure he’d been languishing in the backwater of bumfuck, doing not nearly enough bum fucking…
No, he sighed, he’d probably be dead because of said bum fucking.
Which was why, he was reading the article about the head coach of the Oklahoma Copperheads closely. He’d been the coach of the college football team Chester attended. Not that he had anything to do with the football players, but he had friends on the cheer team. And they had told some stories.
That same coach was now married to the daughter of the Copperhead’s owner.
While Chester didn’t bet, he’d take odds on why Garrett Stevens had been traded. Not that he’d say anything, because if he knew one thing about football players, it was that none of them wanted their preferences and predilections discussed.
But that little find made Garrett Stevens go from another boring football player who no doubt thought he was God’s gift to the game, to something a little more intriguing.
Add in his cute accent, and the dimple when he smiled… really smiled…
Chester closed his laptop before he watched the two-minute clip of Garrett saying how glad he was to join the Troopers, and how the weather was so much better in Austin, for the third time.
There was research, and then there was obsession.
Then there was the itch to uncover the truth, because what player was stupid enough to sleep with his coach who was married to the owner’s daughter?
Garrett didn’t sound like that kind of guy. For starters, he could string complete sentences together, although, as a punter, he’d probably never had a concussion. His job wasn’t to smash heads with other players. No, he swaggered on to kick the ball a long way down the field and swaggered off again.
He may have also watched a couple of clips of Garrett playing, which he couldn’t write off as research.
If someone had told him while he’d been at college that he’d be hosting charity dinners to welcome new football players to the local team, he would’ve laughed in their faces. The only thing he liked about football was that their pants were gloriously tight and that some players cut a bit off their bottom shirt, so when they lifted their arms, a little skin showed.