CHAPTER 1 LINCOLN

I stand in the shower, palms flat on the wall as I consider everything going on.

I'm clean. I'm done. I should get out, towel off, and get dressed.

But I'm not quite ready for my day to begin. There are too many things I don't want to face on the other side, and now I have another secret wedging its way between Jolene and me.

I thought she might've overheard, but she didn't seem to. I don't like lying to her. I don't like keeping things from her. But at the same time, I can't exactly confess to her what Asher just told me…especially not given her position.

It's another reason why word can't get out about us. Players may no longer trust me with confidential information if they know I'm intimate with a member of the media, in particular one who focuses on our team.

It's all sorts of conflict of interest.

I draw in a few deep breaths of steam as the hot water beats down on my back.

What the fuck am I going to do?

Asher admitted to me that he gambled on the Aces to win, and now he owes a huge debt. Gambling on games when you're a player is a serious, serious offense, one the league doesn't take lightly—one the league has taken more seriously in recent years. My guess is he'd be suspended for the rest of this season, and whether Jack wants to keep him on after that is anyone's guess.

He put us all in jeopardy with his stupidity, and I regret ever bringing him over in the first place.

I told him not to tell a soul.

Too late, he'd told me. Dad already knows. He advised me to come here since he knew you had the money to help me out.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. We don't need Dad of all people knowing. He's only going to pressure me into protecting his youngest son, but at what cost?

I asked Asher to promise me he wouldn't make any more bets. I told him I'd take care of it this time.

I said that last time, too.

And now I'm involved. If the league finds out, I'm as good as toast. It's my first year here. I need to keep a clean profile, and he just dragged me into something I want no part of.

Fuck!

I slam a palm against the shower wall.

If the league finds out, we're both fucked. Something like this could end both our careers, and that's not an exaggeration.

And there's a chance on top of it that Jolene, Aces team correspondent, overheard. She has a duty to report what she knows about players on this team.

She wouldn't, would she?

I didn't ask, and I don't want to know. She can bring it up if she has something to say to me.

I finally emerge from the shower and towel dry. I get dressed, and when I head out to the bedroom, she's not in bed anymore.

I invited her over last night so we could have a night together, and somehow that's not at all what it turned into. And now I'm not sure how to face her with this latest news clinging to my every thought as if she'll be able to read my mind and see it there.

He committed penalties in the last two games. People will think he did them purposely to change the outcome of the game—even though he was betting on us to win. People will think a lot of things if this gets out, and we absolutely cannot afford that.

I finish getting ready and head downstairs, and I find her in the kitchen at the stove making scrambled eggs. She's dressed in different clothes than those she wore when she came over last night, and two plates sit beside her on the counter.

"Eggs?" she asks when she spots me.

"Sure."

"You sleep good?" she asks.

"Not really," I admit. Instead, my brain swirled with all the trouble my brother is causing. I thought about my conversation with my financial manager. Two big withdrawals in a few weeks' time is unusual, and even stranger is the fact that I'm wiring the money to my brother.

That means there's a paper trail. Evidence that I gave him money to cover something up.

If people dig hard enough, they'll find it.

But there's no reason for anyone to dig, so I'm crossing my fingers we can do this silently and walk out the other side without any trouble.

"You?" I finally ask, reciprocating her question.

She blows out a breath. "Not really."

"How come?"

"I was worried about you. You had a visitor you didn't want to talk about, and then you disappeared for an hour after you invited me to spend the night with you. You didn't talk to me when we went to bed, and I was worried you were mad at me or I did something to upset you."

My chest tightens. "Fuck, Jolene. I'm sorry." I move across the room toward her and pull her into my arms, and instantly I feel a measure of relief. Instantly. That's how goddamn powerful this is. "It has nothing to do with you, and I'm sorry you felt that way. The visitor…" I trail off as I debate how much to tell her. I finally blow out a breath. "Don't worry about it. It's between a player and me, and I'm sorry, but I can't say more than that."

She nods as she presses her lips together and backs out of my arms to stir the eggs. I don't miss the look of disappointment on her face as if I'm keeping something from her. I am keeping something from her, but it's not something I'd tell her even if she wasn't a reporter. It really is something to be kept between my player and me, and some things in life are confidential. This is one of them, and I shouldn't feel guilty about that.

So why do I?

Oh, right. Because he committed a terrible offense against both the team and the league, and a reporter is the last person I need finding out about it.

She's quiet as she finishes making the eggs, or maybe she's always that way and this is just the stress of holding onto all this talking. It's causing problems where there simply don't need to be any.

"Are you upset?" I ask as she sets the plate beside me.

She shakes her head as she shoves a forkful of the eggs into her mouth. "No," she says once she swallows. "I get that you have confidential things with your players. You should. It's the nature of the job to form close relationships with them so you can learn how to motivate them on the field."

I take a bite. "These are fantastic. Thanks for cooking."

She nods, and she finishes her plate quickly. "I need to go."

"I do, too. Thanks for coming over. I'm sorry it wasn't the night we were hoping it would be."

"It's fine." She offers a tight smile, and then I walk her toward the front door. She grabs her duffel bag, and she pulls her hood up over her hair and walks out the front door…without kissing me first.

She runs across the yard to Sam's car, and I'm left wondering what the hell that was all about and whether we're going to be okay.