13. The Apology
13
THE APOLOGY
Hayden
“Jeez,” I whistled as I drove up to the Locklear’s house. House was too small a word. It was like driving up to the goddamn state capitol as we cruised up the driveway and past the perfectly manicured lawns.
“Let me do the talking, okay Champ?”
Maiden nodded his agreement from the backseat, looking uncomfortable at the boastful surroundings. We reached the entrance and, just as I slowed down, we were suddenly greeted by two wild, mean-looking rottweilers from hell, hurtling out of the house in full attack mode.
“Christ!” I yelled, veering manically away from the snapping, snarling jaws that flew at my window, taking my truck straight into the side of a parked red Porche. The awful sound of scraping metal made me wince as the hate-crazed beasts pounced and smeared the window with teeth and drool, showing me their meanest side.
“Jethro! Denver! Get here!” came the yell from a red- faced, plump, and enraged man who followed through the same door that the terror dogs had come from.
Jethro and Denver looked disappointed as they reluctantly stopped their assault on the unknown vehicle and trotted sheepishly back toward their owner.
“My fucking car!” The angry potato screamed, holding his hands to his head and pulling at where his hair would’ve been, if he had any.
Fuck. This had not started well.
Climbing out of the truck, I looked down at the red-faced figure in front of me and his expression softened in surprise.
“Hayden Raynor?” He asked.
I nervously rubbed the back of my neck. “Er, sure is. Mr. Locklear?”
“That’s right,” he said, gawping at me like I’d just levitated in front of him.
“Damn, I’m real sorry about that,” I told him, looking uncomfortably at the tangled mess of cars. “Your dogs came out at me like a wild one. I’ll, er, get that fixed.”
“Sure, sure. Hey, come on in!” He’d remarkably cheered up now and didn’t seem that concerned by the fact my truck was chomping into his Porsche, exactly like his dogs had wanted to do with my leg.
Maiden and I followed the blob into the inner-sanctum of his palace, walking through a reception room of garish old paintings, with wide, opulent staircases running up either side of the hallway. Then, we were led out onto a sun-soaked terrace, where we found a group of middle-aged people lounging lazily, while screeching kids ran around an Olympic-sized pool.
“Hey! Look who’s here! Hayden fucking Raynor!” That’s how Locklear introduced me to his gin-soaked audience. The oldest of them, perhaps Locklear’s mother at a guess, didn’t even turn her head, but just sighed. She looked like old money and unimpressed by everything. Meanwhile, a guy in a sports cap (Wildcats, I mean really? ) got up awkwardly, nearly fell back down, reclaimed his balance, and then came over, beaming.
“Jesus, you’re massive!”
I nodded back at him. “Er, thanks?”
“Hey, you know Randall Jackson, right?”
The Randall Jackson who plays on my team? I mean, I might.
“Yeah, sure I know Randall.”
“I heard… It’s massive.”
I frowned back at his shining eyes. Was he really asking me, a man he’d just met for the first time, the size of Randall’s cock? The fact he was still staring eagerly and wobbling in front of me as he waited for my answer, told me he actually was.
“Oh.” I took my cap off and scratched at my head. Gotta play it nice here Hayden, for Maiden, remember? And then there’s that Porsche outside. Better give them a bit of a show. “Well… You know Jessa Huckley?”
Everyone knew Jessa. The former Playbunny turned good girl, then back to getting her assets out again. She and Randall had been a thing. It was short-lived, but the gossip columns had lapped it up.
“Yeah, I do!” He sounded pleased with himself.
“Well, let’s just say they broke up because he wasn’t that in to her.” I held up my hand and wiggled my pinky finger to illustrate what I meant. It was nice to get one over on Randy, even if he wouldn’t ever find out about it.
Sports cap guy’s eyes bulged and then he burst into a wild laughter that made me recoil, as if he’d just opened his mouth and moths had flown out of it .
Locklear whacked me heartily on the back and started laughing too.
“DAD!”
We all turned toward the interruption, which came from a small blonde kid sporting a hell of a black eye on his face and a white plaster across his nose. Maiden squeezed my hand harder.
“Can we go on the golf cart?”
“No, Matthew! Not after the last time.”
Matthew looked like he was about to throw a tantrum, then he turned to peer up at me.
“You’re that hockey player.”
“Sure am!” I told him as cheerfully as I could muster. Did these rich folk just go around stating obvious facts all the time? Was that a thing? Oh hey, you’re wearing a shirt. Oh look, it’s a tree. This is my enormous swimming pool.
After a pause, an excited expression came across his face. “Can you throw me in the pool?”
I looked over at his dad to see what his thoughts were on that, and he just shrugged. So I leaned over, picked up the blonde kid, held him up over my head like I was a pro-wrestler, and chucked him unceremoniously into the pool. The other kids stood for a moment open-mouthed, then they started running toward me, all yelling at the same time, “Me next! No, me! Do me!”
I managed an hour of throwing kids in the pool, making idle chat with Tom Locklear and the Wildcats fan, whose name I never got, and getting withering looks from Tom’s mother before we made our escape. I would’ve made up an excuse to get us out of there once everything had been smoothed over, but I actually had one already. One I didn’t really want to think about. Cara.