Chapter 18 #3
“I don’t think you all understand. This doesn’t look good,” Sheena said quickly, before anyone cut her off.
“Do you think you could… I don’t know, Mr. Kulti, I’m just throwing out ideas for you to talk to your publicist about, but…
do something publicly to pull rumors away from…
this… friendship? Possibly go on a date? ”
Kulti didn’t even hesitate. “No.”
“But—”
“No,” he repeated.
Sheena’s desperate eyes met mine. “Sal, what about you? Could you go on a date? Post some pictures—”
“No.”
That was definitely not me who answered her. It was Kulti who answered almost angrily. I let him.
“Sal—”
“No.” That was Kulti again. “Absolutely not.”
“But—”
“Stop asking,” the German snapped. “I’m not doing it, and neither is she.”
“I’ve done just about everything that’s ever been asked of me. I don’t want to do this,” I explained gingerly, trying to ease over the hostility radiating off the man next to me.
Cordero guffawed.
Ten minutes later, I found Kulti waiting outside of Gardner’s office. Mr. Cordero had left first, with the German following immediately afterward. Sheena stayed in the office to discuss something. What else could it be besides me or the German?
“There’s nothing for you to worry about,” Kulti’s deep, heavy voice assured me.
I scratched my forehead, trying to urge away the frustration I felt at the conversation that had just finished up.
A nasty nagging feeling had taken up residence in my belly.
This wasn’t sitting well with me, and honestly I was really worried they were going to try and find something to use against me.
I wasn’t sure why I felt so pessimistic, but I did.
An elbow nudged at mine. “Stop worrying,” he ordered.
I blinked at him and didn’t even think about pulling my elbow away.
He’d called me his best friend; I’d give him half-credit for that…
though he was still a douche. “I can’t,” I whispered to him as we approached the elevator in the office building.
“Cordero doesn’t play around. He isn’t a fan of mine. ”
Kulti made this face that told me I needed to chill out. “He’s like every general manager on every team. He thinks he’s a god, and he’s not.” He nudged my elbow once more. “You don’t have anything to worry about.”
My stomach and my head said otherwise. Nerves had started eating up my organs. “I don’t want to get traded, and I don’t want them to bench me.”
I wasn’t going to have a panic attack. I wasn’t going to have a panic attack.
This wasn’t going to be like the national team all over again.
I hadn’t done anything wrong.
I pressed my hands against my hips and squeezed, willing myself to calm down.
“Sal.” Kulti stood right in front of me. “Nothing is going to happen. I won’t let them do anything, understand?”
My knees started to shake the same way they did when I was in front of a camera. Oh God, I was going to throw up. Sometime in the last two minutes, I had started sweating.
“Sal,” the German’s voice got even louder, more determined. His big hands landed on my shoulders. “No one is going to make you do anything that you don’t want to do.” He kneaded the muscle there, his voice a gentle reassuring cadence. “I promise.”
It was the “I promise” that had me glance up at him; I felt this huge ugly knot of dread creep up to the center of my chest. “I like it here.”
His green-brown eyes seemed so close to mine. “Remember all that money I made?”
The urge to punch him in the gut was still there, but instead I nodded. “What about it?”
“I can afford the best lawyers.”
“You want me to sue them?” I coughed out.
“If it’s necessary.”
Holy shit. “I don’t want to. I just want to play here.”
“I know.” He gave my shoulders a squeeze. “If it comes to it,” the German continued, “we’ll worry about it. You’re the best player on the team. They won’t get rid of you.”
Another shot to the heart. Jesus Christ. The best player on the team?
I felt greedy, like I needed to gobble up all these nice things and store them for a rainy day when he called me a slow-ass, or even one day when I was older and couldn’t play anymore.
I could think back and remember the day the five-time World Player of the Year, The King, told me I was the best player on my team.
He shook my arm. “Yes?”
I nodded, still the slightest bit unsure. “Yes.”
Kulti nodded and blew out a breath. There were dark circles under his clear eyes, and he looked conflicted. “When I get angry, I have a hard time controlling what I say,” he said, his chin tipping down.
“Oh, I know. Trust me.” I blinked. “Or don’t.”
The German gave an exaggerated sigh. “You are my best friend.”
I started to make a face like “yeah, right.” Me? His best friend? I’d take “friend.” I took the title in the office because it seemed like such a monumental thing to say in order to get me out of trouble.
But… as soon as I started to make a face, I stopped. Kulti wasn’t a man who wasted his words, so… “You have a horrible way of showing it.”
“I know.” But he didn’t apologize. “I’ve done a great deal of things I regret now, and it’s difficult for me at times to cope with them.”
My eyes narrowed, curiosity prickling at me. I might never get a chance to encounter an apologetic Reiner Kulti again. Taking a quick look around, I made sure there wasn’t another person within listening distance, and I whispered, “Did you really get a DUI?”
Answering the question wasn’t as easy as I’d hoped it would be, but with a great gulp, Kulti tipped his chin down.
Well. That wasn’t exactly shocking. He’d been blitzed out of his mind when I’d picked him up from that bar months ago. People made mistakes all the time. He had a right to make them as much as the next person. “Okay,” I told him simply. “Thank you for telling me.”
His gaze flickered from one of my eyes to the other before he took a shallow breath and swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing with the force.
“I was in a bad place after I retired,” he explained in that low voice that I liked, unexpectedly.
“I was very angry, and I picked up a bad habit I’m not proud of. ”
I nodded slowly, still keeping an eye out to make sure no one was around. “Do you need help?” I whispered.
Kulti’s eye started to twitch, but he shook his head. “I’ve been sober for over a year.”
I closed one eye and made a face. His timeframe was debatable.
“With the exception of that one day, I have no problem not drinking, but once I start….” Kulti knuckled his brow bone.
This was hard for him to admit. Who wanted to admit their failures?
Not me. Definitely not him. “I let myself down, and I know there are people that this news could disappoint even more. There won’t be any bars in my future anymore either way.
I would rather stay home.” He nudged me. “Or at your home.”
Yeah, I was a total sucker, forgiving people way too easily.
My facial expression must have said that because he nudged me again. “You and I fight, yes? It’s in our nature. I think you should get used to the idea.” The corners of his mouth tipped up just a bit. “Are we fine now?” he asked earnestly, expectantly.
Were we? I knew what the polite thing to say would be, but I wasn’t a liar.
At least I wasn’t usually. I told Kulti the truth.
“Mostly. You’re still a jackass for what you said, but I’ll forgive you because I know you were upset, and some people say things they don’t mean in the heat of the moment.
So as long as you don’t say something so stupid again, I can live with it this once, Reindeer. ”
The look he gave me was blank for so long, I wasn’t expecting him to react the way he did. I thought for sure he’d argue with me some more about how I needed to get over being pissed at him, however small the amount.
He didn’t.
Instead, almost a minute after I finished talking, as the doors were opening to the main level of the office building, Kulti burst out laughing. I swore he said something like “Reindeer” under his monster laughs.