Chapter 7 Ashton
ONE WEEK LATER
I ran through the defense, moving smoothly around Cross as I drew closer to the basket.
Adrenaline pumped through my veins. We only had one opportunity to win this game.
This three-game losing streak had to be broken, and losing to the Cobras wasn’t an option.
I arched my wrist and aimed for the basket.
“Less than four seconds to go . . . and Santoro for the three.”
The ball went flying through the air, and all I had was a prayer. I watched as the ball rolled around the hoop and fell off the other side.
“Ohhh, that was an ugly shot, Curt.”
My teammate, Neal Falls, tried to tilt it back in, but it fell back just as the buzzer sounded.
Another loss that we couldn’t afford. My shoulders slumped, because I knew my performance had been shitty tonight.
My head hadn’t been in the game all night, even after Coach reamed our asses during halftime.
All I could think about was the bomb that Muffin dropped on me. My world hadn’t been right since.
Communication would have solved all our problems. I knew that I needed to discuss it with my mother, but I wasn’t in the right space at that time.
I hated that shit that happened to Muffin though.
We could have sued the doctor, we could have addressed the issue to see what her medical options were, or any number of things.
The other problem I had was Chanel. I normally didn’t pay attention to the reporters, but my eyes kept straying to where she was on the sidelines. My attention was torn between the game and her all night. She was just a reporter doing her job, like I should have been doing mine.
I was juggling feelings of guilt about what happened to Muffin, with a growing attraction to Chanel.
I knew that I shouldn’t have been feeling her like that, but I was, and there wasn’t a damn thing that I could do about it.
The last thing that I wanted was her in my face after playing that shitty game, knowing how I felt. But she beelined in my direction.
“Santoro, your performance has been off tonight. Why were you forcing bad shots?”
Wiping the sweat from my eyes, I glared at her but then dropped my gaze when the cameraman homed in on me. “I didn’t really feel like I was forcing bad shots. I gave it my best, and it just wasn’t good enough tonight.”
“Why weren’t you getting your teammates involved?”
“I saw a couple of openings that I was comfortable with, and I thought I was close enough to make the shots. My aim was off, and I miscalculated a few times.”
“It seemed like more than a few times. Your game was off all night. We could tell that your head wasn’t in the game. Did that have anything to do with the opponent? You all have a history with the Cobras.”
“It had nothing to do with the Cobras. Sometimes, we just have a bad night, and this was mine, a’ight?”
She turned her lips down and narrowed her gaze. “Thanks, Santoro. Maybe next game.”
She walked away from me and moved to Angelo Song, our power forward, to interview him. I stormed off the court, knowing that I wouldn’t need to do any other interviews tonight. What the fuck was wrong with her? Why couldn’t she just leave me alone?
“You good, Santoro?” Christian Bourne, our center, asked.
“Yeah,” I grumbled, heading for the showers. I didn’t want to talk to anyone. I already knew Coach would be on our asses soon.
I walked back down the hall leading from the locker rooms. I overheard Coach Jesse’s voice before I saw him. When I turned the corner and saw him speaking with Chanel, I leaned against the wall just out of their view.
“You gotta know how to handle his type. When you don’t handle him right, he can become aggressive, territorial, and difficult to handle.”
I walked into view. “What the hell am I, a dog? I’m a grown ass man. What do you mean handle me?”
“Your aggressive, territorial ass acts just like a dog sometime. You act like that mean ass cane corso of yours.”
I couldn’t help but ease up and snicker at the way he said that because only Coach could speak to me that way. Chanel smiled until I met her gaze, and it immediately dropped.
“Stay out of trouble, and don’t say anything that she can use against you,” Coach warned, pointing at me as he tugged his bag up his shoulder and headed to the private team parking lots.
“Well, I guess I’d better be going too,” she stated as she started walking in the same direction Coach Jesse had.
“Chanel, can I holler at you for a sec?”
She turned around and lifted an eyebrow at me. Tugging her bag further up her arm, she angled her head at me as though she was trying to determine if she wanted to give me another chance.
“I’m listening.”
“I just wanted to come and apologize to you for before. I was an asshole. The game was tight, I had a lot of shit on my mind, and we just weren’t gelling. But that was to be expected, right?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it was, and maybe it wasn’t. I’ve told you a thousand times that I regret giving you those pictures. I think it may have pushed everything over the edge.”
“Nah, I was already a pot of boiling water. Those pictures just turned up the heat a little more until I boiled over.”
“I guess that’s why you’re still punishing me for it.”
“I’m not, Chanel. I swear that I’m not, and I’m sorry about that. I wish that I could take it back, but I cannot. I promise that it won’t happen again.”
“Damn right, because the next time I’ll snap back on your ass, and I don’t care who’s listening.”
I smirked at her sassiness as she sashayed away with her ass bouncing and hips twisting.
“Where the hell are you?” I growled into the phone as I pressed the L button on the elevator for the lobby.
“At home where I belong. You do realize that we’re going through a divorce, and I don’t owe you an explanation as to my whereabouts, don’t you?”
“Are you sure that you’re at home?”
“What do you want, Ashton?”
“Never mind.”
“If you don’t believe me, you can always check my location. I haven’t blocked you yet.”
“You know I don’t believe in that shit. You started doing that to me because you didn’t trust me. I guess I understand why now. When you’re not trustworthy, it’s impossible for you to trust anyone else.”
“Whatever. I gotta go.”
She ended the call, and I allowed my finger to hover over the app that she had installed on my phone a while back. Pushing it, I went to her contact to check her location. Sure enough, it showed her at her house. She was in Chicago and not in California with me.
That was odd. Who the hell had gotten access to my room? It must have been one of the guys playing tricks. When we returned to the hotel after the game, my room smelled like a woman’s perfume, and I found a pair of thongs on the bathroom floor.
I immediately assumed it was Muffin. I didn’t know why, because she stopped doing surprise visits to me on the road a while ago. It just didn’t make sense for it to be anyone else.
“Hey, Ashton. Surprised to see you still here. The rest of the team headed out about an hour ago,” Chanel stated, walking up to me in the hotel lobby as I exited the elevators.
I jerked my head up from my phone.
“Uh, . . . yeah, I know. I was just coming down to grab a drink at the bar.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I replied, stuffing my phone in my pocket. “You want to get a drink?”
“Sure.”
“I didn’t realize you were staying here. What floor are you on?” I asked.
“The third. Of course, not on your floor.”
“You know which floor I’m on?”
“Everyone knows that you guys occupy the twenty-ninth and thirtieth floors.”
I knew that it couldn’t be her. Sure, she had come on to me, but that made no sense. This woman had no reason to play those types of games. If she wanted me, she could just come out and say it. Besides, we had cleared that up anyway.
“You didn’t want to go out with them?” Chanel asked, distracting me from my thoughts.
“Nah. They’re going to the strip club. There isn’t anything there that I haven’t already seen.”
“Sure it isn’t because you’re trying to keep the peace between you and the other teammates?”
“Nah. I’m good. They know what’s going on.
I gave Coach permission to share with them so we could be a cohesive team and get our shit out there.
Angelo, Wade, and Christian wanted me to come with them, but I was good on that.
I’ve got a lot on my mind, and watching naked women dance isn’t at the top of my list of things to relax me. ”
“Mm . . . said no man ever,” she stated with a chuckle that hit me down low.
We took a seat at the dimly lit bar and ordered our drinks.
Chanel wore a pair of jeans that looked like she had to be poured into them.
They hugged her hips, thighs, and ass nicely, as if they were made specifically for her.
She wore an ecru off-the-shoulder crop top sweater and a pair of heels the same color.
“You traveling by yourself?”
“I am.”
“Do you get out when you go to some of the cities and check out what they have to offer?”
“Absolutely. I love to travel alone so I don’t owe anyone an explanation about my time. I can move of my own accord, when and how I want to, and switch up if I desire.”
“I’ve always traveled with my wife in the past, or with family and friends. I’ve traveled alone a few times. I love checking shit out with other people or seeing things through their eyes for the first time.”
“That’s cool, too, I guess. Uhm, . . . about the game earlier. What was going on with you?”
“Still struggling with this shit between Alex and Zoe, and some other stuff. I mean, don’t get me wrong, we’re over, and she’s gon’ do what she’s gon’ do anyway. I just don’t get him. He’s my boy, and I thought we were better than that. You know?”
“No, I get it. If you can’t trust the people around you in this world, who the hell can you trust?” she asked, sipping her drink while her eyes started dipping a little lower.
“Exactly.”
“But here’s the thing, Ashton. You’ve got to get that shit out of your head and get your head in the game.
If you knew your wife was cheating all these years and put up with it, now is not the time to be in a space about that.
You were able to make it through and put on stellar performances all this time, and you should expect nothing less from yourself in this last season. ”
“I know,” I admitted. I didn’t want to talk about the bombshell about Muffin not being able to have a kid or the other people I learned she had fucked.
That wasn’t Chanel’s business. “Let’s go grab a table.
” I noticed a few other people joining us at the bar, and I didn’t want to talk about personal shit where folks could ear hustle.
“Okay.”
I took her hand and helped her slide off the barstool. Her breasts pushed against my chest, and her eyelashes lowered as she bit her bottom lip.
“After you,” I muttered, extending my hand out.
She walked ahead of me, and it was hard as hell to keep my eyes up on her shoulders and upper back.
The more that ass bounced, the more it became like a magnet, dragging my eyes down to it and the curve of her thighs and the arch in her back just above her ass.
A vision of her arching her back as I hit it from behind flashed behind my eyelids.
“Fuck,” I grumbled.
She turned back and looked over her shoulder at me. “You say something?” she asked over the music.
“Nah, I’m good.”
“How about this table?” she asked, stopping at one.
I hurriedly slipped in the booth, not waiting for her to take her seat first. I didn’t need her seeing my growing erection.
“I guess that’s a yes.” Chanel giggled and sat down opposite me.
“Truth or dare?”
“What?”
“Truth or dare?”
“Truth. If Muffin hadn’t cheated, would you be happily married or satisfied?”
Sighing, I replied, “Satisfied.”
“Why just satisfied?”
“Because we had shit in our pasts that we never addressed. It would always be hanging over our heads and echoing out in the distance.”
“That’s fair.”
“Truth or dare?” I asked.
“Truth.”
“Why did your husband divorce you?”
Her expression closed me out, and I could tell that I hit a sore spot.
Placing my hands on the table, I leaned forward.
“That’s what that question you just asked me felt like.
I mean, I get that you’re a reporter, so you instantly go into that mode.
But sometimes, you got a way of asking the hard shit that pours salt on open wounds.
You’ve had two years to become acclimated to your new normal. Mine hasn’t even begun yet.”
She bit her bottom lip and reached out and placed her hands on top of mine. “Sorry. You’re right. I shouldn’t have gone there. It was very insensitive of me.”
I noticed movement out of the corner of my eye, and I turned sideways to catch a glimpse of what was happening. It must have been a fan because the girl just waved and then left the bar.
“Do you ever get accustomed to that?”
“Nope. But I’m sure you know what it’s like.”
She laughed. “Come on. I’ve got my share of fans, but nothing like you guys.”
“It’s the same no matter how many fans you’ve got.”
“I’m sure that’s not true.”
Laughing, I replied, “You’re right.”
“When do you guys leave town?”
“We’ll be heading out around two in the morning. That way we avoid a lot of the fans and attention. What about you?”
“I’ll be heading out tonight. I was just passing time until my Uber arrives in about . . . twenty minutes to take me to the airport,” she declared after looking at her watch.
“You’d better head up and grab your luggage so you can check out then.”
“I’ve already done all of that. My luggage is actually behind the checkout desk. They’re holding it for me until I leave.”
“Smart lady.”
“Thank you.”
“Nothing to thank me for when it’s the truth.” I pulled my glass to my lips.
“Ashton, I don’t usually propose this, but after your divorce, after you retire, I would like to be friends.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re truly one of the good guys, and I genuinely like you—and I have a feeling you’ll need a real friend after the divorce.”
I thought about the things that Muffin brought up to me, and although I was just a kid when I did them, their impact hurt no less. Those actions had ruined my wife’s future and our marriage. I wondered if Chanel would still think so highly of me if she knew the truth about my past.
Rather than disclosing that, I replied, “I’d like that, too, Chanel.”