CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX #2
He leans in closer. This time his body does touch mine, his chest to my back, and as much as my body fires at the connection, I’m hoping I’m not going crazy and that he sees it too.
“What am I looking at?” he asks.
“Your hand.”
“My hand’s been working fine for years,” he says but there’s a tinge at the edges of his voice that tells me there’s more there.
I run the clip again.
“Okay,” he says. “What am I supposed to be seeing because . . .”
“Not your throwing hand,” I say. “Your left. What you do with it in between plays.”
Cole takes a step toward the screen. He glances over to me and then points to my computer. “Can you play it again?”
I do as he asks. And when it finishes and he doesn’t respond but rather crosses his arms over his chest, eyes narrowed in deep thought, I replay it again.
He finishes the throw. The play ends. He turns and there. It’s subtle and almost unnoticeable, but his hand trembles. And then he flexes his fingers once, twice, before shaking his hand.
“Okay,” he says. “What are you—”
“The tremble. The flex. The shake,” I explain, confused how he doesn’t see it. “It’s easier to see here because these are the team’s internal cuts. Different angles. Between plays.” I tap my computer screen to demonstrate. “You don’t get this attention to detail on TV.”
“So my hand has a tremble to it. It’s no big deal,” he says, tone defensive, as he flexes the hand right in front of me without realizing it. “I’ve always done it. It just comes and goes during the seasons.”
I nod. “Mm-hmm.”
His eyes flash over to mine, expression irritated. “I told Doc Hawley about it. She says it’s stress induced,” he fires back. “It’s nothing. A quirk. What’s your point?”
Never show weakness.
If I hadn’t witnessed the scene between him and his dad, I would have taken Cole’s defensiveness as a hint of guilt. But now his reaction makes total sense to me.
The tremble is weakness to him.
Now to explain to him why I’m not looking at that tremble as a sign of weakness, but rather a tell one could make predictions on.
“I’ve been looking at these reels for hours. Play after play. Going all the way back to your college days.”
“I still don’t—” He exhales, frustrated, and drags a hand through his hair. “Explain this to me like I’m twelve because I’m not following.”
I wait for him to meet my eyes. “I’m saying the bets being placed aren’t random.”
I hit play, appreciative of the Rebels staff for setting up a Cole-only film reel for me. Clip after clip rolls. Different games. Different practices. Different angles. Same pattern.
I talk as the film runs. “At some point, there’s a tremor in your left hand. You throw all game without it, but when it shows up”—I lift the remote to slow down on the tremble—“and within four or five plays later . . .”—I fast-forward four plays—“an interception.”
I stare at his profile, see his Adam’s apple bob, and his lips twist.
“The tremor isn’t the signal,” I say quietly. “It’s the confirmation.”
“Another one,” he whispers.
I flip through the clips faster now. I’ve spliced together the ones showing the tremor and amassed all the relevant data in one endless stream.
Cole stares at the screen, the muscle in his jaw ticking. I know this is probably hard for him to watch, but I have to give him credit because he doesn’t deflect. He moves toward the screen, one step, then another, until he’s a few feet in front of screen, shoulders tight and focus locked.
“Fine. Say I agree with you,” he says turning to look at me for the first time, expression unreadable. “But I haven’t always had the yips, and I sure as shit didn’t have a high interception rate until recently, so how does that fit with the theory you’re forming?”
“I don’t think the yips and this are connected. The yips might be part of it but . . .” I shake my head slightly, searching for the right way to explain it. “That’s why I went back to college games. I needed to see if this showed up before now. If it’s new or if it’s always been there.”
He watches me, wary now. “And?” he asks.
“And it’s there,” I say. “It just presents differently.”
His brow furrows. “Differently how?”
“You didn’t implode by throwing interceptions,” I say. “You simply adjusted.”
I turn toward my computer and scroll through the clips, hoping my anal retentiveness in file labeling won’t fail me now. It takes a second to find the college reel, but when I do, I pull it up and push play.
“When the tremor shows in college, your completion percentage drops for a series or two. You miss high. You check down more. You hesitate just long enough to avoid risk instead of taking it.” I glance at him. “You compensate.”
His slow exhale fills the room as his eyes narrow on the screen.
“But here?” I cue up the next clip. “There’s no room for that. The hesitation doesn’t turn into a safe throw.” I hit play. “It becomes a turnover.”
He presses his fingers to his eyes, like he’s trying to shut this out. Reset it. Deny it. Guilt washes over me because he’s doing nothing wrong intentionally in these clips, but clearly my analysis is affecting him.
“So no, this tremor isn’t new,” I say, voice quiet. “In college, it made you careful. In the NFL? You don’t have the same amount of time, and the pressure is infinitely higher. Here, it makes you vulnerable. Here it’s finally costing you.”
He chews the inside of his cheek as he walks around the room, fingers laced at the back of his neck, disbelief or acceptance—not sure which one yet—palpable.
“It doesn’t happen every game.”
So he is aware of it.
“Neither do interceptions.”
He stops in front of the table I’m sitting at and waits for me to lift my eyes to his. There is a lifetime of emotions in his, but they move so fast I can’t hold on to one long enough to know what he’s feeling the most.
“From your perspective, what does this mean?” he asks.
“It means someone didn’t just notice it,” I say. “It means they knew when to look for it. This doesn’t show up clearly or early enough on the broadcast to bet like this. Not with this consistency. This is someone who sees you before the game—or stands close enough to know when it’s coming.”
Cole scrubs a hand over his face and then shakes his head. “This is ridiculous. There’s no way that all the timestamps or whatever you call them line up perfectly.”
“No. They don’t. There are times you tremble and nothing happens, but the pattern is when you do, the probability is high that you’ll make an error.” I pause. “Especially this year. Even in games you’ve won, there’s a tremble, then a turnover.”
“Fuck.” Agony coats the word.
“They’re not guessing,” he says.
“No.”
“They’re watching me fall apart.”
I meet his gaze. Hold it. “They’re watching for when you might and betting on it. They have insight to make educated guesses.”
“I’m not throwing games.”
“I know.”
He whips his head up. “You know?” His voice breaks.
Shit.
My job is to report the findings to GIA not tell the athlete under investigation that he’s innocent. For all I know, the man could be an extremely talented actor playing a part. He could be denying it vehemently publicly while making wagers privately.
He could have slept with you to curry his favor.
Fuck. I just . . . no. I have to believe that was real.
But that doesn’t mean the notion shouldn’t be considered.
There’s evidence though that doesn’t point in his direction.
I need to walk this all back—clarify and rebuild the line.
But I can’t take the comment back, and I can’t deny it’s my professional opinion.
For the first time since this mess started, I don’t want to pretend otherwise.