Faking the Play (Hot Mess Harems #2)

33. Ethan

Chapter thirty-three

Ethan

W hen I dropped the second pass in thirty minutes, I let out a scream of frustration, followed by a string of curses that would’ve done Samuel L. Jackson proud. I didn’t need to see everyone looking at me to know what they were thinking, because I was thinking it too.

I was fucked.

What made it worse was that I knew why and couldn’t do a damn thing to fix it.

It’d been nearly three weeks since Amelia walked out of our apartment, and I hadn’t smiled or laughed since. Even if I had, it would’ve been faked. The only thing I’d felt since then, besides misery, was anger. Anger at myself, at Amelia, at Ryan and Logan. At Jason fucking Hunn. It was all I could do to get through classes and practice without breaking something. If Hunn were still at school, I probably would’ve beat the shit out of him already, and that wasn’t how I usually handled things.

“What the hell, Blake?!” Terrick shouted. “Get your head out of your ass!”

I actually took a step in his direction, like I was going to do something stupid, but then Ryan was in front of me.

“Don’t.”

He just said a single word, but it was enough to turn my attention from Terrick to him.

“Why not?” I snapped. “I’ve been playing like shit, so it’s not like I have anything to lose. I’m one fumble away from being benched.”

“Because Terrick’s a good guy and you’ll hate yourself if you take out your anger on him.”

Ryan sounded reasonable, but his eyes had the same hopeless look to them that I knew mine did. And for the same reason.

All of that rage emptied out of me, leaving me feeling deflated.

“I don’t really think I could hate myself more than I already do,” I said quietly.

Before Ryan could respond, Logan was there. He clapped a hand down on my shoulder. “Come on, Ethan, we need to focus.”

“You’re one to talk, Carter.” Otto came up behind us. “You’ve fucked up more plays this practice than you did at our last game, and that’s saying something.”

Logan’s face flushed, but he didn’t argue, because Otto was right for once. The game the other night had been bad, but instead of pushing us to do better, all three of us had gotten worse. Forgetting plays. Getting distracted. Dropping the ball.

Literally in a lot of instances.

“We need to get our shit together,” Logan said. “We have to move past Am—past what happened. We had plans before, and we let… things get in the way. We can get back on track. Get back to what matters.”

“Signing with the NFL.”

Ryan said it like he wanted to be sure what Logan was talking about, but I didn’t need the confirmation. Logan had made it pretty clear that he wanted nothing more than to pretend like our time with Amelia hadn’t happened. The dark circles under his eyes and the shit way he’d been playing said that he hadn’t managed to convince himself yet.

“Carter, Blake, Thompson!” Coach Hobkins shouted. “Get your asses over here! We need to talk!”

“Fuck,” Logan grumbled. “What now?”

Ryan and I kept our mouths shut as we followed him over to the coach. We seemed to be doing that a lot lately. Keeping our mouths shut and following Logan’s lead. Actually, we’d done it since we were kids, because we trusted him.

Except it had been his leading that took us away from Amelia the first time, and I couldn’t help wondering if things would’ve gone differently if that hadn’t happened. If one—or all—of us would still be with Amelia.

Thinking about her and our childhood together brought back the last words she’d said to us.

I wish you’d just kept walking and left me alone.

She didn’t just regret getting romantically involved with us. She regretted even meeting us. Her friendship was one of the best things about my childhood, and the fact that she didn’t just want to forget it, that she wished it’d never happened, had cut deeper than her cheating.

And to make matters worse, I still had my doubts about what had actually happened.

I’d doubted it from the moment Logan had said that Amelia slept with Jason, but he’d been convincing, and emotions had run high, so I’d decided to believe it. That decision, however, hadn’t stopped my brain from constantly bringing it up when I least expected it.

“Office,” Coach Hobkins barked.

He didn’t say anything else until the four of us were crammed into his office, with him behind his desk and the three of us on the other side. Since there were only two chairs, we stayed standing.

“What the hell is going on with you three?” he demanded. “You’ve been off your game for weeks and now I got professors telling me that your grades are all slipping.”

I winced. I knew I bombed a test last week, and there was an assignment I’d completely forgotten about for another class, but I hadn’t realized it’d tanked my grades enough for Coach to get a call.

“Everyone has off days,” Logan said.

Coach shook his head. “Don’t give me that bullshit, son. You guys have been off in practice, in games, and in school for weeks now.”

“We’ve got some personal stuff going on, Coach,” I offered.

“No shit,” he said. “Unless someone died or is sick, I don’t give a damn. Everything else isn’t important.” His eyes narrowed. “Unless one of you idiots got a girl pregnant. That’s not what this is, is it? You knock up some chick?”

“Hell, no.” I shook my head. “That’s not it at all.”

“Then put it aside. Push it down. Do whatever the hell it is you have to do to get your heads screwed on straight again.” He reached into his desk drawer and pulled out a toothpick. Popping one end into his mouth, he chewed on it for a moment and then added, “You boys are all still serious about wanting to play pro, right? Because if you’re not…”

“We are,” Ryan said.

“Good. Then keep your eye on that prize.” He crossed his meaty arms and leaned back in his chair. “This next game we got coming up, it’s an important one.”

“Yes, sir,” Logan said. “It determines whether or not we’re moving on to the playoffs for this new bowl game.”

“Now, I know there’s been a lot of talk about how this Honeycomb Bowl was the wrong choice for our team, but if we make it, we’ll be playing here. And I happen to have it on good authority that some members of the Broncos staff have said if the game is at CSU, they’ll be coming. And I don’t think I need to tell you what that could mean for your futures.” He eyed each of us for a long moment, like we needed time for what he was saying to sink in.

“No, sir,” we all muttered.

“I’ve been coaching for a while now, and there’ve been other talented players, some who went on to play pro, but you three are the most talented athletes I’ve had the pleasure of knowing, and you’re even better when you’re together. I sure as hell would like to see you boys all get to keep playing together, and if it happened to be as close as Denver, well, it’d be nice to take my players up there once in a while and brag about how I used to be your coach.”

We stared at him, mouths hanging open. He wasn’t a cruel or verbally abusive coach. In fact, he gave a lot of positive reinforcement. But I’d never heard him make a speech like the one he just made.

“Do I have your word that you’re all gonna buckle down and get those grades back up?” He kept going like he hadn’t just shocked us into silence.

Dumbly, we nodded our heads.

“Good. Go hit the showers and then hit the books,” he said. “And when you come into practice tomorrow, I expect you to all be focused on the game and not on whatever else has been filling your head.” He leaned forward and put his elbows on the desk. “I don’t want to bench my best players during an important game, but I will do it if I think you aren’t thinking straight. I won’t have anyone getting hurt because you weren’t paying attention.”

Shame filled me as I nodded my head again. He was right. We weren’t just screwing with our futures or even just putting our own health at risk. Football was a dangerous enough sport on its own. Add in someone who didn’t have their entire focus on what they were doing, and the chances of someone being getting hurt increased by a lot.

“We hear you, Coach,” Logan said. “We’ll take care of it.”

“See that you do.”

And with that, we were dismissed. None of us said anything as we headed for the locker room, but I didn’t think we needed to talk. We all knew what we needed to do. Now we just had to do it.