Vegas Aces: The Wide Receiver Complete Series

CHAPTER 30 TESSA

I shouldn’t be stewing over the photos I keep seeing him tagged in, but I’m stewing.

It’s only Thursday night. He’s only been gone for a few hours, really. And yet a new picture pops up every few minutes. He looks like he’s having the time of his life. Last I heard, he was meeting his friends for some blackjack. Instead, it looks like he’s the entertainment at a bachelorette party.

And I’m only guessing that because in one of the photos where he’s tagged, a girl wearing a headband with plastic penises swaying in the breeze is kissing him on the cheek.

Rage blossoms in my chest.

I’m not mad that he went. I can’t be mad he went—not when I practically forced him to go. He should celebrate. He should see his friends. He deserves that.

But these girls showering him with attention…that’s not really so much my cup of tea.

I trust him.

I remind myself of that over and over.

I trust him .

I do. He wouldn’t cheat on me. He loves me. He bought me a damn house, for crying out loud.

But still…history keeps knocking on my thoughts.

My little encounter with Cam’s wife in the bathroom at the Christmas party still plays in my mind. Was she just marking her territory when she warned me to keep my hands to myself? Or was there something deeper there, some fear or knowledge that he was cheating on her?

And my mother…she didn’t seem surprised that my dad had a million other children running around—at least not the same way I was surprised.

The men in my life were cheaters. That doesn’t mean Tristan is, but he’s got an awful lot of temptation for one night of fun right there in front of him while the pregnant girl he pledged forever to is four states and over fifteen hundred miles away.

And it’s not just the pictures with the women, though those are plenty. It’s other photographs, too. Tristan with Cory, or Austin, or Travis—or some combination of the four of them. His head’s thrown back in laughter in one. It’s a little different from how I pictured his night going with the whole I’m meeting my buddies for some blackjack in a bit, but other than that, nothing special line.

I close Instagram rather than continuing to do this to myself.

I’m tired anyway, and all it’s doing is reminding me that he already has a life.

He lives in Las Vegas. He has a circle of friends. He has a career, and he has a place there.

He keeps telling me he wants me, wants the baby, wants us …and I believe him. But it’s hard to reconcile those words with the pictures I’m seeing. Women will always want pictures with him. They’ll always stop and ask for a selfie with one of the best-looking guys in the NFL. Journalists or paparazzi will always be tailing him for the latest gossip.

How do I fit into that?

How does this baby fit into that?

I don’t want the spotlight—not for her, and not for myself. But it’s inevitable because a spotlight shines brightly on Tristan Higgins wherever he goes.

My phone starts ringing, and it’s a number I don’t recognize.

I should just go to bed.

I should ignore it.

But something drives me to answer it.

And when I do, I wish I never had.

“Hello?”

“Tessa, hi. It’s Savannah…Tristan’s ex-wife.”

“How did you get my number?” I demand, my hackles rising as I suddenly wish he was here—or, at the very least, that he was next door right now rather than halfway across the country.

“Does it matter?” she asks. “Look, I have things I need to tell you. Things you don’t know about the man you’ve brainwashed.”

“Excuse me?” I say, and I sit up as I rest a protective hand over my stomach.

Jeez, I really don’t need this stress right now.

“I haven’t brainwashed him,” I protest.

“Right,” she says. “Says every minister’s daughter ever.”

I can picture her rolling her eyes.

Hang up, Tessa. Hang up.

“What do you want?” I ask as I ignore my very intelligent inner voice.

I try to clear my head. I should record this conversation as evidence against her, but I don’t even know if that’s possible to do on a phone. I glance around for a tablet, or my laptop—but everything’s in the kitchen plugged in and charging.

“Did you know that after you disappeared , sweet Tristan had a, well, tryst with none other than Miss Tiffany Gable?” she asks.

“What?” I gasp. How would she know that?

And why is she telling me?

“I know!” she says, her voice dramatically sarcastic. “I was shocked, too. I thought he was so heartbroken over you that he’d be celibate forever when you left to go have his baby unbeknownst to him. But trust me…he broke that vow long before he met me. Then he broke it with me more than a time or two if you know what I mean.”

My chest tightens at the mention of our history and the things he doesn’t know about, and my stomach twists at the thought of him being intimate with her.

Was he the same way with her as he is with me?

I shake off the thought.

I don’t know who this woman thinks she is…but I do know she’s extremely dangerous. “Why are you telling me this?”

“You should know everything about the man you want to spend forever with, my sweet darling girl,” she says, and the sugar in her voice is enough to give me a toothache. “He’s back here in Vegas right now probably about to bring one of those bachelorettes back up to his suite while you’re back home growing Cam Foster’s baby. Ugh, it’s all just so…what’s the word? Oh, that’s right—it’s all so cliché .”

Cam Foster.

Oh my God.

I thought she was just bluffing.

She knows the truth about the baby.

Both babies.

I draw in a shaky breath as I try to figure out what to say next. I don’t have to say anything, though, because she keeps dumping more and more onto my lap.

“Anyway, Tiff and I are great friends now after your little craft thingie, and she filled me in on all the deets about what happened after you just took off on poor Tris. I guess he got epically hammered one night, and Tiff swooped in and, well, I probably don’t need to tell you the rest, but let’s just say Mr. Higgins must have some mighty strong swimmers in there because there was this whole pregnancy scare—can you imagine? You’re off having his baby while he’s screwing Fallon’s favorite Gable. And I myself had a pregnancy scare, so potentially he could’ve had kids with three different baby mamas! Or even more, who knows?” She rambles on as my chest grows tighter and tighter, as that knot in my stomach twists more and more, as my head buzzes louder and louder.

Is this true?

Did Tristan sleep with Tiffany?

I shouldn’t care what he did after I left. It doesn’t really matter, and I can’t sit here and get mad about secrets he’s keeping from me when I’m keeping secrets of my own.

But if it’s true, it’s a sting that hurts pretty damn bad.

“I’m hanging up now,” I hiss.

She cackles. “Oh, no you aren’t sweetie.”

“What do you want?”

“If you want me to keep what I know about your history a secret from our beloved Tristan, then you need to break it off with him,” she demands.

And there it is.

The blackmail.

The part I wish I’d been able to record.

Break it off with him?

Not a chance in hell.

I’m too scared to say that, though, so I simply end the call. My fingers tremble as I hit the red button, but I don’t know what else to do. I click off my phone and toss it away from me onto my bed.

It starts ringing again. I know it’s her, but I refuse to answer.

I also know she’s not the type of woman who will be ignored.

She was blackmailing Tristan, and he was brave enough to admit the truth to his coach so she could get him to back down.

I need to be brave enough to tell Tristan the truth before she does.

Just like he was brave enough to tell me about him and Tiffany.