Page 39 of Sideline Play

Wringing my hands, I hastily confess, “Dad and I paid Castor off,” a weight lifting off my chest as I speak the words out loud for the first time in three years as another settles into place.

“WHAT? He attacked you andyoupaidhimoff?” Remi yells, getting up from the bed, pacing an angry path. “I don’t understand, Scar. Help me understand why you didn’t send that fucker to prison.”

“I did it for Roman!” I cry. “I did it for my brother. They told me the charges wouldn’t stick, that Ro’s case would be thrown out, but it would have derailed his future. If what he did was made public, not even Boomer could have signed him. He would have been seen as a liability to the franchise. I couldn’t let that happen.

“Remi, my family will always come first. That will never change. For as fiercely as Ro protects me, I do the same for him, he just doesn’t know what lengths I went to do it. He thinks I wastoo scared to take the stand and have the media looking in on me and knowing what I experienced.”

Pacing several more times, Remington comes back to the daybed and squats before me, silencing me as I try to tell him not to squat so deeply after picking me up that way earlier. Wiping my cheeks clean of my earlier tears, he takes my hands and asks, “What does that mean for us? I would never ask you to pick between me and them, but what do you mean by they will always come first? Because Scarlet, I will stand with you and support you through anything, including whatever you did for Roman, but I need to know now, how invested in us will you be in return?”

“Well,” I start, pausing to chew on the inside of my cheek while I gather my words. “Until I can review the policy on athletes and employees dating, I need us to keep things quiet because I don’t want to lose my position, and I don’t want Ro and my dad in a tough spot knowing something that they would otherwise report if it was anyone else.”

“That’s more than fair,” he nods. “But after that?”

“After that…” Rubbing my hands inside of his, I bite the bullet and give him a rambling confession of where I see things potentially going. “I’m not saying I’m in love with you right now, but I could be, and if you think you could love me—which I think you do based on how you talk—then I assume… can see… hope… that, that you would eventually want to become part of that family as you know…”

Smiling as he kisses me, he stops my words. “I get what you’re saying, Scarlet, and yeah, I can see that too.”

Nodding my head several times, I mumble, “Well okay then.”

“Now,” Remi says, climbing back in with me, “I don’t want to push, but baby, I have to know, what the fuck did Roman do that was so bad you and Colt paid off the guy who assaulted you to keep it quiet.”

Putting my hands on his thighs, I stress, “I signed an NDA, Remington. Everything I’ve told you falls under that NDA so you cannot speak of this to anyone, ever. It was a part of the deal to get Castor to drop his charges. I couldn’t breathe one word of what he did to me, and he wouldn’t breathe a word of what Roman did to him.”

“I won’t, Scarlet. I swear to you, I won’t.”

Taking him at his word, I accept, “Okay. After it happened, I desperately clung to Roman. He couldn’t leave my sight or I would completely collapse. He got the doctors to sign off saying I had contracted pneumonia and was highly contagious and us plus Reeves took our finals remotely at the house so as to not spread it.”

“What about the other roommate?”

“O’Mally? Yeah, that’s easy enough to explain.

“I wouldn’t let Roman call our dad even when he couldn’t leave me alone. Not to bathe, not to sleep, nothing. If I was awake, he had to be within reach. I was too ashamed to tell our dad, which he understood and accepted though he hated it.

“We thought the house would be safe, but it turns out when you walk in on the adoptive siblings sleeping in bed together with the brother spooning the sister, the potential payday is too much to pass up.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“Yep; that’s the origin of that photo and why it always sets my dad off when it comes up. It was taken the same weekend Castor assaulted me and all anyone sees is Ro and I snuggled up in bed together—him without a shirt and me wearing said shirt. When it first hit, we were quiet because I was still talking with detectives and was in no shape to go before the cameras. Afterward, we couldn’t say anything to convincingly refute the claims without Roman finding out about what dad and I did and so our silence on the matter was taken as guilt.

“O’Mally for his part got kicked out of the house and off the team, but the genie was already out of the bottle on that one, so we just made do and keep making do. Eventually, at least I hope, they'll get tired of going down that fruitless rabbit hole and let the story die.

“As for what Roman did… Castor is many things and stupidly arrogant is one of them. His dumb ass showed up to his first final on Monday as if nothing had happened. As if Roman and Reeves hadn’t made it a point to have others keeping an eye out for him.

“So while I took the same exam at the house and then went to sleep, Roman went to wait for Castor at his car… with a baseball bat.

“He fractured his cheekbone, broke every one of his fingers, busted both his kneecaps, and then he made sure Castor would never get an erection again.”

“Holy shit,” Remi breathes.

Rolling off to his side and creeping my fingers under his clothes and up his ribs, I chuckle. “When Ro was arrested, he said he was delivering a justice far more fitting than any prison sentence. The police assured us that in light of the events leading up to it that the charges wouldn’t stand. That the case would be thrown out or at worst he would serve community service because a jury would never convict when presented with the evidence of what happened to me. Even still, if it came out, it would have ruined any chance Roman had at a professional career. Probably any career. I couldn’t let that happen to him.

“So when he called Reeves to come bail him out, I called our dad. I cried the whole time, telling him how sorry I was as I explained it all and begged him to come help us. Which of course the moment he heard me, he was already in the car making the drive to The Nest texting Boomer about needing the helicopter to bring him to Knoxville.

“He and two of Boomer’s lawyers showed up not long after, one going to get Roman from the precinct and the other going with me and dad to see Castor. We agreed, dropped charges for dropped charges, NDAs all around with the contingency that I would give an Oscar worthy performance when it came to convincing Roman and Reeves of my reason, and a several million dollar payout with half up front and the rest to be deposited monthly until the statute of limitations on what Ro did was up and a guarantee Castor couldn’t ask for more or renegotiate. Otherwise he would have to pay it all back with interest, and I would take him to civil court for the assault.”

“And Roman doesn’t know?”

Shaking my head, I confirm, “No. He has no idea, and my dad and I want to keep it that way. Roman carries enough guilt that has never been his to bear. I couldn’t let any more be added to his shoulders.”

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