Page 22 of Choke

But all I see is the way her hands were on him.

The way his arms wrapped around her.

Tension coils in my neck, so tight it feels like my head might snap.

“You know who is your chick? Alice. She was there, man. She saw you sucker punch a teammate for a reason we all claimed not to know. Alice, who took a leave from work to follow you around on this string of games.”

His focus on me wronging Alice comes as a surprise. He doesn’t even like her. He certainly gave me a lot of shit when I told him she was planning to go with us. I hold his stare, unwilling to display any form of submission to one of my oldest friends.

He takes a breath, calming his tone before continuing, “That bar was full of people who follow us on socials, man. It’s already all over Instagram and TikTok. This isn’t a good look for the team.”

Ronan’s words hit home—Instagram and TikTok. I can already imagine the videos. Liberty sucker-punching his teammate over a girl. The comments must be tearing me apart. No doubt Britt was losing her mind.

Unlocking my phone, I scroll past Britt’s text, ignore the email with the subject line ‘Damage Control—Urgent,’ and open TikTok, quickly locating the video. 67 million views.

Holy shit.

Bushy Beavers Drama: Did Assistant Captain Liberty Just Deck a Teammate Over a Chick?

The clip is grainy, the flashing club lights making it hard to see, but it’s clear as fucking day. Nate has his hands on her, and then—

BOOM.

I filter through the comments; there are thousands of them. The top comment has over 50,000 likes.‘LMAO, Liberty threw hands over some random girl? Relax, bro.’I scroll down; the comments range from calling me out for shitty behavior to suggesting Nate press charges to women asking me to fight for them. What a fucking disaster.

I lock my phone, blocking out the video of his hands on her body.

“I know. I’m sorry. She got under my skin, and I was drinking. I wasn’t thinking straight. How do I fix this?”

He scrubs his hand down his dark two-day-old stubble and shrugs.

“I have no idea. I already pulled Nate aside for a chat. You owe him a couple of beers when we get back home. Brittney sounded like she was on the brink of a nervous breakdown when she called me this morning. You can deal with that shit.” He sighs. “The team shit will sort itself out. You and Nate will be fine; you’ve tussled before. Just try to remember that we handle other people. Try not to handle your teammates.”

“First time over a chick,” I interject in jest.

“Yeah, first time over a chick. Please don’t remind me. Man, I don’t know what the hell you’re going to do about Alice. She is pissed. I’m pretty sure she’s seen the TikTok by now. Pretty sure everyone has seen that fucking video.”

I lean my head back, taking that tidbit of information in. Millions of views—how could she not have seen it by now?

Fuck sake.

“That little dress your girl was sporting didn’t help any,” He says in a playful tone. “Damn man, even I gotta admit, she looked good.”

“Don’t.” I snap. This is too fresh, and that dress was too short.

Too. Fucking. Everything.

He shrugs, laughs, and shakes his head.

“You’re so fucked.”

“Shut up, Ronan.”

“Seriously, you haven’t even fucked this chick, and you’re throwing hands. What would have happened if you had?”

I glare at my best friend, and he laughs.

“I haven’t seen you like this in a long time. All twisted up over a chick. I would rather not go back to that, Adrian,” He says, walking to the water cooler, filling a paper cup, drinking it, and then carrying on. “Also, her friend. Good God. I’ve never paid for sex, but I couldn’t say no.”

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