The next day at practice, I thought about everything happening to the team. First there was the sabotage to the two Broncos in the parking lot. Then Rhett received a death threat in his locker. After that was the peanut butter cookie incident, which seemed like a really silly way to describe what was basically attempted murder. And now a second note, this one threatening to burn Cole’s house to the ground.
Rhett had been targeted once, and Cole three times. How were they connected? Were there other incidents to Reapers players that we had overlooked?
I hated feeling helpless—and I knew it was worse for the players, since they were the actual targets of whatever washappening. After a few months on the job, I was quickly learning just how much stress there was for a professional athlete. The pressure of performing under the spotlight was awful enough without worrying about whether or not your house might burn down while you were at a game, or whether your food was poisoned.
I didn’t know how Cole and the others could stand it.
I expected them to lean on me more, coming over and losing ourselves in the mindless drive of our bodies, but Cole had the opposite reaction. He withdrew, saying that he wanted to be alone at home. I told him I understood, but deep down, I wanted to be there for him.
While I was typing some workout notes into my computer, one of the third line players knocked on the trainer’s door. “Hey, June? Have you seen Cole?”
I glanced at my watch and said, “I think he’s on the ice. They’re running defensive drills today. Why, what’s up?”
“There’s someone here to see him. He says it’ll be quick. And no, they don’t look suspicious. That was my first thought.”
Curiosity got the best of me, so I stood up and said, “I’ll see what they need.”
The man waiting in the hall outside the locker room was wearing a button-down shirt with a puffy vest over it. My first thought was that he looked like a stereotypical finance bro. Which, it turned out, was pretty damn accurate.
“Cole’s on the ice right now, but is there something I can help you with?”
“I’m Ted Harmon, Cole’s financial advisor. What’s so funny?”
I quickly wiped the grin off my face “Nothing, I was just thinking of a joke I heard.”
“I’m just here to give him some documents.” He held up a manila folder. “Wait a minute. You’re June!”
“Um. I am.”
“Cole was telling me about you the last time I saw him. He really likes you, if you don’t mind me saying so. I’ve never seen him like this for the past few weeks.”
“That’s really nice to hear,” I said awkwardly. “If you want to hang around, he’ll be done with drills in maybe twenty minutes?”
Ted glanced at his watch and winced. “I’m kind of in a hurry. Can you give these to him? It’s all his financial allocations for the previous year. I made the changes to Alice’s payments that he requested since she’s in her twenties now. All the details are inside.”
Alice. The name sent a jolt of surprise through me. “Of course, I’ll give this to him.”
I returned to my office and stared at the folder. There was a Post-It note on the outside that said, “Alice’s allocation bumped up per request” in red pen.
Who is Alice?
She was in her twenties. Cole was twenty-eight, so Alice couldn’t have been a secret daughter or something like that.
I tried to go back to my work, but I was too distracted now. The folder was sitting right there on the edge of my desk. It would have been easy to take a quick peek inside, but that’s not the kind of person I was. That would have been a massive breach in trust, both as an employee of the Reapers and as someone who had a personal relationship with Cole.
But without any firm information, my imagination began to run wild. Cole didn’t want to tell me who Alice was, which meantit was probably something bad. A secret affair? But then why would he need to make payments to her? Ted implied that the payments had been going for a while. If she was only in her twenties now, then they would have begun when she was in her teens…
I quickly shook my head. I was speculating way too much. There was probably a logical explanation for whatever was going on.
But all the explanations that I could think of right nowfeltbad.
I was sick to my stomach as the team returned to the locker room. I waved at Cole, and he came into my room a few minutes later.
“Someone dropped this off for you,” I said, handing him the folder. “He said his name was Ted, your financial advisor.”
“Oh. Okay.” He took the folder and stiffened when he read the note on the outside. “Did he say anything else?”
I kept my tone neutral as I said, “He told me that he made the changes to Alice’s payments.”
