Then the line clicked dead.
I stared at the screen for a second, shook my head, and tossed the phone back onto the couch. I didn’t know who it was, but I knew I wasn’t in the mood for childish games.
“Clown,” I muttered, pulling my food from the microwave.
And while I ate, a thought crossed my mind. Hopefully, Tessa’s little plan worked. Come out, come out wherever you are.
We’d just pushed our record to 16–5, and the locker room was loud behind me—music, trash talk, that winning-season buzz you couldn’t fake if you tried. But the second I stepped up to the podium, everything shifted. Cameras flashing, reporters locked in, and me trying to act like my head wasn’t somewhere else entirely.
“How’d you feel about the team’s performance tonight?”
“Good,” I said, leaning into the mic. “Real good. We executed. We played our game. I like the energy the team is carrying. We keep that up; we’ll be tough to beat.”
Somebody shouted from the back, “Too early to start talking playoffs?”
I cracked a grin. “Way too early. Y’all not about to bait me into that headline. It’s one game at a time. That’s all I’m focused on right now.”
The room chuckled, pens scratching across notepads. I rolled my shoulders, still buzzing from the court.
“DaVinci, usually around this time of year, you announce your annual foundation donation. Anything you can share with us yet?”
I nodded. “Normally I do, yeah. But this year I’m holding it. Something’s in the works. You’ll know on the night of the gala.”
Reporters perked up. “So no hints? Nothing at all?”
“It’s going to the real MVPs,” I said. “The people who don’t get enough shine for the work they do every day. People who put their lives on the line for us. That’s all I’ll say for now.”
The questions kept coming, about minutes, rotations, the road stretch coming up, but I kept it simple. Short, clean answers. Nothing dragged. I wasn’t about to sit up here and spill strategy. Nor was I about to be up here all night. I gave them ten minutes every time.
After about ten minutes, my PR rep wrapped it. “Thanks, everyone, that’s all for tonight.”
I headed back toward the tunnel, and that’s when Marsha caught up with me. Marsha Brooks had been my publicist for five years. She was sharp as hell, always three steps ahead, and the only person on my team who wasn’t afraid to tell me when I was fucking up. But she’d been on one, and I’d been letting Chance handle it.
“Good presser,” she said, falling into step beside me. “But we need to talk.”
“About?”
“Cassie. The future. Your image. You’ve been avoiding me by using Chance as your mouthpiece.” She pulled out her tablet, swiping through what looked like mock-ups and headlines. “The story’s going to break wider soon. Arson, stalking, restraining orders. It’s going to be everywhere. And when it does, we need to control the narrative.”
I kept walking. “I’m the victim here, Marsha. What narrative?”
“The one where you look stable. Settled. Not the guy whose assistant burned his house down because she was obsessed with him.” She looked up at me. “Sponsors are already asking questions. They want to know you’re not a liability.”
That irritated me because I was a lot of things. A liability wasn’t one of them.
“So what do you want me to do?”
“Get a girlfriend.” She said it as if it were simple math. “Or at least let us set you up with someone who looks good on your arm. A WAG situation. You know how much value that adds? We’re talking another couple of million in endorsements, easy. Someone pretty, poised, knows how to play the game.”
I stopped walking. “You want me to fake a whole relationship for optics?”
“I want you to be smart about your brand. You’re thirty-four, DaVinci. Single, no kids, drama with an ex-employee? That’s not the story we want totell. Because victim or not, the media is going to spin this into you being in the wrong.”
I knew she was right. When Devyn got into her fatal accident, the media didn’t care that I was grieving. They cared about clicks. So many allegations and supposedly factual headlines about her running from me. All types of shit. And I didn’t need that shit repeating itself,but I also didn’t want Halo to see that mess and really lose interest. I knew Halo didn’t tolerate bullshit from men. I wouldn’t be any different in her eyes. That was fine. It was the way I preferred it. I wanted her to make me stand on business like she would anyone else. Plus, she was already under the impression that my hoe tendencies had led to my house being set on fire, I didn't need any more negative marks against me.
“But you with a nice woman at events? Someone the media can love? That changes everything,” she finished, bringing me back to what she was saying. Whenever Halo comes to mind, I lose all sense of time, direction, and reality.
“No.”
