“I’m serious,” I tell her, which only makes her laugh harder.
“I know. That’s what’s so funny.”
I wait with a scowl until she calms down enough to speak. “You’re not terrible, but you are hypercritical. Probably because you’re so critical of yourself.”
“Okay.” I take my hand from hers, playfully knocking it away. “I’m not paying you enough to psychoanalyze me.”
She claps for a play, a short pass Erik completes then leans into my space. “But that’s the whole thing, isn’t it? The harshest judges of others are projecting from themselves.” When I grimace, she apparently thinks it’s a green light and goes on. “If you never feel good enough, of course you’d find it easier to think others around you are assholes or stupid or whatever negative and most likely inaccurate descriptor you want to fill in the blank with. Because you want to believe you’re already above them, so you won’t be hurt by their rebuff.”
I jerk back. “You don’t need to read me to filth here. I thought we were having a good time.”
“We are.” She smiles sickeningly sweetly before lowering her voice to a whisper. “Because you’re in love, and now you feel bad for judging him before. It’s making you rethink your entire life, and I like watching you squirm.”
I cough a laugh and push her away. “Now you’re being an asshole.”
She grins, taking my hand once again. “No. I’m not.”
“No, you’re not,” I agree, and we watch the next few plays until the Founders finally score a touchdown, both of us jumping up to cheer. But as the clock ticks down to the fourth quarter, I feel a noticeable shift in the atmosphere. It started with Shayna, one of the wives, showing something on her phone to another, and now they’re whispering and casting furtive glances in my direction.
When Molly notices, she takes it upon herself to find outwhat’s going on, and I try to ignore the twisting in my gut. Whatever it is, it has to do with me, and I know it can’t be good.
Out of the corner of my eye, my friend slides her phone out of her pocket and studies it for a minute before returning to me. “It’s Valerie,” she says, holding out her phone to me, so I can view the screen. On it is a social media post. A beautiful black-and-white shot of Valerie, set against what appears to be sand and ocean, a shadow of a palm tree in the corner with a caption about the sun being the best cure for heartbreak and that karma will take care of men who cheat.
Without naming any names, Valerie Blondeau basically told the world that Camden Long cheated on her. I look up from Molly’s screen to a mix of curious and accusatory stares from the other women, and it’s clear they’ve put the pieces together. Since I’m sitting here in his jersey, I’m apparently the one he cheated with.
Even though nothing happened between Camden and me while he was with her, the heat of embarrassment and shame creep up my neck. This isn’t how I wanted things to come out, and certainly not in such a public way. I’m not even sure what Camden and I are to each other, but now it seems like everyone—the wives and girlfriends of his teammates, who, in this instance, are everyone that may be inmyfuture—has come to their own conclusions.
The game continues, but I can barely focus on the action, hyperaware of every whisper, every sideways glance. Not only from the WAGs, but from anyone in the crowd. I debate whether to stay or leave, but it’s Paisley who taps my elbow and asks to go. I know she saw the post, and I know she’s lying when she says she’s not feeling well, offering me an out.
I take it, accepting Molly’s hug, and return a few waves of goodbye, some understanding eyes, some disapproving glares. I’m so in my head about it all, I barely notice how long it takes our private car to chauffeur us back home, only that I’m in time to catch some of the postgame interviews on television. TheFounders won by a few points, though I’m so nauseous about everything, I don’t care.
Paisley doesn’t stick around as I tie myself up in knots, doomscrolling. Valerie’s post has taken off and already hit the sports podcasters, throwing in their two cents about Camden’s state of play and if his extracurricular activities are getting him in trouble, but that’s completely absurd. Camden’s been playing better than ever. Besides that, Valerie’s social media post has nothing to do with Camden and everything to do with her need for attention.
Yet with the thousands of reposts and comments, it’s clear many people agree with this person, and they want to know who he cheated on Valerie with. Helpfully, she’s been going around hearting comments that defend her and leaving little nuggets about not trusting nannies and “never believe him when he says he’s not in love with the help.”
The help.
She could not be more insulting. Not only to me, but to all caretakers.
And even though she never mentions my name, she’s all but calling me out publicly. Camden has always been careful to keep Paisley out of the public eye, but it wouldn’t be difficult to find out who I am. I mean… I am mentioned on Erik Rivera’s Wikipedia page as his sister. I have been known to appear in the background of photos online. It’s not like I’m completely new to this, but the frenzy Valerie has whipped up feels mildly threatening.
My stomach churns, and I force myself to put my phone down and really consider what the possible outcomes of this are. A plausible but least likely scenario is some creep on the internet connecting the dots and blasting it out everywhere that I am the apparent “cheater.” The more likely scenario is that this will all blow over in a day or two, because some other celebrity will do or say something that sucks up all the oxygen, but that doesn’t make me feel any better.
Because even if I know the truth about my relationship with Camden, I don’t know anything about his past relationships. I don’t know if he was faithful to Valerie or any previous girlfriend. He has a bad-boy reputation for a reason.
And what I can’t parse out is exactly how I feel about that.
The front door of the penthouse opens quietly, but I spin around, nonetheless, realizing I’ve lost so much time to my anxiety-spiraling tonight. The moment Camden’s dark gaze find mine, all of it crashes down on me, and tears flood my eyes.
CHAPTER 22
CAMDEN
I’d been fuming.It was all anybody could talk about as soon as the game ended and I’d been notified of Valerie’s dumb fucking social media post. I figured I would ignore it, but I couldn’t with my teammates giving me shit about it and Malcolm leaving a terse voicemail to call him back. Even the security guard at the parking deck asked about it.
I wouldn’t have cared if I didn’t know that Nadine was involved. All I wanted was her in the stands and to be proud of me, but it was Erik who informed me she’d left the game early. Molly had relayed the message to him that Paisley wasn’t feeling well, but I had a hunch it wasn’t the truth.
Nadine was upset, and she had every right to be. I expected her to be pissed and maybe go a couple of rounds about what a jerk I am—and more than likely that I deserve every bit of scorn from every corner of the world after cheating on Valerie. But what I don’t expect is those river eyes to fill with water and her face to fall when I open the door at home.
