Page 81 of Tiger Lilies and Tight Ends

“What is that?” I ask him.

But he still doesn’t answer. He wanders past the kitchen to look out the door that leads out back.

I grab his phone, but before I can look at it, he blurts out, “Are those flowers?”

“Yes. I put them outside so they wouldn’t bother you. Is that okay?” His hands are down by his sides and both of them curl into fists. I look at him for a beat longer, and it’s then that I glance down and see my social account pulled up and a picture of his boat.

“What in the . . .?”

I read the post and swipe through the pictures, and with each one, my stomach drops further and further. The line says, “Living the life,” and then underneath it are thousands of likes and hundreds of comments.

People already knew that I was in Tampa based on other things that I’d said, but now they are feral, excited, and curious.

Oh no.

Tyler loves his privacy. While he’s okay with pictures that are posted of him at games or even randomly out and about, he made it very clear that his personal life was never to be shared. I told Morgan this the day I told her I was staying with Tyler. She laughed about the rules. Did she think he wasn’t serious? I don’t know. I just can’t believe she didn’t ask me first. And now given that I’m about to go public with my face, everyone will know these things belong to him.

“Tyler, I didn’t do this. You know Morgan runs my social accounts for me. I can assure you it must have been a lapse in her memory because I told her no photos. I’m so sorry.” My words crack as I’m trying to catch my breath. He’s so upset, and this hurts my feelings so badly. I feel betrayed by Morgan, but she never does anything malicious. She had to have just forgotten.

He ignores what I’ve said as he turns to face me. Everything about him is tense. He’s so upset, and then he says, “Is that what you tell people? That you’re living the life. It feels so fucking superficial and not like who I thought you were. You went from one cushy situation to the next. Is that your end goal?”

My end goal.

What is he talking about?

I thought he was my end goal. Not because he’s a football player but because he’s Tyler. Someone who’s come to mean more than anything to me.

My eyes well with tears.

“I have never said this to anyone.”

The tension lining his forehead and jaw drops as he frowns at me. He takes a few steps forward and snatches his phone out of my hands and shoves it into his pants pocket. “Funny, I ran into two fans in the elevator at the hotel in Seattle who said they spoke to you at last week’s game, and you said exactly that. This was before I saw your post.”

Immediately, I know who he’s talking about.

My racing heart thrashes in my chest. “Tyler, I didn’t say that. They did. I just agreed with them.”

“Why would you do that?” He shakes his head like he’s disappointed.

“Are you kidding me?” I scoff and take a step backward, needing to put some distance between us. “You know firsthand how it is. Don’t engage. Be cordial and kind. I just agreed with what they said. Like I would ever open up about my life to strangers, and even if I did, it wouldn’t have mattered. Those two had pigeonholed me into this very specific image, and it didn’t matter what I said. They weren’t going to change their minds.”

“Why were you talking to them in the first place?” he asks, crossing his arms over his chest.

My jaw drops.

“Last week’s game was a shit show, in case you forgot. Everyone under the sun tried to talk to me after that little fifty-yard sideline show you and Dean put on two weeks ago. Why didn’t you just walk away? Why did you talk to him? Seems like a lot of the noise that’s circulating right now could have been avoided. Including this conversation you apparently had in an elevator.”

“The timing of it all just seems very coincidental,” he says, looking me over.

“What does that mean?” I ask him, glancing to see what I’m wearing. Of course it’s one of his Tarpons T-shirts. I didn’t think anything of it when I grabbed it out of the dryer, except the fact that it was his, and I wanted to be closer to him, even if it was just a shirt.

“Are you excited for your grand reveal?” he hisses through his teeth.

“Is that what’s really bothering you? Me deciding to go to my book signing? Because this attitude started before you left, and I had no idea what I’d done wrong.”

“Well, at least you admit to doing something wrong.”

Who is this person standing in front of me? Where is my sweet and kind friend? What did I do to make him really think these things about me? And why does this somehow feel like déjà vu, but it hurts so much more?