Free The Game Changer: A Novel by J. Sterling Page B

person.” I threw my hands up into the air in my frustration.
    “So are you!” she fired back.
    “No. I’m an asshole. There’s a difference.”
    This girl pushed every goddamned button I had. And not in a good way. I half wished Melissa would walk past me and deck her. Lord knows I couldn’t. If it were socially acceptable to punch a girl, this might have been the time I’d actually consider doing it. If she were a guy, I’d knock her teeth down her fucking throat.
    “I will do whatever I have to do to be rid of you. You hear me? Whatever I have to do.”
    “Are you threatening me?” she asked, her voice overtly raised.
    “If I were threatening you, you’d know it. Sign the damn papers.” I turned away from her, punching the bar door open with my fist.

    “I didn’t think it was possible to hate her more.” Cassie exhaled as she shook her head in disbelief. “Who does stuff like that?”
    “Crazy bitches. I swear I’m never talking to another girl who isn’t you again.”
    That actually isn’t a half-bad idea. If I never talk to another female fan, I’ll never get in trouble with Cass and she’ll trust me again.
    “Gran might get sad.” Cassie’s sweet voice interrupted my new plan.
    “Right. You and Gran,” I amended before continuing. “So, Chrystle filed a restraining order against all three of us the next day.”
    “Shut the fuck up! Against you, Dean, and Melissa?”
    I nodded. “She said we threatened her life and she feared for her safety.”
    “Are you joking? That bitch better hope I never run into her or she will fear for her safety.” Her fingers tapped the top of her plate, making a loud ping with each touch.
    I laughed out loud. “I like it when you get all protective over me, Kitten. It’s cute.”
    “You should have had her locked up in an asylum or something when you had the chance.” Her voice filled with anger, and I found myself amazed at the amount of craziness in my life over the past year.
    “I still can’t believe Meli didn’t tell me any of this. I mean, after I saw you at your game that night, I called her right away. She toldme to get over you. She said I needed closure, but she knew everything that you were doing the whole time.”
    I grabbed the back of my neck in discomfort at the memory of seeing Cassie with some other guy at my baseball game and also how irritated Melissa had become. “Yeah. She was pretty pissed at me by that point.”
    “Why?”
    I tugged my neck to the left, cracking it before exhaling loudly. “She told me that I had a deadline. Either I told you by a certain date, or she would.”
    “When was the deadline?”
    I looked away from her eyes, the truth still a painful reminder. “Before I left for spring training this season.”
    I watched as her mind worked, the pieces clicking together like a puzzle that only fit together in one particular way. She was making the connection between Melissa’s demands of me months ago and their conversation after seeing me at the game a few weeks ago. “But she never told me. I mean, she never said anything. And obviously, neither did you.” She stopped, her forehead wrinkling with her continued confusion as she realized that Melissa threatened to confess everything to her, but never followed through. “Why didn’t she tell me? She knew how hurt I was.”
    I nodded. “I know. She said that you were finally happy here. That you were giving people a chance and you loved everything you were experiencing. And she was afraid if she told you everything that you’d go back to being sad and close yourself off. She figured telling you would only make you take steps back, instead of forward.”
    I watched as her forehead softened, releasing the tension. “Because of Joey?” she asked softly.
    “Yeah. She said that even though it wasn’t the same, she could hear the subtle excitement in your voice whenever you talked abouthim.” I forced a smile while my stomach churned and twisted with