Page 76 of Keep Me
“My problems are a little harder to solve,” I muttered, and she patted my knee.
“Well, then, maybe you should think about ways to work around it. If the problem won’t go away, how can you at least make things more tolerable.”
“Thanks, B.” I sighed, gently shaking out of her hold. I glanced over to the crowd, and my dad wasn’t there. It didn’t mean I was scot-free, though. He’d find me, and I needed to talk to him. “I’ve got to go, but I’ll see you tomorrow in class,” I said.
Britt nodded. “Sure thing.”
Standing, I trudged back to the showers, knowing that the only things waiting for me were a lecture from Coach and a discussion with my father.
Why was he here, anyway? Did he want to see me fail? Did he think I needed to get to the NFL to survive? It wouldn’t surprise me. He’d never taken much interest in my extracurricular activities, so maybe he thought I needed the money. Maybe he was trying to get a cut. Most likely, he was just here to try to get me to sign over the house, but that was something I was unwilling to do.
Walking out of the stadium, I slowed when I saw my dad sitting on one of the benches. He hadn’t turned to see me yet, and I contemplated leaving him there, but then I remembered how quickly he mentioned Britt. I needed to know how he knew her name.
Reluctantly, I walked over, and without acknowledging him, I sat on the bench and stared at the bronzed statue of a football player in front of me.
“Good to see you, Ben,” he said, and I smelled the alcohol on his breath from here. My lip curled as my stomach curdled. It wasn’t always like this between us. We weren’t always this distant, but I wouldn’t say it was ever smooth sailing. “Not so good to see you play. I assume you aren’t always that terrible for you to be on the team.”
“I’m not normally,” I said, resting my elbows on my knees and blowing out a tired breath. Players walked out of the stadium, but no one bothered us. Jackson and Tanner took a little look as they walked past, but I guessed that was more to do with checking if I was okay than anything else. “You saw me on a bad day.”
He snorted. “No kidding.”
“What are you doing here, Dad?”
“Really? I flew all the way out here, and you’re acting like it’s an inconvenience?”
“Dad. Come on.”
He chuckled. “Yeah, well, I got something very interesting in the mail a couple of weeks ago, and after speaking with your girlfriend, I felt like it was something I needed to talk to you about.” With a clenched jaw, I stayed quiet, just staring at him. He shook his head. “Honestly, I knew you were impulsive, but I gotta admit, I didn’t realize you were dumber than a bag of rocks.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Although, to be fair, now that I’ve seen her, I can see why you’d want to tie her down before anyone else got to her.”
“Still have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Getting married before you’ve even finished college to a girl that’s not your girlfriend. I know your mother and I married young, but we were high school sweethearts. I’ve never even met Brittany Brennon, yet she’s my daughter-in-law.”
“Daughter-in-law?”
“The marriage papers. Surprised you got them sent to our house, considering you haven’t been back since you started at this fancy school.”
I froze. I thought I’d gotten rid of all of that. My brain was malfunctioning, and he could see it.
What marriage papers?
The first thing I did after speaking to Britt at the Crushers game was hack the little white chapel where we got married and delete any reference of it happening. I thought it worked and Britt wouldn’t have to deal with the consequences, but clearly it hadn’t if my father knew about it.
Britt was going to kill me. Yeah, I’d been vaguely hinting about our little drunken marriage to get a rise out of her, but I honestly thought it didn’t count if I’d deleted all records of it.
“I need to see the papers. Where are they?”
“Do you really think I’d come all the way here to see you for five minutes and just give them to you? We both know I’m not that good of a guy and you’d leave me high and dry.”
“What do you want?” I cut to the chase, unwilling to sit here and listen to him any longer.
He seemed content with that as he lifted his hand. “Two things. Dinner with your new wife and for you to sign off on the house sale.”
The two things I couldn’t give him.
