Page 21 of Unrivaled

I gesture toward the building’s exit. “Can I walk with you, at least? I just wanna ask you a couple of questions.”

She glares at me for another moment, but then she checks the time on her phone and seems to deflate. “I have somewhere to be,” she says, her voice clipped, and then she maneuvers around me—I let her this time—and heads for the door.

I catch up to her and push the door open before she can reach it, holding it for her.

She gives me another narrow-eyed glare. “Holding a door for me doesn’t score you any points, for the record.”

“Noted.”

When she sweeps past me, walking quickly away from the building, I let the door go on whoever’s following her and catch up again.

“You have a kid,” I state without preamble. She’s not giving me an inch here, so I’m going to have to just claw my way onto some kind of footing.

She glances at me out of the corner of her eye, but doesn’t otherwise acknowledge that I spoke.

Sighing, I rub a hand over my face, jogging a couple steps so I can get in front of her and walk backwards. “Jackson saw him. And he’s been to my parents’ house, so he’s seen the pictures they still have up from when I was a little kid. He says your son is the spitting image of me.”

She stops in her tracks, her face blank except for the curl of her lip that communicates her loathing for me as clearly as when she stormed out of game night.

I hold up my hands. “Look. I just want to know. Is he mine?”

Her face goes slack with surprise for a second, and she looks away. When her gaze returns to mine, even that lip curl is gone. Her face is completely devoid of emotion. But her voice is full of fire when she shakes her head and says, “No. He’smine.”

“Then who’s the father? That’s all I want to know.”

Once again, she sidesteps to get around me, a woman on a mission, head down, arms still clutching that notebook to her chest like a shield, her tote bag banging against her side with her jarring pace.

“Tiffany,” I call, but she doesn’t slow, doesn’t give any indication of hearing me. “Tiffany,” I call again, louder. Then I curse quietly to myself, jogging to catch up yet again, this time making an effort to pitch my voice low. “I could get a court order,” I say. “For a paternity test.”

She stops again, her shoulders hunching up around her. But when she meets my eyes, hers are blazing. “Why?” she demands. “Why would you do that? Why do you suddenly care? You didn’t four years ago when you had yourcoachtell my dad you didn’t even know me. You didn’t give a single solitary shit about me or my baby then. Why in god’s name do you care now?”

My mouth hangs open, and all I can do is blink at her. My coach? Her dad? Her baby? Four years ago?

Before my brain can catch up, she squares her shoulders and faces me down. “You have zero obligation right now. You’re not listed on the birth certificate. No one’s coming after you for child support. Don’t you want it to stay that way? Especially with you poised to start a career as a professional athlete? Don’t you want to keep all that money for yourself? Save it up so you can retire once you’re in your thirties and all beat to hell from getting tackled constantly for over a decade?”

But I’m still stuck on what she said about four years ago. I hold up my hands. “Wait wait wait. Back up just a second. What are you talking about?”

Looking at her phone, she shakes her head. “I really don’t have time for this right now.”

But I catch her arm before she can walk away. “Maketime.” It’s a menacing growl, and I release her, clearing my throat and stuffing my hands in my pockets. “Please.”

She’s uncowed by my reaction, simply staring up at me, her eyes narrowed once more.

“I’m not sure what part of this is unclear to you. The condom broke or leaked or had a hole in it from being stored in your wallet—which I hope you’ve stopped doing, by the way—and I got pregnant. After I ruled out my ex as the father via a paternity test while I was pregnant, I knew it had to be you. Itriedto contact you. I sent you messages on Facebook and Instagram, all of which sat unread.”

I take in her nearly emotionless recitation of events in silence, unwilling to interrupt for fear she’ll stop talking, even though I definitely have questions. Namely, what the fuck does my coach have to do with this?

Her emotionless facade is starting to crumble, though, and her voice cracks on the next part. “So I asked my dad to reach out to your coach. Get the team roster so I could get your phone number and call you. When your coach got back to my dad, he said that you’d never met me and told me to leave you alone. That it was up to me to take care of my—” She stops, shaking her head, blinking rapidly. Sucking in a deep breath, she checks her phone again. “I have to go or I’m going to be late to pick up my son. Don’t ever stalk my classes again.”

“I want to meet him,” I blurt out as she passes me.

She freezes, her back straight and stiff. “No,” she says, the single word brooking no argument.

And while I get that she thinks I’m an asshole who abandoned them … “I didn’t know,” I say quietly, taking advantage of her momentary frozenness to give her my part of the story. “My coach didn’t tell me. I never saw your messages, and my coach never said a word. I swear on everything I hold dear that I had no idea you were pregnant, no idea I had a kid out there wandering around with my face until Jackson put it together and told me. I thought you just didn’t bother to let me know.”

She whirls around, her cheeks red, eyes blazing. “I wouldneverdo that!” she spits, incensed. “Never!”

Stepping closer, I almost reach for her, but think better of it. Instead, I curl my hand into a fist at my side and look into her eyes. “And I would never abandon my child or his mother.Never.”

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