Page 73 of Ruled Out

I felt the blood surge to my face. I had no response, no leg to stand on. Every decision I’d ever made worked against me in that moment. “I’m sorry, Graham.”

“Fuck off,” he scoffed at me.

Steve opened his mouth to speak again, but Graham shoved his hand up in the air. As he leaned forward across the table, further than he had before, I could feel his disgust absorb into my bones. Graham’s face was twisted with hatred, all too similar to my dad’s.

Oxygen thief.

“My late wife always used to tell me to trust my gut. Especially when it came to you, Jessie. She said you were the right boy from the wrong side of town and you needed more support than most. She said she could tell you wanted this, even if you were messed up.” His voice shook with emotion. “She’d kill you herself if she knew your true agenda. All you wanted was our only daughter.”

“It wasn’t like that.” My hands were freezing cold, the pain was shooting into my chest, and my heart was hammering at an unsteady rhythm, reverberating throughout my body.

“Was she a bet?”

My head whipped up to him, anger swelling in my gut. “Mia is everything to me.”

He huffed out a disbelieving laugh. “You’re just sorry because you got caught before you could put your dick in her.” He paused again, straightening his tie, before he pinned me again with a glare. “You’ll never see her again. I’d be tempted to say you might catch a glimpse of her when you play away games, but I doubt your career will last more than a season with the way you’re playing. I’ll be calling in my final favor on your behalf, if only to get you off my team and out of my fucking life. But mark my words, Callaghan. You so much as LOOK at my daughter again, and you won’t have legs to skate on.”

Silence stretched throughout the room.

Steve dropped his pen to the notepad in front of him as he pushed it away, resigned to my fate. “What’s this favor you’re speaking of, Graham?”

He picked up his cell phone and started tapping on the screen a few times. “Mike Burrows is a former teammate and a good friend. He’s got serious pull with the GM of the Seattle Scorpions. I know they have been watching game tape of Jessie for some time. They were interested at one point and likely still are if we can bury this scandal and Callaghan can keep off the fucking bottle.”

“We will need to look at the terms of Mr. Callaghan’s contract with regard to a trade deal,” Richard added.

Graham shook his head at the speaker. “You mean the contract he’s already in breach of? This is misconduct of the highest order. As far as I’m concerned, he’s a free agent.”

Steve threw me a despondent look and drummed his fingers on the table. “I don’t want this to be dragged out. Jessie needsto be on his new team ASAP. If we can get discussions off the ground, I want negotiations to follow quickly afterward.”

Graham nodded vehemently and pushed back his chair; he was done with the conversation. “Agreed.”

I was barely able to inflate my lungs. I needed to get outside. I was either going to pass out or puke at any second.

“Like I said, Callaghan …”

I paused on my way out of the room and spun back around to eye Graham for what I knew would be one of the last times.

“Not one fucking word about this from you, not even to your parents. This trade is by mutual agreement. You’re a disturbance, and you dislike the way I run things, and I can’t see a future here for you anymore.”

I nodded as he turned and walked out of a second door leading to his office.

He had it all wrong if he thought I’d be breathing a word of this to anyone, let alone my dad. He always told me I was a fuckup, but if he knew, he’d have the evidence to prove his theory right.

I flew out of the room and left Steve to finish the call with Richard.

The hallway out to the parking lot was thankfully empty. I didn’t want anyone to see me like this, especially not the rest of the team. They were already pissed at my performance and the way Graham had given me way more chances than they would ever get.

I got right to the end of the hallway when a hand landed on my shoulder from behind, spinning me back around. Other than Graham, this was the last person I wanted to see.

Tate Coulson, our captain and experienced hard-ass defender. Other than Zach Evans, who played for the Scorpions, he was the guy no one wanted to mess with in the league. I didn’t like the way he looked at me. I knew hewouldn’t start a fight right here, but I could tell he knew what had happened. He was close with our GM. Unlike me, when Graham had put Tate through his program, Coulson had taken the opportunity with both hands. He was one of the first success stories for Graham’s foundation, and at this point, he was more like a family member to him. He’d also known Mia since she had been really young. Part of me thought he wanted her, but he wasn’t that fucking irresponsible.

“So, the cat finally ran out of lives,” he sneered, getting right in my face.

“Leave it, Tate,” I replied, stepping back toward the door, feeling less sure that he didn’t want to get into it right here.

He shook his head and tutted at me. “The GM’s daughter. I mean, I always knew you were a fucking idiot. But I never thought you’d bury your career with a sex scandal.”

“Fuck off. You got what you wanted; I’m gone.”