Page 61 of Playing the Game

“Sure.”

The door opened and Adam walked in. Being in the same building as Jonas made him shiver. Of course he hadn’t spent a lot of time here. Enough for there to be plenty of happy memories.

Fat chance of that tonight.

The door was open when he got there.

“Evening, Skipper. This is a nice surprise.”

“Hi, Tito. I need a word.”

Tito moved to let Adam inside. It had an identical layout to Jonas’ apartment, which was disconcerting at first. The only difference being it was a total mess.

“Did you throw a party?”

Tito chuckled. “I’m not one for housework. I’ll clear it up tomorrow. What’s up?”

Adam perched on the arm of the sofa.

“I need you to work with Ewen and not against him.”

“You came all this way to tell me that?”

“Would you rather I did it in front of the others? Javier and Steven are onto you and it won’t be pretty. I’m giving you a friendly heads-up.”

The television was showing the highlights from that day’s football. There wouldn’t be much from their game this afternoon. It could easily be the dullest game Adam had ever played in.

“Fair enough,” Tito said.

“I mean it, Tito. This rivalry is impacting our play. We’ll be playing in the FA Cup soon and we need to be the best we can be. You heard about Jamie’s threat.”

“Yeah. If we don’t win something, Javier and Steven will be out or something like that. I don’t know them as well as you, of course.”

Heartless little shit.

“I guess that’s a fair comment,” Adam replied. “Still surprises me you’re not worried.”

“Me? Why would I be worried?”

“It’s not like there are many managers out there cool with openly gay footballers.”

Tito straightened up. “Meaning?”

“Meaning you’re living a decent life now you’ve come to Brockton. I hear Dean Jack is going to make you a lot of money on the back of being gay players. Javier made that happen for you. I’m willing to bet you wouldn’t have had that at any other club.”

To his credit, Tito appeared embarrassed. “I hear you.”

“Do you? I really hope so, Tito. We’re creating something really special here. Something that’s never been done before. I’d hate to think you would ruin that because of your own fragile ego.”

“Have you spoken to Ewen about this as well?”

Sometimes being the captain of a football team was like running a creche for under-fives.

“Yes,” Adam replied with a sigh. “I have spoken to him.”

“He annoys me.”

“You know what? You’re both annoying me. I’ll teach you some professionalism.”