Page 60 of Touchdown, Tennessee

“Pretty sure Gray is the one who keeps staring at me.”

“Well, that’skind ofhis job, though,” Luke said before dropping his voice. “Think he’s going to find out about Coach’s affair and make the whole article about that?”

Damn.

I hadn’t even considered Coach’s affair. Hadn’t even thought about it in weeks.

It definitelywouldbe something Gray might latch onto.

“Christ, Luke. Don’t say that out on the field.”

“Swear to God, Peachel, Coach smells like that same super flowery perfume every time he says his wife’s traveling.”

I grabbed my bottle and swigged a fat gulp of water. I could hear the crowd already starting to cheer again, knowing we were about to come back out and finish the game.

“Don’t give a fuck about his personal life,” I told Luke.

Luke raised an eyebrow. “Still. If you want to make sure the article is abouthimand notus, that’s a very easy story to spin. We could give it to Gilman on a platter.”

I furrowed my brow. “I’m not doing anything like that.”

Luke looked down at the ground, kicking at the grass with the toe of his cleats. He glanced back up at me, and I was surprised to see guilt on his face.

“Sorry,” he said. “Just wanted to help you. You seemed pretty worried about the article.”

I gave Luke a pat on the back. “We don’t need to throw anybody else under the bus, okay?”

Luke gave me a nod. “Got it.”

“Back out there!” Coach bellowed over toward us, waving us back out onto the field.

A tiny sliver of guilt pooled in my chest as I ran back out. As the crowd went wild in the stands, I couldn’t stop looking over at Coach.

I knew it was true.

Everyoneknew it was true.

Coach Ennick had definitely been cheating on his wife, having an affair with a woman who literally looked like a 25-year-old Marilyn Monroe. She showed up after games sometimes, but only when Coach’s wife, Debbie, was out oftown. We turned the other way, nobody ever daring to comment on it.

But I’d never considered that someone like Gray would probably see something like that and run absolutely wild with alluding to it in the article.

I didn’t want that happening.

It wasn’t that Coach was such a perfect guy. I didn’t support his affair at all, and it disgusted me that he would do that to his wife.

But it didn’t need to be blasted out into the school paper.

Just keep your head down and stay out of it, I told myself.

You’re here to play football.

And to fucking crush it.

“Two! Fucking! Touchdowns! Baby!”

I heard Luke screaming it at the top of his lungs even before I hit the endzone. I was running like my life depended on it.

My quads burning. My core like a Mack truck, headed straight for that line.