Throwing Love #2 (Throwing Love #2)

TROWING
LOVE #2

By Nella
Tyler

This
book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are
products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not
to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual
events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Copyright
© 2015 Nella Tyler

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Chapter One

I stirred cream in my coffee and
watched it swirl together to make a creamy drink that used to cheer me up
instantly. Coffee wasn't going to cut it this time, however. In fact, I had
never wished more than to have a shot of whiskey at that moment. I looked up
and found Connie staring across the table at me with a look of concern.

We were sitting at table by the
windows in the local coffee shop we often haunted in between classes. She had
taken me there after I had freaked out in the hallway.

“We really should have gone for
something a little stronger.”

Connie half smiled. “Yeah, sorry,
my bad. I sorta panicked when I saw you sobbing in the hallway. We can go get
one if you want.”

“No, it's okay, the coffee will
do for now. But tonight may be another story.”

“Well, we'll take things one hour
at a time. I'm fine for day beers if you want, so you just let me know.”

I smiled. There was my friend. I
knew I could count on her. I was completely mortified after finding out I was
on the cover of my own newspaper. I wanted to strangle someone, anyone, for
putting me through that. How could I have been so stupid as to get myself
involved in a situation that was going to lead to ridicule?

Seeing myself on the cover of the
paper was almost too much to bear. I had never thought that I would be the
subject of gossip. Hey, maybe when I was a sportscaster, but now in college, I
wasn't exactly the kind of girl that made news. But that had all changed
because of one stupid date.

“How did this happen to me,
Connie? I don't even know what to think right now.”

“I don't blame you.”

“I want to be mad. But how can I
be? It's really my own fault. I shouldn't have gotten involved in the first
place.”

“Seriously? I think you're taking
this really well, all things considered.”

“What you mean?”

“Well after reading the article,
which by the way is awful, I just don't understand why you are not angrier
about the person who wrote it. It's disgusting and to think it came out of the
newspaper you write for. Who was this person that wrote the article?”

The newspaper was still sitting
there in front of us – laying there on the table between us like a
reminder everything that I had done wrong in the past year. I wasn't sure what
to think of it, but just looking at it made my stomach turn. When we had got to
the coffee shop, Connie had read the article in full and she practically
growled the whole time she was reading it. I couldn't blame her; I was pretty
upset about the whole thing myself. I felt the whole thing was out of my hands,
however, I had put myself in the situation. Now it was a matter of getting
myself out.

“I need you to get the paper out
of my face. It’s driving me crazy.”

Connie looked down at the paper,
embarrassed. “Yeah, of course. No problem.”

She got up from the table and
took the newspaper to the garbage can to toss inside. It wasn't about to be
something that I kept as a souvenir. In fact, all it really made me want to do
was die.

“Who wrote that stupid thing?”
Connie said as she sat back down at the table.

“It's this girl name Rebecca.
She's actually really nice. I've worked with her and usually she is very good
at research. I've never known her to make a mistake before. Maybe she was under
a tight deadline and thought she had everything she needed. I don't know what
to think. She definitely got her facts wrong, but she obviously thought she was
doing the right thing. Like I said, I've never known her to make a mistake
before; she's never gotten in trouble before.”

“Well, if I was you, I would be
going there and punching that girl in the face. That would be my first order of
business today. A nice solid punch in the face.”

I laughed. And actually it felt
kinda good. I wasn't really the kind of girl that liked to punch other girls in
the face, but maybe there was a time and a place for everything.

“Look, as much as I would like to
get out some aggression, I don't really think it's her fault.”

“How could you possibly say
that?”

“It's easy. Somebody else
assigned that article, she was just doing her job.”

“Then she did a really shitty
job.”

“No, she must have gotten a bad
lead or something. There's an explanation for this, I'm sure. The newspaper
doesn't just write gossip, there has to be facts involved and for whatever
reason, she must have thought that she had all the information she needed to
write the article. That's why I think you can't really blame her –
sometimes you just get a bad lead.”

“Well, she should have followed
up on that lead and made sure she knew what she was talking about before going
to print. How could she possibly have figured anything out in the few minutes
they saw you on the date? It's so ridiculous that it makes me crazy. How come
you aren't going crazy over it, too?”

“Oh believe me, I want to lose my
mind. But I'm in the same business and sometimes when a deadline is close, you
take a risk and hope that your source hasn't completely screwed you over. She's
a nice girl and she has nothing against me, I'm sure. This wasn't a case of
someone out to get me, she was just doing her job and she screwed up.”

“Well, I hope there will be
consequences for her screw up.”

I sighed. “Look it isn't her
fault. Not in this case, anyways. It's not the writer's fault she got bad
information. It's my own fault.”

“And how do you figure that?”

“Because I should never have
started dating him when there was all this pressure for him to go to the major
leagues. How could I have been so stupid? That's why it's my fault. I should
have left it alone. That's what would've made sense. My own father for crying
out loud was telling me to be careful.”

Connie was looking into her
coffee, probably trying not to admit that I was right. She always warned me
that it was probably not a good idea to date a baseball player. I did it
anyways and now I had to deal with the consequences of that.

“I think you're being way too
hard on yourself. It’s really not your fault that somebody wrote about article
about you. You were trying to be happy. You were trying to have a date with a
handsome guy and nobody else should be involved in that.”

“Yes, you're right. People shouldn't
be getting involved in my business. But unfortunately, that is part of my life.
My father's famous, I'm going to be a sportscaster, I'm going to be in the
limelight, too, to some extent; these are the things that are going to happen.”

“Well, I still don't think you're
to blame for this. I think you need to go talk to your editor and at the very
least get an apology.”

“I should have just left it
alone, ya know? If I had never gone on this date, this never would have
happened. I should have waited until he was picked for a team and then went out
on a date with him. Then no one would be able to say anything about us. They
wouldn't be able to say he didn't like me...for me.”

Connie frowned. I was trying to
fight off tears again. I couldn't help it. There was a small part of me that
wondered if the article was right on the money. What if he was using me? I
didn't want to believe it, but it was hard not to. My own father warned me to
be careful, probably for that very same reason. I hoped he never got wind of
the article, but that was hardly likely. Someone was bound to stumble across it
and show it to him. Then I would have to hear all about why I shouldn't be
dating players.

I knew that Bennett desperately
wanted to get on my father's team. He worshipped my father and wanted to play
for him. Would he really go so far as to lie and use me to get what he wanted?
I didn't want to believe it.

Connie sighed. “I know I warned
you about Bennett and so did your father, but that doesn't mean that any of
this is true!”

“I know.”

“You have been talking about all
this crazy chemistry that you have with Bennett. Don't forget that, that stuff
can be really hard to fake, so chances are he felt it, too, and it's genuine.
Don't let these people get in your head. If you're happy, then be happy. End of
story.”

“I can't see him again, Connie. I
just can't.”

“Are you really sure you want to
do that?”

“No. But I don't have a choice
now. I don't want my relationship with him to be tainted by rumors all around
us. I don't want people thinking I'm a fool because Bennett is using me. I have
a career in the same industry to focus on, and I'm not having the rumor mill do
anything to ruin that. Plus, at the end of the day, I don't even know if it's
true and I'm not going to be humiliated even further.”

“That makes me very sad because I
haven't seen you that happy in a long while.”

“Yeah well, I have bigger issues
than that. The newspaper assigned me to cover the Triple A team as a feature.”

“Who's that?”

I laughed. “Connie, stay with me here.
It's Bennett's team. I was assigned to write about his team, so I'm going to
have to see him again.”

Connie's mouth was hanging open.
“You can't be serious? The same paper that assigned someone else to drag your
name through the mud also wanted you to write about Bennett? Who are these
people? Do they have any integrity at all? I'm furious. I want to walk right
over there and give that editor of yours a piece of my mind.”

“No please, I don't need that,” I
said, laughing.

“I just can't believe it,” she
said, shaking her head.

I sipped at my coffee and
wondered about what I should do.

“I think you need to refuse the
article. Tell them you're not writing it anymore. I'm sure you won't even have
to explain why. The idiots. They probably even expect you to tell them to shove
it.”

“I don't know.”

“Come on, Emmi. It's not like
they aren't going to understand why. So why would you put yourself through
that?”

“I can't. I have to write it. If
I wasn't in college for sports, then maybe I could turn it down, but I'm here
to be a sportscaster. I need to grab every opportunity that I can to cover not
only their team, but any team. It's going to be my job, I can't just run away
every time I have to write something I don't want to write.”

“Really? You're going to do that?”

“I have to. I'm a professional
and this is my job. I don't want anything on my resume that says I refused to
write a sports article.”

“Wow...so when do you want to go
for that drink?”

I laughed. “Now is as good a time
as any.”

Chapter Two

We managed to find our way to the
same burger joint that I had my first date at with Bennett. I'm not sure how
wise it was that we went there, but Connie felt that I shouldn't hide my face
at this point in time. Show people that there is nothing to talk about, she had
said. I could see some truth in it. If I avoided people because I was
embarrassed, then maybe the rumors were true. But if I went in there with my
head held high and a smile on my face, then people would have to assume the
rumors were wrong because why on earth would I be so happy at such a tragic
moment in my life. I didn't want to plaster any sort of smile on my face, but I
knew Connie was right. So I did as she said and we walked in.