Scrambling (Out in the NFL Book 1) Read online

  Scrambling

  Out in the NFL, Book One

  Lex Valentine

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Also By Lex Valentine

  Lexicon Publishing

  PO Box 11751

  Santa Ana, CA 92711

  Scrambling, 2nd Edition © May 2020, Lex Valentine. All rights reserved. This book is licensed to the original purchaser only. The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the author is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized editions and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated. This book was previously published. The content has been revised only slightly from the original publication.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places, organizations, or persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover art © 2020, Winterheart Design, http://winterheart.com

  Interior Design and Graphics by Winterheart Design Book Services

  Cover content is for illustrative purposes only and any person depicted on the cover is a model.

  Formatting by LesCourt Author Services

  WARNING: This work contains graphic language and explicit sexual content between two consenting adults. Intended for adult readers only. Not intended for readers under the age of 18. Please protect your copy of this work from access by underage readers.

  For the late William Neale, who was slated to be the beta reader of this story and who believed in the plot and my ability to pull it off. I will never forget his generosity and caring.

  Acknowledgments

  Many thanks to my former coworker Michael Casey for answering questions and always being willing to talk about the NFL and the premise of this story with me. Kudos to my het buddy and fellow author Marty Mankins for his support and willingness to read anything I write including a gay romance. And as usual, my undying gratitude to Z.A. Maxfield for taking me to lunch, listening to my woes, and critting this book.

  Also, many thanks to the core group of authors who have been chugging down the same road as me for about the same length of time and have always been there in my corner. (And who let me make them pretty covers too!): Z.A. Maxfield, Tara Lain, KC Burn, Belinda McBride, Lynn Lorenz, Jaime Samms… being an author just wouldn’t be the same without all of you as my friends and “co-workers.”

  And to all the readers who’ve hung in there with me on social media and Patreon. Your support means everything to me as an author and person. My family and I are indebted to you for always being there for us.

  Los Angeles Stars Complex

  The Los Angeles Stars, a brand-new NFL expansion team, had a facility just east of Los Angeles. The state-of-the-art facility, a mammoth complex of team offices, indoor training center, and an outdoor field, sat just a quarter mile from the new Los Angeles Stadium where the team’s games would be played. Evan McAdam and his best friend, Reed Matthews, walked through the complex, slightly in awe of everything they saw. As the Stars’ first two draft picks, they were valuable to the team even though neither of them had so much as played a down for them yet. Evan felt the responsibility of that to the marrow of his bones, and he knew Reed felt the same.

  However, with the draft behind them, training camp and their new careers in the NFL ahead of them, Evan realized that he wasn’t a kid anymore. His life, his chosen profession for as long as he could play, lay before him, and he had a huge adult decision to make. As usual, with anything life altering, he’d gone to Reed and discussed it. Evan preferred to defer to his quarterback, Reed, in both life and football. Reed was outgoing and used to calling all the plays on the field and in anything that affected both their lives. But when Evan did take the lead, it was because he had a firm, well-thought-out conviction about something. His calm manner always made Reed sit up and take notice. And Reed inevitably fell in line with what Evan wanted to do.

  That had been the case today as well. Evan had made a decision, and after some protest, discussion, and a lot of thought, Reed had fallen in with Evan’s plan, which was what had brought the two of them to the Stars complex. By the time they sat down in leather chairs before the teakwood desk of Darcy Jensen, the team’s public relations director, Evan’s resolve had grown rather than faltered.

  “What can I do for you?” Darcy asked, her bright green eyes flicking from Reed to Evan and back again, obviously expecting Reed to do the talking.

  “You can promise that what we discuss here today will go no further than this office without our permission,” Evan stated calmly. Reed nodded his agreement but remained silent.

  Darcy smiled, and Evan could see she was not only beautiful but smart. He’d figured she would be. A woman wouldn’t be the top PR gun for an NFL team if she weren’t smarter and more resourceful than most men. Women in the NFL world had it tough. Evan had done his homework on her, though, and he knew she had a knack for turning bad incidents into good press for a team.

  “I take my job very seriously, and if I don’t have the trust of the players, I can’t create effective PR for the team,” she said simply. “Whatever you tell me will be held in the strictest confidence, but you have to understand that my goal is always the positive promotion of this team and its interests.”

  Reed glanced over at him, and Evan could see the concern in his friend’s dark eyes. He gave him an encouraging smile before turning back to Darcy.

  “That’s why we brought a confidentiality agreement with us.” Evan took out the contract and slid it across the desk toward her. “Will you sign it?”

  Darcy picked it up and began to read. When she finished, she laid it on the blotter. “It’s a standard agreement. If I sign it, are you going to screw me?” she asked with a lift of her delicate brows.

  Evan and Reed exchanged an amused glance. “You’re not our type,” Evan told her.

  Her green eyes darkened, and she picked up a pen. After signing the agreement, she pushed it toward Evan. “Send me a copy of that.” She nodded toward the paper. “Now, what is it that you’d like to talk about that requires a gag order?”

  “This is highly personal, Ms. Jensen. Reed and I would like to go public with something, but this being the NFL, we decided we couldn’t do it without you and your approval. We don’t know how to put a positive spin on the situation, but we figured you could.”

  Evan stared at her, watching her gaze shift from him to Reed and then to her hands, which lay flat on her leather blotter. When she looked up, Evan knew she had guessed the truth. He smiled slightly.

  “I can see you think you know what I’m about to say,” he told her, leaning forward in his chair. “I’m gay. So is Reed. We kept our sexuality under wraps during college in order to play football, but now we want to come out. I figured if anyone could help us, it would be you. You’d know what to say to the media to make them accept two openly gay NFL players.”

  Darcy pursed her lips for a moment,
then let out a sigh. “You’re lovers?” she asked.

  Reed shook his head. “My partner is Lennox Sterling. He was my college ‘roommate.’”

  “I know who Lennox Sterling is. He’s a multi-millionaire. Owner of the Sterling Resort line of boutique hotels here on the West Coast.” She raised her brows. “If you want to come out, you could do worse for a lover in the eyes of the media.” She glanced over at Evan. “And you? Who is your partner?”

  “I’m single,” Evan replied. “No lover. No partner. And I’m pretty picky about who I’m with. Football has always come first for me.” He and Darcy stared at each another for a long moment. “Can you help us? Or are you going to tell us to stay in the closet for the good of the team?”

  The PR director rose from her desk and paced her office, obviously thinking. “I’m not going to give you an answer today. I need to think this through very carefully,” she said in a serious voice. “I believe there is a way to make this work to everyone’s advantage. A sort of ‘new team, new players, new era in football and the NFL’ kind of thing. I’d try to use the angle that the Stars embrace the ideals of the modern world even though its roots are in tradition.”

  She ran a hand through her blonde hair and turned to look at them. “Are you sure you want to swim in the media shark tank you’ll be tossed into over this? Are you sure you want to put up with the good ole boy attitudes you’re going to find and the homophobes who believe gays don’t belong in football?”

  Before Evan could answer her, Reed spoke up for the first time. “You and I both know that there are already gays in football. They just don’t have the courage to be out,” he said, his voice firm and edged with annoyance.

  “They aren’t out because it’s damned hard to be gay in a sport filled with testosterone-driven heterosexual men, many of whom will feel threatened by your sexual orientation and who will probably want to kick your ass for daring to be fags in the NFL,” she shot back.

  Evan swallowed hard. He knew she was right. He knew what to expect. He wouldn’t have many friends in the game if he came out. Even people who didn’t care if he was gay would be resentful that he had upset the heterosexual apple cart of their sport. The media would focus on who he was fucking and not how he played.

  He exchanged a glance with Reed, knowing his best friend was thinking the same thing. Before either of them could say anything else, Darcy sat down behind her desk again and reached for her phone.

  “Look, before you two decide you absolutely want to do this, I want you to speak to a friend of mine. I won’t tell him what you told me. It will be up to you to decide whether you want to tell him. You need to give me until a few days before training camp begins to find out if this is going to work out.” She gave them a stern look. “I know I signed your confidentiality agreement, but I have to discuss this with the owners, the coaches, and the rest of the PR department. They aren’t going to tell anyone about this. Too much is at stake. But you have understand that management needs to approve such a radical move.”

  “They can’t tell me not to come out,” Reed protested.

  Darcy held up a hand for silence. “Not exactly. But you should read your contracts. There are clauses in there about doing things that reflect poorly on the team. Do you want to have to give back the signing bonus and leave the team for breach of contract?”

  Reed looked from her to Evan and back again. He let out a frustrated sound. “No. Of course, we don’t want that. We want to play.”

  She nodded crisply. “Then give me some time to come up with a game plan and present it to management. If they agree, we three will talk again before training camp starts. Meanwhile, I want you to go to dinner tonight with a friend of mine.”

  Darcy dialed a number and spoke quietly in the phone. She made some notes on a slip of paper and then hung up. She passed the paper to Evan.

  “Rio Restaurant in Sherman Oaks. It’s on the Boulevard. Seven o’clock sharp.”

  Reed frowned. “Who are we meeting?”

  Darcy grinned. “Don’t worry. You’ll know him when you see him.”

  Age 22 - New York City

  For Evan, the world had always revolved around football. At least, it had from the moment he’d stepped onto the PeeWee league field at age six and met a budding quarterback named Reed Matthews. The two had been inseparable from that day forward both on and off the field. But the NFL draft had truly been a game changer for Evan. It made him a professional ball player, and with the achievement of that dream, Evan realized he wanted more out of life than just to play football.

  Initially, he’d been scared to death of the draft, afraid he and Reed would be separated, drafted to different teams. Walking the red carpet at Radio City Music Hall with Reed and the other possible first-round picks had been surreal. Reed, who’d been a runner-up for the Heisman Trophy, and Evan, as the winner of the Rimington Trophy for outstanding collegiate center, were among the favorites to be picked in the first round. Both of them held other awards as well: Reed as MVP of the Rose Bowl and Evan as PAC-12 Offensive Player of the Year.

  They had brought fame and glory to that year’s UCLA football team, and the media loved them. All eyes were on the two guys who’d played together since they were kids and had been dubbed the “Dynamic Duo” by the press. Their success had brought agents and scouts sniffing around, and when the Los Angeles Stars became a reality, Evan and Reed made the decision that they wanted to play for their hometown.

  While being scouted by the Stars at UCLA’s Pro Day and the NFL Combine, they’d made their preferences clear to the team and the media. They wanted to be together on their local team. That had upped the media frenzy around them. The Stars’ scouts gave them the distinct impression that sixteen years playing together had significance, and they seemed to view Evan and Reed as a matched set. Which was the complete and utter truth.

  With the clock ticking for the Stars, who by virtue of being a new team had first pick, Evan and Reed had practically held their breath until Reed’s cell phone rang. A few minutes later, he closed his phone, grin widening impossibly as the announcement came from the stage that the Los Angeles Stars had chosen Reed Matthews as their first pick. The crowd sent up a huge roar, and the media and NFL big wigs converged on Reed.

  Evan sat in silence, fear licking like flames inside him as he felt his life changing uncontrollably. He stared at the big-screen TV, seeing Reed posing on stage with a red and blue Stars hat on his head, holding a Stars jersey with his number eleven below his last name. Evan grew very afraid that he’d just lost his best friend.

  On one screen, the ESPN commentators had begun to debate the Stars’ second choice for the first round. His photo popped up while the commentators waxed poetic about his achievements. Their final prediction: Evan would be the Stars’ second first-round pick. So a few picks later on, Evan wasn’t at all surprised when his phone rang. Relief rushed through him.

  His walk to the stage had a dreamlike quality. He posed with a Stars hat on, holding up a jersey with his name and his number fifty. When he returned to the table where Reed sat, his best friend got up and wrapped his arms around him in a huge hug.

  “We got what we wanted, buddy,” Reed whispered in Evan’s ear. “We’re still together.”

  And that’s when the draft became a game changer for Evan. Now he was a professional football player…who was gay. Gay and the NFL had never been synonymous, but becoming a pro football player had changed Evan’s priorities in an instant. Instead of continuing on in the closet as he had throughout high school and college, he realized he needed more. He needed to tell the truth. His truth.

  In the limo, on the way back to their hotel, Evan held out his hand to Reed. “Not gonna say I told you so,” he said, referring to their private bet that Reed would be chosen before Evan.

  Reed dug in his wallet and slapped a fifty-dollar bill in Evan’s hand. “I don’t mind paying up. We both won. We’re going to be teammates on the Stars. What more could we want?”


  Evan grunted and put the money away. He watched his best friend closely as he uttered the fateful words, “To be out.”

  Dark eyes wide, Reed stared at him in shock. “You’re kidding.”

  “Actually, I’m not.” Evan heaved a sigh. “I’m tired of being in the closet. I want to come out.”

  “You think it will make it easier to get laid?” Reed teased, but Evan saw the flicker of fear in his friend’s eyes.

  “I think it will make it easier to be myself and live an authentic life.” Evan shook his head. “After we sign on the dotted line, I’m going to find out who does the marketing for the team and set up an appointment to talk to him or her. I’ve always thought a good PR person could spin an openly gay NFL player into a shitload of mostly good press.”

  Reed sat back with a thump. “You’re kidding, right? Tell me you’re joking.”

  “I’m not. But I’m not quite sure how to bring it about. Being gay doesn’t have the stigma it used to have. Celebrities and athletes are coming out all the time. I want to be out. I’m tired of secrets,” Evan said firmly.

  The flicker of fear in Reed’s eyes became a firestorm. “I don’t know if I could handle it, but Len would sure love it.”

  At the mention of Reed’s boyfriend, Lennox Sterling, Evan’s stomach twisted, but he kept his face neutral. “How are things with Len? This is a big change for the two of you,” he said, more to be a good friend than because he wanted to know.