Page 248 of Just for the Cameras
And if you thought I was angry before, hell has now burned into my bones as a side of fury no one has ever seen takes over.
“Uh…Graydon, I think you might break your phone if you keep squeezing it that hard.”
“I’m going to rip him apart.”
Hutton clears his throat just as I chuck my phone against the wall, letting it shatter to the floor.
“And here I was worried about your hand breaking it.”
I growl, turning on my friend, who now holds his hands up in theair.
“Okay, listen, I know it feels like things are spiraling and that you are losing all control, but I think it’s important that we remember—”
“Fuck off,” I say as I turn away from him and head up to Welcott’s office.
“Yup, saw that coming.”
I pace the front office, waiting for Gretchen to show up, the image of Slutty Little Glasses answering my girl’s phone playing over and over in my head. Was he just waiting for me to call, planning this whole goddamn thing out, laughing ’cause he knew I fucked up?
Probably.
He was probably waiting for the moment to roll in where he could show Maple just how much of a douche he is.
“Stop pacing,” Gretchen’s voice sounds off as she walks up to me. “I need you calm and collected when we go into that office, or else what I have planned is not going to work.”
I pause in my pacing. “What do you have planned?”
“Well, for one, your father and coach are headed this way.”
My hands tighten into fists. “Great, can’t wait to greet him properly.”
Gretchen points her finger at me. “You will not touch him. You will not say a word to him. Do you hear me? I swear to God, Graydon, if you want this to work out in your favor and get your father out of this building and far away from you, then you need to listen to every word I say. Understood?”
The seriousness in her tone snaps me out of my murderous thoughts. “What are you going to do?”
“Just follow my lead.” She walks up to Welcott’s door and knocks on it.
“Come in,” he calls out.
Gretchen looks me in the eyes and takes a deep breath, gesturing at me to do so as well, so I do. And then we release our breaths together. Satisfied, she opens the door, and we both walk in, my dad and Coach Keenan already in Welcott’s office.
When my eyes fall on my father, the tension I just released immediately coils at the base of my spine and nearly propels me forward, my fist leading the way, but Gretchen’s warning rests firmly at the forefront of my brain, preventing me from making a mistake.
Instead, I take a seat on the couch in Welcott’s office, as far away from my father as possible.
“I can’t possibly see why we needed to call a meeting,” Coach Keenan says. “This PR nonsense is starting to get in the way of my coaching.”
“I’m glad you see it as nonsense,” Gretchen says as she takes a seat as well. “Good morning, Mr. Welcott. Thank you for meeting on such short notice.”
He nods. “Make it quick.”
“Of course.” Gretchen pulls a piece of paper out of the folder she carried into the office and places it on Welcott’s desk. “As you know, the PR relationship has been exposed despite Graydon and Maple being in a real relationship now. The news is damaging but not unfixable. I dug into some of my contacts and came back with this. It’s a memo from one of my sources stating that they got the tip from Troy St. John.”
My dad stands up, fury raging in his eyes.
“That’s preposterous. Why would I ever do that?”
Keeping her eyes trained on Welcott, she continues, “When you brought me onto the job, it became my responsibility to assess all strengths and weaknesses outside of the client I’m focusing on. My team and I did a deep dive into the organization to see what could possibly be tainting the business from the inside, and my team has brought up a series of conversations within your organization, all stemming from Troy St. John and Coach Keenan.” She sets down another piece of paper. “We have audio records, but they are written out here. As you can see, Troy and Coach Keenan have been formulating plans to remove Graydon from the team.”
