Chapter 5: The Photo

I read the post three times.

It said a source close to the team called me "very involved."

It said Tate had been scratched for Thursday.

It said nothing about a tear.

Gemma came down the hall in her pajamas and a face mask the color of mint.

"It's a gossip blog," she said. "Nobody reads it."

"It has forty thousand shares."

"Nobody smart reads it."

My phone rang at six in the morning.

Mom.

She was crying before I said hello.

"Lainey, what is this? Doug showed me at breakfast. He put it on the table next to the cereal."

"It's a photo of me telling him his blood work."

"You're holding his face."

"He was upset."

"People are saying things, honey. The women from the club texted me. Tate's agent called the house."

"Mom, his body stopped making its own hormones. Dunne did that. Doug signed off on it."

She didn't hear it. Or she couldn't.

"Why were you in his truck?"

Then a small voice came on the line.

"Lainey?"

My sister.

"Hi, bug."

"Is Mom sad because of you?"

I closed my eyes.

"She's sad because some people wrote something mean on the internet."

My brother's voice, farther away. "It says comfort or more. More what?"

"More nothing," I said.

"Then why does it have a question mark?"

Mom took the phone back.

"Please," she said. "Please just keep your head down. For the twins."

"I'm trying to keep their brother's arm on."

She hung up.

I sat on the edge of my bed with the phone in my lap until the radiator knocked twice.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Breeding My Stepsister on the Ice from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.