Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 74766 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 374(@200wpm)___ 299(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74766 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 374(@200wpm)___ 299(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
He left Connie sitting at the table getting her thoughts together and went into the living room for a breather. It felt like he’d been going all night; in fact, he hadn’t had a moment’s respite since this whole thing started. When his phone rang, he didn’t even look at the readout to see who was calling before picking up the call.
“Yes?”
“Coach, it’s me.” Ryan smiled into the phone.
“Hey Marissa, I guess you’ve heard the news.” Pete had promised that they’d clear that whole thing up, and he wouldn’t have to take care of it himself. “I’m so sorry, coach, I didn’t…”
“No need to apologize; you did nothing wrong. You handled it exactly the right way.”
“But you were innocent.” Poor kid sounded close to tears.
“Yes, but you didn’t know that at the time. Let’s put this one away, shall we? I’ll see you on the tracks next week.”
Ryan already knew he had his old job back. He wasn’t sure who’d called in a favor to get the fire lit under the board because he knew these things could take a while to clear up, innocence proven or not. But when he’d checked his emails earlier, there’d been a message telling him that he was cleared to go back to work.
He had a feeling it had something to do with the district being sued for unlawful termination. Then again, things had never got that far; he’d never really been fired. Now with things out of the way with Marissa, he felt like he was one step closer to getting his life back on track.
Marissa felt even worst after hanging up the phone. The ease with which he’d forgiven her wasn’t deserved; it only made her feel more ashamed of herself for jumping to conclusions. She should’ve known better. She’d been with coach long enough to know the kind of man he was, and yet even with reservations, she’d still believed the worst. I’ll just have to figure out a way to make it up to him. She told herself.
She still had no clue who had exposed the catfish story from years ago, but how crazy is it that the man she’d targeted as a prank all those years ago would turn out to be Connie’s real dad. The rumor mill had already been hard at work this morning, and after the furor surrounding coach had died down some, the new talk was about some scandal from years ago, something she had no interest in, but at least it had taken her mom’s mind off of trying to figure out who had sent the incriminating message if it wasn’t coach.
Celia was beat by the time she returned to the station house after leaving the Bishops. Her part in the whole mess was done; now, it was up to the courts to decide. Though she planned to keep an eye on the Connie situation until things smoothed out there, this case was pretty much over for her.
Lunchtime came, and she’d been so buried in work that she hadn’t given Riley a thought until she saw him come waltzing in with a sack lunch. “What’s the smile about?” He looked very pleased with himself about something, which may or may not be a good thing.
“I got the results back from doc.”
THE END