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  Red Zone

  Shannon West

  TS McKinney

  Red Zone

  Copyright © 2019 Shannon West, TS McKinney

  Published by Painted Hearts Publishing

  About the eBook You Have Purchased

  All rights reserved. Without reserving the rights under copyright, reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or any other means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. Distribution of this e-book, in whole or in part, is forbidden. Such action is illegal and in violation of the U.S. Copyright Law.

  Unauthorized reproduction of distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

  Red Zone

  Copyright © 2019 Shannon West, TS McKinney

  ISBN 10: 1-946379-63-8

  ISBN 13: 978-1-946379-63-4

  Publication Date March 2019

  Authors: Shannon West, TS McKinney

  All cover art and logo copyright © 2019 by Painted Hearts Publishing

  Cover Design by E Keith

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  A Note from the Authors:

  This novel is a work of fiction, one we first imagined one cloudy Fall Saturday while on a trip to the mountains of North Carolina. As it says in the front matter, “Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is strictly coincidental.”

  But while our characters are fictional, we would like to acknowledge that some of the situations they find themselves in are ones that are shared with thousands each year. In the book, Kingston engages in cutting, the most common form of “non-suicidal self-injury”. Our intention in including this in the novel is to give light to a real issue faced by people his age and the impact it has on their day-to-day lives. One study in the Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine reported that while 4% of adults in the United States engage in this behavior, the risk among college students ranges from 17% to as high as 35% in some areas.

  If you or someone you love has or is struggling with self-injury, you may find some parts of this novel to be triggering.

  If you or someone you love is struggling, please consider reaching out to one of the many organizations that offer understanding and support. A few such places to find assistance are:

  1-800-DONTCUT (800-366-8288), OR selfinjury.com

  National Suicide Prevention Hotline: 800-273-8255

  The Trevor Project, www.thetrevorproject.org, 866-488-7386

  Prologue

  Kingston Bentley

  “This is total bullshit and you know it, Coach! Kingston would never do something like what he’s being accused of and that damn girl is lying!” Caleb Peterson, our Athletic Director, screamed in outrage and frustration.

  Me? I just sat staring into space, unable to believe what I’d just heard from the cop who had just pulled me out of practice to arrest me. They said your entire life passes in front of you when you’re in an accident, but I could honestly say it happens just the same when your future and possibly your freedom is swept away right before your very eyes—the future I’d dreamed about and training for since I was only a kid.

  Poof. Just like that, I could see it all being washed away, all the hard work and the careful lies I’d built, leaving me floundering around with absolutely nothing to hold onto. The lies weren’t about any crimes I was supposed to have committed—I’d done nothing wrong and Caleb Peterson was right. The girl was either badly mistaken about who had attacked and raped her, or she was flat-out lying.

  No, the lies had been about how “perfect” my life had been up to now, when the reality was far uglier. I was terrified that my parents and everybody else was going to find out how truly unworthy I was. I was supposed to be the perfect son, the perfect student, the perfect athlete, the fucking perfect everything. And I’d tried. God only knew how hard. But it was all just a pretty façade, while on the inside, I was a mess. A seething mass of inadequacies. The loss of my football career and the idea that I could possibly be sent to prison for a crime I didn’t commit paled in comparison to that truth coming out for the world to see. All my work, all the hours of sweat in the gym and on the field, and all my efforts to impress my parents and my coaches were ending faster than they’d begun, and I had no idea what to do to stop it.

  I slowly looked up at AD Peterson and his gaze pleaded with me to say something to defend myself. Anything. I knew he wanted me to say just one goddamn word, but I couldn’t. My tongue was glued inside my mouth. I stood frozen, unable to do anything other than think about the disgrace I was about to bring down on my family, the team, the coaching staff, the fans. And myself.

  So, as AD Peterson silently tried to get me to come up something to say, I quietly accepted defeat. I’d just take my chance in the court system. I hadn’t raped her so there couldn’t be any evidence in existence. I couldn’t get sent to jail without evidence, right? Then again, I’d read somewhere that nobody gets justice in this life. There’s only good luck and bad luck.

  Hoping no one else would notice, I gave my head a slight negative shake as I locked eyes with my older friend and mentor. His look of utter disappointment and defeat told me he’d noticed my inability to defend myself. That look nearly caused my knees to buckle.

  “Sorry, Mr. Peterson,” one of the police detectives said quietly, “but a charge of rape has been made against Kingston Bentley and we have no choice but to arrest him.” As he spoke, he pulled a pair of handcuffs from his belt and held them in front of him. If it mattered—which it didn’t—he did look like he wasn’t enjoying the job of ruining my life. “If he’s innocent, everything will work out properly, I assure you.”

  Peterson stepped straight into the armed policeman’s personal space. “You assure us? Really? How the fuck do you figure that? I guess none of you stopped to realize that Kingston is the starting quarterback in the National Championship game in less than seven days or that we’re scheduled to leave for the stadium in three days?” He leaned in closer. “I suppose it never dawned on any of you that this could be a lie in order to sabotage his ability to lead us to our third title in three years?” He whipped his head around to glare at Coach Sawyer, who’d been silent throughout the entire ordeal. “Damn it, are you just going to sit there and let this happen, Sawyer?”

  Coach Sawyer stood up. “It doesn’t look like we have much choice, Caleb. None of us believe Kingston would do such a thing, but this young lady deserves to have her allegations handled through the proper processes of the law. If we even attempted to throw our weight around and intervene with the judicial system, we would look sexist and completely dishonest—a team that only focuses on winning instead of one that builds character and wins at the same time.”

  Peterson reeled back like he’d been slapped. His eyes blazed as he looked at the Coach he’d hired, the man he called a friend. It made me sick that I was the focus of their argument. It also hurt that Coach seemed so calm and collected—like he didn’t really know me as a person or that I’d already led them to two National Championships in the same number of years.

  Peterson crossed his arms over his chest and spread his legs in an intimidating stance
. “Well, now…aren’t we lucky that you brought your son on as backup quarterback for Kingston? Funny how things work out, isn’t it?”

  Sarcasm dripped off his voice as I allowed his words to sink into my skull. Fuck…was there a connection? I’d thought it strange when word had first gotten around the locker room that Coach Sawyer’s oldest son, Memphis, was planning on a transfer to our team. I’d heard about his son—Memphis had been a super star quarterback on a team in the Big Ten Conference up until this season. It seemed ridiculous for him to leave his team to join ours, since we already had a starting quarterback. Me. But maybe there had been a plan all along to get rid of me and let him take over.

  I’d only had one real interaction with Memphis—the shocking night we’d met. And that had been plenty enough for me. Ever since that night, I’d lived in fear of what he’d tell his father and the team. So far, he’d kept his mouth shut, but I believed it was only a matter of time until he told everything he knew. It was one more thing I had to worry about, and I felt like I was already drowning in a sea of stress.

  We hadn’t exactly done a lot of talking that first night—I hadn’t been in any shape to talk that night. So when I saw him again in the locker room, and his father—our coach—had introduced him to the team, I’d thought I was going to pass out from fear of him outing me. But he hadn’t even glanced in my direction and he’d been with the team for months now, since the beginning of the season. I was still waiting for him to tell what he knew and destroy me. But telling about me would expose him too, so maybe he and his dad had found another way to get rid of me.

  My eyes lifted upward, first connecting with Peterson’s furious gaze and then drifting over to look at my coach. My mentor. My friend. His oddly colored gray eyes met my gaze straight on. I could be imagining it, but there did appear to be a tiny amount of sympathy swirling in those stormy depths. Or was it deceit? I hadn’t raped the girl. Hell, I didn’t even know her. Had someone convinced her to make false allegations to weaken our chances at winning? Or had my own coach convinced her to lie in order to kick the door wide open for Memphis Sawyer to take my place as quarterback?

  No way. This was football—a sport I loved, but still... This was my fucking life! Could anybody be so heartless as to ruin it because of a football game?

  “Please stand up, Mr. Bentley,” the officer said as he opened the cuffs. “I’m sorry I have to do this, but it’s the law.”

  Shit, this was really happening. My team was on the field, running practice drills and wondering where in the hell I was while handcuffs were about to be slapped on my wrists. My legs trembled as I stood up and turned my back to the officer, so he could clamp the cuffs into place. The cold metal against my flesh caused me to flinch in shock.

  Fuck, I was going to jail.

  “I’ll contact your parents as soon as possible, Kingston,” Peterson said quietly. “We’ll have you out before the end of the day.”

  I didn’t even turn around. “I’ll be fine, Mr. Peterson.” As for Sawyer, I had nothing to say to the coach who may very well have betrayed me. I heard a roaring sound inside my head when the officer started reading me my rights as he led me out of the office. This wasn’t me. I didn’t break rules. I did as I was told. I was—I had to be—perfect.

  As soon as we walked out, the office door slammed shut, and I could hear Mr. Peterson shouting at Coach Sawyer. Funny, as loud as they were, it was the officer’s soft-spoken reading of my rights that echoed most loudly in my ears. The few students bustling around in the locker room hallways stopped and stared…then the whispering started. Before they got me to the car, most of the campus would probably already know about my arrest. At the end of the hallway stood Memphis Sawyer, a strange expression on his handsome face as he watched our approach. He’d only been on the team for less than a season, and in that time, other than our one brief encounter, I’d tried everything in my power to avoid him off the field, but I’d still seen too much of him. And he’d seen way too much of me. Literally.

  Sadly, I’d liked what I saw—Memphis’s physical appearance, at least. To be perfectly honest, he was everything I wanted to be—a few inches taller, with the broad shoulders and hard, rangy muscles of a good quarterback. He was handsome and smart too. I’d heard he had a solid 4.0 average, which was incredible, because the school he’d transferred from had a reputation for being academically tough. And he made it all look effortless. I hated him. I hated him with every fiber of my being. I tried to tell myself I only admired his physique as a way to try to convince myself to push harder in the weight room, but I knew the truth, and I was afraid that he did too.

  “What’s happened, Kingston?” he asked, when we got close enough to him, his dark eyes expressing what had to be a fake concern.

  “Fuck off,” I answered, my voice so full of hurt and hate that it surprised even me. In the short span of time since I’d been arrested, I’d made up my mind that Memphis and his father were behind the lies—just like that. No evidence needed. Hatred that I didn’t know I possessed washed over me as I stared at the man who’d knocked me off my pedestal. The man who had the power to crush me completely if he told what he knew.

  ****

  Two days after my arrest, there was a hearing to see if bond would be set, but the judge, while not outright denying bond, set my bail at such a high amount that he may as well have. The lawyer Mr. Peterson had arranged for me explained that it was because there was a lot of news sensation around the arrest, with rumors swirling that nothing would happen to me because of who I was and the team I played for. So…I sat in jail and endured the humiliating shit they put the prisoners through like constant strip searches and zero privacy. I’m a private person, and that shit played hell with my nerves.

  Due to my so-called celebrity status, I had at least been kept in solitary confinement, away from any other prisoners. While I wasn’t allowed to watch television, not even during the one hour I was allowed out of my cell, some of the guards taunted me about how well Memphis had stepped into my shoes—winning my team’s third National Championship with his outstanding passing and magical feet. Fuck Memphis Sawyer! Fuck his father. Fuck the team. Fuck the school. Fuck my life. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

  Other than my parents and my lawyer, the only person who contacted me at all was AD Peterson, calling daily to check on my welfare. My parents had also hired the best criminal law attorney in the state to add to my defense team and had already hired a private investigator to dig into the girl’s allegations against me.

  The girl’s name was Macy Bennett. I hadn’t realized it at first, but I did know her. She was in my Calculus class…which was the extent of my interaction with her. When my father found out I knew her, he had looked at me like he was wondering if I could be guilty after all. I’d been crushed by that look, physically and mentally.

  One of my attorneys visited on the second day and told me I had nothing to worry about. He’d already filed the appeal papers to have the judge’s ruling to keep me in prison overturned and felt very confident I’d be out before the end of the month.

  A fucking month!

  “Hey, Bentley!” The guard called out as he slid the key into my cell lock. “Stand up but don’t come near the door!”

  They said the same damn thing every time they came to give me my hour of imprisoned freedom. Bastards.

  As always, I did as I was told but my mind screamed that something wasn’t right. It wasn’t time for my hour out of my cell. What the fuck? Were they taking me somewhere to kill me? Surely that shit only happened in the movies?

  “It…it…isn’t time for my hour, is it?” I asked quietly, figuring I was wasting my breath, because they rarely answered my questions. Sure, they loved feeding me information they knew would hurt me, but other than that, they remained tight-lipped. I knew this officer’s name was Adam because I’d heard the other guys call him that, and he was marginally nicer than the other guards. At least he didn’t look at me with disgust.

  He sta
red at me for a few long seconds and then said, “No, Bentley, it isn’t. You’re going home. Don’t worry about your belongings. They’ll have them waiting for you at the gate by the time you finish checking out. Follow me.”

  He turned to walk away, offering me his back which was something they never did. “Home? Why? Did my appeal go through the courts without me knowing about it?”

  “No, the appeal didn’t go through the courts. The girl dropped the charges, said she made the whole thing up because she had a crush on you, but you never paid her any attention,” he said as he motioned for me to go through the cell door in front of him.

  I stumbled over my own feet and stumbled to a stop. “What? Are you fucking kidding me?”

  “We don’t usually joke about those things around here, son,” he answered dryly. “They’re working on your release papers now. Be thankful she finally came to her senses, and you’re getting out of here.”

  I was thankful. I was also very pissed off. “What will they do to her?” I asked as we walked through the maze of boring concrete walls and floors.

  Adam shrugged. “Unfortunately, probably not a whole lot. She’s already got a lawyer who alleges the girl is mentally unstable. She’ll probably be ordered to pay a fine, maybe do community work. That’s probably about it. You didn’t hear this from me, but you could probably bring a civil suit, though that might seem to some folks like the big football star is beating up on some poor little girl.” We reached the door and he pushed the buzzer that would tell the guards on the other side to open it for us. It was the room where I had been strip-searched, so my gut twisted in distress.

  “Not a lot? Yeah, sure, that sounds fair,” I said, feeling worn out and sarcastic.

  We walked into the small room and my personal belongings were in a clear plastic bag on a desk in the corner. There was also a bundle of clothes, jeans, a button-up, and some boots next to the bag. I recognized them as my own clothing.