The First Time Again: The Braddock Brotherhood, Book 3 Read Online Free Page B

speeding inside the Edna Falls town limits.”
    “Great. That’s just great.” Trey let himself stew in that information for a minute.
    “So. Is this a social call? Or are you looking for a lawyer? Because I make it my business to stop assholes like Spoley from overstepping their legal boundaries.”
    “You know him?”
    “Hell, yes. You remember him. Or the name at least. He played defense for Forest City. Senior year? Last game of the season? A shot at the state championship on the line? Justin intercepted your pass—”
    “—and started running with it.” Trey could see it all, the field, the other players. For a moment he felt his own dismay, knowing it was his last shot at quarterbacking a high school championship. He could almost feel the way adrenaline shot through him. He had to do something.
    “You took off after him, and to this day, I’ll never know how you caught up with him.”
    “He made a fatal mistake. He looked back to see who was there,” Trey put in with a grin.
    Ryan nodded, his eyes alight with the memory. “He tripped. Fumbled. You recovered.”
    Trey nodded. He’d scooped up the ball and reversed direction. Somehow he’d managed to elude the rest of Forest City’s defense. His team had rallied around him, blocking for him as he zigzagged his way up the field to score as the final seconds ticked away.
    Hendersonville had gone on to win the state championship instead of Forest City. Was it even possible that Justin Spoley had never gotten over it?
    “I remembered him after he let me go,” Trey admitted.
    Ryan grinned again. “You had no idea who he was? Oh, man, that must have pissed him off.”
    “You’re not saying Justin Spoley had it in for me last night because of a high school football game?”
    “It’s not a secret. Over the years he’s told different versions of the story, but yeah, I’d say he’s held a grudge against you since that game. His belief is you got the break he was supposed to have. The scouts saw you make that play and subsequently overlooked him. You got the offers from the best schools and he got the ones from the second tier. You went on to play pro. He sat on the bench in college. You married a gorgeous cheerleader, went to the Super Bowl a couple of times. He’s stuck here making traffic stops. He pulled you over, identified himself, and you had no idea who he was. No wonder he gave you a citation for every charge he could think of.”
    “It was high school for Pete’s sake. I can’t believe he hasn’t gotten over it and moved on.”
    Ryan opened his middle desk drawer and withdrew a small cloth. “We could sit here and analyze Spoley’s victim mentality and discuss his motive for carrying around this kind of baggage for ten years, but it’d be a waste of time. Not to mention boring.” Drawing off his wire-rimmed glasses, he polished first one lens and then the other before dropping the cloth back into the drawer.
    After he put his glasses back on he drew a blank legal pad toward him and picked up a pen. “You want to tell me what happened last night and we’ll go from there?”
    Trey related the events of the previous evening. Ryan made notes and asked a few questions.
    “I’ll cop to the speeding ticket. Everything else is bogus.”
    “Technically, maybe not bogus, but also not provable. Refusing the breathalyzer could be a problem given your past, uh, very public history.”
    “I haven’t had a drink in over a year,” Trey grated out. “I wasn’t drinking last night. If he thought I was driving drunk he should have arrested me.”
    “True. Still, his behavior does seem extreme. He could have started with a roadside sobriety test rather than a breathalyzer. Made you walk a straight line, close your eyes, touch your nose. He didn’t, though. You’re sure he didn’t suggest it ?”
    “I’m sure.”
    “The expired tags? Hard to make that one stick, either, especially if, as you say, you had the new tags in the car.”
    “I had