Change the play, p.1
Change the Play, page 1
Change the Play
Nashville Rampage
Book 5
Kaylee Ryan
Contents
Copyright
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Epilogue Foster
Epilogue Eden
Thank you
More from Kaylee Ryan
Acknowledgements
Copyright
Copyright © 2026 Kaylee Ryan
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All Rights Reserved.
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Without in any way limiting the author’s exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license the use of this work for generative AI training and the development of machine learning language models.
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No part of this book may be used, including but not limited to, the training of or use by artificial intelligence, or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of Kaylee Ryan, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, events, locations, businesses and plot are products of the author’s imagination and meant to be used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events throughout the story are purely coincidental. The author acknowledges trademark owners and the trademarked status of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication and use of these trademarks are not authorized, sponsored or associated by or with the trademark owners.
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The following story contains sexual situations and strong language. It is intended for adult readers.
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Editing: Hot Tree Editing
Proofreading: The Ryter’s Proof, Jo Thompson, & Jess Hodge
Cover Designer: Lori Jackson Designs
Photographer: Wander Aguair
Formatter: Champagne Formats
Special Edition Cover Designer: Books N Moods
Prologue
Foster
* * *
There’s a fist gripping my heart. The squeeze causes an ache that’s been there longer than I can remember. Its presence is familiar, yet still unwelcome. Today, however, that ache is for something altogether different. It’s not from the tragedies of my past. It’s for the hope of my future.
Sitting next to me on my right is my high school football coach. Coach Nathan Pruitt and his wife, Hope, stepped up for me in a big way my sophomore year of high school. They took me in when I had nowhere else to go, and they saved me from, well, life. I’ll never be able to repay them for all that they’ve done for me.
Coach and his wife are the reason we’re here today. Sure, I put in the work, but they guided me. Gave me a safe place to lay my head at night, food in my belly, as much as I could eat, and they pushed me to be better. To make better grades, to want more for myself. They guided me at a time when I was walking my way through the darkness.
To my left is my long-time girlfriend, Violet. She and I met in our freshman year of college at the University of Cincinnati. We both chose to stay close to home for school. We hit it off immediately, and we both fell hard and fast.
My friends, my teammates, they’ve given me shit more times than I can count for being in a serious relationship in college, but I ignore them, letting their words roll off my shoulders. Violet is the first person outside of Coach and his wife who has ever stayed. My life has been a long line of family who’d forget me and walk away.
Not Violet.
She’s been with me every step of the way during this process. She’s also the reason my leg keeps bouncing like it’s trying to release all the fear and hope I’m carrying at once. Her presence steadies me, even when my body can’t quite keep still, because what she doesn’t know is that I have a ring in my pocket.
Today marks the day my future changes. Our future changes, and I want her by my side. I need her by my side. She’s been there for all of it. Every practice, every game, every pep rally, and every workout session. Violet is my future, and today, we take the first step toward that.
At least, I hope we do.
We’ve been together for four years, and we’ve talked about the next steps. I don’t think she’s going to say no when I drop to one knee, but there’s always that chance, hence the leg bouncing like I’m thirteen again, trying to hide a crush.
Coach places his hand on my shoulder as my phone rings. We’re sitting in their living room, where we’ve been waiting for the call.
“Hello,” I answer.
“Foster Vaughn, this is Coach Warner from the Nashville Rampage. Welcome to the Rampage family, son,” he says.
Tears well in my eyes, and that same bout of emotion clogs my throat. It’s happening. It’s really happening. This has always been my dream. There was a time in my life when I didn’t know where my next meal was coming from, and this dream felt too far away. Too out of reach, but here I am, living it in color.
“Thank you, sir,” I manage to croak. Violet leans in close, and I take comfort that she’s here with me. I’m not doing this alone. Only in recent years have I had a steady presence that I could rely on. Coach Pruitt and his wife gave me that, and when I met Violet, another piece of my pain, more cracks around my heart were filled in by her constant presence and unwavering support.
“We’ll see you soon,” he says, and I nod, even though he can’t see me.
“Yes, sir.” Ending the call, I turn to Coach and grin. “Nashville,” I rasp and swallow back a sob. Coach stands and pulls me into a hug, then steps back, allowing his wife to do the same. Once they’ve released me, I turn to Violet, who stands and opens her arms. I lean into her embrace, burying my face in her neck.
The TV is blaring as the announcer begins speaking. “In the first round of the professional league draft, with the fifth pick, the Nashville Rampage selects Foster Vaughn, University of Cincinnati.”
The room erupts with cheers, and all I can do is hold on to Violet. She’s my calm in the storm. The light in the darkness that’s surrounded me for years.
The ring is burning in my pocket, but it’s not time yet. I don’t want an audience. I want the moment to be ours, and ours alone.
I’m pulled away from Violet by my friends and college teammates, who are here to help me celebrate. Nathan and Hope’s living room is packed, and everyone is here to celebrate me and this accomplishment.
Foster Vaughn: Professional athlete.
Officially on the Nashville Rampage roster.
Fuck yes!
There are a lot of hugs, handshakes, congratulations, and even more food. Hope really went all out, and now, maybe with my signing bonus and my salary, I can repay the Pruitts for everything they’ve done for me.
Hours later, once the guests have gone home and the mess has been cleaned up, I’m sitting out on the back patio with Violet in my lap. I’ve been waiting for there to be a moment when it’s just the two of us, and this is it.
I had planned to get on one knee, but she’s on my lap, snuggled up to my chest, and I like her here. I like her close, so instead of dropping to one knee, I pull the ring out of my pocket, along with my phone, so she’s not suspicious. I glance at my phone, not really seeing the screen at all, and drop it onto the lounger next to us. The ring is gripped lightly in my palm.
“I love you,” I tell her.
Her reply is soft, almost a whisper. “I love you, too.”
“Thank you for being here with me today.”
“You know I want to support you,” she says, placing her hands over mine that are wrapped around her waist.
“I want that every day, Vi. Every day of forever.” Unclasping my hand, I hold my sweaty palm out to her with the ring. “Marry me, Violet. Come with me to Nashville. Let’s build the life we’ve both always dreamed of.” I kiss her cheek, waiting for her answer.
The one that never comes.
The silence is deafening.
Finally, she moves off my lap to sit next to me on the lounger, facing me. She closes my fist around the ring, and my heart sinks to my toes. “I can’t marry you, Foster.”
Am I having a heart attack? I’m too young for that, right?
“What?” I rasp. I don’t understand. We’ve talked about this—our future, what we want out of life.
“I got into Johns Hopkins. Their program is intense, and their selection process is brutal. I didn’t think I’d get in, but I did, and I accepted. I’m moving to Maryland, Foster.”
“Maryland?”
She nods. “Yeah, it’s my dream school.”
“We had plans.”
She lifts her shoulders in a slight, helpless shrug. “Plans change, Foster. I love you—God, I do—and I’m so proud of you. But I have dreams I need to chase, and I can’t chase them in Nashville. I don’t want to be known as the wife of a profess ional athlete. I want to be known for being an incredible doctor.”
“Why can’t you be both? You were going to be both,” I say, the words catching as I try to make sense of what’s unraveling in front of me.
Silence settles between us—heavy, stretching, impossible to ignore. “I don’t want both, Foster. I know this isn’t what we planned, or what you ever expected, but I don’t want the life you’re about to step into. I’m sorry. I can’t marry you.”
I can’t marry you.
I can’t marry you.
I can’t marry you.
Her words loop through my head like a broken record, each repetition cutting deeper. I thought Violet was my forever—we planned for it, talked about every detail—so hearing this now knocks the ground out from under me.
“We can work it out,” I tell her, grasping for something solid. “You can go to Maryland, finish school, and we’ll figure the rest out. We always do.”
“Foster…” She exhales my name like an apology. “I don’t want to work it out. This is goodbye for us.” She leans in and presses a soft kiss to my cheek, and I hate how desperately I want to turn my head and catch her lips with mine. Hate that I gave her my heart after it had already been shattered so many times. I wasn’t sure it could ever be rebuilt, and now she’s breaking it all over again.
“So that’s it?” I whisper. “All the plans we made were just empty words? Promises with no weight, already broken before we even spoke them?”
“I never wanted to hurt you, Foster.”
I let out a short, bitter, humorless laugh. “Well, you did.” Heat flares in my chest, masking the ache with piercing pain. Anger mixed with the familiar sting of being left behind swirls in my gut. Violet is just one more person I trusted with my heart, only for her to crush it under her heel.
“Foster—” she begins, but I cut her off.
“Go. Just go, Violet.” My fist tightens instinctively, the ring biting into my palm—a cruel reminder of everything I thought we were building. The life I pictured, the future I thought we shared, all of it going up in smoke in a matter of minutes.
“I love you,” she whispers.
“Go!” I roar. The word tears out of me. How can she stand there and say she loves me while she’s breaking my heart? How can she refuse to marry me and still claim those words?
Tonight, I learned a fool’s lesson. From this day forward, my heart will remain on lockdown. The pain isn’t worth it. I’m moving to Nashville, and I’m going to make something of my life. I don’t need Violet or her empty promises.
It’s time to change the play.
Chapter One
Foster
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Staring down at the baby in my arms, a pang of longing washes over me. The last five years, I’ve felt that particular feeling more often than not. Watching my four best friends meet the loves of their lives and start families—not always in that order—reminds me of the life I had planned.
The one that went up in smoke.
“Is it my turn yet?” Landry whines.
“Nope,” I say, popping the p as I start down at the slumbering baby.
“He’s my nephew. He’s named after me,” Landry huffs.
“He’s my son. He’s named after me,” Knox counters, making us all laugh.
“He might not be named after me, but he’s my nephew, too.” I whisper the words, but I know they hear me.
I don’t know what I expected when I stepped on Tennessee soil and onto the field at the Rampage Stadium, but I do know it wasn’t to find four best friends, who are my brothers—not by blood, but by heart. For someone who didn’t have a true family growing up, these guys and the brotherhood we’ve formed mean everything.
It took me some time to let them in. Well, at least as much as I was willing to let them in. Some pains are better left in the past. The ones that you bury deep inside your chest, never to see the light of day. Everything else, they can have. Knox, Landry, Reid, and Baker have shown me over and over again what true friendship and family really mean.
They didn’t let my grumpy-ass attitude steer them away from bringing me into the fold of their lives, and they don’t know that they saved me from drowning in grief and regret.
“Alexander Landry Beckett loves his uncle Foster,” Corie says, smiling at me. There’s a softness in her eyes, as if she’s reading my mind.
That’s something else about my best friends. The women they’ve chosen are their perfect match, and they’re like sisters to me. Our family is growing, and I can’t help but wonder if it will ever grow because of me. I don’t date much. It’s been longer than I care to admit since I’ve hooked up with anyone. I want what my friends have, but putting my heart on the line again doesn't sound like a good idea to me. I don’t know if there will ever be a tiny human walking this earth calling me Dad.
“Seriously, we should have a time limit,” Landry says. “Reid’s had Camden’s attention since we all got here, Knox has brainwashed Coral, and now Foster is hogging Alexander,” he grumps.
“Maybe you should have your own,” Sloane tells him.
Landry grins and turns toward his wife. “It’s only fair,” he tells her, waggling his eyebrows.
Rowan tosses her head back in laughter. “We’re not having a baby so that you have one to hold during family functions. Wait your turn.”
“I mean, we’re really good at the mechanics,” Landry tells her. “I think we’ve practiced enough, and it’s time to shoot our shot, or my shot.” He laughs.
Rowan shrugs. “Okay.” She’s smiling at her husband, because I think for the first time in Landry Reynold’s entire life, the man is speechless. He sets his small paper bowl of pretzels down on the table. If you can keep the man from eating, you’ve done something.
“Rowan, I think you broke him,” Knox teases.
Landry stands, walks over to the huge sectional couch, and holds his hand out to his wife. “It’s been fun, but we’re leaving.”
“You want to hold him?” I ask Landry, and he turns to glare at me over his shoulder. “I’m sharing.”
“I’m going home to make one of my own,” he fires back, and we all laugh.
“We’re not leaving. Go take your turn, grumpy pants.”
He leans down and kisses her before whispering something in her ear. We can’t hear what he says, but her face is beet red, and she smiles up at him as if he’s her entire world.
I used to know what that felt like.
“Fine, hand him over,” Landry says, standing to his full height and stalking toward me.
“I think I changed my mind,” I say, barely holding on to my laughter.
“No takebacks,” he says, bending down and scooping Alexander out of my arms. He coos down at the baby before going to settle next to his wife on the couch.
“We need more babies around here,” Sloane says, smiling at Camden, who’s playing with blocks in the middle of the floor with Reid.
“Cam needs a sibling,” Baker tells her, kissing her temple.
“And another cousin,” Reid says, winking at his wife, Bellamy.
“Well,” Amanda, Bellamy’s best friend and a new member of our group, speaks up. “Ethan and I will have a little one soon.” She smiles. Her eyes are lit with excitement and love for a child she’s never met.
“When are we going to meet this husband of yours?” Reid asks. His wife is Amanda’s best friend, and he’s never met the guy. That tells me he’s a shit husband, but who am I to judge? My girl walked away from me the night I proposed. He must be doing something right if he got her to marry him.
