by Lily Zante
“Gerry’s seen them.”
I exhale loudly. Oddly, in this moment, it bugs me more that Gerry has seen these.
“They could surface online for all we know,” Merv growls. “Other newspapers might have these in their possession. Eli is a huge story now. He’s big news, and this? A member of my staff? You were supposed to write a journalistic piece on Cardoza’s rise to fame and victory, instead of making a soft-porn movie with him.”
I lower my head and stare at the table. “What do we do?”
“There is nothing to do. This isn’t a blackmail attempt. It looks bad on you. Cardoza’s win will help him. He’s the current golden boy, and things like this won’t matter much to him.”
“Were they addressed to you?” I ask, as if a light has suddenly gone off in my head.
Merv nods. He looks so uptight, so uncomfortable. I don’t need to worry about not being able to face him again, because he’s having as much trouble for his part.
I need to listen to my dad’s messages.
“Get out of here, Lindstrom,” he tells me.
I look at him, expecting him to tell me I’m fired or suspended, but he seems to want me out of his sight more than anything.
I rush back to my desk and listen to my dad’s messages, and when I do, he asks me to call him back. He doesn’t sound too happy either.
I think I already know.
He answers his cell phone on the first ring.
“Are you trying to give me a heart attack?” he bellows. His tone gives me a heart attack.
“What’s wrong, Dad?” I’m praying that it will be something to do with his girlfriend. I’d even be happy if he told me he’d proposed to her. It’s news I’d hate to hear, but I’d prefer that over what I fear it really is.
“I didn’t raise you to be a slut.”
His words send me reeling into my seat. He has the same photos.
This isn’t about Eli.
This is about me.
Somebody is out to get me, and cause me the most amount of humiliation.
“The photos,” I say, rubbing my forehead as I close my eyes, wondering how it is that my world has imploded so suddenly.
“Yes, the damned photos,” my father spits back. “Have you no shame?”
“Someone is out to get me, Dad.”
“Is that the boxer?” he seems to struggle to say it.
“Yes.”
“And that’s your idea of working on him?”
He’s so angry he’s not even making sense. This is a double shot of shock for him. It would be for any father to see a photo of their daughter like this, and for my father, seeing Eli, ‘that boxer,’ with me, must be like dousing fuel over fire.
I have no words.
I have nothing to say that will explain any of it. Nothing that will make either of us feel better.
As far as I can see, there is no feeling better, not now, not after this.
That was a private moment between me and Eli, but some nosy, douchebag, vengeful, slimy piece of shit decided to teach me a lesson.
I know who it is. At least, I think I have a clue.
Only someone like Gerry would be that vengeful.
I storm into his office, but he’s not at his desk. I grind down on my teeth because I want to have it out with this bitter and deceitful excuse of a man, and he’s not here.
I don’t have concrete evidence, but it’s not too difficult to piece it all together, after all, he left the bar with me that day. He was angry that I was going to meet with Eli. It’s not inconceivable that he would follow me. But I have no idea how he managed to take those pictures.
For the next hour, I’m in the bathroom, pacing around, trying to keep it together. I can’t face being in the office around people, because I have no idea who will have seen those photos, but if Merv’s been sent them, and also my dad, then who else?
I’ll have to tell Eli at some point. There is no reason to tell him now when he’s probably busy signing new deals and getting endorsements.
I need to check out the articles I wrote which would have been printed in today’s paper, and also on the day of the fight and the day before.
I venture out of the bathroom a little later, but as I return to my desk, I can already hear my cell phone going off.
“Turn that goddamn thing off,” Merv spits out as he walks past me. Turns out that he can’t sit still either.
I rush to get my phone just as it stops ringing, but I catch sight of Eli’s name flashing on the screen.
I call back, dreading the worst.
“What the fuck did you write?” he snarls.
I blink in confusion. What’s he talking about. “I… uh … ” His question stumps me.
“You lying little—” he stops himself but I catch the hiss as he exhales.
Something is wrong. What the hell is wrong?
“You lied. You lied and snaked your way into my bed to get your fucking story.”
My heart splinters, not just at his words which slice through me, or the tone, but at the accusation he makes. I don’t understand what he’s talking about. He’s not talking about the photos. He’s on about the articles.
“I wrote…” I try to remember what exactly I wrote. I know what Gerry wanted me to write, but I held back.
“You spilled my secrets; the things I never wanted anyone to ever know about.”
My breath catches and stifles my surprise. “It was all about the story, wasn’t it, you stupid little bit—” He doesn’t finish the sentence. He doesn’t need to. I can hear the hate in his voice crystal clear.
I rush over to the desk where the week’s worth of papers are, and I pull out all the ones which contain the articles I wrote.
My stomach knots and twists with a sickening feeling. I’m almost too afraid to open the papers, afraid of what I might find.
Chapter Forty-Four
ELI
* * *
“Is this true?” Nina asks me.
My heart is breaking. It's nothing to do with that love bullshit. I don't give a fuck about Harper. But my heart, the thing that keeps beating only because Nina and I made it in this world, feels like it wants to give up. I kept this dirty filthy secret from my sister because I knew it would crucify her if she ever found out. But Harper took my secrets, took my demons and exposed them for the world to see.
She used me to get her story.
The princess was good. She was very, very good. Even I fell for that shit.
“Is it?” Nina asks.
I want to lie. I really do, but she already knows the truth. She can see it on my face. I don't know I'm crying until I feel a tear roll down my cheek, and that one thing gives Nina her answer.
She puts her hand to her face and crumples to a heap on the floor. I'm not prepared for this. I knew it would hurt her, but I am not prepared for this. She really has been like a mother to me. She really did think she had shielded me from the worst of humanity.
“It's okay,” I say, rushing to her. I'm on the floor with my arms around her, holding her body as she cries. I don’t understand this level of despair. “It’s not your fault,” I tell her.
She looks up. “I had no idea. I had no idea, Elias,” she wails, and then, maybe because she catches my astonished look, she tries to calm herself down. It’s noticeable, though.
“We were only children,” I tell her. “Nobody would have believed me, and I couldn’t tell you. I just couldn’t.”
I shake my head, because those memories are starting to lodge back into my brain like a cancer I thought I had finally cut out. “You couldn't have stopped it.”
“Who?” she wants to know.
I frown then look away. I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t want to say his name out loud. I don’t want to go back into that time or place.
“Who, Elias?”
“Does it matter?” Harper doesn’t realize what she’s done, but she has opened up so many festering, bleeding, pus-infected wounds. She’s i
nterfered in my life and fucked things up.
My hands have been permanently fisted ever since I found out. I can’t relax. I can’t sit still. I have an uncontrollable urge to hit something.
I despise Harper with every cell in my body. She keeps calling me and Nina, and leaving messages. She claims that she didn’t know the articles had been switched. She blames Gerry for the changes, for mentioning the abuse, and the fight club, and the stuff about me throwing the fights.
I don’t care so much about people knowing about that, but it was something I wanted to put behind me, like most of my early life. What I hate is that she broke my trust.
We shared little of ourselves with others—Nina and I. It was almost as if by not talking about it, we could pretend it didn’t happen.
I guess I should never have trusted her. I blame Lou as well. He should never have allowed this to happen. I didn’t need this type of fucking PR. He tells me that Tommy is on the case, that I’m going to get a person to take care of my publicity.
He wasn’t too happy when I told him I needed to get back to Chicago tonight. I caught a late flight out, didn’t want to wait a day or so.
“There’s a welcome home parade for you,” he insisted. “We’ll go back on Wednesday. The city is putting on a hero’s welcome.”
I ignored him and came back, because Nina sounded so distraught on the phone after she’s read the shit Harper had written.
“His name, Elias.” She won’t let go of it.
My jaw tightens and I don’t answer right away. I hate to say his name out loud. “Swain.”
Her face turns ghostly white and she rushes out of the room. Then I hear her throwing up.
Now I'm the one who's concerned.
I bang on the bathroom door. “Nina!” I bang again. “Nina!”
“Just... just give me a moment.”
If I saw Harper now, I couldn’t hurt her, not physically, but I would put a hole through the wall because I couldn’t look at her face and not erupt. My hate for her is a million times more than when I first saw her.
She will go back to her rich-Daddy world, to her workplace with Merv the Perv and the slimebag that is Gerry, meanwhile, we’re the ones who will have to put this behind us.
Lou told me this would blow over, that people would forget, that my win has made boxing history and people won’t care.
But I care.
I never wanted the world to know.
I never wanted my sister to know.
The world loves a broken hero, but Lou has no fucking clue. This isn’t about how the world sees me. It’s about my deep dark past being revealed and made real all over again. It’s about the trust that has been shot to pieces, leaving shrapnel in my daily life.
When Nina comes back, her face is ashen, her eyes bloodshot. I never expected her to take it this bad. “You were so little,” she says, as if she needs to explain.
“You weren't much older yourself.”
“Nothing happened to me,” she throws back. “I'm sorry I couldn’t protect you.”
“Hey.” I move towards her, but she's closed off. She has one arm around her stomach, and one fiddling around with the chain on her neck. She needs time. “None of this was your fault,” I insist.
“I failed you.”
“You were eight,” I remind her. “We were children.”
“He's dead. He died four years ago.”
My eyes widen. “How do you know? Why do you know?”
She shrugs. “I read about it in one of the papers. It was a hit and run.”
I pray it was someone seeking revenge, and I'm glad they got it. “That’s good news.”
There is a silence as the words sink in, and we both have our own memories of that hell.
“Why did she do that?” Nina asks. “Harper?”
“I don't know, but I'm going to fucking find out.” I scrub my face with my hand. What a shitshow this has turned into. My last few days have been beyond unreal.
“She keeps calling me,” Nina says, “but I don’t answer.” She takes a deep breath. “I really liked her.”
I liked her too, and I trusted her, and in the end she fucked me over for a story.
Chapter Forty-Five
HARPER
* * *
I couldn’t find Gerry yesterday, and I went home early anyway. My evening was spent speculating on the nightmare that has swept into my life from out of nowhere.
I’ve called Nina and Eli multiple times but neither of them ever pick up the phone.
This morning I’m back at the office, and the moment I see Gerry come in, I charge into his office. I don’t have conclusive proof about the leaked photos, but the more I think about it, the more I am convinced that Gerry is involved. But trying to get information out of that slippery snake is impossible.
“You're mistaken,” he tells me when I accuse him of having some involvement.
“Mistaken?” I’m doing my best to keep my voice calm. Hard to do when I have this urge to put my hands around his neck and throttle him. “You had something to do with those photos, Gerry. Why don’t you man up and confess?” I can’t prove outright that he did, and I’m doing my damndest to rein in my anger.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The lying little creep. Eli was right to be concerned about him. He never liked Gerry.
“You do know what I’m talking about.” And though I can’t prove outright that he had a hand in those photos of me and Eli, I do know that he changed my article and put in those things I was adamant stayed out; Eli’s secrets—the things he had confided in me.
Gerry’s deceit is coming to the surface slowly. I considered him to be my friend and mentor, and he took Eli’s secrets and published them for the world to read. It’s my fault for telling him in the first place, but at the time I still believed that he was a good friend, and not the soulless shitbag I now see him for.
“What about the articles?” I ask, when he refuses to say anything about the photos.
“What about them?”
“You changed things,” I say, accusingly.
“I tightened them up.”
Every time I close my eyes, I see Eli’s face before me, only now he is cold again, and his eyes as hard as stone. He will never forgive me for this, and he has no idea about the photos, I assume, otherwise he would have mentioned them.
“You deliberately put in the things I told you I wasn’t going to put in!”
He huffs out loudly. “You don't owe Cardoza a thing. There's no loyalty, there isn’t supposed to be. He was supposed to be the subject of your piece, nothing more.”
“My article was fine as it was. You didn’t need to expose his secrets.”
“You shouldn’t have told me, then.”
“We were friends having a drink, we were talking. I confided in you.” Eli giving me a cold shoulder after the training camp might have made me susceptible to feeling I could trust Gerry. I wonder if that’s how Gerry saw it. Then I think back to all the times I’ve confided in him and he’s looked out for me.
Maybe Eli was right. Maybe Gerry did have a soft spot for me that I couldn’t see.
My suspicion grows. I know he had something to do with the photos. It’s too much of a coincidence with everything else going on. “I might not be able to prove it but I know you had a hand in the photos,” I say. After all, he left the hotel with me that day. He could have easily followed my taxi, and given all the research he’d done on Eli, I wouldn’t be surprised if he already knew where Eli lived. “At least have the balls to own up,” I say, my anger simmering to boiling point. Any minute now I’m going to explode.
“I’m shocked and hurt that you would accuse me of such a thing, Harper.”
“You gutless piece of shit.” I don’t hold back. He must think I’m stupid. “You changed the article to hurt Eli, and to make me look bad in Eli’s eyes, and as well as that, you took the photos. I don’t know how you did it, I have no idea how you got
the angle and the height, and the camera to take those shots… ” And then I realize. “You probably didn’t take them, because you have contacts. You could easily get someone to do your dirty work for you.”
He shifts uneasily in his chair and attempts a surprised look. I know it’s fake because I’ve come to know Gerry well. He’s been odd lately, as if he’s been avoiding me. I equate avoidance to guilt.
I don’t even care anymore whether he will admit to it or not, because the damage is done. Eli won’t want anything to do with me. The fact that neither he nor Nina answer my calls clues me in.
I will go see him and Nina, I will try to explain, but I don’t see them letting me anywhere near them.
One thing at a time, though. First I have to sort this mess out. “It’s too much of a coincidence that you added in the things I didn’t want in the article, at the same time as Merv and my father received photos of me and Eli.” I suddenly remember Eli’s hunch. “You’re jealous that I chose to see Eli that evening.”
Damn.
That’s it. That is exactly it.
He made Eli look like a dodgy dirty guy desperate for a quick release. And he’s done his best to cause me the maximum amount of humiliation. My cheeks turn red each time I think of my father looking at those photos.
Rage seeps out of my pores, and I want to poke Gerry’s eyes out, especially now as he stares at me with contempt. But he doesn’t deny anything.
Initially, I had assumed that a freelance photographer might have looked for dirt on Eli, something that might sell for more if he won the belt.
I never dreamt that Gerry would be behind this.
He rests back in his seat, staring at me blankly, as I try to unravel what happened and he’s amused by it. I imagine situations in his private life where he drove his ex-wife bonkers just the same way he’s driving me bonkers, and I no longer feel as sorry for him.