Chapter 14 Rory's Pov
1640 Words
“ I found the other clauses too,” I said after a while and Jaxon’s body went still behind me.
“What other clauses?”
I laughed quietly. “You really do not know?”
“Tell me.”
I faced him again.
“The impossible performance standards buried in my contract. The limited ice time used against my own metrics. The injury reports written like character defects. The media notes. The behavioral summaries. The fact that my entire career with this team was designed like a maze with every exit marked failure.”
His expression darkened with recognition and somehow, broke anything that was yet to be broken inside of me.
“You saw your file,” he said in a matter of fact tone. It was not a question; it was clear that he knew.
I glared at him. “So you knew there was a file.”
He sighed before responding carefully, “I knew they tracked incidents.”
“Incidents.” I smiled bitterly. “That is a lovely word for living.”
His hands flexed again. “I did not know the full structure.”
“But you knew enough.”
“Yes.”
There it was again. Yes.
A confession was not always mercy, I thought.
Sometimes it was just another way to bleed.
“And Marcus?” I asked.
Jaxon’s eyes sharpened at that. “What about Marcus?”
Of course. Of course he did not know that part.
For some reason, that almost hurt more.
I folded my arms tighter over my chest. “He was reporting on me.”
Jaxon’s face went blank. “What?”
“Marcus Hale. Warm eyes. Charming smile. Team conscience. My one almost-friend.” My voice hardened. “He sent notes to management about my reactions, my frustration, my isolation, my emotional state…he f*****g helped them build the profile.”
Jaxon took one step back. It was as if the information had physically struck him. “No.”
I raised an eyebrow and said sardonically, “That is my line.”
“Marcus would not—”
“He would.” My voice cracked on the second word, and I hated myself for it. “He did.”
Jaxon stared at me and I watched the rage build in him slowly.
It was not the hot, reckless kind from the bar video. It was not the captain’s fury he wore on the ice. This was colder. More dangerous. The kind that came when a man realized the rot had spread through the walls of the house he kept defending.
“I will kill him,” he said softly.
I laughed, exhausted. “And there he is.” His eyes cut to mine. “What?”
“The man who thinks violence is proof of love.”
His face tightened just then. “I am not asking you to fight Marcus for me. I am not asking you to punch Victor. I am not asking you to burn the building down because guilt finally learned my name.”
“That is not what this is.”
“It is exactly what this is.”
“No.” He stepped closer. “I have been working on it.”
I went still. “What?”
His eyes locked on mine. “I turned down the bonus six weeks ago.”
My heart made a sound inside my chest I did not trust. “Convenient,” I managed to say.
“I can prove it.”
“Of course you can. Men like you always come prepared with exhibits when the damage is done.”
He absorbed that but he did not stop.
“I sent Victor a written rejection. I told him I would not cooperate with any incentive tied to your departure. After that, I hired outside counsel.”
I looked at him for a long time, unable to believe what I had just heard. “You hired a lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“To review the contract structures. Yours. Mine. The senior players’ amendments. The team policies.” His voice roughened as he continued. “I knew something was wrong, Rory. I did not know how deep it went at first but I knew enough to start digging.”
I stared at him.
No.
No, this was not fair.
He did not get to stand there with guilt in one hand and proof in the other. He did not get to be exactly the villain I had imagined and then also something else. Something complicated. Something that hurt more because hatred had been easier when it was clean.
“When?” I asked.
His gaze flickered.
“After the charity gala.”
My stomach dropped.
The gala. The almost-kiss in the coatroom. My hand on his chest. His breath uneven. His mouth inches from mine before I pulled away because I refused to become another mistake in Jaxon Kane’s life.
I remembered his face afterward.
The coldness the next morning.
The distance.
I had thought he regretted wanting me.
Maybe he had been trying to survive wanting me while knowing what he had done.
“How noble,” I said because cruelty was easier than breaking. “Did falling for me interfere with your business model?”
His flinch was sharper this time. “Yes,” he said.
I stopped breathing. He stepped closer but not enough to touch me.
Never enough to touch me without permission.
That detail should not have mattered but somehow, it did.
“It interfered with everything,” he said. “The bonus. The team. My captaincy. My mother. The version of myself I kept pretending was necessary. You interfered with all of it.”
My throat tightened. “Do not make that sound romantic.”
“It was not romantic.” His voice was rough. “It was brutal. It was realizing I had spent two years punishing the only person in that locker room brave enough to be honest about what we were.”
I looked away. The tears were too close now. I could feel them sitting behind my eyes like traitors waiting for permission and I hated them for it…for the betrayal.
“I do not know what you want from me,” I said.
“I want you to let me show you the proof.”
“I saw proof already.”
“Then see all of it.”
He reached into his coat pocket slowly, like he was approaching a wild animal. Maybe he was. Maybe that was what betrayal made of people.
He pulled out his phone, unlocked it and placed it on the coffee table.
“I have emails,” he said. “Letters from my lawyer. Draft pleadings. The rejection notice. Notes from Lena.”
My eyes snapped to his. “Lena?”
“She has been helping.”
I laughed in disbelief. “Of course she has.”
He shook his head at my sarcasm and said, “She knew where bodies were buried.”
“That is one way to describe public relations.”
“She wants Victor out.”
“Does she want Victor out because he is corrupt or because he is no longer useful?”
Jaxon’s mouth tightened. “Both can be true.”
The worst part was, I believed that.
Lena Brooks did not suddenly become a saint because the plot needed one. She was strategic. Controlled. Terrifyingly intelligent. If she was helping, it was because the truth had finally become more profitable than the lie.
I respected that more than I should have.
I stared at the phone.
Do not pick it up, I told myself.
If you pick it up, you are letting him back into the argument.
If you read the proof, you are admitting the world is not as simple as he hurt me and I left.
If you let the truth become complicated, you might have to feel everything.
Still, I picked it up
Jaxon did not move as I did so.
I did not say anything as I opened the first email.
It was dated six weeks ago and to Victor Shaw from Jaxon Kane.
The subject line made my stomach tighten.
RE: Callahan Resolution Incentive.
My eyes moved across the text quickly.
No. Not quickly. Hungrily was the word for it.
I read every word like it might either save me or finish destroying me.
Jaxon had written that he would not accept any bonus, consideration or performance-related benefit tied to my resignation, trade, demotion, injury, reduced roster status or contract termination. He had written that the clause was unethical, discriminatory and potentially unlawful. He had demanded written confirmation that no similar arrangements existed with other players.
My hand started to shake.
I opened the next document.
Letter from outside counsel.
Review of discriminatory incentive structures.
Then another.
Preliminary litigation strategy.
Then another.
Notes from Lena Brooks.
Not emotional notes. Not kind notes. Evidence notes. Dates. Meetings. Internal phrasing. Media strategy. The timeline of how the fake relationship had been used to rehabilitate Jaxon and contain me simultaneously.
My stomach rolled.
I put the phone down before I threw up again.
Jaxon saw the movement.
Concern flashed across his face.
“Are you sick?”
I stepped back instantly.
“Do not.”
His brows drew together. “You look like you’re going to pass out.”
“I said do not.”
He froze.
The concern stayed on his face, but he locked his body in place.
Good.
Distance was safer.
Distance meant he could not feel the pulse racing in my wrist. Could not see the way my hand kept drifting toward my stomach before I caught it and forced it back down.
He could not know.
Not yet.
Not like this.
- Writer
