The conference room felt a bit chillier than it had three weeks ago, even though the temperature remained the same. Perhaps it was the heightened stakes and the lingering sense of anticipation, as everyone awaited an answer after three long weeks of uncertainty.
Patricia Odom sat across the table again, flanked this time by a second compliance officer Cole didn't recognize and, more ominously, the athletic director herself, a woman named Carol Weiss whom Cole had met exactly twice before, both times in ceremonial contexts that had nothing to do with anything as fraught as this. Coach Halloran sat beside them, his expression carefully neutral in a way that told Cole nothing and everything at once.
"Thank you both for your patience," Odom began, opening a folder with the kind of deliberate
