Chapter 4
Dimi was annoyed. Like many people, he liked to think of himself as happy—fortunate and grateful for his good fortune. So, he didn’t like to be annoyed, especially as he was mainly annoyed with himself.
He had achieved his next goal of cracking the top five in men’s tennis—thanks to some sparkling play at the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati, where he had lost to world number one Evan Conor Fallon, so no shame in that. That, however, had not dimmed his momentum. He was still the hottest player around, the coming man. And he was poised for the next rung on his ladder—making a run at the US Open a week later—had he not been sidetracked by a disturbing text:
Need to work on your backhand. V.
This was the code in which Valerian communicated with him—their having decided a lo
