Chapter 13
Hades
“Murky clauses in Mireya Guerrero's signing: the deal the club doesn't want you to see.”
Reading that headline at six fifty-three in the morning wrecks your entire day.
I'm not a paranoid person. Well, maybe a little. But I am practical. I've spent enough years in professional sports to have seen everything, and more than enough to recognize a live grenade rolling toward my chair.
Nearly three thousand words, bylined by Dante Vega, a journalist with no conscience and a taste for anything that bleeds. They ran it in the opinion section, which means the paper covers itself legally if things go south. The damage lands the same either way.
He doesn't name me directly. It's not a personal attack; it goes after the club. He questions our practices, the opacity of Mireya's transfer process, the legality of a financial rescue operation dressed up as a player signing.
“One must ask whether an investment of this size answers to sporting criteria, or whether there exists another kind of reading.”
Another kind of reading.
He leaves it open. Lets every person who clicks on that article fill in the blank with whatever they want. The worst version of whatever they want.
At eight in the morning, Tessa walks into my office with two cups of coffee and sits across from me before she even says hello.
“Did you read it?”
“At six fifty-five,” I mutter.
“How many times?”
“Four.”
“Make it five for me,” she says, taking a long sip. “Diana, whoever fed this to that journalist isn't from our club.”
I raise my head slowly.
“How do you know?”
“Because the numbers in the article match the original transfer document.
The one submitted to the players' union and the federation.
They're not the internal figures we work with here. They come from the official paperwork. And on top of that, everything is too vague; he throws around accusations without specifics, just enough to generate clicks.”
“I'm not so sure,” I say.
“I am. Completely sure. Very few people know the actual numbers. This came from outside; someone at the federation, at the union, or an agent who worked for a rival club that tried to sign her.”
“Someone from her old club?”
“No, God, we saved their lives by signing Mireya. Drummond is furious, I just got off the phone with her. She's terrified the legality of the whole arrangement is going to get scrutinized.”
“I can imagine.”
“But I'll tell you one thing, she's going to come down on you before the day is out. She'll want to protect herself,” she adds, raising her eyebrows.
**
At ten fifty-three, I dial Alexandra Drummond's number. I'd rather get there first.
“Diana. I was going to call you in five minutes. Come up to my office, please. I want to have this conversation in person.”
Damn.
Two floors up. The executive level has pale gray carpet that swallows the sound of footsteps. I knock, and Drummond tells me to come in before I finish the second knock.
I've never liked her office. The long glass desk is uncomfortable to work at, there are three computer screens she uses for reasons I've never fully understood, and the walls are covered in photos of club players lifting trophies.
“Sit down,” she says.
She's had her assistant prepare a coffee for me, and it's already waiting when I take my seat. I drink it anyway, even though I've lost count of how many I've had today. That's a bad sign. Drummond always orders you a coffee when she wants to work through a serious problem.
“You've read it,” she says.
“At this point I doubt there's many people who haven't.”
“The source isn't internal,” she tells me.
“I know it isn't.”
“Diana, I'm going to be very direct with you.
The normal outcome is that this article amounts to nothing.
It does throw accusations, but they're vague, without hard numbers, the whole thing will most likely be forgotten in a couple of weeks.
What I will say is that you need to be very careful about how that player is treated.
There can be no favoritism toward Mireya Guerrero, nothing that puts us in the press's crosshairs. Do you understand?”
A knot tightens in my throat.
“Alexandra, I'm coaching Mireya exactly as I coach every other player on this roster,” I tell her.
“Good. I won't press it further. You know how this works. If we don't want that journalist to keep digging, the situation with Mireya Guerrero needs to be beyond question.”
“Define beyond question,” I say, swallowing.
“Right now the club needs the player's next semi-annual review to be evaluated with strict criteria. And if her performance doesn't justify what we spent on the transfer, I'm going to need you to sign off that she isn't meeting her objectives.”
“She's performing well.”
“Until three weeks ago. Now she's injured,” she reminds me.
“You're not asking me to raise the bar for Mireya Guerrero's evaluation, are you?”
“I'm asking you to be strictly professional with the criteria,” she insists.
**
At eight forty in the evening I buzz Mireya's apartment, fully aware that I've never done this before. I've never gone up to a player's apartment alone. Until today, that was a line I hadn't crossed, but with her I've already crossed quite a few.
She opens the door with surprise on her face, already in pajamas, leaning on her crutches.
“Is it because of that article?” she asks.
“It's because of the article,” I confirm.
“My mother is furious,” she says, dropping onto the couch.
I tell her what I think, more or less what Tessa said: that nobody inside the club leaked this, that the information is too vague, that the journalist is just muddying the story and lobbing loose accusations to drive traffic.
I also tell her about Alexandra Drummond's request that the next semi-annual review be held to strict criteria, because I can't keep that from her.
“That's not fair,” she says.
“The club wants to cover itself so that journalist doesn't keep going,” I explain. “Either way, I'm very pleased with your performance on the field.”
“But my performance on the field isn't the real problem, is it?”
“No. We both know the real problem is something else entirely,” I admit, letting out a long breath.
“Just tell me one thing. The note. Is it still true?”
“The note is still true. Is it for you?”
“Yes,” she says. “But you know that if what's between us comes out, that journalist will tear you apart.
They're going to say you spent all that money to sign me because something was already going on between us, or because you wanted there to be. Do you understand what that means? Your career and your professional reputation could be finished. For good. Is it worth it to you to keep going?”
“We'll just have to make sure nobody finds out,” I murmur, and then I kiss her.
On the way out, a message from Lauren comes through.
“I saw the article. Call me when you can. No rush. But call me.”