CHAPTER 11
Caroline
“Why can’t we spar again today?” I mutter a protest as I get into my stance, both hands up, shoulders squared on Brian, leaning slightly on my front foot, tilting forward.
The past two weeks have been relentlessly brutal, then the last few days only deepened the strain.
Connor’s spiraled like a Formula One car skidding out of control at murderous speed.
Life just gutted out of him and nothing Gigi, Ethan, Adam, or I did seemed to bring him back, not even a fraction.
It hurts in a way that’s hard to put into words to watch someone you care about unravel like that right in front of you, while you’re left standing there unable to steady the wheel for them.
Then there's work, which has been pushing me to a near breaking point.
I'm not just irritated anymore, I'm fucking pissed.
The constant layering of distorted bullshit, one lie stacked on top of another until it becomes this dense, suffocating slab, like mud packed into something so heavy and so incoherent you can't even find the edges of it.
It's exhausting, it's disorienting, and cutting through it to find anything real feels like clawing through burning fire with my bare hands.
“Enough sparring for the week. Only drills today.” My trainer smirks. “Fifty jabs first. Go.”
I pivot, rotate my hips, and fire jab after jab into the pads Brian holds, repeating the same movements I’ve done for the thousandth time this month.
Same motion, same line. It snaps through me like a kinetic whip, energy coiling in my hips, traveling sharp through my core, and cracking out at the end of my fist.
“The line. Good.” His voice cuts through. “Precise. Keep going.”
A few minutes in, my muscles are warmed up. I push off my back foot, draw back my hand, and drive it straight above the taped line, again, again, and again.
Snap. Clap. Snap. Clap.
“Harder. Faster.”
I draw back and jab harder. The gym smells like sweat and old leather. Around me, gloves thud, bodies shift, breath grunts out, but it all fades away. I don’t hear anything else but the rhythm of my punching.
Snap. Clap. Snap. Clap. Snap. Clap.
Everything else is irrelevant now, the only thing my mind and my body care about is the movement. No business concerns, no lingering thoughts. Brian edges the pads just out of range. Without moving forward, I throw single jabs on a full extension of my arms and immediately retract.
Full reach, clean line, snap it back.
Snap. Clap. Snap. Clap.
Brian starts circling. Like a mountain lion on a hunt, I track him without thinking, eyes locked in. My mind empties out any noise or any drift. It only focuses on his movement, reading him, measuring the distance, and strategizing about the next combination of punches.
But my body’s even faster than my mind. It sets the next moves before thought even forms.
My left hand throws a distraction jab as I step forward and immediately pivot away, transferring the weight onto my back foot and giving the right hand a powerful punch through Brian’s pad. It lands hard and precise.
“Faster!"
I throw a one-two, then slip left and immediately return with a cross hook, then slip right.
“Faster. Harder.” Brian roars again, his voice bounces off the concrete walls.
I answer with speed. My punches turn thunderous and lightning fast, but I maintain my control.
My glove work now is a conversation of precision after years of building discipline.
I’m not thinking about the drill, I’m just ingraining the muscle memory and transforming the deliberate movements into instinct.
Left hook - crack. Right straight - drive. Slip. Snap the jab back in.
Time disappears. I don’t see the pads anymore but just the space behind them. Each strike picturing my fist going through the padding, beyond Brian’s resistance, and into the air behind it.
Jab. Cross. Hook. Slip. Return. Again. Again. Again.
I punch through the pads as my body burns, shoulders screaming, lungs pulling hard. But everything is distant and irrelevant. The only thing coursing through my body is adrenaline. It floods clean and cold, washing out every pressing thought and every lingering emotion.
Just movement. Just impact. That’s what my body needs. That’s what my mind needs.
The hours blur past.
When Brian calls it, I slow. My shoulders ache, heavy and lit up, but my hands feel sharp and my head clear. It feels like sunlight cutting through on a crisp summer morning.
I exhale long, loosen up, shadowbox light, and shake it all out.
“No more sparring. No more drills this week,” Brian says, handing me a bottle. “You’ve done enough damage. Take it easy at home.”
He tosses me a towel and moves on, already barking at someone else for footwork too sloppy, movement too slow, hook not clean enough.
I sip the water slowly and press the towel to my face. It absorbs only a small percentage of the sweat that is running in steady streams down my skin.
God, this feels good. It feels so good to take my muscles to the threshold like this and push them over the edge so I can concentrate, so I can quiet my mind and feel the clarity settle in again.
The hurt is so worth it. I close my eyes, control my breathing, savor this peaceful moment, and let it all drop.
I stay there, in that controlled quiet. Just a second longer.
***
“Oh, fuck. Where the hell did that come from?”
I throw my hands in the air as Eyal, one of the three analysts Connor lent me, slides another dataset across the table. It doesn’t match anything. Not the pattern I suspected, not the deviations I mapped, not even the bullshit assumptions I was willing to tolerate.
Eyal and the other two exchange a look. Just a glance. No words. Then they turn back to their screens and keep digging through the datasets I’ve been sent.
They’re exhausted. So am I.
George Rubin really knew how to spin a web: misleading data layered on misleading data, looping endlessly, like a financial merry-go-round designed to make you dizzy enough to stop asking questions.
But he’s playing with the wrong person.
He’s not playing with fire. He’s playing with a fucking volcano.
“Take twenty, guys,” I tell them. “Step outside. Use my credit card for whatever you want.”
Numbers don’t match, but I can’t fire him for that. Not yet. Aggregation gives him cover. Sources give him excuses. At the total level, everything balances just enough to look clean.
And that’s the problem. But we’re not back at square one.
I will make this motherfucker pay for every loop he’s dragged us through.
I call my house staff and ask for icy sparkling water, tea, coffee, pastries, desserts, fresh fruit for all of us. Fuel for a siege.
I down an entire bottle of sparkling water in one go, forcing my pulse to slow, my rage to settle into something colder and sharper.
My mind snaps back through the last few months, replaying the financials and datasets George has fed me like breadcrumbs.
At first, the numbers were almost comical. Sloppy. Not well thought out. Barely stitched together to tell a story.
Then I challenged him. The follow-ups were better, pieces improved individually, but they didn’t talk to each other.
Then I pushed harder, only then the datasets evolved. The financials became synchronized and coordinated in a way that led us in circles without ever giving us a handle.
Which means one thing: I have a mole within my close circle. Because I never told George what specifics I was looking for and the improvements were like he knew what I was going to ask. And that mole was planted very recently because the sloppy numbers were there till a few weeks ago.
That much is obvious now. So, who is it?
God, I need someone I can trust completely. Someone smart, relentless, and clean. This kind of operation can’t survive a second leak.
The datasets will never give me anything real. The more we analyze, the more we orbit. That would be motion without progress.
Gigi’s voice cuts through my thoughts, sharp and casual and infuriatingly correct, “Why don’t you get Celina to help you out?”
Why not? I could hire Celina. But it’s complicated with Connor’s situation.
Well, let’s make it a slow hunt. For now, I’ll have Connor’s three analysts document every single inconsistency. Just a catalog of fractures.
But if George thinks he’s winning, he’ll lean back on his so-called victory, he’ll reuse the same tricks. Same inconsistencies. And that’s when inconsistency becomes pattern.
And patterns are leverage for me to fire him after I find the mole and extract the information. Then I’ll know. For sure.
My hands itch to dial Connor or Celina. But I won’t. I can’t just sit here and wait, either.
Right. Gigi and Gloria, Connor’s house manager. They always pick up. And they’ll put me through to Roman, his security chief. My security team has different backgrounds than Connor’s.
And this? This is going to require outside help. Roman’s help. His team’s help. Quiet, disciplined, surgical help. The kind that doesn’t leave fingerprints.
I’ll start this now. By the time Celina is back in our orbit, I’ll talk to her, bring her in, and get her on board the right way.
I exhale slowly. It’s a good plan, a patient one. It’s a slow hunt.
And I’m going to enjoy this. You’ll get what you fucking ask for, George.