Chapter 6 #2
Under the headline there are direct quotes from my notes, with details about Roman’s training schedule, specifics about the footwork adjustments Dominic’s been making, the combination sequences I documented during last Tuesday’s session, and a breakdown of the sparring rotation.
All of it pulled directly from the raw files I uploaded to the shared drive, my raw files, my unpublished, unvetted, absolutely-not-ready-for-publication notes that I stored on a project drive because that’s what project drives are for.
Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.
I keep scrolling, hoping somehow that it’s not as bad as I think, that maybe David only pulled the innocuous stuff, the color details and background material that wouldn’t matter. But no. It’s all there.
Everything that could possibly hurt Roman’s chances in the ring, laid out in clean prose with my observations polished into pull quotes like I wrote them for publication.
Like I handed them over willingly. Like I looked Dominic in the eye and promised his fighter’s strategy was safe with me, and then turned around and sold him out for clicks.
I call my editor, David.
He picks up on the third ring. “Brooke? It’s the middle of the night here and—“
“What did you do?” I cut him off. “How dare you use my notes for that piece?”
“The teaser piece? Is that what you’re calling about?” he asks, like I’ve interrupted his night over nothing. “Corporate wanted content. Engagement’s been soft this quarter and your notes were solid enough to pull something together. It’s good stuff, Brooke. Readers are eating it up.”
“Those were raw notes, David,” I say. “Unpublished, unvetted notes on a shared drive that exists for file storage, not content mining.” I’m speaking as calmly as I can, because if I let myself talk at the speed I’m actually thinking, I’ll say something that gets me fired.
“I gave my word to my source that nothing would publish until after the fight. I looked him in the eye and told him his fighter’s strategy was safe with me. ”
“It’s a teaser piece,” he says again, and I can hear him leaning back in his chair, settling in for what he clearly thinks is going to be a conversation where he talks me down from an overreaction.
“Eight hundred words, tops. It’s good publicity for your subject, gets people excited about the main profile. Everyone wins.”
“Everyone does not win,” I say. “Roman Kincaid’s opponent now has access to detailed breakdowns of his training strategy right before the biggest fight of his career.
” I stare at the glowing screen of my phone, at the article that has my raw observations polished into pull quotes.
“And I look like a liar who couldn’t keep her word. ”
“You’re being dramatic,” he says.
There it is. Dramatic. The word men like David reach for when they want to make a woman feel small for having a legitimate grievance.
I’d bet my entire salary he’s never once called Greg in features dramatic for losing it over a missed photo credit.
But a woman calls him out for a genuine breach of professional ethics, and suddenly she’s being dramatic.
“I’m being accurate,” I say, and my voice drops into something cold and hard, the voice I use for sources who are trying to lie to me.
“Which is something I take seriously even if you don’t.
You published my material without my knowledge or consent.
That’s not editorial judgment, David. That’s a breach. ”
The phone goes quiet for a long moment.
“Look, I hear you,” he finally says. “Maybe I should’ve given you a heads-up. But the higher-ups wanted content and your notes were right there on the drive. It’s not like I went through your personal files.”
“It’s exactly like you went through my personal files,” I tell him. “It’s where I store working materials that aren’t ready for publication. It’s not a buffet for you to pick through whenever corporate wants to boost engagement metrics.”
“Brooke.” He’s using that paternal, let’s-all-settle-down voice, like he’s talking a junior reporter off a ledge instead of addressing a senior correspondent whose work he just strip-mined without permission.
“It’s done. The piece is live, it’s performing well, and your profile is still going to be the main event. This just builds anticipation.”
“Take it down,” I say.
“I can’t do that.” He sounds almost amused now, like I’ve said something naive. “It’s got fifty thousand reads already. The numbers are great. Corporate’s thrilled.”
“Then we’re going to have a very serious conversation when I get back to New York,” I tell him, and I hang up before he can respond, because if I hear him say one more patronizing thing about why it was perfectly fine to betray my source’s trust for a bump in quarterly engagement, I will lose what’s left of my composure.
I sit in my parents’ driveway with the phone dark in my lap and my chest tight with a fury that has nowhere to go. This is what David does. He coasts on other people’s work and calls it leadership.
He’s been doing it for years and he’ll keep doing it until someone above him finally notices or someone below him finally snaps, and it infuriates me that tonight, sitting in my car in the dark, I already know it’s not going to be me.
Because I’m good at my job and I need this job and he knows that.
I pull out of the driveway and drive back to The Harbor Inn with the radio off and my jaw locked.
The next morning, I walk into Dominic’s gym prepared for a fight.
David may have torpedoed my credibility, but if I can keep my composure long enough to explain what actually happened, if I can make Dominic understand that this wasn’t my choice, maybe the last few weeks of work won’t have been for nothing.
Maybe he’ll be angry but reasonable. Maybe he’ll give me a chance to fix this.
At least that’s the plan. I take a sip of the coffee I picked up on the way over, which is doing very little to offset the four hours of sleep I got, and push through the front doors.
Sarah spots me from the front desk and immediately drops her gaze, busying herself with a stack of papers.
She doesn’t say good morning, doesn’t wave, doesn’t do any of the friendly front-desk things she’s done every other time I’ve walked through these doors.
Great. So Dominic knows, and apparently he’s told the staff.
I keep walking before she has to figure out whether to acknowledge me or pretend I don’t exist.
His office is at the back of the gym, past the ring and the row of treadmills, and the walk feels longer than usual. I can feel eyes on me as I go, or maybe I’m imagining it. Either way, by the time I knock once and push the door open, I’m ready for a fight.
Dominic is behind his desk, leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed over his chest, and the look he gives me when I walk in could strip paint off walls. Could curdle milk. Could probably wilt every plant in a five-mile radius if he aimed it in the right direction.
“Listen, I—“ I start, holding up my free hand in what I hope is a placating gesture.
“You have a lot of fucking nerve showing your face here,” he snaps, cutting me off before I can get three words out.
Whatever composure I’d scraped together on the drive over, all my careful plans for how to handle this conversation like a professional, evaporates completely.
The exhaustion and the anger and the frustration of the past twelve hours come rushing back, and suddenly I’m not interested in being diplomatic anymore.
“Seriously?” I drop my hand and stare at him. “I came here to explain what happened, and you’re not even going to let me finish a sentence?”
He laughs, and there’s no warmth in it whatsoever. “Right. By all means, Brooke. Explain.” He gestures at the chair across from his desk like he’s granting me an audience I should be grateful for. “I’m dying to hear this. Please. Enlighten me.”
I stay standing, because if he thinks I’m going to sit down and plead my case like some junior employee hauled in for a performance review, he’s out of his damn mind. I’ve survived fifteen years in sports journalism, an industry that treats women like interlopers at best and targets at worst.
Dominic Midnight in a bad mood doesn’t even crack my top twenty most intimidating encounters.
“My editor published without my approval,” I tell him, fighting to keep my voice level when every instinct I have wants to match his hostility blow for blow.
“I didn’t know until late last night. I was at my parents’ house having dinner and the article was already live by the time I saw it.
I called him immediately, told him to take it down, and he refused.
I had no idea this was happening, Dominic. None.”
“That’s convenient,” he says, and the sneer in his voice makes me want to throw my coffee at his head.
“It’s the truth.” I meet his eyes and hold them. “I gave you my word that nothing would be published until after the fight, and I meant it. My editor went over my head.”
“I think I should have trusted my gut from the beginning,” he says, coming around the desk to stand in front of me, close enough that I have to tilt my head back to meet his eyes. “I knew who you were when you walked in here, and I let myself forget.”
“Who I am?” I echo, and fire flares in my chest. “And who exactly is that, Dominic?”
“Someone who destroys careers and calls it journalism,” he says. “Someone who’ll do anything for a story. Someone who looks you in the eye and lies without blinking.”
“I’ve been doing my job with integrity, and you’ve spent the whole time waiting for me to prove you right about some story you’ve been telling yourself for fifteen years.
” My voice is rising and I can’t seem to stop it.
“You can be pissed about the situation, you have every right to be, but don’t you dare stand there and accuse me of betraying my word when I didn’t. This wasn’t my call.”