Chapter 33 #2
I haven’t been called kid in a while, but it doesn’t strike a nerve the way it used to when the season started. I barely tolerated being called a rookie then. Now it doesn’t even register a blip, and I wonder what I was so gassed about.
“Time for me to go too,” Heidi stands and shrugs into her coat. I walk them all to the door. “This was very productive,” she says as she leaves. “But you have a lot of phone calls to make, Mr. Holden.”
Sitting down at my kitchen island with a cup of coffee, the brand Brooks made for me, I start making calls.
I start with Kara, then call my parents and brothers.
My family gives me a level of understanding and comfort I’m not sure I deserve, but that I swear to repay.
I promise my parents I’ll do a better job of keeping in touch and visiting with them.
The next calls I make are to the list of people I’m inviting to the meeting on Wednesday. The first name on the list is the toughest one: Coach Logan. I take a breath and go for it.
“Coach Logan, sorry for interrupting your Sunday evening at home.”
He cough-laughs. “You know I tried calling a half a dozen times and left messages?”
“Yes. I owe you an explanation about recent events.”
“You do.”
I tell him the short version of the story, minimizing Sabien and Brooks' roles.
“I’d like you to come to a meeting of stakeholders to discuss the handling of the public fallout if you’re free Wednesday evening. It won’t take long.”
“That’s interesting. I’ll be there. Who else—”
“Stubichuk will be there, among others. Also Coach Nash if he’s interested.”
“I’m fairly certain he’ll be interested.”
“Thank you for listening, Coach.”
“Sure. Next time we have a private conversation, I expect you to do the listening.”
Those parting words send a small quake through me, but I withstand it well enough to continue my calls until I’m finished with the list, leaving me with one last call to make.
It’s almost ten o’clock. I’m wired because I refilled my mug with Brooks coffee halfway through the list. I glance at the bottle of Courvoisier; I consider adding a jolt into my coffee.
But I close my eyes and tell myself to man up.
I need to deal with this, the scariest call of all, without the benefit of liquid courage.
I need to gather whatever bravery or bravado I have inside and jump off this ledge on my own, and trust that I’ll land on my feet no matter what.
I pick up my phone and tap on the icon for Brooks.
She answers almost immediately.
“Hello, Brooks. You’ve been waiting for my call.”
She snorts. “You said you’d call, and it’s after ten.”
“I had a few calls to make, and I saved the best for last.” I listen to her short laugh, to hear the emotion, to listen for amusement, pleasure, or sadness, and I decide it’s all there. “How are you?”
“Let’s see, I’ve been catching up on current events, and there seems to be a big kerfuffle about some so-called fake marriage caper all over trad media and social media.
I’ve also had numerous requests for podcast appearances, and Jett’s line is ringing off the hook with sponsorship offers from several large jewelers, including Long’s and Gucci.
I only know this because his wife called me.
She seemed kind of excited and thought I’d be pleased, too. ”
She finally stops talking, and I still can’t read her mood. She’s confusing the fuck out of me so that I can’t think of what I’d planned to say to her.
“So are you? Pleased?”
“Considering I was worried I’d be out of work, I don’t hate having offers.”
I smile to myself, and some of the pressure in my chest lessens. “What are you going to do when the dust settles?”
“Be the best rep I can for Kat. I’ve been doing lots of research in the music industry, calling some veteran agents in that business and requesting lunches. So far, I’m lunchless.”
I smile again. “Not for long. I know how relentless you are.”
“Some people call it persistent. Sounds more professional, less stalkerish.”
I laugh, and it feels like my chest is cracking open to let the sunshine in, like I’ve been living in the dark for the last two days, which feel like two years.
I invite her to the meeting, giving her a rundown of the attendees.
“What’s it about?”
“I’ll explain it all there. Let’s just say I’d like you to keep an open mind. Don’t write me off as past history, Bianca. Not yet.”
“Okay,” she whispers, and it’s the first crack in her upbeat attitude I hear. Shit.
“And Bianca, thank you for sending me Heidi Lawless. Ax thanks you too.”
She laughs. “Anytime. See you there, Brody.”
I stare at the phone for a long time, mixed about how I feel, unsure about how Bianca feels. Sure, I care way too much about how she feels. In particular, about me.
The conference room at the Harborview Hotel fills one by one with my list of attendees. Heidi and Jett are seated at the head of the table, and Heidi’s assistant distributes a neat sheaf of papers to each person as they walk in and take their seats.
Sabien and Ax arrive together, and Coach Logan and Coach Nash arrive together.
Jett’s PR expert arrives with an apology for not coming sooner.
Martino arrives and shakes my hand before sitting at the opposite end of the table.
Gary Edwin, the reporter from Bar Stool, stops in the doorway and surveys the crowd before coming into the room and taking his seat.
I look at my watch and sigh in relief when I spot Bianca, dressed in her signature out-of-style pin-striped suit with a silky pink blouse under it, and my eyes drink her in like she’s a fancy umbrella drink and going to make me very drunk on her sex appeal if I keep it up.
Stubichuk is attending via video conference, and when he calls in, Heidi puts him up on the screen.
“That’s everyone,” Heidi says after she introduces Stubby around the room.
“Thank you all for coming.”
“You didn’t need to rent a hotel conference room; you could have used the Arena’s conference—”
“I wanted us to be on neutral ground.”
“Who’s the stranger in the room?” Coach Logan nods in the direction of my brand-new lawyer who’s dressed in a winter white wool dress that shows off her long, shapely legs, and I can see her using her legs as a distraction.
“This is Heidi Lawless, my attorney for handling the fallout from the so-called fake marriage caper.”
She nods in her no-nonsense way and pushes a lock of her mane of flaming red hair over her shoulder while looking over the room with her snapping green eyes.
“As you all know from the recent barrage of coverage and social media gossip on the subject, a man named Bigelow, who worked as a concierge at the hotel where the NHL All-Star team stayed last month, sold a story to the TMSZ purporting to be all about the Great Newlywed Hoax, or the fake marriage caper as others have dubbed it. His story is true in part, but it’s not the truth, and it’s not his story.
“It’s my story and Bianca’s story.” I drag in a breath and take the plunge. “I’m going to tell you my truth here and now. In spite of our confession to not being married, there’s a lot more to the story than that.”
Jett puts up a hand. “Let me interject here that Brody and I tried to buy the story from Bigelow, but he wanted his pound of flesh and his five minutes of fame, so he sold it to TMSZ for far less money than we offered.”
“Thanks, Jett. That’ll be the last interjection.
” I look around the room. “I’ll start by calling out the untruths in Bigelow’s story.
I didn’t steal the wedding ring. I didn’t bribe Brooks to pose as my wife for a publicity stunt, and neither did she suggest that we should pose as newlyweds for that purpose.
We broke no laws or rules set by the team or the NHL. I had Heidi double-check that.
“Besides letting a few gossip-inclined people believe we were married, the worst thing I did—and that was solely on me—was invite a woman I didn’t know back to my room for the night.
By the way, she was a willing woman who happily accepted my invitation.
” A smattering of chuckles in the room proves that my sense of humor never rests.
“Predictably, it was an ill-advised invitation and led to the unfolding of the caper like knocking down the initial domino in a long line of dominos, and one thing led to the next. So if you, the media and the public, want to hang me for my poor judgment that night, go for it.”
“Brooks is blameless and even tried to stop me from inviting the show girl to my room, so do not put any of this on her.”
My eyes are on her as she bows her head.
I know she wants to say something, and so does Sabien, who puts a hand over hers.
But I give him a warning look to keep his word and not say a thing.
Because in spite of my irritation at his instigation, we both know I didn’t need to go along and could have shut it down immediately or at any time along the way, no matter what he said. Same with Brooks.
“We were never married, so we have no need to get a divorce. I’d be perfectly happy if Brooks would continue as my agent with or without the Jett agency.”
Jett squirms at my words, and I acknowledge him.
“But she gets to decide where she works and who she takes on as clients.
Jett is willing to keep her on and to have her start a new music talent division.”
She looks at me with her mouth open, then grins and turns to Jett. He nods in confirmation.
“They’ll work that out between them. In the meantime, my lawyer and the Jett agency’s PR people, as well as myself and Brooks, will be executing a social media campaign that will tell a much different story than what’s out there now.
I’ll also be accepting numerous podcast invitations to spread my message. ”
“We’ve apologized to the people we needed to apologize to, Cavalaro Motors and the Speck ad agency for lying to them specifically, and most of all, to our families, friends, and my teammates and coaches.
“I’m sorry if misleading you hurt you or inconvenienced you in any way. We will be returning all wedding gifts.”
“What about your message? Where do you and Ms. Brooks stand now?” Martino asks, and everyone in the room looks to me expectantly for the answer.
I put up a hand.
“I don’t know the answer about where we stand.” I meet her eyes and manage to keep my cool, even in the face of her sadness.
“But I’ll tell you what my message is. I don’t know why I allowed myself to get swept up in the fake marriage caper, though I’m working on figuring out that answer, but I can tell you two things.
“First, none of it was Brooks's idea nor her fault. I swept her up with me, and she did everything she did to help me and protect me, going above and beyond what a professional agent is expected to do, and I have all the respect in the world for her for that.
“And I apologize to her for taking advantage of her decency, her hard work, and her willingness to do whatever it takes to please her clients.”
There are a few snarky smiles from Stubichuk and Martino, but I meet them with my game face, as expressionless and menacing as a shark.
“Brooks is a professional through and through. If there was any blurring of the professional lines, it was all my doing, and that’s all I’m going to say on that subject.”
The reporter, who I invited for this reason, asked the question on everyone’s mind. “Was there anything real about your relationship? You two looked—”
I put up a hand again.
“Here’s what I’m going to say about my relationship with Brooks.
Though I’ve apologized for the lies, I would, God help me, do it all over again because I treasure the time I spent with Brooks and getting to know her.
I hope that we can still…” I push a hand through my hair, emotions overwhelming my ability to speak, not exactly sure which words to use or how much.
Turning to her, I watch her eyes, study her expression as I choose my next words from somewhere deep inside my chest, possibly my heart. “I would like to continue my relationship with her, pick up where we left off, if she’s open to that.”
Turning away, I heave a breath and push back from the table, standing. I don’t even want to see her expression or any hint of how she feels right now. I need to steel myself for possible rejection before I can handle knowing how she feels.
“That’s all. Send questions to Heidi’s office for a response.”
I retreat from the conference room at a brisk pace, not stopping for anyone, not Jett, not Ax, not Sabien. And especially not Brooks.