“No, not when she was young. More, um, recent.” His look offers sympathy. “You didn’t know?”
Decker and I stare at each other. I know what’s in that file. Maybe I’ve known all along and didn’t want to accept that it could have happened to her. Too many things that didn’t add up suddenly stand in perfectly straight columns and equal a horrific sum.
“Caleb?” The name is strangled in my throat. “Are you saying Caleb hurt her? He put his hands on her?” I stab the file on the table with my index finger, rage pistoning through my body. “Is that what’s in here?” I grit out. “That motherfucker hurt my girl?”
“Yes.” He lifts his hand from the file. “Before you look at this, consider something. Iris probably had her reasons for not telling you.”
“She said she signed an NDA. That was the only way she could guarantee sole custody of Sarai.”
“Yeah, well that makes sense.” He draws a deep breath and expels it. “Considering what’s in it, she probably never wanted it to come to light anyway. I need to tell you something else.”
“What else?” I stand and pace in tight circles, driving my hands into my hair. “What is it, Deck?”
“August, he . . . he raped her pretty brutally.”
God, no.
I stop, stock still, turning only my head in careful inches to make sure I heard him right.
“He . . .he raped her?” My voice can’t make it past a whisper. “Caleb?”
I honestly can’t remember the last time I cried, really cried, but tears burn my eyes and blur my vision. My chest feels concave, like it collapsed on itself and is crushing my heart. My hands tremble when I link them behind my neck. I’m holding on—to my sanity, to my composure—but everything’s slipping through my fingers.
“Fuck!” I scream it so loud, conversations in the lobby stop, and all eyes turn to me. I don’t care. I’m spiraling, thinking of that son of a bitch violating Iris. Of him abusing her. Beating her. I kick the table, and it spins a few feet into the path of a couple walking to the elevators. I turn to the wall and punch it, denting the lobby wallpaper. Denting my hand. My knuckles swell and redden immediately.
“August, stop it.” Deck grabs my arm, his frown stern. “We don’t have time for tantrums.”
“Tantrum?” I croak, my voice like sandpaper. “If someone raped Avery, someone beat her, what would you do?”
He goes quiet, a flare of violence in his eyes. “I’d want to kill them.”
“Right. Then let me go find Caleb.”
“But I hope I’d have at least one friend who would stop me,” he says. “Look, Caleb’s going to get his. That file didn’t just go to Avery’s station. It went to every major station.”
“Shit.” I drag my hands over my face. “This’ll be a media circus.”
“Yeah. You might want to sort through all your feelings later and worry about Iris right now. I think Avery was one of the first to get it, but there’ll be reporters and TV cameras at Iris’s door very soon, if not already.”
“I can’t . . .” I pull my phone out to check the time. “How much time you think we’ve got?”
“It’s late on the east coast,” he says. “That helps, but we may want to get her out of there and get some PR on this. You can best believe Donald Bradley is already lawyered up and has his spin machine hard at work.”
“Fuck him,” I spit. “What are the odds he didn’t already know about this? Caleb doesn’t piss without him signing off on it.”
“I’ve already got our PR team working on it.” Deck glances at his phone when it dings with an email alert. “Matter of fact, this is from them. I sent the file over as soon as Avery told me so they could vet it and figure out a statement since the public knows about you guys now.”
If I’d gone to Houston, I’d have forty-five million dollars, and maybe I’d even be on my way to a ring, but I wouldn’t have Deck—someone who’s truly a friend and looking out for me.
“Thanks, Deck. I . . .” Emotion clogs my throat. “I just . . . Iris? God, she’s the sweetest thing in the world. And she’s . . . she’s so small. How could he . . .”
Deck hooks an elbow around my neck and brings me in close.
“Hey,” he says gruffly, pulling back and placing his hands on my shoulders. “We’ll work through all of that. I promise you he’s gonna get his, August.”
“You sure about that, Deck?” I ask bitterly. “Did he ‘get his’ when he broke my leg? No, his daddy and the powers that be protected him. And you and I both know how it is—how there’s a different set of rules for athletes. How we close ranks and protect our own. Consequences aren’t ever guaranteed. I’m not having it this time. I’m telling you, if he gets out of this, I’ll kill him myself.”
“Keep your voice down,” Decker says through clenched teeth. “You don’t get to be a hothead. You hear me? You got a bright future that most guys would give anything to have. And you got a girl most guys would give anything to have. Would you sitting behind bars make this go away? Would it take away what happened to her? Is that gonna help her raise her kid?”
