by Ava Ashley
The big glasses and the long sleeves.
“Wasn’t there anyone in the house who saw what was going on?” I ask. “Why didn’t they report it?”
“Most of the staff were illegals. They were too scared Pop would have them deported if any of them had dared stand up to him.”
“So, why did your parents decide to give Logan up?”
“Aha! See, there’s another twist to the fairytale. My parents didn’t decide anything. Mom was already pregnant with us when she found out what a prince Pop was. But, she couldn’t bear the thought of bringing up a child in an abusive home. When she went into early labor, while Dad was on a ‘business trip,’” Lennox sliced angry air quotes in the air, “she saw her opportunity. She bribed her doctor to falsify documents. To say the baby was stillborn before Pop could find out. She’d arranged with friends from back east, who were infertile, but desperately wanted to have children, to take the baby and raise him as their own. Imagine her surprise when the doc delivered two of us. Logan had managed to hide behind me on the ultrasound. It’s rare, but it happens.”
“And the friends?”
“Willing to take us both. But, I was a troublemaker. Even back then. Wound up with an infection and had to stay a bit longer at the hospital. Mom had a change of heart and decided at the last minute to keep me, but Logan was already gone.”
“But now you,” I whispered as I ran my finger over the small scars, “now you were caught up in the cycle of abuse.”
Lennox nodded. “And I don’t think Mom ever forgave herself for what she saw as her worst selfish act. The guilt drove her to take her own life. A bottle of pills with a vodka chaser.”
“Lennox, that’s awful.”
“Not as awful as getting stuck with Pop. That’s what Logan just doesn’t get. Things didn’t work out so great with him with his adopted family. He knew he didn’t belong, and he fought it every step of the way. And if you ever doubted that God has a sense of humor? Imagine my face when I get called to the principal’s office for stealing the answers to the Algebra final and find out it was really this kid who looked just like me!”
Sloane’s laugh warms my heart. “Anyway, turns out his adoptive family had moved, the dad got transferred, or something. And he wound up at Kennedy with me. At first, it was pretty cool to have someone who looked so much alike. Not to mention had the same jacked-up sense of humor. We both loved South Park re-runs. We both hated when our food touched on the cafeteria tray. It was like we had both found home...part of something we could connect to. Then he got jumped by those guys with the knife, and we found out just how close the connection was when he needed that kidney transplant.”
“You found out you were brothers,” I suggested.
Lennox nodded in the affirmative. “Unfortunately, so did Pop. He figured out what Mom did and was determined to bring Logan back into his life. Not because he loved him, or out of any sense of fatherly duty. Because Mom had taken something that he felt belonged to him.”
“But, you argued with him. You stood up to him.”
Lennox bobbed his head again. “Wasn’t going to let that sonovabitch ruin three lives.”
“What happened?”
“He told me to go screw myself. That he wasn’t about to take orders from some snot-nosed punk whose balls hadn’t even dropped.”
“I’m guessing Logan didn’t overhear that part.”
“Nope. Pop left the hospital for a celebratory drink to toast his ‘new son’. He was hit by a speeding car while crossing the street. Logan has always blamed me. For everything. When all I wanted to do was protect him. To be there for him. You’d think he’d get it. But, no. Just keeps saying maybe one day, I’ll know how it feels. To have everything taken from me.”
That’s when it hits me. All the pieces of the puzzle are finally in place.
I have my story.
Lennox kisses my hand. His sea-glass eyes stare into my own blue ones. “Like I want to be there for you.”
Not a story, Sloane. A fairy tale.
Thing about fairy tales? There was always a great, dark forest on the path to “happily ever after.”
Chapter 18
Lennox
I made my way through the forest of press.
“Mr. Hardy! Mr. Hardy! What do you have to say in response to these allegations made by your brother?”
“Lennox Hardy? Is there any truth to what Logan Masten said in tonight’s debate?”
“Lennox! Was Congressman Daley readily aware of the alleged situation in the Cougars’ locker room?”
“Mr. Hardy! Mr. Hardy! Mr. Hardy!”
Fortunately Ken, the security guy at the desk in my building is a former Marine. He plants his wall of a body in between the crushing press outside and me as I thankfully make my way toward the elevator bank.
“Don’t worry, Mr. Hardy. I’ve got this. You’d think the rain would have kept the bastards away.”
“Naw, Ken. Parasites are waterproof,” I grumble. Grateful for the cushioned silence of the elevator, I lean my head back against the wall.
What in the hell just happened?
I had made a stop on the way home from the training facility. After Logan’s dick move at Daley’s party last night, I’d had a lot on my mind, and needed to work through it. Somewhere between the deadlift and my fiftieth burpee, I’d made up my mind. Now, I ran a conscious finger over the package in my pocket.
Maybe if I hadn’t stopped at the sports bar. Maybe I could pretend it never happened. But, Sloane had mentioned a craving for hot wings and Granite’s had the best. I had figured I’d surprise her.
And maybe surprise her even more with what I had in my pocket.
The bartender had just handed me my to-go order. I had snaked one of the hot wings from the container when somebody had put the debate coverage up on the television behind the bar.
The debate had started out simple enough. The candidates had been introduced. The rules of the debate explained. Then each candidate was given two minutes for opening remarks.
And that’s when all hell broke loose.
Logan, standing high on a platform of moral ethics and family values, had levied the accusation against Senator Daley of being complicit in a doping scandal within the Cougars’ organization. More specifically, Logan dropped my name, saying I had used performance enhancing drugs, calling into question every stat I’d laid down this season, every game we’d won.
“How,” Logan had asked, “can we trust a candidate is willing to cheat, just to put more people in the seats? To line his personal wallet? A candidate who is willing to risk our most precious natural resource...our children. Never has the gravity of our actions as leaders been more poignant to me than since I recently found out I, myself, am going to be a father. I don’t want our children to turn themselves into chemical stockpiles because they look up to athletes, like Lennox Hardy, and feel they have to poison themselves and risk their young lives to achieve an impossible goal. For the candidate who is willing to allow that to happen, who would condone such rash stewardship of our moral code? That is not a candidate who cares about the future of this country.”
An undercurrent of grumbling had waved through the bar. Some of the patrons had started throwing some disgusted looks my way. I had gotten out of there as quickly as I could, before it turned into more than just looks. Nature’s symbolism wasn’t lost on me as the sky opened up and dumped what seemed like the entire Pacific Ocean on my head as I had run to my car.
You’re washed up, Lennox. Your life is over.
My hand had drifted to the small box in my pocket.
I had goosed the accelerator of the Enclave all the way back to the loft, but I think my brain drove even faster.
I never touched a PED. Not in my whole goddamned life! Logan was the one on drugs! Not me!
The vultures had already been waiting on my doorstep.
“Sloane? Sloane? Please tell me you didn’t watch that disaster.” My voice echoes hollowly as I
walk in the front door. I hang up my coat and set my keys on the foyer table. “Sloane?”
Maybe she’s in the bathroom.
But, the door stands open. The bathroom is empty. A nervous twist starts to build in my gut. I walk into the office. Her computer’s still here. A cream-colored tab peeks out from under the laptop edge, nearly hidden. I step closer.
Thirty.
I vaguely recognize the name on the tab of the manila folder. It’s one of those gossip rags, dressed up as glossy art mag with profile pieces on celebrities.
The twist becomes a knot.
I flip the file open. I’m staring at my mother. And not just my mother. There’s a copy of an old newspaper article about my parents’ wedding. I look at my mother’s bright, beaming smile.
Damn, but she was beautiful! Inside and out.
Sloane reminded me so much of her. I looked at my Pop. His nose didn’t have that cauliflower look that had set in after all the years of hard drinking.
Something starts to burn in my stomach. I think about Sloane and the baby. Maybe I should have ordered the mild wings.
I take the file in both hands and rifle a thick index finger through the pages. Handwritten notes about me and Logan. Hugh’s name next to the words “gambling debts”. Pictures of Mom and Pop at some society event before I was born. One of those ones where she’s wearing those massive glasses.
Why did that asshole have to ruin her?
Copies of Logan’s campaign account records, certain entries highlighted. Mom’s obit stapled to a piece of paper with scrawled questions.
Why did Sloane have all this stuff?
A loose note.
Meeting. 8:00 PM. October 14th. Giselle Nast. Thirty. Re: Lennox Hardy story.
Reality sinks my heart.
The sudden metallic clunk of keys on the hardwood floor behind me makes my heart jump into my throat. I whirl around.
“Lennox,” Sloane whispers when she sees what’s in my hand. Her face is white as a ghost. “Lennox, I can explain.”
That now-familiar boiling anger starts to churn. My brows narrow together in pinched distress. “You can explain? You can explain why you have a file of the Hardy family’s greatest hits, ha! No pun intended.”
“It’s really not what it looks like,” she starts.
“What? That you used me? That this whole thing, whatever the hell it is, has just been a big ruse? For what? To get a story? So, that was ‘the new job’, huh? How much of it was real, Sloane?” Grief chokes my voice. “Was any of it?”
“Lennox, I was going to tell you the truth the other night, at the party, but...”
“The truth?” I storm over to Sloane, my breath hot in her face.
“You’re press,” I sneer with as much disdain as I can muster. “You wouldn’t know the truth if it came up and slapped you right across the cheek!”
Sloane’s hands instinctively reach up to shield herself.
And that’s when it hits me. I’m just fooling myself. I’ve been fooling myself this whole time, thinking any of this had been real. That I was anybody’s hero.
I’d spent my whole life trying to save people. Playing football to give Mom something to put a smile on her sad face. Bailing Logan out, mess after stupid mess. Trying to help Sloane.
And I’ve failed...every single time.
Maybe I’m more like my father than I want to admit.
“Seriously, Sloane? Do you really think I would hurt you?” A serious hitch interrupts my voice. “Sloane...I loved you.”
A heavy silence falls between us. I crack the silence first. “And, stupidly, I guess I thought maybe you loved me, too.”
I threw the file down on the ground.
“But, what do I know? I’m just a dumb jock.” I head for the door. At the last moment, I turn. “Good for headline, I guess. Not much else.”
“Lennox! Wait! Don’t leave! Where are you going?”
“I don’t know, Sloane. You’ve done your research. Where else would you expect a Hardy man to go?”
Chapter 19
Sloane
None of this is going as expected.
I had just gotten back from a meeting with Giselle. It was official. I had told her I was deep-sixing the story. As expected, she hadn’t been pleased. She’d been in the midst of bombarding me with the delivery of the hackneyed “You’ll never work in this town again” speech when I shut her up with her the new spin I had developed.
I had done the right thing.
Now, as I stood in the empty hall of Lennox’s loft, I’m not so sure.
Was it too little, too late?
I don’t know why I cringed when Lennox approached me. I knew he would never consciously do anything to injure me. But, I’d heard the debate on the car radio. Logan had beaten me to the punch. I hadn’t had a chance to tell Lennox what I suspected. The evidence I had uncovered. And I knew the kind of dark mood the drugs in his system could cause. Whether or not he knew they were there.
My fairytale was turning into a horror story.
My feet are mired in quicksand. I want to move. I want to follow him. To tell him what he suspects is completely and totally wrong....unless, somewhere he still believes I am completely and totally in love with him. Because, if there’s one truth in this whole mess, that’s definitely it.
“How do you know, Ma?” I can remember asking my Ma, one day when she was home. I seem to recall sobbing over some boy of the moment, and how he’d left me for some heavy-breasted cheerleader. I guess Speech & Debate hadn’t been sexy enough for him. Three pints of Chunky Monkey into it, and I was still sobbing on Ma’s shoulder. “How do you know when you’ve found the right guy? I mean, aren’t they all just jerks? That’s what you always said about Dad.”
“Aw, Slo-Poke,” she’d soothed, rubbing my shoulders. “Not all guys are jerks. And what I had with your Daddy? Sure, it wasn’t lifelong romance. It was more like a thirty-minute romance in the back of his brother’s Camaro. But, I wouldn’t trade it for the world. If we hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t have you.”
She’d kissed the top of my head. “But, if you really want to know how to tell you met the right guy? If you’ve truly found ‘the one’? Love the man who loves you when you can’t love yourself. When you can’t stand to see the person who’s staring you back in the mirror. If you have that guy by your side...you can move mountains.”
Well, I was a mountain. Even if I only felt like it. And there had been times over the last nearly six months where I had barely even been able to stand to look at myself...both physically and mentally. And Lennox had been there. Been there to rub my aching, swollen feet. Been there to make sure I had the most comfortable place to sleep. Been there as my best cheerleader when things looked beyond gloomy.
And I’d heard Ma’s voice, reminding me of what was important. That’s when I had known, I had to forget about what was right for me - Giselle’s story - and do what was right for Lennox.
My inner newshound had first begun to howl when Lennox mentioned performance-enhancing drugs at the café, right before we had run into Kirk. Then Kirk had passed his comment about some “big news” Logan was planning on springing at the debate.
And then there were Lennox’s physical symptoms. The dizziness. The restlessness at night and inability to sleep. His quick temper. All symptoms of steroid abuse. Thing was, I knew Lennox would never take them of his own free will. Someone had to be slipping them to him. It had to be someone in a logical position to do so. The only person that made sense was Hugh, the teams’ trainer. But, it was a risky venture. Hugh had to have had some serious incentive. It’s amazing how willing football wives are to talk when they’re lubricated by expensive, cost-free champagne, especially when you were the designated pregnant woman.
I had learned a hell of a lot about team personnel that day talking to Angelina, Paulette and Monique. Apparently, Hugh liked the ponies. But, he sucked almost as bad at that as he did at picking wives. Between gambling debts and three
ex-wives and their alimony, Hugh was damn near broke. No wonder the man had high blood pressure.
It didn’t take much to assume that if the right amount of money was thrown his way, that he might be able to see his way clear to administering a little illegal power boost to one or more of the team’s players. I’d used the Freedom of Information Act to look at the campaign accounts of both Congressman Daley and Logan – the only two people who really stood to gain from the scam. Daley for the reasons Logan had accused him of at the debate. Logan? To besmirch Daley’s reputation and win the election and to destroy his brother’s career out of some sort of twisted revenge for their messed-up childhood. The search proved what I already knew in my gut. Regular payments were going out of Logan’s campaign account to Hugh. I remembered that day, at the game. Hugh had been in the hallway, waiting for Daley, looking squirrely. I suspected he was already harboring doubts about his involvement with Logan, and had been almost ready to spill to Daley that day. I figured, with the right amount of pressure, I knew Hugh would roll over on Logan in a heartbeat.
There’s only one heart I’m interested in right now, though. Lennox’s.
I had to love him when he obviously didn’t love himself. When he believed that he had done nothing but fail everyone he had ever loved. To prove to him that he hadn’t failed.
My feet found their path. I flew down the hall, and out after Lennox. He had to be heading for bar at The Buckhorn Grill across the street.
I ran past Ken in the lobby.
“Everything okay, Miss Armstrong?” he asked as I waddled by.
“I don’t know, Ken. Check tomorrow’s headline”
I crowded past the reporters and out onto the curb. I could see Lennox, just across the street. The little person inside me leapt with joy.
“Lennox!” I waved. I doubted he could hear me with the cavalcade of reporters screaming questions at me. Even the blatting horn of the approaching city bus couldn’t drown them out.
