Fuck. “I’m sorry! Hell. I was just… surprised. You gotta fill me in.” I try to pull her into my arms. “Start from the beginning.”
To my surprise, she lets me hold her. “It’s b-b-bad, Neil.”
“Okay. I’m not scared. Where was this photo taken? In a strip club?” It’s not like I’ve never seen a topless bartender before.
“Y-yes. Last year.”
“All right. So what? I am working really hard not to say the wrong thing right now. But I’ve been to bachelor parties, Charli. I know titty bars exist. This isn’t the end of the world.”
“Yes, it IS!” she shrieks. “This p-picture is going to end up everywhere. In the tabloids. With your name attached. And I can’t let that happen, Neil. I can’t. Because I love you!” She glares at me. “I love you, and I really, really wanted to be the girl in your c-corner. And not embarrass your family.”
“Oh, honey. You’re already that girl. And you’re so much more than one unflattering photo.”
“I know,” she bites out. “But he said he can also get video. Neil, I’m being blackmailed.”
“Oh.” Oh shit. “By who?”
Instead of answering, she just sobs.
I wise up and stop trying to pry answers out of her. I just hold her, stroking her hair, rubbing her back. And I tell her everything is going to be okay. That she and I are a team, and we’re stronger than this.
After a while, she listens. She finally calms down. I bring her a glass of ice water, and I ask if she trusts me enough to explain the situation to me.
“I do trust you,” she whispers.
Then she tells me the story.
And I almost lose my shit.
It takes me an entire day to calm down enough to make a plan.
We’re coming up on the playoffs, my schedule is crazy. So the plan waits a few more days. I won’t be telling Charli the details ahead of time.
“You have to let me take care of it,” I insist. “My way. This is just one of those times.”
I expect an argument. But Charli is so afraid of her mother’s cousin that she doesn’t even put up a fight.
This man had hurt her when she was a teenager. One night while staying in his home, she’d awakened to find him naked and on top of her. She’d had to fight him off.
“I haven’t really slept well for almost ten years,” she told me.
I want to kill him. I really do.
But I’m not going to. I’m just going to scare him a little bit. Which is why I’m driving a rental car deep into Brooklyn on my day off in the company of a young bodyguard named Duff.
“You have to let me go in first,” Duff insists. He works for the security company that protects the team. “What if this guy is packing? I’m wearing a vest.”
“Fine,” I say, parking in front of the dingy, old apartment building. “You can go in first. I don’t need to get shot.”
“And we leave no marks on these guys,” Duff adds.
“That’s a taller order,” I grumble.
“I bet it is. But neither of us is going to jail. You can scare a man half to death without punching him.”
“Castration was more in my line of thinking.”
Duff shakes his head. “Do you need to stay in the car?”
“No.”
We get out together, and Duff picks the lock on the building’s door in about four seconds flat. Even as we climb the stairs, we can hear the TV playing behind the door to Charli’s old place. It’s so loud that Duff picks that lock, too, and the people inside don’t notice until he flings open the door and steps inside.
“Don’t fucking move,” he says, his hand on his piece. “Keep your hands where I can see them.”
Two doughy men on the sofa raise their hands. They both look baffled. And they both look like they’re about to pee themselves.
“You’re right,” I say to Duff. “Big danger.”
He grins.
Then I turn my attention to the asswipes on the sofa. “I’m Neil. I’m a guy you never want to cross.”
The older creep seems to gather himself. He lowers his hands to his thighs and sneers at me. “Yeah, you’re tough. You had to get another guy to bust in here for you like Rambo?”
I put a foot on the milk crate they’re using as a coffee table and look down at the two of them. “Yeah, yeah. Say what you will. Do either one of you want to fight me? I’m available right now, and my day job is hockey. I enjoy it when things get a little rough.”
There are no volunteers, so I move on.
“First up, I don’t give a crap about that picture of Charli. As far as I’m concerned, you can cover the Goodyear blimp with that photo and fly it over New York. So Charli worked in a titty bar. Who cares? My family doesn’t.”
The men on the couch scowl.
“But I’ll tell you who cares—Charli,” I continue. “And I love Charli. So that’s why I need you to know something. If those pictures leak, I’m coming for you. I don’t care if it’s this year or a decade from now. I don’t even care if it was you who leaked it. I’m coming for you both.”
“Bring him, tough guy.” The older turd points at Duff.
“Oh, I won’t have to,” I say easily. “I’ve got your rap sheet. Possession of unregistered firearms. Possession of illegal substances. I got a feel for your tastes. So if you do something I don’t like, the police are going to get a tip. Your house gets searched. Your mother’s house gets searched. And maybe they find some extra-special drugs there. I’m sure my team can think of something.”
Suddenly the dude doesn’t look so brave anymore.
“And if I’m feeling extra cranky, maybe your car gets forced off the road after dark. Maybe you get called in for a lineup at the police station when they’re looking for a murderer. Who knows what I’ll come up with?”
Both men glance at each other. But neither of them moves.
“I guess I’ll decide later. But I have a lot of money. Nearly infinite resources. I have a lot of friends in high places—and low ones, too. And when I hold a grudge, it’s gonna sting. If you want to find out how bad, you leak that picture. Meanwhile, don’t contact Charli. Don’t call her. Don’t visit. Don’t come within two hundred feet. Don’t reach out to her in any manner existing in the present, or invented in the future.”
“Jesus, we get it,” the younger asshole says.
“Excellent. Now I just need each of you to tell me the rules. Once you clarify your understanding, I’m done here. You first.” I point to the older punk.
He gives me a scathing look.
I wait.
Duff unholsters his gun and inspects it. He blows some invisible dust off the barrel.
The punk sighs. “I will never share the picture.”
“In any format, ever,” I add.
“In any format, ever,” he says.
“And?”
“And I won’t contact Charli.”
“Excellent. Your turn.” I point at his asshole of a son.
“What he said. We won’t contact Charli or ever share her picture. Or a video.”