The Snap, page 16
I was wearing a gold strapless bodice of handlaid sequins that bloomed into a tulle skirt. My hair was done in Old Hollywood–style waves, and my lips were a deep merlot. The event, thrown by a luxury brand whose name was synonymous with extremely expensive watches, was called A Time to Celebrate, and the guest of honor was the brand’s main ambassador, one bruised, worked over, and extremely churlish all-star quarterback.
That meant by Asbel’s new rules that I had to be here too, although I wasn’t really. I physically might be clutching the stem of a white wineglass where condensation from the crisp liquid quivered against the sultry night air. I might be listening to the unfamiliar sound of southern insects harmonizing with the string quintet. But mentally, I was still in the booth across from Chloe.
“No,” she’d said as casually as if I’d asked after her weekend plans, “there’s nothing.” But she was calm where she should have been confused, and I recognized too much of myself in her. Something was not right between Chloe and Red, but if he was dead and she didn’t want to talk about it, where did that leave me?
When Chloe came on, we’d had “the talk”—If anyone in this office ever says or does something that makes you uncomfortable, I want you to tell me about it. It’s on them, not you, and you won’t be in trouble, but I can’t help unless you tell me.
I will believe you.
I needed her to know that part, that she could come to me without fear of what would happen to her next. That I would stand up for her, that I’d use my position as a senior member of staff to be a voice for her. It was so very important that women do that for each other.
I doubted that today a Neil from accounting could pin young interns against the wall and be laughed off as over-friendly. It had been years since I’d heard a female trainer complain about “happy feet,” where players wiggled their toes while their foot was propped against the trainer’s chest for taping. But if everything had changed, it was also true that nothing had, and a girl like Chloe was just as vulnerable as I’d been, just now with shiny new packaging. Look at Nisha checking into hotels under a pseudonym. Look at Sarah’s Digital Dick Museum, as we’d once dubbed her collection of unrequested photos, or the way Dayanna’s GM, who seemed to be recovering nicely from his heart attack, spoke about her curves like she was Jessica Rabbit.
And we were the adults. We were the ones with a fair amount of aggregated power.
Chloe was a thousand times more self-assured than I’d been at her age. She gave unsolicited feedback to her boss on the day after the franchise’s icon was murdered. Not content to be a mere vegetarian, she lectured about which specific animals were environmentally acceptable. It was hard to believe that if she had something to tell me, she would hold back. And yet.
“Is this dirt taken?”
Omar Kadeer stood beside me in a black tie and a cobalt-blue tuxedo. Exhausted after the first hour of trying to look interested while talking to no one, I’d made my way down the patio’s broad stone steps, past the open-air dance floor, and tucked myself beneath one of the giant oaks.
“Nice seeing you again,” I managed, forcing my attention back from Chloe. I indicated the patio where A.J. was posing for photos. “He seems to be behaving, considering there’s probably still grass in his teeth.”
“His teeth are blindingly white. I assumed that’s why you were all the way over here. And he always behaves in public, which is why I like him. Well,” he corrected, grinning, “it’s one reason I like him.”
I calculated the couple hundred million that A.J. had made over the years in contracts, roughly doubled that on endorsements, and took a conservative 10 percent off the top. I just bet Omar liked him.
“It’s not easy for him, you know,” he said. I looked up, a retort on my lips, but saw that Omar, for once, looked serious. “Getting older.”
It probably wasn’t—no one wants to feel passed by—but sympathy, I felt, was a bridge too far. “As a woman, I really can’t relate to that, since we’re famously celebrated for aging. Why are you standing all the way over here?”
“Poppy, this place has ‘Plantation’ in the name. I’m keeping one foot near the exit.”
“Fair enough.” I held out my glass, and we clinked. A burst of laughter erupted from the group around A.J., and I shook my head. “I don’t get it—they scream obscenities at him, and throw water bottles at him, and hope his leg snaps under him when he gets sacked, but then when they see him in person they want a photo.”
“Ah, you’re one of those,” said Omar, and then, when I raised my eyebrows, “a purist.”
“I mean, I like plenty of opposing players, but that’s because I like them as people. The whole point of him to them is that he’s not a real person.” The wine was like an ice cube trailing along my sticky skin from the inside, the only relief from the muggy night air. It was shocking how the heat could still make itself known down here, at night, in November. At home we had already seen flurries. Resisting the urge to press the glass against my forehead, I swirled it instead and said, “Do you want to take a walk?”
We set off away from the party, around the elaborate grounds and gardens. Crushed stones crunched under our feet, giving me jellylegs in my high heels, and after a minute I pulled them off and left them abandoned on a stone bench near the entrance to an honest-to-God hedge maze.
“Should we?” Omar indicated the opening.
“Oh. I didn’t mean—they just hurt.”
“I know. But should we?” His eyes narrowed as he smiled playfully, and I laughed in spite of every competing disaster tumbling around my head. Would I take a moonlit stroll with some guy around a definitely haunted plantation under normal circumstances? Of course not. But the nice thing about Omar Kadeer was that he was way too hot for me, we both knew it, and that took all the pressure off. Setting my glass beside the shoes with a light tink, I gripped my dress so that it hung above my ankles.
“Okay,” I said. “You’re on.”
It was quiet inside the maze, which rose several feet above our heads in all directions. The earth was soft and cool beneath my toes, and the paths were flooded with moonlight. At the first turn, I chuckled, and then, in response to Omar’s raised eyebrow, said, “No—it’s stupid. I was just—have you ever seen that Toni Braxton video where she’s running in the ball gown?”
His laugh was an easy, full-throated sound. “Our jobs come with a lot of…unexpected experiences, don’t they? That’s what I like about it—never boring.”
It was what I liked about it too, and it felt so validating to hear Omar say that. Like this was the kind of job worth devoting your life to. Like it was the kind of job worth sacrificing something precious for. Maybe on another night, as my normal self, I wouldn’t have said anything, but traversing a hedge maze with a relative stranger, our hands swishing past each other close enough to make a vibration, it felt like an opportunity to talk to someone who might understand.
“Omar, can I ask you a personal question?”
“Now this is the strategy my ex-girlfriends should have used.” He indicated the living walls surrounding us. “Where am I going to go?”
I blushed deeply. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t trying to—”
“Poppy, I’m joking. Of course you can.”
We turned another corner, met a dead end, and reversed back in the direction we’d come. “I just wondered, with these jobs, and the travel, and no weekends—how do you make it work? Having something outside? I mean, if you do, that is. Obviously we don’t know each other that well.”
He stopped and faced me, the force of his gaze so powerful it lifted my chin. A skitter of panic crossed my chest—maybe I’d misunderstood. I was suddenly extremely aware of the way my dress plunged at the neck, the salted sweat across my décolletage. There was moonlight caught in Omar’s short curls, the shadows of it throwing his cheekbones into sharp relief. His voice was low, and serious. “I’m going to tell you how, but you have to be ready to hear me, because it’s not easy. You have to really want it. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“This is the secret. Date…a twenty-year-old…model.”
The tension broke so completely that I barked out a very unladylike guffaw and gave him a shove. Omar held up both hands. “It’s true! I’m going to tell you why, and you’re going to thank me, so you’re welcome. They don’t eat much—easy to take care of. They stare into their phones all day so you never have to talk to them—surprisingly low-maintenance. And they don’t make any demands on your time. We’ve solved your problem. I’m telling you, a twenty-year-old model is going to be the fix for you. Should we look some up?”
“No,” I said, still laughing. “I don’t have anywhere near that kind of energy—I need a rescue dog, not a puppy. But thank you for sharing that extremely hard-won wisdom.”
“Okay, so tell me who you’re seeing that’s so great.”
I hesitated, but he raised his chin expectantly, so I said, “No one, at the moment. But the previous guy was a surgeon.”
“And what are scrubs except the male version of a belly ring? They’re both status symbols.”
My smile tightened. Suddenly it didn’t all seem so funny. “Hey, come on,” said Omar, noticing the change, and then, “I’m sorry. That was too far.”
“No, no, it’s fine. That guy’s long gone.” My easy tone made it sound like I’d been the one to ditch Peter. It was more bearable that way.
We’d arrived back at the entrance to the maze, where my shoes and wineglass waited. An out-of-season firefly had fallen into the liquid and was now paddling gently around, lightning in a bottle.
* * *
*
When I parked in the stadium lot on Monday, I sat in my running car because I didn’t want to go inside. Sarah had called on Sunday and, when I didn’t answer, left a rambling voicemail apologizing for her comments about Red. “I’m so freaked out, Poppy,” she’d said, and I could hear the tears in her voice. “Nisha told me not to tell you, but she’s had some weird things going on too. I don’t know what to think. But I shouldn’t have put that on you. Red’s death was not your fault.”
It would have meant more coming before we knew that Buster Gibbs’s heart attack was just a steak-and-cigarettes special, and it would have helped more if Sarah was right about the second part. Red’s death was partly my fault, just not in the way she meant.
Once I was in my office I took a long, slow look around. There were awards for leadership and mentorship through the Women in Sports Foundation. The magazine cover featuring “40 Women Under 40 Blowing Apart the Old World Order.” A framed photo of me at my alma mater with a group of public relations students. I was proud of what I’d done here. I liked my life, and I was happy in it. Ever since Annika’s scandal, since the initial note—really, ever since Red was killed—it felt like it was all being held together with Scotch tape and toothpicks. It felt like the floor could swing open and swallow me at any moment.
The door to the annex clunked but didn’t open. An insistent knock that might have been a kick followed, and Chloe rushed to open it. When she did, a pair of crutches swung into view, followed by DeMario.
“Hi,” I said. “That’s new.”
DeMario looked like he’d been dipped in foam—his leg from thigh to ankle was wrapped in a hard brace. His usual easy smile was replaced with a grimace, and there were dark circles beneath his eyes. “I need to talk to you,” he said, sending my stomach cartwheeling. With a glance at Chloe, he added, “In your office, please.”
After I’d closed the door he tried to sit, but the chair was too close to the desk and he didn’t have the angle. I hurried to pull it farther out, and he waved me off in frustration.
“You had the surgery?” I asked, and he nodded. Seeing him in front of me looking so diminished drove home that not only had I used him, I’d kicked him when he was down. When he’d needed me the most. How could I have sold him out, my friend, just to cover my own ass? What kind of person would do such a thing?
“Rehab started last week. That’s one good thing about not coming back—I don’t have to get into football shape, I just have to be able to get out of bed and into my chair.”
I winced. “I’m really sorry.”
“It is what it is. I’ve had a good run, you know? My kids are set. Their kids will be set.” He hitched forward as much as his bum leg would allow. “I just want to know what shitstain leaked it. Faith found out from SportsCenter—she thinks I couldn’t tell her. There’s no secrets between us, she knows everything about me, and now she’s looking at me sideways. I’ve known you a long time, and you get shit done. I need you, Poppy. How do we find this guy? Because I’m going to fuck him up.”
DeMario didn’t talk like that. He was becoming a worse version of himself because of me, because of my lies. He and Faith were fighting over it? No, I couldn’t let that go on. I sighed from my toes and pictured the way his face would twist in shock and betrayal and eventually anger. He was going to hate me, and it would be awful to lose him, to lose them both, because I loved Faith too. This was going to really hurt.
Fuck.
“D—I need to tell you something.”
And then my phone buzzed—a call from Sarah in the middle of the workday. I silenced it, folded my hands on my desk, and leaned forward, but it immediately buzzed again.
CHAT ROOM RIGHT NOW 911 SOS.
NOW NOW NOW.
Pulse pounding against the roof of my mouth, I shoved my chair back and swept my phone and laptop into my bag. “I’m so sorry,” I told DeMario as I stood, “um, I need to leave right now. I’m sorry. We’ll talk about this, okay? Soon. I just—sorry.”
I half jogged down the stadium hallway, through the lobby, and opened the front doors into a thick wall of lake-effect snow.
It sucked up sound and color until there was nothing but silence and white. I looked once back down the hallway, cursed under my breath, and went out. In my heels, without a coat, I trudged toward my car, crying out as the snow filled my shoes, forced its way between my toes. The windshield was already covered, and I used the sleeve of my blouse to clear the driver’s-side doorframe. Inside, I popped off my heels and flexed my frozen feet. It brought an explosion of pinpricks, but they would be okay, they hadn’t been exposed for long. Whatever Sarah needed to tell us so urgently might not be as easily fixed.
I propped my laptop on the dashboard, caught the stadium Wi-Fi, and logged in. Only Sarah was waiting for me.
“What is it?” I said immediately, stabbing at the heat controls. Seat warmer, lower-zone airflow. “Where’s everyone else?”
“I can’t find Nisha.”
“I don’t understand what that means, like she’s not answering?”
“No, I mean she was supposed to be in Denver yesterday for work and didn’t show. Didn’t call anyone, didn’t say anything. Just wasn’t there.”
The car was warming now, but I felt chilled to the bone. Taking time off was one thing—though I couldn’t imagine Nisha doing that in the middle of the season—but just not showing up was impossible. It meant something was seriously, seriously wrong. I rubbed at the sopping sleeve of my blouse. “So what do we do, call the police? Someone with her team obviously knows she’s missing, did they do anything?”
Sarah’s curls bounced side to side. “I don’t know, I haven’t talked to anyone there. Someone at my place was supposed to talk to her for a development story and was complaining in our Slack when she didn’t show. I’ve tried calling and texting, I checked her socials. There’s nothing.”
I’d lived my entire professional life under stress. I thrived under it and did my best work when the stakes were high. But until that moment, I don’t think I’d understood the difference between pressure and danger. Pressure, I could handle, I was built for it, but this was something else. This stress was the fear of monsters in my closet and under my bed, and it was very quickly going to tear me apart.
“What about Dayanna, have you talked to her?”
“She’s okay. She’s talking about flying out there to check Nisha’s apartment, she wants to, like, hug her back to safety. But what happens when she gets to San Francisco and the door’s locked? Then what?”
“Okay…okay, shit.” Nisha was missing. Sarah was in a full panic. Annika was still off-grid, and Dayanna was flying across the country with no plan.
“There’s one more thing.” Sarah’s mouth was a line. “The last time I talked to Nisha was Friday.” Three days ago. “She sent this really cryptic message—Vergangenheitsbewältigung.”
“What the hell is that?”
A fist hit my window, and I practically went through the roof of the car. I turned to look at the same time I snapped the laptop shut and found Asbel bent at the waist, peering at me.
“You starting a true-crime podcast now?” he said once I’d rolled down the window. He nodded toward the closed laptop with its Bobcats logo on the front.
“Yeah—you want to sponsor it?” I said, still trying to catch my breath. I hadn’t seen him coming through the snow-covered windshield. “I had a telehealth appointment. I don’t like doing them in my office, and the investigators are in the conference room, so…Just needed a little privacy. That’s all.” I flashed what I hoped was a confident smile, but I could feel my lips trembling.
“You hung up on your doctor?”
“We were finishing up. I actually have to get back inside. First availability in a week, everyone’s a little restless.”
“Don’t forget your coat.” Asbel tapped the roof of the car once and then walked off toward his own sleek black vehicle.
* * *
*
All afternoon I ran from one crisis to the next. First Rodney shared his “theories” with the detectives, which brought a request for a list of Bobcats wide receivers over the past ten years. Then I fielded a call from a reporter alleging he’d heard our secondary was using bounties to encourage big hits—cash bonuses for violently knocking someone out of the game. Coach Washington had been burned for that once before—not his own initiative, but one of the position coaches who wanted to provide a little extra incentive for his unit. I was sure this was a lazy rumor, but it still had to be dealt with. Chloe flashed me an extra-wide smile every time I saw her—something was not right there—but we were still a professional football team in the middle of the season with work to do and games to play.
