I hold his gaze. He holds mine. “All of it,” I say.
“Of course.” He shakes his head. Runs a hand over his neck. “Her job?”
“I don’t know yet.”
Across the room, Mac mutters, “Man, she’s screwed.”
I turn so fast that the bench creaks under my weight. “Watch your mouth.”
He lifts his hands. “I didn’t mean?—”
“Then don’t say it.” Silence drops again. Not tense this time. Careful. Like everyone suddenly remembers this isn’t a joke. Because it’s not.
“Max.” Trey is still in the doorway. “Her father?”
I look at the comment. Her dad is gonna LOSE IT. Frank Amato whose opinion lives in Toni's spine like a load-bearing wall. “He doesn’t know about us,” I say. “He doesn’t know about any of it.”
Trey absorbs this. “She’s going to try to handle it alone.”
“I’m not sure what she’s thinking.”
“Are you going to let her?”
I stand. The skate laces are done. The question hangs there, and the answer is so clear it doesn’t require a second of consideration. “No.”
I find her in the film room which is the smallest, most controlled space available, footage running onmute. The door is half-open. I push through it. She is standing at the monitor, facing away, tablet in one hand. Her phone is screen-down on the table. Her shoulders carry every pound of what has happened this morning, and she has not moved them an inch lower.
“Toni.” She doesn’t turn right away. That hits harder than anything online. When she does, her expression is controlled. Professional. Clean. “I’ve seen it,” I say.
“Close the door.” Her voice is level. The professional register, fully engaged.
I close the door.
“Damian Price’s office called at six fifty-eight.” She turns. Her face gives nothing away. Her eyes give everything. “My supervisor called at seven-oh-two. The league’s communications team is aware.” She sets the tablet on the table. “The photo has been taken down from the original account, but it has been screenshotted and reposted forty-seven times as of seven minutes ago. I read the comments before I turned my phone face-down. Most of them I expected. One of them I'm still carrying. Four hundred thousand people and one anonymous account and eleven words, and I've been standing in this film room for forty minutes trying to decide whether I believe them.
I don't.
But I heard them. That's the part I can't file.”
“Toni, that picture?—”
“Is accurate.”
I blink. “That’s not what I?—”
“We were on the service dock,” she continues, voice even. “During a fire alarm. You were underdressed. I was not.”
“Underdressed?” I huff out a short laugh. “That’s what you’re going with?”
Her eyes flick to mine, sharp. “I’m going with facts.”
“Here’s another fact,” I step closer, lowering my voice. “We didn’t do anything wrong.”
Her breath stutters. Small. Fast. Gone. “Yes,” she says. “We did.” That lands. Hard.
“What?”
Her grip tightens on the clipboard. “I allowed a situation that can be interpreted as unprofessional.”
