Page 116 of Hard Pass

The muscle in his jaw pulses. “I expected more from you, Dublin. That’s on me.”

The words hit me like a sledgehammer, because Marcus doesn’t do vague disappointment. He deals in facts, in precision, in control. This feels personal.

“I don’t understand,” I say, although I can damn well assume.

His gaze doesn’t waver at the break in my voice. “In about two hours,” he says evenly, “a story will break.”

My stomach drops. “A story?”

“Yes. I was contacted to see if I wanted to give a comment before it was published.”

My stomach drops.

Oh. Fuck.

“Marcus—”

He flicks his hand up almost as if to say it’s not your turn to talk. I shut my mouth.

“A story,” he continues, “about how the lead investigator from Gridiron Integrity Analytics is sleeping with the NFL quarterback she’s investigating.”

The room tilts and I have to lock my knees to stay upright. Marcus doesn’t look away or give me a second to recover from the blow he just landed.

“Is it true?” he asks.

There’s a moment—a single suspended moment—where I could deflect and try to control the narrative the way I’m desperate to.

While it’s so very tempting to stop the way he’s looking at me, I don’t. Because not only will he know, but it’s also disrespectful to him, the man who saw my potential and fostered it.

“Yes.” The word is barely a whisper and coated in shame like I’ve never felt before.

His exhale is slow. Measured. Controlled. And somehow that’s ten time worse than if he’d yelled.

“I was going to tell you,” I say. “I should have but was worried—”

“And that’s somehow supposed to make things better?”

“No. Yes. It just happened, Marcus.” It’s the kind of lame excuse I’d tear apart in someone else’s report, but it’s all I have.

There is a long, foreboding stretch of silence. “I can’t believe you did this.”

The disappointment in his voice eviscerates me. Tears well in my eyes. Yes, I’m fully at fault. Yes, I knew this was a possibility every moment I spent with Cole. And yet . . . holy. Shit.

“It wasn’t intentional,” I blurt out, trying to save face that’s already lost. “It just—”

“Please don’t.” He lifts his hand again almost as if the gesture will help him process my actions.

But it’s his tone that gets me, that guts me, because I’ve never heard that tone from him directed at me.

“Do you have any idea how this looks?” he asks, voice a rubber band being stretched tight.

My throat constricts. “Yes.”

“Especially after everything we went through with the Murdoch shit?” he asks.

He doesn’t have to explain it. The case. The fallout. The league’s reaction. The way he defended me and the tough lesson I learned about how credibility can disappear overnight.

There’s so much I want to say but it’s best if I keep my mouth closed.