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Dad laughed softly. “I didn't mention him.”

“You didn't have to.”

“No,” he agreed. “I suppose I didn't.”

I glanced toward the end of the corridor, suddenly paranoid that someone might come through the doors and hear me.

“He's my captain.”

“I know. I watched the game.”

“You watched me.”

“You're my son.”

Those words should've meant something, and once maybe they had. Now they just made my skin crawl.

“Renaud seems like a decent man.”

“Leave him out of this.”

“I'm not the one who brought him into it, Ash. You did.”

Dad's voice stayed infuriatingly mild, and I hated that stripped of everything else, he was right.

I'd let Max matter. I'd gone to Vegas with him, slept with him, and kept going back even after I'd realized this wasn't going to stay casual. I'd let myself imagine mornings in his apartment and nights on his couch, and somewhere along the way, I'd stopped thinking about Max as something temporary.

Dad hadn't created any of that.

He'd simply noticed.

I swallowed against the pressure building in my throat. “What happens if I don't pay?”

“You already know.”

“You send the video.”

“Yes.”

“To Max.”

This time the silence lasted longer.

“If that's what it takes.”

The nausea hit immediately. “Why him?”

“Because the newspapers don't matter to you as much as he does.”

The accuracy of it hurt more than the threat.

“You don't know anything about him.”

“I don't need to.”

“You stay the fuck away from him.”

“Then pay me.”