Read Chapter 11: Confrontation

The flat smelled of stale coffee and old newspapers. Jack stood by the window, arms crossed, watching the street below with the same intensity he brought to a penalty. Elena dropped her bag on the kitchen counter and pulled out her phone.

"I need to ask you something," she said. "And I need you to answer honestly."

He didn't turn around. "That sounds ominous."

"When I was at the training ground yesterday, someone recorded you."

That got his attention. He turned slowly, his face unreadable. "Recorded me doing what?"

"Threatening to quit if Adam gets sold." She watched his reaction carefully. "Marcus Webb has the tape. He's planning to run it tomorrow morning unless I can prove it's a setup."

Jack's jaw tightened. "Who gave it to him?"

"A source he wouldn't name. Anonymous." She stepped closer. "But here's the thing, Jack. The recording isn't fake. I listened to it. That's your voice."

For a long moment, he said nothing. Then he moved past her to the small table by the window and sat down heavily, running both hands through his hair.

"Who else was in that room when you said it?" Elena pressed. "Who could have taped you?"

Jack let out a bitter laugh. "You're asking the wrong question. You should be asking who I said it to in the first place."

Elena sat across from him. "Okay. Who?"

He stared at the table for a beat. "Ricky Dempsey. My agent. And the closest thing I have to a brother."

The name hit her like a cold wave. Ricky Dempsey—former youth coach at West London FC, now a high-flying agent with a stable of Premier League players. Everyone in football knew the name. Everyone trusted him.

"He's been with me since I was seventeen," Jack continued, his voice quieter now. "He negotiated my first contract, my England call-ups. He knows everything. My passwords, my bank details, my—" He stopped, shaking his head. "If someone's been sabotaging the club from within, I never once thought it could be him."

"Frank said the money trail leads to someone close to you."

Jack's eyes snapped up. "Frank told you that?"

"Two hours ago. He's got financial records linking the club's missing funds to someone with access to your accounts. Someone who knew about Sarah's investigation before she vanished."

The colour drained from Jack's face. "Sarah trusted Ricky. She spoke to him about the medical records before she came to me."

"Then he knew what she found before you did."

Jack stood abruptly, pacing the length of the small room. "This can't be right. Ricky introduced me to Sarah. He vetted her. When Adam's sale fell through last year, Ricky was the one who pushed back against Ashcroft. He fought for the club."

"I'm not saying he's the mastermind," Elena said carefully. "But someone with access to you is feeding information out. The recording proves it."

Jack stopped pacing. "The recording might not be from that meeting."

"What do you mean?"

He pulled out his own phone, scrolling through messages. "I told Ricky I'd quit the club if they sold Adam, yes. But I said it three times in the last month—to Ricky, to Ashcroft, and to Kate Rowland in the front office." He looked up. "The only one of those conversations I had alone was with Ricky."

"Then we're back to Ricky."

Jack shook his head. "Or someone planted a device somewhere I wouldn't think to check." He held up his phone. "Ricky's been on my team for fifteen years. He's never once given me a reason to doubt him. But if he's been compromised—if someone has leverage on him the way they had leverage on Greg—"

Elena stood. "That's what I need to understand. The pattern. Greg Ashworth was desperate for money for his daughter. What would make someone like Ricky Dempsey turn on his closest client?"

Jack's jaw tightened. "You're asking because you've seen the same thing before."

"Manchester," she admitted. "I thought I had the story. The club chairman was laundering money through transfer fees. I'd confirmed the sources, verified the accounts. Then suddenly every contact I had went silent. Someone had gotten to them first. By the time the story broke, it was my sources who were discredited, not the chairman." She paused. "Whoever this is, they're patient. They build networks over years. They know people's weaknesses before their targets even know what's happening."

Jack sat on the arm of the sofa, studying her. "And you think they've been doing that here too?"

"I know they have. Greg. Maybe Ricky. Definitely Dr. Okafor—she found something she wasn't supposed to, and she's been silent for twelve days." Elena's voice tightened. "The recording proves they're escalating. They're not just trying to get rid of Adam anymore. They're trying to destroy you."

"Why?"

"Because you're the only one standing in their way."

The silence stretched between them. Outside, the streetlights flickered on against the grey Hammersmith evening. Jack's phone buzzed on the counter. He ignored it.

"There's something else," Jack said finally. "Something I didn't tell you about Sarah."

Elena waited.

"The night before she disappeared, she called me. Late. She sounded scared." He swallowed. "She said she'd found the name. The one behind the whole thing. She told me she was going to meet with someone who could help—someone she trusted. She said if anything happened to her, I needed to get the records to the press."

"Why didn't you tell me this before?"

"Because the person she was going to meet," Jack said, meeting her eyes, "was my mother."

Elena's breath caught. His mother—Charlotte Dempsey. Former club physiotherapist, beloved figure in West London FC's history. She'd been on the staff for decades before retiring three years ago.

"Your mother," Elena repeated slowly. "The woman who asked Ricky to represent you when you were seventeen. The woman who introduced him to everyone in the club."

"She's the only one Sarah trusted completely," Jack said. "She's also the only person besides Ricky who knows everything about me."

He looked lost—a man untangling years of trust from the people who'd built his life. Elena crossed the room and stood beside him.

"Did she ever talk to you about the club's finances?"

"She mentioned once that Thomas Ashcroft was ruining what her father built. She grew up here, watching her dad run the youth academy. She's always said the Ashcrofts were caretakers, not owners." Jack met her gaze. "But she'd never hurt the club. She loves it more than anything."

Elena pulled the USB drive from her pocket. "Then maybe it's time we found out who's really been running it."

Jack looked at the drive in her palm. "What's that?"

"Everything Frank's given me for months. Financial records, phone logs, that trail leading somewhere I couldn't follow." She set it on the table between them. "Frank risked his job to get this. Sarah risked her life. We can't give Marcus the recording yet—he'll publish it the moment I can't prove it's fake—but we can use this to find out who's behind all of it."

Jack's phone buzzed again. Then again. He picked it up, his expression hardening as he read the screen.

"What is it?" Elena asked.

He held up the phone. "Ricky just texted. He says someone's been going through my contract files at his office." He paused, meeting her eyes. "He thinks it's Sarah's missing person case being reopened by an outside investigator."

Elena felt a chill run down her spine. "He knows about Sarah."

"Everyone knows about Sarah now," Jack said grimly. "Which means whoever took her knows we're asking questions."

The delivery van down on the street below rumbled to life, its headlights cutting through the dusk. Elena moved to the window and watched it pull away, noting the same partial registration plate she'd seen outside the training ground.

"Do you trust Ricky?" she asked quietly.

"I don't know what I trust anymore."

"Then we start where we are." Elena picked up the USB drive. "We go through every file on here together. And we don't tell anyone—not Ricky, not your mother, not the club—until we know who we're dealing with."

Jack watched her for a long moment. Then, slowly, he nodded.

"Together," he repeated, as if testing the word.

"Together."