Read Chapter 23: The Leak

The phone buzzed against Camille's thigh at 6:47 a.m., a sound that had become synonymous with dread. She fumbled for it on the nightstand, squinting at the brightness before the headline registered.

*RUGBY STAR JULIEN DELACROIX: "A MENTAL CASE" — LEAKED THERAPY NOTES REVEAL PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILE.*

Her stomach dropped through the floor.

She was already scrolling before her feet hit the ground, thumb trembling as she skimmed the article. Excerpts. Real excerpts. Her handwriting rendered in cold digital type, clinical observations stripped of context and compassion. *"Subject exhibits signs of unresolved trauma, manifesting as aggressive outbursts and self-destructive behavior patterns…"* *"Rehabilitation hindered by emotional volatility; patient demonstrates limited capacity for trust…"*

Worse, they'd included the raw annotations she'd scribbled after their darkest sessions. The ones she'd never intended for any human eyes but her own.

*"Julien's psychological state remains the single greatest barrier to full recovery. There is a haunted quality to his attention when he speaks of his brother — a survivor's guilt that borders on pathological."*

Pathological. The word burned. She'd used it in a moment of clinical frustration, and now it was splashed across every sports site in France, and somewhere in Marseille, Julien was reading it.

Camille called him. Voicemail.

She called again. Voicemail.

She dressed in under a minute — jeans, a crumpled t-shirt, yesterday's sneakers — and was halfway to her car when her phone finally vibrated with his name.

"Julien." Her voice cracked. "I need you to know —"

"I've seen it."

His tone was flat in a way she'd never heard before. Not angry. That would have been easier. This was something else entirely — a deadness that made her skin prickle.

"I didn't leak it. I would never —"

"I know you didn't."

The words were right, but the silence between them told a different story. She could hear it in the way he paused too long before each syllable, the careful neutrality of a man locking down his reactions.

"Julien, you sound like you don't believe that."

"I'm just tired." A breath. "The club is having a press conference this afternoon. Delacroix wants me there."

"You're still in Marseille. You can't make that in —"

"I'll make it."

The line went dead.

---

The club's main hall had been converted into a war room by the time Camille arrived. Staffers clustered around monitors, phones pressed to ears, and the air tasted of bitter coffee and fear. Moreau appeared from the corridor, looking like he hadn't slept.

"They're calling for blood," he said without preamble. "Three news cycles and the narrative's already set. 'Unstable athlete.' 'Club failed to protect players and public alike.' Delacroix is holding an emergency board meeting upstairs."

"The leak — what do they know?"

Moreau's jaw tightened. "IT went through every access log. Every printer, every server, every cloud backup. The notes were never digitized before the leak — they were photographed. Pages from a physical notebook."

Camille felt ice slide down her spine. Her notebook. The leather one she kept in her bag, the one she'd barely let out of her sight since—

"We found the photograph timestamps," Moreau continued. "Eleven days ago. Taken in the storage room off the rehab wing during a shift change."

Eleven days ago. She'd been in that room retrieving Vincent's kit bag — the night she'd found Julien's letter. The night she'd been so shaken she'd left her bag unattended while she composed herself.

"Who was on shift?"

"That's the problem." Moreau's eyes met hers, and she saw something there she didn't like. "You were the only one in that room for the entire window. The cameras confirm it."

The floor tilted beneath her.

"I didn't — you think I leaked my own notes? Notes that make him look —"

"I don't think anything. But the board will." He lowered his voice. "Dubois is already spinning this as damage from your 'unprofessional proximity' to the player. He's calling for your dismissal before lunch."

Camille's hands were shaking. She pressed them flat against her thighs to still them. "There has to be another way in. A window, a door propped open, someone who knew my schedule —"

"Who would know you'd leave your bag unattended that specific night?"

The question hung between them.

The answer was obvious. Only someone who'd known she'd be distracted would have timed it perfectly. Someone who knew she'd just discovered Vincent's letter and would need a moment to compose herself.

But the only person who could have known that was already dead.

Or someone had been watching her.

---

The press conference was a feeding frenzy.

Camille watched from the back of the hall, pressed against the wall as Delacroix took the podium. Julien stood to his right, face carved from stone, wearing a suit that looked borrowed and wrong for his frame. He hadn't looked at her once since entering.

"Julien Delacroix remains a valued member of this club," Delacroix said, voice smooth as polished marble. "These stolen documents represent a gross violation of medical privacy. We have launched a full investigation and will pursue all legal remedies available."

A reporter shouted from the third row. "Does the club dispute the clinical assessment in those notes?"

"Patient confidentiality prevents us from discussing —"

"Your own physiotherapist called him a pathological risk. How can you claim he's fit to represent this club?"

Julien's jaw flexed. Camille saw his hand curl into a fist at his side, then slowly unclench. It was the only tell he allowed himself.

"The notes were taken out of context," Delacroix said. "We stand by our player."

But the camera flashes caught the sweat at Julien's temples, and the questions kept coming — a salvo of them, each more pointed than the last. *What about the headbutt? What about the disappearance? Is it true you've failed psychological evaluation?*

Julien leaned toward the microphone.

"I've played through broken bones," he said, voice low and rough. "Through concussions. Through seasons where I forgot my own name for three days afterward. You can call me a mental case if you want." His eyes swept the room, and for a moment, they caught Camille's. "But I've never quit on this club, and I'm not starting now."

He stepped back. Delacroix moved to close the conference, but the damage was already done — Camille could read it in the vulture satisfaction of the reporters' faces.

They had their story. Whether Julien survived it or not was secondary.

---

She caught him in the corridor afterward, away from the cameras and the handlers.

"Julien."

He stopped but didn't turn around. His shoulders were rigid beneath the jacket, a wire pulled taut.

"I would never leak your private information." She heard her own voice crack, hated the desperation in it. "Those notes were meant to help you. Only you."

"I know."

"Then why won't you look at me?"

A long beat. When he finally turned, his eyes were different. Colder. The warmth that had been building between them through weeks of shared secrets and silent mornings had been banked, replaced by something she couldn't quite name.

Suspicion.

"I know you didn't leak the notes." He said the words carefully, deliberately. "But I keep asking myself how someone got access to them. How someone knew to be in that room that night." A pause. "How someone knew about Vincent's letter before I told them."

The implication hit her like a physical blow.

"You think I —"

"I don't know what I think." He ran a hand through his hair, and she saw the exhaustion beneath the anger for the first time. "I know you're the only one who knew everything. And I know this started the moment you came back into my life."

"That's not fair."

"No." His laugh was hollow, bitter. "It isn't. But nothing about my life has been fair since my brother died, Camille. I'm starting to think it never will be again."

He walked away without looking back.

Camille stood alone in the corridor, her phone buzzing again with another unknown number. She checked it automatically — a new message, no caller ID, composed of screenshots. Her own handwriting again, another page she'd thought private.

This one wasn't about Julien's psychology.

It was the page where she'd written her genuine assessment of his recovery timeline. The one that concluded he could potentially play again at the top level within nine months.

The message below it read:

*"You still believe in him. Interesting. We'll be in touch before the season ends."*

The screen went dark.

Camille stared at her reflection in the black glass, and for the first time, she understood the trap she was in. Not because the syndicate had threatened her, not because the club was cutting her loose, not even because Julien had looked at her with doubt in his eyes.

Because whoever had leaked those notes wasn't trying to destroy Julien.

They were trying to isolate her.

And it was working.