Read Chapter 35: The Final Push

The text on the screen blurred and reformed, and Camille read the headline a third time: *Rugby Club Physio Admits Credentials Were Fabricated—Vows to Fight Back*. She pressed her palms flat against the kitchen table, letting the cool wood ground her.

"Words look the same every time you read them," Julien said from the doorway. He had a towel draped around his neck, hair still damp from the morning run. "Trust me. I've stared at enough medical reports to know."

Camille exhaled. "I still can't believe I made her print a quote from me saying I 'did it out of desperation born of love for the game.'"

"Better than 'born of fear of destitution.' Too honest. People don't want real." Julien crossed the small kitchen and stood behind her, reading over her shoulder. His hand landed on her arm, warm and deliberate. "She spun it well. Made you look human."

"I'm not human. I'm a fraud who just got her job back through blackmail and a dead man's paperwork."

"You're a fraud who walked into a board meeting with actual evidence of decades of financial manipulation, told them exactly what you did and why, and then offered to fund your own re-education while the club's finances recover." Julien's voice dropped, half teasing and half reverent. "They had no choice but to reinstate you. You gave them the excuse to do the right thing."

Camille laughed without humor. "The board doesn't do the right thing. They do the cheap thing."

"And you are, apparently, very cheap. Your salary is now half of what Moreau was skimming per month."

She pushed her chair back and stood, turning to face him. "It's not the money. It's the look in their eyes. Every one of them wondering if I'm competent at my actual job or just good at lying."

"Then prove them wrong. That's what the next three weeks are for." Julien's eyes held hers, and for a moment she saw the fear underneath his bravado—the stakes stacking behind his comeback, his career, his identity.

A knock at the door saved her from answering. Julien went to open it, and Camille heard the familiar heavy tread of Antoine's boots on the stone floor before she saw him.

"Your timing is getting better," Julien said, a dry edge to his voice that hadn't softened yet despite the vineyard conversation a day earlier.

Antoine frowned at him, then looked past to Camille. "I saw the article. The journalist called me this morning before she published—asked for a comment."

Camille's stomach dropped. "What did you say?"

"Nothing. I told her I had no comment." Antoine stepped inside, closing the door behind him. His face was gray, the way it had been in the vineyard when he'd finally confessed about Vincent's brain condition. "But I want to give her one now. If you'll let me."

"No." Julien's voice came out clipped. "You've done enough testimony to last a lifetime."

"Son—"

"Don't." Julien walked past his father to lean against the counter, arms crossed. "You lied for fifteen years. One day of honesty doesn't reboot the clock."

"Julien." Camille stepped between them before the heat could spread. "Let him finish."

Antoine held his son's gaze. "The original investigation. The one I testified in. I can tell her that the official conclusion was not what the syndicate wanted, but it was what the medical evidence supported. If I speak now—if I confirm what the club's own doctors recorded seventeen years ago—it anchors your story. You're not just claiming Vincent's death was misrepresented. You're showing the board that the institution itself has been lying to protect sponsors."

Julien was quiet for a long moment. "And what does that cost you?"

"Everything, probably." Antoine didn't blink. "My pension, my reputation, maybe my membership at the golf club." A ghost of a smile crossed his face. "Worth it."

Camille watched the war play out in Julien's eyes—the boy who needed his father to be guilty, paired with the man who needed his father to be brave.

"One comment," Julien finally said. "One. I'm not asking you to relitigate my brother's death in public. Just confirm the medical records were clear."

Antoine nodded. "That's all I planned to do."

The room settled, but the air stayed charged. Then Antoine pulled an envelope from inside his jacket and tossed it onto the table.

"What's that?" Camille asked.

"Moreau delivered it this morning. Before he left for Paris." Antoine's jaw tightened. "The drive he promised. Hidden inside a letter to his wife, apparently. The man has a theatrical streak."

Camille crossed to the table, staring at the envelope as if it might explode. "He actually did it."

"He did. The club's finances, the shell companies, the payments Delacroix directed through the youth academy. All of it." Antoine exhaled. "There's also a memo from Delacroix's attorney dated nine years ago, laying out the contingency plan if Vincent had survived the season."

"The offer," Julien said flatly. "The one you rejected."

Antoine nodded, the pain of it still live in his face. "The one Delacroix would have made again if you'd gone down that path. That memo proves the intent. It proves the syndicate knew about Vincent's condition and was prepared to use it."

Camille's mind was racing. "Does Roland know?"

"He's the one who arranged the delivery." Antoine glanced at his watch. "We're meeting him in two hours. Roland wants to submit the drive as part of the discovery package before the board's vote. It changes the legal landscape—if Delacroix tries to claim Moreau fabricated testimony, we have documentation from before Moreau was even hired."

Julien shook his head slowly. "And Moreau just handed it over. Just like that."

"He didn't." Antoine's face went darker. "He had conditions."

Camille's chest tightened. "What conditions?"

"Full immunity from prosecution in exchange for corroboration. And a transfer—he's being moved to a club in the South American circuit, where the syndicate's reach is less direct. Roland is arranging it."

"So we're protecting a criminal to catch a bigger criminal," Julien said. His voice was flat, but Camille could hear the disgust underneath.

"Welcome to rugby politics," Antoine replied. "It's rarely clean."

The silence stretched. Camille picked up the envelope, feeling its weight—the accumulated lies of a decade and a half. And yet, in her hand, it felt like a lifeline.

"One interview isn't enough," she said quietly, turning back to Julien and Antoine. "I need to do one myself. To the journalist who exposed me. Fully on record."

Julien frowned. "You already gave her a statement."

"A statement isn't an interview. It's a press release. I need to sit across from her and explain exactly what I did, why I did it, and what I'm doing now. Without editing." Camille swallowed. "If I keep hiding behind words Roland wrote for me, then the board will always see me as a liability. But if I face it—openly—then I become someone they can trust."

Antoine studied her. "That's a dangerous gamble. The interviewer gets to ask anything."

"I know."

"And if she asks about Julien? About your relationship?"

Camille met Julien's eyes across the room. "Then I tell her the truth. That there is one. And that he is the reason I decided to stop running."

Julien's face softened, just a fraction. He crossed the room and took her hand, his grip steady. "Then we do it together. One last push before the surgery. You face the cameras, I face the scalpel, and we both come out the other side."

Antoine stood, slowly, like a man who'd carried too much weight for too long. "Then I'd better go call Roland and tell him to expect a media circus."