Read Chapter 11: What the Club Owns

The vandalism changed the temperature of everything.

Lucas reported it as a business dispute. Marc wanted the police told about Kovač. Lucas refused.

“They ask why I owe him, we're done.”

“You are already done if they can do this.”

“My employees weren't there. My children weren't there.”

“Is that your threshold now?”

Lucas looked away.

Jean paid for temporary plywood over the windows from the club emergency fund. Marc discovered the fund contained €4,300.

“How does a club with a six-hundred-thousand-euro budget have four thousand cash?” he asked.

“Because budget is a story you tell before the season,” Jean said. “Cash is what survives the story.”

Marc demanded the accounts.

Jean resisted for half a day, then surrendered a laptop and three binders.

The finances were worse than Marc expected. Sponsors owed money. The club owed suppliers. Municipal grants arrived late. Player reimbursements were sometimes paid through sponsor companies rather than the club. Several consulting invoices from Orbe Loisirs contained vague descriptions: event coordination, community activation, talent support.

“What is talent support?” Marc asked.

Jean rubbed his eyes. “They paid apartments for two recruits.”

“Why isn't it in payroll?”

“Because then we'd owe charges.”

“So tax fraud?”

“Don't dramatize.”

“I'm not sure the tax office uses your tone.”

Jean shut the binder.

“You wanted to know how survival works. Here.”

“No. This is how dependency works.”

“Same difference when you're poor.”

Marc turned the laptop toward him. “Who authorized this €30,000 ‘performance partnership’?”

Jean looked at the line.

“Maret.”

“He paid us?”

“No. We paid Orbe Loisirs.”

“For what?”

Jean stared.

Marc felt cold.

The invoice date was two days after the Vallon match from the betting slip.

“Claire needs this.”

“No.”

“Jean.”

“No. These are club accounts. Confidential.”

“They may be evidence.”

“They may also be sloppy bookkeeping.”

“Then why are you afraid?”

Jean stood.

“Because I know what happens if sponsors freeze payments while journalists ‘ask questions.’ I know who doesn't get paid first. The physio. The youth bus. The cleaner. Not Vautrin. Not Maret. Ordinary people.”

Marc thought of Claire's warning.

The trap.

He closed the laptop.

“I won't give her copies yet.”

Jean exhaled.

“But I'm keeping access.”

“Marc—”

“That's the deal.”

Jean nodded reluctantly.

That afternoon, Yannis knocked on Marc's office door.

“Scout from Béziers called.”

Marc smiled. “Good.”

“They want me at a training session next month.”

“Better.”

Yannis did not look happy.

“What?”

“He asked whether I had an agent.”

“Do you?”

“No.”

“Then don't suddenly acquire one in a café.”

Yannis sat.

“Somebody already called me.”

Marc's smile vanished.

“Who?”

“Guy named Laurent Dumas. Said he represents players and can guarantee Béziers takes me if I sign.”

“Guarantee?”

“His word.”

“Worthless.”

“He also said he can get my parents' mortgage refinanced.”

Marc stared.

“Did you tell him about their mortgage?”

“No.”

“Number?”

Yannis showed him.

Claire traced it within an hour to a sports agency in Montpellier.

One of its silent partners was a Luxembourg company whose administrator had also represented Meridian Sports Advisory.

The network was reaching for the next generation before Marc had even protected the current one.

That evening he called the entire squad into the clubhouse.

“No agents meet you without telling me,” he said. “No betting contacts. No sharing injury information. No debts arranged through sponsors. No free phones, free trips, free meals, free anything.”

Rémi Vidal raised a hand. “What if my mother makes dinner?”

“Your mother's cassoulet is exempt.”

The laughter helped.

Then Marc looked at them one by one.

“If anyone has already crossed one of those lines, come to me now. Before someone else decides your silence belongs to them.”

Nobody moved.

Lucas stared at the floor.