“It’s a reliable metric when I say it.” He looks up from the screen. “You’ve been working all week.”
“Some of us have businesses to run.”
“And turning down media requests.”
My jaw tightens involuntarily. “News travels.”
“Mack has a Google alert.”
“Mack needs a hobby.”
“He’d tell you the alerts are the hobby.” Reece shifts his weight, and something in his posture changes, like it changes on the mound when the chips are down, and he’s decided to stop calculating and start throwing. “I went to the gala Thursday night.”
“I heard.”
“From who?”
“Zoe, who heard from her cousin. Who apparently follows three separate sports gossip accounts. It’s a whole ecosystem.” I keep my voice neutral. “She told me you spoke to Lena.”
“I did.”
“And?”
“She admitted it. The footage from the Ring camera, the blogs, all of it.” His eyes stay steady on mine. “She’s agreed to stop. The throwback post came down Friday morning.”
Something shifts in my chest. Not relief exactly, more the particular sensation of a tension you’ve carried so long you forgot it was there, suddenly loosening.
“Good,” I say.
“I should have dealt with it months ago. Before it touched you.” He doesn’t break eye contact. “I’m sorry, Ava. Not a partial apology with context around it. Fully, directly, sorry. You took damage from something that wasmy unfinished business, and you deserved better.”
I let the words sit for a moment. Let them mean what they mean without immediately processing them into something smaller.
“She would have found a reason regardless,” I say finally.
“Maybe. But I gave her a longer window than she needed.” He takes one step closer, not crowding or pushing, just closing the distance slightly. “I watched you take on the fallout of something I could have prevented, and you didn’t call me, text me, or go public with any of it. You came in here and did your work.”
“What else would I do?”
“Most people would’ve done something with it. Talked to someone. Made noise.” His voice drops slightly. “You turned down aSportsCenterproducer.”
“She wanted my ‘perspective.’”
“I know.”
“My perspective is that I am a tattoo artist in a studio across the street from a baseball stadium, and my personal life is not content.” I hold his gaze. “I don’t owe anyone my story. I especially don’t owe it to someone with a recording device and four hundred thousand followers.”
The expression on his face shifts into something I haven’t seen before. Not the focused intensity from the mound, not the easy charm he carries through public spaces, not even the particular tenderness from the late nights, the truck tailgate, the kitchen counter, and the string-light bedroom.
Something that looks like awe.
“You’re not even angry,” he says quietly.
“I was angry.”
“Past tense?”
“I moved through it.” I lean back in my chair, crossing my arms. Not as armor, more as the posture of someone who has thought through what they want to say and is taking their time getting there. “Anger at Lena is a waste of energy I’d rather spend on work I care about. And anger at the situation doesn’t change the situation.”
