I Burned The Hockey Star Down novel · Chapter 13 of 32

Chapter 13: Proof

"They won't believe you this time," I said.

"They believed me about the charity." Ice rattled in his glass. "They'll believe me about a robot."

"You stole that charity from seven-year-olds, Dane. On camera."

"See, that's your problem. You think the truth is a strategy." He yawned into the phone. "Delete it, and I'll tell Grady to leave your grandma alone. That's me being nice."

"You called me at eleven at night to be nice?"

"I called to give you a chance. Night, Greer."

He hung up.

I stood in my kitchen with the dead phone in my hand.

Grady's got a guy who does this stuff.

I believed that part. Grady had a guy for every problem that money could fix.

I opened the bread box and took out the little silver recorder.

Then I called Beau.

He picked up on the first ring, wide awake.

"Dane called," I said.

"Let me guess. It's fake."

"It's AI. Grady's got a guy."

He was quiet for a second.

"Then we prove it's real before he finishes the sentence," he said. "Rink. Eight a.m. Bring the little silver thing."

"Your knee is the size of a grapefruit."

"My knee is on four bags of peas. It's never been happier."

At eight the next morning, Peg was on the loading dock with her cigarette.

Beau was beside her on an upturned milk crate, leg straight out, drinking her terrible coffee out of a chipped mug.

"Your coach says you've got something to tell me," Peg said. "He won't say what. I've been working on him for twenty minutes. He's a vault with a beard."

I looked at Beau.

"She's your family," he said. "Tell her."

So I sat down on the dock and told her.

The tape. The couch. The ten grand.

Peg didn't say a word the whole time.

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