“Don’t get it,” Noah said firmly then turned to Abel. “You’ll watch it after.”
“Get the f**king monitor,” Abel’s words exploded, making everyone in the room flinch. “Now!” he followed up and a frozen Cuen began moving again.
Noah shook his head and walked away. “You really should wait until after,” Hector said, his voice much calmer than it had been early.
“Don’t start with me, Hector,” Abel warned, pacing now and looking around at all the guys in this room who refused to make eye contact with him.
What the hell could be so bad? Andy looked paralyzed where he still stood by the door he’d walked through but stopped at the sight of everyone staring at him. There was something else about the uncomfortable expression he wore. Like everyone else, he clearly wasn’t looking forward to having to stand there and watch while Abel saw the footage of whatever had everyone so uncomfortable. But there’d been something a bit smug about the way he’d delivered the news that Nellie couldn’t be found. The ass**le was probably glad he hadn’t found her.
Cuen rolled the monitor back in the big room. With his gloves on, Abel wouldn’t be able to do anything. “Turn it on, please.”
Cuen began to and some of the guys actually walked out of the room. What the hell? Swallowing hard, he waited. As long as Nellie was okay, he could take anything. His stomach dropped, remembering the terrifying asthma attack she’d had in the room earlier. What if that’s what everyone in the room already knew? That she’d had another one.
“What’s taking so long?” he demanded, the alarm full-blown now.
Fumbling with the buttons on the remote, Cuen finally got the monitor on. He switched the channels, and then Abel froze when he saw the images. “Turn it up,” he said, his eyes glued to the screen.
The words the reporter spoke were a low buzz getting louder and louder with every word. Abel watched and listened as his insides began to boil. He wasn’t even sure if he’d blinked the entire time he watched, but after a few more minutes, he’d had enough. “Turn it off. Take the key to my room, Andy. She’s probably still there, afraid to leave. Go get her.”
“You really think that’s a good idea?” Andy asked, glancing at Noah for help. “She’ll be an even bigger distraction now, right? I think the crowd—”
“I don’t give a f**k what you think, Andy!” Abel was done with Andy’s obvious disregard for the importance of his relationship with Nellie. “You take my goddamn key, go to my room, and you bring her here!”
“But—”
“God damn it!” Abel started pulling the strings on his gloves with teeth.
The music for his grand entrance to the ring outside was already starting.
“What are you doing?” Hector asked his voice completely panicked.
“If I have to go look for her myself, I will!”
“Okay, I’ll go!” Andy finally conceded.
Abel continued pulling the strings, unconvinced that Andy was actually going. “Stop that, Abel,” Noah approached him, grabbing his glove. “Get out of here, Andy,” he ordered without even looking at him. “Go get her.”
“Don’t come back without her,” Abel said as Noah began tightening the strings on his gloves again.
“Look at me,” Noah said as he roughly retied the strings on Abel’s gloves then spoke slowly but very clearly. “You are going to blow this if you don’t get your head back in it. Forget everything you just saw on that damn television, and you concentrate on the technique we’ve put so much time and effort into perfecting. You hear me?”
Abel nodded, his insides burning up and only getting hotter by the second. That mother f**ker was going down.
Chapter 19
Minutes after Abel walked out of the hotel room, Nellie still stood there, torn between listening to Logan’s voicemail and just turning on the television. Knowing full well that the media never had the entire truth as it really was, she decided to listen to his message first. She hit the prompts until it brought her to her unheard message and closed her eyes bracing herself as Logan’s message started.
“Since you’re obviously not gonna be calling me back, I’m hoping you’ll at least listen to this. I know you must be furious with me, and I will admit that I gave in because of the money that was offered in the beginning, but please let me explain. I never imagined it would turn into this. First of all, I didn’t even meet Sam until the night of the concert.” He cleared his throat and paused as her heart punched against her chest. The reality of how bad this might really be began to sink in. Sam wasn’t actually his friend? “The day I interviewed with you for the job, a guy approached me outside your office as I left. He said he was with the press and knew you worked closely in conjunction with 5th Street. He told me there’d be money in it for me if I could get anything out of you about Abel.
“He made it sound harmless, said you might not know anything about him but I’d still get paid for any effort I made to get something. The bigger the scoop I got, the more money there was in it for me. At the time, I didn’t even know if I had the job yet, so I took his number and told him I’d call him if I got anything. Later, I’d already decided I wasn’t gonna do it, but remember I told you how tight money was for me? So I called and told them what little I had, which was really nothing. They pushed me to get closer to you so I could get more from you. They suggested I ask you out—said they’d pay for everything—but you kept turning me down. So after you mentioned that concert you wanted to go to being sold out, I told them and they said that was my chance, and that’s how I got not only the tickets but the VIP passes.