Page 46 of Settling the Score (The Karma Club #4)

Sienna

Are you guys here?

Bella

In the locker room. Where are you?

Sienna

On our way.

Paige

Is Astrid with you?

Astrid

I’m here.

Paige

So this is happening?

Sienna

Aiden and Blake have got the worm on the hook.

Paige

Gross. But accurate.

Astrid

So gross.

Bella

And Chuck?

Sienna

He’s in the box. Says he doesn’t need to see him squirm, it’ll be enough to know we’ve nailed him.

Bella

Okay. Let’s do this.

Astrid

Be there in five.

The away team locker rooms for the Titans’ game against the Chicago Arctics was completely deserted, except for the Karma Club. The team wouldn’t start arriving for another hour or so, giving them plenty of time to complete this final revenge quest.

Sienna was a tangle of nerves, hope and anxiety.

She so desperately wanted to thread this needle for Paige.

God knew the other woman deserved it. Except, at some point, it had stopped being about Paige.

Whether it was falling in love with a guy as sweet and kind as Olly, or just an inner sense of peace and calm, her need for revenge had lessened day by day, to the point where she was almost the least invested in this of the group.

The thing was, it wasn’t just for Paige.

Horrible Harvey had form for this, and if they didn’t act, he’d keep doing what he’d been doing all his adult life.

Revenge porn was the lowest of the low, especially when it was perpetuated by a guy who had the computer skills to make sure he was never caught by law enforcement.

She thought of Chuck, and the team of cyber ninjas he’d engaged to help them fight the good fight, and her heart lifted.

He’d been such a good friend through all this.

Hanging out with him, when she was in New York, was something she always looked forward to.

And even though she hadn’t fully decided to accept his job offer, the prospect was growing more and more tempting by the day.

Sienna’s phone buzzed.

Aiden

Showtime.

‘You guys, they’re nearly here.’

‘Ohmygod.’

‘Don’t worry. It’s almost over,’ Sienna promised.

The women moved to the assigned spot, where they were hidden from easily being seen, but still able to look out.

Sienna crouched beside a heavily pregnant but incredibly nimble Astrid.

This woman made ballerinas look like oafs – she was some kind of freaky, super-breeding princess.

Sienna could hear her breathing so hard that she had to reach out and squeeze her hand to remind her to be quiet.

Astrid pulled a face.

‘Not bad.’ A male voice reached them and when Sienna looked up at Paige, she knew it was Harvey, because of the way Paige’s lips were pressed together so hard they’d turned white-rimmed.

They’d had to ban Chase and Olly from being anywhere near this guy – Olly in particular.

He might have been diffident with a capital D, but he’d made no effort to hide how much he wanted to be let loose on the guy who’d been such a monumental dick to his girlfriend.

‘When do the rest of the team get here?’

‘Soon. The bus pulls up in about an hour.’

‘I thought it was a whole team meet and greet?’

‘Yeah, it is, if you want it to be.’ Aiden shrugged carelessly.

‘That’s what I won at the auction.’

Sienna hid her smile. Thanks to Paige, they knew Harvey was incredibly competitive, so setting up a charity auction with a Titans ‘meet and greet’ package as the prize had been one thing.

But getting Chuck to bid on it as though it were the only thing he could possibly want in life had been the perfect bait.

Harvey hadn’t been able to resist the chance to one-up his professional rival, nor to show the gathering of East Coast elites just how much money he’d made from his tech empire.

‘So you did,’ Blake murmured smoothly. ‘Okay, we can wait for the whole team, if you’d like. We just thought this might be a bit better if it’s just the three of us. Up to you, though.’

‘What might be better?’ Harvey’s voice was all bravado, but Sienna was sure she heard the slightest quiver.

And who could blame him? The guy spent most of his time hunched over his desk and had the physique to prove it.

Here he was being confronted with two huge, buff hockey players.

It was only natural he’d feel a hint of panic.

‘To show you this.’

Blake grabbed the tablet they’d left on one of the seats, and turned the screen on. They’d linked the audio to the locker-room speakers, so it came out loud and clear.

‘Hey, that’s me,’ Harvey said.

‘Shhh.’ Aiden lifted a finger to his lips exaggeratedly. ‘You’ll miss the good part.’ With Harvey’s attention focused on the screen, Aiden glanced towards the towel rack the girls were hiding behind and risked a wink.

Nah, you don’t let them know. Women get crazy uptight about that kind of shit, but deep down, they love it, even if they won’t admit it.

Bella put her arm around Paige’s shoulders and pulled her in for a hug. Sienna, crouching down, could only pat her foot, but she did so, because she needed to comfort their friend.

‘Is that legal?’ A man’s voice came over the speakers, responding to Harvey’s bragging.

Chuck had roped another Silicon Valley friend into taking Harvey to lunch and getting him to spill the beans.

It had been a precision operation, thanks to Chuck and his contacts.

For legal reasons pertaining to consent and recorded conversations, Sienna had made sure the lunch took place out of state.

Usually, she’d have felt bad about that – in her opinion, people should always consent to everything they did that affected them – but this was Harvey the Horrible, and it was one of the rare instances where two wrongs absolutely made a right. Or something like a right.

Who gives a shit? You and I know how to bury this kind of thing without having our fingerprints on it.

‘And then you put it on the internet. Why?’ the voice volleyed back.

Because I’m the boss. It was almost psychopathically self-assured. I call the shots. No one walks away from me until I’m ready to let them go.

It was damning; they’d heard enough. Blake stopped the recording.

‘There’s another twenty minutes of that,’ Aiden said.

Harvey was whiter than paper. He looked satisfyingly awful.

‘What the hell is going on?’ he asked when he was able to speak, some moments later.

‘You screwed with a very good friend of ours,’ Blake said. ‘Someone sweet and kind, who deserved a hell of a lot better than to cross paths with you.’

When Sienna looked at Paige, she saw her eyes were moist and the smile she shot back was wobbly.

‘She’s fine though. In fact, she doesn’t ever give you a moment’s thought, these days. But knowing you were out there, doing this to other women, she decided to act.’

‘And we decided to help her,’ Aiden added.

‘So, you set me up?’

‘Hell, yeah, and I’d do it again and again and again. It’s not even in the same ballpark as what you’re doing.’

‘Fuck you,’ Harvey said, storming towards the door.

‘You don’t want to meet the team?’ Blake asked, grinning.

Harvey looked like he was going to vomit or pass out.

‘Oh, you should know something,’ Aiden started, but then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Paige moving, a fire in her eyes that warmed Sienna’s belly and shot goosebumps over her skin.

Aiden, Blake and Harvey all sensed her at the same time, turning towards the motion in the corner.

Harvey blanched.

‘You should know something,’ she said, a little softly at first, so the three other women moved like a wall of support, coming to stand beside Paige without touching her.

Just letting her know they were there. They literally had her back, and always would.

She cleared her throat and tried again. ‘That tape isn’t just for your ears. ’

Harvey was frozen to the spot. Sienna could just make out a bead of perspiration forming on his brow.

‘Oh, no. Why waste such good filmmaking?’ she said, taunting him with a line he’d once thrown at her. ‘We made sure your mum got a copy, and your sister.’ She smiled serenely.

He went from white to grey.

‘But it really was too compelling to limit just to family.’

He reached for the doorjamb. ‘So, we also sent digital copies to your board, and just to be extra sure the message got out there, we sent it to the DA, and two national broadsheets.’

Paige’s smile was slow and half-manic, and Sienna couldn’t blame her. Finally, they had outmanoeuvred a guy who’d made it his life’s work to hurt women, to embarrass them in the most defiling, vicious way.

‘You picked on women who didn’t know what you were like. Women like me, whose only mistake was trusting an asshole like you. But you’re done with that now, Harvey. You’re going straight to hell.’

‘Pretty sure he’s going there by way of prison,’ Astrid whispered, pressing a hand to her basketball-round stomach.

‘Even better,’ Paige said.

‘Now, if you don’t mind, get your ass off the grounds.’

Harvey didn’t move. He couldn’t. He looked from one, to the other, to the other, gawping like a fish.

‘Get the hell outta here,’ Aiden said, taking a step towards him, and that did it.

Harvey turned and stormed out of the room, and they all knew he wouldn’t get far.

The walls were closing in for Harvey and there was no way he’d be able to escape the consequences – societal, legal and within his family – for his awful, demeaning actions.

‘Good riddance,’ Paige said.

‘Are you okay?’ The girls formed a circle around her, hugging her tight.

She was laughing though, while tears streamed down her cheeks. ‘I’m better than okay. I’m elated. I’m relieved. I’m vindicated. I’m – it’s over.’

Sienna nodded quickly. ‘And Chuck is doing everything he can to have those videos removed. It’s painstaking but he’s got a team working on it.’

‘I can’t believe it. You guys really are my guardian angels.’

‘We’re each other’s,’ Astrid assured her, and Bella nodded.