Page 104 of Audacity

As I head out of London, I muse about something Max said towards the end of last night. I asked him if he’d ever thought about backing away from Dex so as to save him from having to tear his family apart. Max stared at me as if I’d lost the plot.

‘Christ, no. Not for a single second. I needed to save him from his family—and from himself.’

It makes me wonder why Athena’s been so quick to put distance between us, and all I can conclude is that it’s some combination of self-protection—the nature with which our secret was revealed and my family’s reaction cut her to the core, after all—and a horror of being the person who diverted me further from my journey to find grace and purpose.

After all, she knows I’ve struggled with both. She knows my life choices, from leaving the priesthood to hiring her—have sat uneasily with me at times. She jokes about my “goodness”. In her mind, she seems to have cast herself as Mary Magdalene, andit’s as if the fact of seeing herself through my family’s eyes has confirmed her worst fears about herself.

The Athena I know, the Athena Max and Anton know, is fearless. Fierce. It makes me wonder if she’s willing to walk away because she doesn’t think I can handle it if she stakes her claim on me.

It’s about time I show her—and my family—that I can.

Max’s other indictment rings in my ears now.

Athena’s not weak. She doesn’t need you to protect her. But in this moment, she bloody well needs you to fight for her. So stop trying to be noble and keep everyone happy, and fight for what you know to be right.

He’s quite right.

She’s not weak.

She doesn’t need my protection, nor should she feel like I need hers.

But what she does need in this moment, and what I can damn well provide, isvindication.

I intend to procure this position for her because she’s earned it. No more, no less. The vision for the foundation as it stands currently is all hers. It’s a sacrilege to think she should have to hand the reins of that beautiful vision over to someone else.

Anton was spot-on, too, when he talked about the importance of recognising the right times to step into one’s power.

This is one of those times.

If I’m truly honest, I have yet to fully step into my power since taking up this position. I’ve said it a million times to Athena, but I’m still thinking small. I’m thinking parochially when I shouldn’t be afraid to think like a man who has the stewardship of billions of pounds.

I’m still the caretaker, the appeaser. I tend to my flock, I look outwards, but myflockwill soon comprise thousands uponthousands of people, and I need to learn to advocate for them fiercely and unashamedly.

As fiercely and unashamedly as Athena approaches everything she does.

Itell myself that my quick pre-lunch trip to the driving range with my brother is born less out of cowardice and more from a strategic desire to get his take before I face the Spanish Inquisition in the form of a Sullivan Sunday lunch. Catholic attitudes to those who “stray” may be less unthinkably cruel these days, but they’re still pretty fucking terrifying when you’re the so-called transgressor.

Maeve Bernadette Sullivan could have taken Ximinez de Cisneros on as Inquisitor General any day of the week.

Bren greets me in the clubhouse with a bro hug, but that’s the only sympathy I get. Instead, he turns his wicked grin on me as we walk to the bay we’ll share and shakes his head. ‘You dirty, dirty bastard. How the fuck did you pull that off?’

‘Well, clearly I didn’t, did I?’

‘You pulled it off for long enough. What, four months? How the hell did it come about?’

I sigh and look around to make sure I don’t recognise anyone. If I shock any of the neighbours, Mum’ll have it in for me even more.

‘She’s from an agency called Seraph. Anton owns it. I can’t say much more, but their thing is “full service” EAs. They’re all amazing women, apparently.’

‘You don’t say. And what made you decide you needed to get in on that when you had Alchemy? It wasn’t like you didn’t have sex on tap already.’

We find our bay. I stand my golf bag up and select my driver, pulling off its cover. ‘I was making up for lost time,’ I say drily, ‘and I was burning the candle too heavily. After the cleaners found me passed out in one of the rooms, I thought I’d go for a more effective solution.’

He’s shaking his head again, like he doesn’t even recognise me. He bends and empties out our bucket of balls. ‘So all that time you were fucking her, even when you were being all pious at the RA.’

I grimace. ‘Guilty.’

‘Well, Jesus, mate, I don’t blame you. I mean, look at her?—’

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