“We’ll talk about it at home tonight,” he said before he walked over to congratulate the winners.
Ji-Su’s stomach flipped. He didn’t want to assume that Raul’s question was about him being there for their personal relationship. But it wasn’t necessary for him to come back next year just for the tournament. Sure, he’d helped a lot, but Elanie knew the ropes after putting on this first event. And she could easily find someone else in gaming to assist her now that she’d made so many contacts. Raulhadto be referring to him staying for another blood pet contract. Or even staying without the contract.
Ji-Su smiled, but it had nothing to do with the celebration going on in front of him. He was happy at the thought of staying with Raul for another year. His answer would absolutely be yes when they talked about it later tonight. That conversationwouldn’t happen for several hours however, so he reined in his giddiness to focus on the victory ceremony.
He watched as Raul shook hands and took pictures with the two runner ups. They each received a check for ten thousand dollars along with a basket of big-ticket items from the tournament sponsors. The host called for a final round of applause for the runners-up before they were escorted off stage.
After a brief moment of quiet, celebratory music boomed from the speakers and a heavy shower of red and gold confetti fell from the ceiling. The winner stepped to center stage and waved to the crowd with a huge smile on her face. While everyone was cheering, two casino staff members approached, carrying one of those giant prop checks between them. It was made out for a staggering fifty-thousand dollars.
Raul held up his hand for them to stop as he accepted the mic from the host to offer his own congratulations.
“On behalf of the Grand Casino, I congratulate you on winning our first Delta Force Combat tournament and present you with this fifty-thousand-dollar prize.”
Next, the DCF representative offered his congrats. Once he finished, Raul nodded at the two staff members and they passed her the check which she eagerly accepted. She’d also won a long list of gifts from the sponsors and an all-inclusive stay at the Grand Colorado. Holding the check over her head, the winner jumped up and down while the crowd cheered and whistled. She’d stopped jumping in order to pose for pictures with Raul and the DCF rep when a shout came from the audience.
“Oh my God!”
Alarmed, Ji-Su searched the crowd, trying to find what had made someone yell like that. But there was nothing happening in the audience. Instead, people were pointing and staring at one of the monitors before turning to look at Ji-Su. Some of theirexpressions were filled with disgust. Others looked shocked. And more than a few were laughing.
Confused as to why he was getting those reactions when he was doing nothing more than sitting there, Ji-Su looked at the screens. Three of them were still paused on theGame Overcard. However, when he saw what was on the screen dedicated to social media, the bottom dropped out of his stomach.
Someone was spamming the tournament tag with lewd pictures of a naked young man posing on a bed covered in white sheets. The young man posed bent over with his ass pointed at the camera. On his back with his legs in the air and spread into a V. Kneeling with one hand wrapped around his dick. Picture after picture flooded the tag. And every single one of them had his face.
Chapter 40
Ji-Su stared at the screen in horrified shock. For a split second, he thought the pictures were real. But that wasn’t possible. The only time he’d ever taken any kind of sexy photos was with Raul and he hadn’t posed like that. He wasn’t partially covered by the blue sheets that had been on the bed that night either.
The pictures were definitely fake. Probably created with AI. It was simply an awful coincidence that this happened a few weeks after he took those photos with Raul. While Ji-Su stood there frozen, watching the auto scrolling feed, Raul whipped around to the social media manager.
“Get that off the fucking screen!” he furiously demanded. “Now!”
His thundering shout cut through the celebratory music playing and the chatter of the crowd. The social media manager—who’d been frozen like Ji-Su—jumped to obey. Her hands visibly shaking, she disconnected the cable connecting the social media laptop to the monitor with a sharp yank.
The screen instantly went black. The photos were no longer visible, but they were still up on the social media pages. And Ji-Su didn’t want people thinking those photos were actually him. He got up from his chair and determinedly strode out to face the crowd.
“Those aren’t me,” he loudly declared. “I’ve got a strawberry shaped birthmark and it’s not in those pictures.” He quicklyundid his jeans and yanked them and his underwear down far enough to show the birthmark on his pelvis. “See?”
“Damnit, Ji-Su!”
Raul sped over to stand in front of Ji-Su, blocking the crowd’s view of him as he pulled his pants back up.
Ji-Su looked up at Raul as he redid his pants for him. “It doesn’t matter,” he said sadly. “The pictures are out there now. There’s no taking it back once it’s on the internet.”
Some of the fury eased from Raul’s expression.
“I’ll get them taken down, I swear it.”
Ji-Su wasn’t sure about that. But there was nothing he could say as Raul quickly hustled him from the stage, leaving the conclusion of the tournament in Elaine’s capable hands.
THEY LEFT THE BALLROOMand went to Raul’s office. Inside, Raul settled Ji-Su in a chair and brought him a drink.
“You could probably use this,” he said as he held out a glass filled a third of the way with amber liquid.
Ji-Su took the glass and sipped at the drink. Whiskey. It burned his chest going down—but Raul was right. He did need it after seeing his face attached to someone else’s naked body and blasted out on social media for the entire world to gawk at. He held the glass with both hands while Raul kneeled in front of him and soothingly stroked his knee.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart.”
Ji-Su swallowed another sip before he spoke. “It’s not your fault.” It wasn’t Raul’s fault. But Ji-Su was certain he knew the culprit behind that awful and humiliating prank.