“Call my bluff then,” I tell him with a shrug. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“There’s no way you’d go out there and spill Chloe’s dirty little secret to the world.”
My control slips another notch. “Let’s get one thing straight, asshole. It’s your dirty secret, not Chloe’s. She didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Do you really think the world will see it that way by the time I get done with her? Especially when they find out just how much money she took to rescind those vicious lies about me?”
“And the other women?”
“What other women?” It’s his turn to lean forward. “It’s funny, really. As rich as you are and you still don’t get that money truly can buy anything.”
“The fact that you actually believe that just might be the most pathetic thing about you. Maybe.”
“Who the fuck are you to call me pathetic? You’re so whipped—”
He breaks off as his campaign manager opens the doors, a concerned look on her face. “Brandon, people are getting restless. They paid for a chance to see you and you’re spending all your time out here.” She looks at me quizzically. “Everything okay, Ethan?”
“It will be, Debra.” The words are as much a threat as they are a promise, and by the way Brandon stiffens next to me, I know he understands that.
Debra looks between us, then pastes a bright smile on her own lips. “Excellent. Then you won’t mind if I borrow our candidate for a little while?”
“Not at all. Have at him.” I gesture for Brandon to proceed me through the doors.
He does, without another word. And as he crosses the room to one of his other big donors, hand out and smile fixed permanently in place, he doesn’t look back once.
“Are you staying for his speech?” Debra asks as we watch him schmooze the crowd.
“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
—
An hour and fifteen minutes later, I watch as Brandon wraps up his speech. A speech that in no way contained the withdrawal from the race that I demanded of him.
Damn it.
As he steps down off the elevated platform in the front of the room, he shoots me a defiant look. One that very blatantly tells me that he’s sure he’s called my bluff. Sure that he has the upper hand.
And a few months ago, he might have. Then again, a few months ago, I never would have imagined doing anything that might jeopardize his political career. But that was then and this is now.
In the last couple of months, I’ve held Chloe while she cried. I’ve listened as she talked about her family’s betrayal and watched helplessly as she’s walked away from me on numerous occasions. The Ethan who used to pull his punches, who would have done anything to protect his younger brother, is long gone. Now, what I want—all I want—is to protect Chloe. And to avenge her.
I watch Brandon make a final loop around the room, oozing charm and confidence and charisma as he takes the big-fish donors for everything he can get. The press are following him, the reporters looking game if a little bored as the cameras record the whole thing.
I bide my time, keeping busy by chatting aimlessly with Margo and the COO of one of the big medical centers located in the Boston area. It doesn’t take long for my brother to work his way around to us—and the journalists with him.
As he shakes Margo’s hand, I turn my body, make myself a little more available. Sure enough, it only takes a few seconds before one of the television reporters calls out, “Ethan, it’s great of you to be here today. Do you have any words of encouragement for your brother now that we’re only a couple months out from the election?”
And there it is. The opening I’ve been waiting for.
Beside me, I feel Brandon tense as it occurs to him for the first time that the only reason the press even bothered to show up to his run-of-the-mill fund-raiser is because I wanted them here. He might be running for Congress, but I’m the real story here—especially now that the news has broken that I’m off the bachelor market.
But that isn’t the story I want to make headlines tonight—Chloe is my business and mine alone. And if Brandon hasn’t figured out yet that I don’t need to use Chloe’s pain to tank his political career, then he’s about to learn a very valuable lesson.
“Actually, Daniel, in light of some new information that I’ve received, I have to tell you that I no longer support Brandon’s run for Congress in any way. In fact, I’m so concerned that he doesn’t have what it takes to be a member of the United States House of Representatives that I’m withdrawing all my financial support for his campaign and pledging it to his competitor, Lauren Bradley, instead. “
For long seconds, nobody moves or speaks or even breathes. And then, as one, all the reporters in the room explode with questions.
“What new information?”