Page 184 of Bona Fide

“That’s on you,” I snap. “I’m not involved in—”

“But you are,” Em asserts. “Demi has her own shit I’m sure on the shady things you did.”

“What did you do?” Phoebe presses next to me. A wave of shame and guilt washes over me. I’m not the big brother she used to look up to anymore. I’m the duplicate of my father but without the child—thank fuck.

“I rigged the vote,” I deadpan.

“Wade…”

“Why would you do that?” Lucas exhorts. “You had a shot. You had—”

“A wife who was fucking my dad and a baby she aborted without consulting me first. And not only was she screwing daddy dearest, but she was also fucking everything with the word ‘model’ or ‘rich’ on their résumé. I got the pleasure of walking in on a few...at one time.”

Phoebe places her dainty hand on my back in support, aware that I don’t want to answer any more questions about it nor do I want any sympathy.

“Demi is trying to gain power,” Em continues. “You won’t give her what she wants, she’ll find it somewhere else. Nikolai can make her royalty, get people to love her for the information she stole from the U.S.”

“She’s getting restless,” Henry transmits. “She wants power.”

I nod. “I’ll go down for the votes. Then we’ll go after her for what she did to Lucas, Phoebe, and shoving pills down Camila’s throat.”

“Absolutely not,” Emmy retorts through knitted brows. “And, I’m sorry Lucas and Phoebe, but it’s not strong enough. People will think it’s you just making things up when she comes out with all of this.”

Henry stands from the couch. “I’m going to out myself and the DNA test. Nikolai might not want her because it’s public knowledge that she has another baby from another man out of wedlock.”

“DNA tests can be forged,” Lucas quips. “She goes down as a whore in the eyes of the public and then what?”

I shake my head. “We can think of another way. I have special intelligence that can—”

“This is our best option,” Em inserts. “It’ll tear her down on both fronts, both Russian and American. She will be a useless piece of space at that point.”

Henry steps forward, looking between the three of us. “It’s my civic duty to protect this country...and my family.”

“Don’t act all noble on us now,” I chide. “I’ve been taking care of myself since you got me into this mess. And they—”

“You will go down as the president who was too blind to see what your wife was doing,” Em preaches. “That you are too ignorant with love to notice. That you can’t run a country properly and you were a mistake. You will go to jail, Wade. The government will audit everything you did when running for governor. This will cause a scandal rivaling Bill Clinton. You didn’t fuck the intern, you fucked the state of Connecticut.”

“Can’t you use your super-spy powers to make shit go away?” I taunt. “If I have to go down for—”

“No.” Phoebe clutches my forearm, fingertips digging into my suit jacket. “You can’t.”

“Chill out, Wade,” Lucas rebukes. “You never were dramatic unless I beat your ass in a video game. Don’t start now.”

“There’s no way one of us won’t go down in order to bring her down,” I proclaim. “And it has to be me.”

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