Page 110 of Tips and Trysts

Everett slides down the zipper of his suit pants before reaching in and taking out his cock. I write on it:Cora Flores, and he grins before tucking his cock back into his pants.

Lander, still seated at the other end of the long dining table, is watching us without shame. I cap the marker and toss it aside. “Are you going to make Valeria do this?”

“I just bought a pack of non-toxic markers,” he replies, holding his phone in the air before he faces Everett. “Are you ready?”

Everett sits while I set up his phone on one of my tripods. He smiles at me—somber, no teeth—and nods.

I start the livestream.

“Thanks for joining me this afternoon,” Everett begins. “Obviously, there’s been talk about me and someone close to me, so I’m here to set the record straight. I’m supposed to explain that Cora Flores, the woman who saved my life, didn’t blackmail Felix J. Worthington. However…” He exhales. “However, that statement would be a lie. I made a promise I wouldn’t lie anymore.”

When he glances at me, my stomach drops—no,plummets.

“What is true,” Everett goes on, “is that Cora didn’t blackmail Felix. I would wager my entire campaign on that if anyone asked.” He looks at me again. “The thing I’m supposed to lie about is whether Cora Flores is my friend.”

Oh my god.Alarmed, I look at Lander. His arms are folded across his chest, and he’s watching Everett with an even expression on his face.

“Cora has never been my friend, and frankly, I don’t want to be friends with her. Cora is—” He looks at me and this time it’s longer than a glance. “She’s a part of me I didn’t realize I was missing until I met her. She’s the beginning and the end for me, and if you take anything away from what I’m saying, let it be this: I would do anything for her—literally anything. A month ago, she took a bullet for me. Tonight, I’m going to take one for her.”

My hands tighten on the table.Stop. I want to tell him.Stop it. You’ve worked your whole life for this.

“I love her,” Everett goes on, staring at me while he speaks. “I love her so much that I’m not sure how much my life meant before her. And if loving someone with every fiber of my being makes me unfit for office, then so be it. But I’m done apologizing for the things I love.”

Everett turns off the livestream. Then he stares at me, waiting.

He told the truth.

He told the truth to the entire world.

Lander rises from his chair and the three of us are silent until his phone starts vibrating. He clears his throat. “That was great, Ev,” he comments, sounding incomprehensibly casual, before he leaves the kitchen. As he goes, I hear him say, “Baby, I know. He did amazing…” until his voice fades under the sound of his footsteps heading upstairs.

“Valeria must have called him,” Everett says, still sitting in his dining chair with his spine straight.

Horrified, I face him before I shoot out of my seat. “What are you thinking?” I question, resting my hands on the back of my neck before I start backing away. “Are you out of your mind?”

“What do you mean?” he asks, rising out of his chair to go to me.

My eyes are welling, and I can’t even remember the last time I cried in front of someone who wasn’t Valeria or Essie, but here I am, crying. “Everett,” I begin when he places his hands on the curve of my neck. I shake my head. “You didn’t have to—”

“Please call me Ev,” he interjects, tilting his head to put us at eye level. “And I did have to. I love you.I love you.”

I’m shaking my head even more vigorously. “You can’t—”

“Yes, I can,” he insists. “What did I write on you? Two weeks ago at my father’s house, what did I write?”

I think back to that night. “Everything.”

“And what does that mean?”

“That I mean everything to you.”

“Yes, you’re everything,” he reiterates. “But it also means I would give up everything for you.” He puts his hands on my cheeks. “There’s nothing about you I would change. There’s nothing about you I want to hide. The person you are is perfect for me—she’s enough for me. The best thing about you, the thing that keeps me obsessed with you, is how much I don’t deserve you. And if you let me, I will spend every day of our lives trying to be good enough for you.”

The words land in a place I didn’t know existed in me. They start in my chest and spread to the far reaches of my body, lighting up my nerves and my skin in a gilded network of tingles. I feel it—I actuallyfeel it: the inimitable sensation of being someone’s everything. Everything they’ve wanted, everything they’ve needed,everything.

I wonder if he feels it too. If he doesn’t, he should—because that’s what Everett has become for me: everything.

“You’re enough for me too, Ev,” I tell him.

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