Page 90 of The Mayor and the Mystery Man

“What? Why?” Leo asked.

“What’s going on?” I asked, surprised at how hard it was to get an answer.

“You’re disgusting!” A zombified man yelled at us as he walked by, getting the attention of more onlookers. Leo and I were used to being the center of things, but not in this way.

“I’m not going anywhere until somebody tells me what the hell happened,” Leo said, barely containing the yell he no doubt wanted to unleash. He threw his chips and water to the ground.

“Hey guys,” Cal turned to the twins, and their terrified faces were daggers in my heart. “Russ is with the boys at the kiddie race. Why don’t you go meet up with him?”

“We can stay here,” Lucy said.

“Kids. Go,” I said, more tired than mad.

“I’ll go with them,” Cal said quietly. He turned to Mitch and gave him a “you’re up” look.

Mitch handed Leo and me our phones. “I’m sorry, guys. It was posted while you were running. They probably timed it that way.”

“Mitch, what the fuck is going on?” Leo hissed through a gritted fake smile. As soon as his fingers made contact with his phone, he began swooping and swiping and typing like he was a conductor leading the shitstorm symphony.

A mother in yoga pants and bib with her daughter came up to us and shook her head. “You really had me fooled,” she said to me, angry and hurt. “You had us all fooled.”

Fooled? A rock of dread plunked in my stomach, rippling out through me.

“Shit,” Leo said. “How did they…”

“You were hacked,” Mitch said, as he said all things—matter-of-factly. I could’ve used a dash of sugar-coating in this circumstance.

“Oh, my God,” Leo muttered that prayer over and over. Not in the good way like he did during sex, though.

“What are we looking at?” I asked. I didn’t know what app to turn on or email to check. I was a little kid lost in a store, parents nowhere to be found.

Leo looked up; that strong face he put on so well was starting to crumble, and he was giving all this strength to keep it up.Don’t let them see you sweat.

“So they hacked your phone and found more sexy photos. Not the end of the world, especially when you look good.” I hoped like hell my attempt would land.

It did not.

“I wish it were pictures they leaked.” Leo sighed. “They found text messages where we talked about our fake relationship to help me boost my polling. It’s all out there.”

I glanced at this phone. A headline in bold, black letters was plastered on the screen. “The Mayor’s Lie.”

“Everyone here knows.”

All the scowls and comments clicked into place.

“They know we lied,” he said. He gripped his zombie medal in his hands and gave it a passing smile. “It’s all over, Dust.”

25

LEO

Ispent the day in sweaty clothes and smeared zombie makeup doing whatever damage control was possible—calling donors and influential voters, who chewed me out for lying and for having multiple scandals now. Meeting with my volunteers and staff, some of whom claimed they felt betrayed. Reading social media comments and then instantly regretting it.

It was Saturday, and the election was on Tuesday. There was no way to come back from this so quickly. This was quite the October surprise. I’d rather have a kick in the nuts.

Straight from the 5k, I went to my office to make more calls and scroll through the endless social media posts about this bombshell. People were shocked that Leo & Dusty was a lie engineered to get their vote, calling me untrustworthy. Others darkly joked that this meant love was dead.

“Don’t you think people are being a tad melodramatic?” I asked Vernita as I paced in my office. My post-run stench made her keep her distance.

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