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I eat my salad in relative silence, broken only by the curses and cheers that pay proof to the fact that it’s not just my friends—much of the still crowded cafeteria really is watching the World Cup semifinal.
On the plus side, when I start coughing about halfway through lunch, only Ro is paying enough attention to me to notice.
“Not a word!” I snap at him, reaching for the damn smoothie and downing half of it in one long sip.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” he answers with a wicked grin that does nothing to set me at ease.
I’m trying to think of a suitable retort when a report on MSNBC catches my eye. It’s footage of Brandon Jacobs—Ethan’s Brandon—standing behind a podium, while being framed by both an American flag and a flag for the state of Massachusetts.
Before I recognize I’m doing it, I fumble my phone and earbuds out of my pocket. It takes me a moment to open the right app and then tune to the frequency listed below the TV, but in under thirty seconds I’m listening to a story about Brandon Jacobs winning the Democratic primary in the fair state of Massachusetts just days after his twenty-fifth birthday. He’ll be running for the seventh district seat in the U.S. House of Representatives this November and he’s doing it with the full support of his old money father, socialite mother and famous, biomedical CEO and philanthropist half-brother. Or at least that’s how the story goes. And judging from how friendly Brandon and Ethan look at the fund-raiser Frost Industries threw for him, I can see where the anchor is getting his story.
Brandon’s victory speech is filled with political rhetoric, very rah-rah Boston and America. He talks about the importance of taking care of our new crop of veterans and the role biomedical companies play in doing that. He even goes so far as to say that funding research at innovative corporations like Frost Industries can make all the difference in saving our soldiers’ lives—on the battlefield and at home.
I don’t hear much more after that. Instead, I’m caught up in the fight I had with my brother the other day, his words playing over and over in my head like a CD that keeps skipping.
He’s not like us, Chloe.
People with that much money don’t think the same way we do.
You’re kidding yourself if you think Ethan Frost won’t sell you out the first time his family needs him to.
I hadn’t believed him, had instead put all my faith in Ethan. And yet it turns out he’s throwing fund-raising events for his brother’s campaign. He is actively helping to get a man elected who he knows is guilty of rape and abusing power.
And for what? Government funding for Frost Industries research? A powerful ally in Congress for biomedical research and veterans’ affairs?
It doesn’t make sense to me. It just doesn’t make sense. Brandon raped me. He raped me and God knows how many other girls he did that to and Ethan is helping him get elected? After their fight? After every terrible thing he said about his brother?
It doesn’t make sense.
The rich are different than us.
Ethan’s different than us.
Suddenly, I can’t breathe. I stumble back from the table, rip my earbuds from my ears. The story is almost over but I can’t stand to hear one more minute—one more second—about Brandon’s run for Congress and the very promising career this young, handsome politician from Boston has in front of him.
“Hey, Chloe! You okay?” Zayn climbs to his feet as well, a concerned look on his face as he rests a supportive hand on my shoulder. “You look like you’re going to pass out.”
I feel like I’m going to pass out. Or, more accurately, like the top of my head is going to blow off right here in the middle of this cafeteria.
Ethan wouldn’t do this, I tell myself. He wouldn’t betray me like that.
But what if he doesn’t consider it betrayal? What if it’s just business to him? Or worse, just family?
On the screen, I watch as Brandon wraps one arm around his mother’s waist and the other around Ethan’s shoulders. He’s beaming at the camera, they all are, and though I can’t read lips, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the joyous words pouring out of Ethan’s mouth are Victory in 2014.
All of a sudden, the strawberry smoothie I just drank isn’t sitting too happily in my stomach. I make a mad dash for the restroom, barely making it into a stall before I end up puking out every last drop of that goddamn smoothie.
Chapter Sixteen
It takes me a while to figure out what I want to do, how I want to handle this.
There’s a part of me that wants nothing more than to storm up to Ethan’s office right now—I know he’ll see me—and demand an explanation for the story I just saw.
Another part is screaming that this is the last straw, that I need to race back to Ethan’s house and strip it of every last trace of my existence.
And still another part wants to call Ethan, to beg him to come to me and hold me and tell me that I’ve misunderstood … everything. That the story isn’t true. That he didn’t raise money for Brandon. That he isn’t backing his brother’s candidacy. That he didn’t sell me out because of his brother’s political aspirations. Because of his father’s terrible death.
In the end, though, I do none of those things. Instead, I go back to work and finish out my day, researching the newest crop of court cases on intellectual property mergers that I’ve been assigned to cull through.
