Page 187 of Sexting My Best Friend's Brothers
He hits the dial, looking over at me. “Asher, get the laptop. Deploy the data.”
I sit at the table, opening my terminal, the harsh glow of the screen illuminates the two grainy ultrasound photos lying between us as the first lines of counter-strike code begin to compile.
33
ETHAN
My world is loud.
Inside the penthouse, it’s a deafening cacophony of ringing phones, pinging notifications, and the low drone of the news playing on the television. Outside, twenty stories down, the faint wail of sirens and the hum of news vans gather on the street below.
The scandal is compounding.
TECH TRIO’S SECRET LIFE EXPOSED, the chyron on the TV reads. MOSAIC CEO AND BROTHERS IN POLYAMOROUS SCANDAL WITH EMPLOYEE.
Snatching the remote, I kill the feed. The room goes quiet, save for the rapid, mechanical tapping of Asher’s keyboard.
“Status,” I demand, staring at the black screen.
“Sterling is holding,” Owen says, pressing his phone to his chest to muffle the microphone. He looks drained, the usual spark in his eyes dimmed by exhaustion. “He says the Boardis convening an emergency session in an hour. They’re talking about triggering the Morality Clause.”
“Let them convene,” I say calmly. “Tell Sterling if he wants to fire the founders after we just delivered the most successful quarter in company history, he can explain the tanking valuation to the board himself.”
Owen nods, putting the phone back to his ear. “You heard him, Sterling. Make the call.”
I turn my attention to the sofa.
Tessa’s sitting there, her knees pulled to her chest. She hasn’t moved in an hour. She’s scrolling through her phone, reading the comments. I cross the room, and the reflection of the hateful words glares back at me from the dark glass of her screen.
Slut. Gold digger. Whore.
I pluck the phone from her hand.
“Hey!” she protests, her head snapping up. Her eyes are rimmed with red.
“No more,” I say, tossing her phone onto the armchair out of reach. “We don’t read the comments. That is Rule Number One of being famous, which, apparently, we now are.”
“They hate me, Ethan,” she whispers. “They’re saying I seduced you. They’re saying I slept my way to the top. They’re saying the babies are mistakes.”
I kneel in front of her, forcing her to look at me. I place my hands on her knees.
“Look at me, Tessa.”
She blinks, tears spilling over.
“They don’t know you,” I say fiercely. “They don’t know you built the brand strategy that made this company worth millions. They don’t know you’re the smartest person in the room. And they certainly don’t know we chased you, not the other way around.”
“It doesn’t matter what the truth is,” she argues. “What matters is the narrative. Nebula won. Markus won. He destroyed our reputation.”
“He destroyed our privacy,” I correct her. “Not our reputation. Watch.”
I stand up and walk to Asher. “Post it.”
Asher nods. He hits enter.
“What did you do?” Tessa asks, sitting up.
“We released a statement,” I say. “On the official Mosaic blog. And on all our personal accounts.”
