Page 26 of The Americana Playbook

Fitz tips his head to the side. “It would be kind of funny if this turned out to be the greatest love story of all time, wouldn’t it?”

His words pull me out of my thoughts and further away from him. “It won’t. We’ll always be friends, won’t we?”

“Better ask yourself that.”

“What does that mean?”

He shrugs, looking down at the crumbs we’ve left in the box. “You could take the money and run.”

“I told you. This isn’t about the money.”

“You could still run.” Fitz lifts his head. “You did before.”

“It’s different this time.”

“How?” he asks.

I pause, wondering if I tell him everything now, maybe all bets will be off. But that’s bullshit. I don’t want to tell Fitz what happened because I don’t want him to suddenly look at me and find himself searching for a problem. I’ve got many. I don’t think any of them justify what was done to me. But other people might.Hemight. After all, people don’t just send their unproblematic daughters away to be tortured.

“This time,” I tell him, “you’re driving the getaway car.”

I’m thankful for his laughter that cuts through the intensity of the moment.

“It’ll be fine. We just have to put it out there. Publicly.”

“Publicly?”

It’s ironic that I worked so hard to escape the public eye for more than a decade. But I realized something—publicity, it offers me protection. They can’t just make me disappear again, not if I’m front and center on the campaign trail, and certainly if I’m not about to be Captain America’s wife.

“We launch this before they even have time to process it. We force them to go along with it,” I decide. “It won’t exactly bode well in the court of public opinion for the president to clearly be at odds with his daughter over a wedding. I mean, that’s what this is all about for them—optics.”

Fitz leans forward, his eyes narrowing in on mine. I watch his jaw tic as he thinks, captivated by his short beard that’s just long enough, I imagine, to be that perfect combination of rough and soft.

“I forgot how much of a menace you can be.”

“Is that bad?”

“If I’m being honest, Parker.” He sort of hums my name. “It’s kind of hot.”

The flush on my cheeks undoubtedly is due to the cheap beer and not Fitz’s words, and certainly not the way his mouth smooths out into a lopsided grin that quickly fades.

“What?”

He shifts his lips back together in thought. “The campaign.”

“You don’t have to do anything,” I tell him. “I’ll handle that.”

Fitz sighs. “But do youhaveto? I mean…”

“Listen,” I begin. “What I need from all this, money can’t buy. It’s more about me being on the campaign, about me having the right kind of platform to get what I want.”

I could’ve figured out a way to go to the press hundreds of times over the last decade. But dropping this at the convention, in front of every important member of my father’s political party? That’s the kind of bomb I want to drop—nuclear.

“What do youneed, Parker?”

I catch the tip of my tongue between my teeth. God, I don’t want to do this. Ever, but especially, not yet. Not right now. Because the truth, maybe it’s too much right now for Fitz. Maybe he’ll hop in the getaway car and leave me on the curb.

And maybe, I wonder, as my throat spasms together, I can’ttellhim yet. But I can show him.

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