He Married His Hometown Neighbor, Then Begged for a Second Chance novel · Chapter 34 of 40

Chapter 34: Global Summit

At eight o'clock on the morning of the Summit, four hundred reporters' phones lit up at once.

Evan stood in the green room behind the main stage, with a paper cup of tea going cold in his hand, and watched it happen.

He did not need to look at a screen.

He could read it in the room.

The woman from the wire service stopped talking mid-word.

A man from a trade magazine laughed out loud, a sharp bark, and turned his phone over on his knee.

The stage manager came in with a clipboard and a very careful face.

"Mr. Green? Your slot is nine-fifteen."

"Thank you."

"Do you still want it?"

"Yes."

"I'd understand if..."

"I'm sure you would," Evan said. "I want it."

The tall engineer sat on the arm of a sofa with the laptop on his knees.

"It's everywhere," he said. "Every outlet. She's done it neatly. Nothing in it is false."

"I know."

"She's quoted a medical letter about Ethan's stomach."

"I know that too."

"Boss." The engineer looked up. "What are you going to say?"

"What's in it."

"All of it?"

"All of it. The way I'd say it to Gran."

The boy with the notebook, white-faced, whispered, "She said you'd be better off not going on."

"She was right," said Evan. "I'd be a good deal safer."

He stood.

At the door of the green room a man was waiting in a grey tie.

He had come in through the back, with a pass he had signed himself, and stood against the wall like a shareholder.

"You're not supposed to be here," Evan said.

"I know."

"I said the back row."

"I'm on my way to it." Ethan's voice was low. "I wanted to say one thing, and I'll say it once. Whatever you say out there, I will not contradict it, and I won't stand up. I won't be anywhere you haven't put me."

"That's two things."

"It's one, with a second part."

Evan found, absurdly, that he was smiling.

He straightened the grey tie with two fingers.

His hand lay for a moment on the knot, in the warm hollow of Ethan's throat, and Ethan swallowed against his palm.

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