For the angst dialogue prompts: 3. (“How could you think this wouldn’t hurt me?”) and/or 60. (“Don’t hate me for this. You would’ve done the same.”) for Nadine/Mike and/or Nadine/Vincent... mix and match however you like!
AU in which Nadine is a little wiser and less gullible when it comes to Marsh.
I have no idea how you would even go about opening a bank account overseas with a fake passport, so let’s ignore the plot holes, shall we. This plot could’ve used 10k or so more words, but I wasn’t exactly in the mood for that, lmao. Hope this still makes sense to you! 😝
60. “Don’t hate me for this. You would’ve done the same.”
She draws the line at forged passports.
It’s not the first unusual thing she’s done for Vincent, but it doesn’t feel quite right anymore.
Nadine stares at the piece of paper in front of her, one that she’s supposed to write her name on – not her name but the alias that would be on the passport with her picture and false everything else. Vincent looks at her, his face blank, as her hand hovers over the table she was lying on not ten minutes earlier.
He’s just been knuckles-deep in her and it hits her she’s now knee-deep in the scheme he’s weaving, a scheme she knows next to nothing about and had no intention of being involved in.
It’s money for them, so that Arabelle Marsh can’t touch it, Vincent has claimed. Maybe, Nadine thinks. But violating a dozen national and international laws doesn’t seem like the thing the Secretary of State should ask of anyone, let alone someone he loves. She’d rather take her chances with a divorce attorney.
She looks at the name she’s supposed to write and thinks about her thesis advisor who encouraged her to see Europe before pursuing law school and the boxes of noodles they lived on when Roman was five, and she puts the pen down and walks out of Vincent’s office.
He doesn’t call after her, his plan sensitive to daylight.
They’re seemingly okay after the incident. He doesn’t talk about it, she doesn’t bring it up, and life continues like it has for her – politics and late nights and stolen kisses behind locked doors.
It doesn’t leave Nadine’s mind, though, the odd request. Nor does Vincent’s smooth acceptance of her refusal. It doesn’t sit right with her; has her second-guessing both her lover and her boss, trying to uncover the subtext of his words in the meetings and caresses in between them.
She tells herself she’s being paranoid, but she doesn’t stop.
About a month later she learns, virtually by accident, that she is the owner of a bank account in Venezuela. Or rather, Carlotta Tanniston is.
She feels like she might choke on her breath.
She gets home, pours herself a generous glass of wine, has to stop herself from drowning it all in one go. How dare he?
After everything she’s done for him. Every day, she bends over backwards for him, literally, goes the extra mile, strives for the impossible. She gets her job done and makes sure everyone else does, too.
She started with nothing. She hasn’t worked this hard for him to pour it all down the drain. He gave her a chance, helped her create a career for herself, but he does not own it. He does not own her.
The arrogance makes her seethe. He’s used her name to… She doesn’t even know what he’s planning with the money, but this confirms her suspicions from earlier; it sure as hell isn’t for them.
She’ll be damned if she lets him use her anymore.
But something else seems off to her as well. She can understand – she hates it, but she does – how he would deem his agenda important enough to go ahead and open the bank account in her name despite her refusal, but… Vincent doesn’t shy away from arguments. There has to be a reason for why he’s gone behind her back instead of trying to persuade her to change her mind, see things his way. It’s almost like wanted her to be blindsided.
She thinks about it for a moment but can’t come up with but one explanation. She’s the failsafe. If something went wrong, she would take the fall.
She’s okay with taking the blame for him professionally – it’s her job. It should be different in private life, though. She knows what love is supposed to feel like; she knows with absolute certainty she would take a bullet for Roman, without hesitation, without thought, without regret.
She realizes now she wouldn’t do that for Vincent. But she thought she would, yesterday. When she thought he would do the same in return.
Whatever she means to him, it’s not real.
Nadine sets her glass down before she hurls it at the wall and carefully pours herself some more wine to chew on instead of all his false promises.
She’s not going down for this. Not for him.
She lays low for a couple of days, planning for the best way to go about confronting Vincent about the mess he’s tied both of them, until next Monday he clears his schedule for the rest of the day and leaves the office at 3pm, giving her no excuse to offer to the disgruntled Australian ambassador he was supposed to meet with.
She’s been avoiding him the best she can given their positions, but his total disregard of his work and clear disrespect of hers feels like personal payback, which she doesn’t deserve.
Part of her job or not, Nadine decides she’s done covering for Vincent.
She deals with the change in the day’s agenda routinely and then heads to the White House. She could go to someone else as well, but her counterpart feels like the simplest choice. She’ll exit this scheme as unceremoniously as she entered it.
And so, it’s in the bright daylight in the middle of a White House hallway where she steels herself and lays it all out, watches Russell Jackson turn white then red then blue like the flag Nadine has just accused the Secretary of State of betraying.
Instead of regretful, she feels relieved.
She rushes back to the State Department, desperate to get there before he’s escorted out of the building. Nothing outside his office signals that anything would be out of order, but when she slips inside, she finds Vincent pacing in front of his desk.
How he’s learned about her disloyalty, she doesn’t know, but she’s not surprised. Walls have ears in Washington. Warily waiting for his reaction, Nadine doesn’t announce her presence. He knows she’s there.
He continues to ignore her for a good five minutes in favor of wearing a hole into the plush carpet. He’s like a caged animal, anxiety oozing from his body language. Nadine keeps her head high and her mind set, won’t let her heart break from his distress.
“They’re coming for me”, he says, not even looking her way. “Someone… someone tipped them off.”
Nadine stays silent, frowning. He doesn’t seem to know it was her. She feels guilty for being pleased.
“Munsey”, he mumbles suddenly, so distracted by his anger at the sudden realization that Nadine has time to rack her brain for people of that name, only barely managing to silence the yelp when she lands on the Director of the CIA.
“How could he sell me out like that?”
Nadine doesn’t know what makes her correct him – probably the knowledge that he’s forced her into something so grand and deceitful it involves the Director of the CIA.
Vincent turns to her, his eyes wide like he already knows what she’s about to say next.
For a second, he deflates, a look of bitterness sweeping across his face before it goes entirely blank and he just stares at her, frozen in place. Like he can’t believe her. For some reason, it irritates Nadine. Did he think he had her completely under his thumb? Her muscles grow tense as she meets his eyes, not flinching under the coldness of his stare.
And then he erupts, springing back to life with animation that makes her jump.
“How dare you?” he roars, the hurt clear in his voice, “Do you even know what you’ve done?”
“No.” Her tone is deceptively calm, wavering on accusing. “I have no idea what you dragged me into! I made it clear I didn’t want any part in whatever it is you’re planning, and you still used my name.”
Vincent scoffs. “Funny, it didn’t seem like I needed to drag you into anything last week.”
Nadine narrows her eyes at the implication, her face growing hot. “Don’t hate me for this”, she hisses through clenched teeth, “You did this to yourself.”
“Don’t hate you?” he repeats incredulously, gesturing so violently Nadine involuntarily takes a step back. She can hear footsteps from outside his office despite his raised voice, curious employees or whoever Russell Jackson has sent to escort Vincent to face the consequences. “You threw me under the bus!”
The anger flashing through her burns bright as Nadine tips her jaw upwards, using smugness to cover up the way her voice threatens to break from the truth of her words. “You would’ve done the same.”
