Nadine is right as rain the next day. Within the depths of her purse, which is tucked safely in the bottom drawer of her desk, new white pills rattle quietly in their bottle like a comforting little secret. She feels human again.
But when the Secretary meets her eyes at the morning meeting, she looks almost… disappointed. Nadine has neither the will nor the inclination to dissect what it could mean. She has a job to do, and as always, she intends to do it well.
That night, Elizabeth marches herself right into Nadine's office a second time.
Nadine looks up at her, startled.
Elizabeth strides over to where Nadine is sitting at her desk, opens the bottom drawer, and extricates Nadine's handbag. Without permission, she begins to rummage around inside it.
"What are you—" Dread curls at the base of Nadine's stomach when she sees what Elizabeth pulls out.
"Come with me," Elizabeth murmurs, and though her voice is soft, it leaves no room for protest. Elizabeth grabs Nadine firmly by the wrist and walks her into the big office, and then into the adjoining bathroom. "I've been more than patient with you. With this," Elizabeth says, and rattles the bottle in her hand jarringly.
"Don't," Nadine pleads, panic leaping into her throat. "Please don't."
Elizabeth cracks open the top of the bottle despite Nadine's weak protestations and pours its contents into the toilet bowl. They makes tiny little plinking noises as they hit the water. Nadine stares down at them, forgetting to blink, as Elizabeth depresses the lever and flushes Nadine's lifelines down the pipes. "Once you leave here," Elizabeth says, "I will go through your desk until I find the rest of your stash, and I'm going to flush that, too."
"There is no stash," Nadine says automatically, staring longingly at the now-empty bottle in Elizabeth's hand. She thinks about the tiny packets she'd taped to the underside of her desk, the lip of the air vent, and the inside of her filing cabinet just that morning. So that she could avoid another situation like last night. "That was it. That was everything."
"Of course it isn't. You're an addict," Elizabeth says in a gentle voice. "You're going to go home now. DS will escort you and perform a drug sweep. They have been authorized to throw out anything they find."
Nadine's shoulders hunch forward defeatedly. Her chest tightens up, and she wonders for a horrifying second if she's going to cry. "I can't work without it," she whispers.
"You've been overworking yourself lately and have thus been feeling under the weather. You've decided to take some sick leave," Elizabeth states, as if reporting a series of events. "Maggie will reschedule your appointments this week, and Jay will take care of your other commitments in your absence." She drops the empty container into the wastebasket and steps forward, clasping Nadine's hand in both of hers. Her skin is warm and dry. This close, she smells like jasmine and musk. "I'm sorry, but I have to do this. I'm worried about you," she says earnestly. "That's why I'm doing this."
Nadine pulls her hand free. "You overstep," she hisses. "We aren't friends." Her humiliation, which had been significantly delayed, is now setting in hard and fast.
Elizabeth snatches her hand back and holds on tight, resisting Nadine's attempts to squirm away again. "This is for your own good. One day you'll see that."
/
"You know what this dress does to me," Vincent growls in her ear. He presses himself against her so that she can feel the evidence of his words and it makes her gasp.
"Uh-huh," she breathes.
He backs her up against the wall and grabs her hands with his. He pins them above her head and grinds himself against her again. "You want this?"
"Uh-huh," she says again.
"How bad?" He transfers both of her hands to one of his and slides his free hand down her leg and under her skirt, then up the back of a bare thigh. He hitches it high on his hip. She tilts her pelvis against him, grinding slowly.
"So bad." She tries to find his lips with hers, but he moves his head away. "Vincent…"
His hand works its way between their bodies and brushes her underwear. Her eyes flutter shut. He presses his fingers against her and she moans. "Let's take care of you," he murmurs.
/
Nadine returns to work clean and sober. It's a fragile thing, but she's got her feet under her now and every day she feels less and less like she might shatter under the weight of her own body. And the Secretary seems pleased.
"It's good to have you back," Elizabeth murmurs so that only she can hear. She lays her hand briefly on Nadine's arm. Everyone else is clearing out of the conference room following the morning run-down.
"Thank you, ma'am," Nadine says. She still feels terribly embarrassed by their last encounter, and suspects she will continue to feel that way for the remainder of her tenure.
Elizabeth gestures toward her office. "If you have a minute, I'd like to catch you up on some things I've been doing while you were out."
"Of course." Nadine follows Elizabeth through the side door, closing it behind her.
Elizabeth crosses the room to the main door and closes that one too. "Have a seat," she calls over her shoulder.
Nadine obeys, settling herself nervously into the seat across from the desk.
Elizabeth walks over, pulls open the top drawer, and withdraws a folded letter. She hands this to Nadine before seating herself. "I found this in your desk while I was looking for your pills," she says. "Would you care to explain it?"
Nadine looks at the Secretary for a long moment, but the other woman gives nothing away. So she slips her glasses onto the end of her nose and unfolds the letter. "It's a bank letter," she says slowly, "for an account under Vincent Marsh's name." She looks up again. "He asked me to keep it for him."
"There are two co-signatories for this account. Carlotta Taniston and Marie Porter. Do those names mean anything to you?"
She has to fight to keep her expression neutral. "Should they?" She doesn't know, exactly, where this is going, but she already knows that she doesn't like it. How much does Elizabeth know?
"Are you Carlotta Taniston?" Elizabeth's voice is hard.
Nadine is silent for a moment. She drops the letter on the desk. "Yes," she says.
Elizabeth nods. "Okay. Thank you for your honesty. I'm going to ignore, for now, all of the laws you've broken in doing this. This letter has uncovered… compelling information. But I think that maybe… with your recovery…" she hesitates, trailing off.
Nadine fills in the gaps. "You think that it might be too much."
"You're still grieving," Elizabeth says. "I don't want to overwhelm you."
Nadine shakes her head. "I don't need the whole story. Just tell me what it is you need, ma'am."
Elizabeth slides a print out of a photo across the desk to her. It's a blown up frame from security cam footage, frozen on the profile of a woman in a blue headscarf. "This is Marie Porter. Do you know her?"
"No." It's half the truth, to be sure. Nadine has never met this woman.
"She was shot dead a few days ago. She was an Iranian national. After I found this letter, I had an old CIA friend of mine run her identity, and just as we were going to intercept her, she turns up dead." Elizabeth takes the photo back. "She had a laptop on her at the time of her death. I had to go through the ringer to get my hands on it, but it was worth it. Her laptop contained information on an Operation Tamerlane, which aims for a regime change in Iran by way of a military coup. A coup arranged by the United States."
Nadine can feel the blood pounding in her ears. "I don't understand," she says.
"There are very high-level American players involved here," Elizabeth says. "Including Marie Porter's handler and Marie Porter's assassin." She pulls out two more photos, this time of two people who Nadine knows very well. "Her handler, Director Andrew Munsey. Her assassin, a CIA operative named Juliet Humphrey." Elizabeth's voice breaks only a hair, but she covers it up well. "They have both been taken into federal custody."
Nadine has just about frozen in her seat. "I see," she manages hoarsely.
"I've learned a lot while you were out, Nadine," Elizabeth says. "And all because of Marsh's bank letter which you were so conveniently hiding."
"I— I wasn't—"
Elizabeth talks over her, with razor-sharp intensity. "Andrew Munsey, Juliet Humphrey, and Vincent Marsh were conspiring to dismantle the Iranian government behind Dalton's back. They were playing a very dangerous game that nearly succeeded in throwing our country into war. And so now I need you to be very honest with me Nadine, because this part is very important. Did you know about the coup?"
Nadine says nothing. It's her silence that gives her away.
Elizabeth's voice is flat. "You did."
Silence.
Understanding dawns. "Carlotta Taniston wasn't just a co-signatory, was she?" Elizabeth asks very quietly. "She was a co-conspirator."
Finally, Nadine nods. "Yes," she whispers. The jig is up. She meets Elizabeth's steely gaze and tries her damndest not to flinch. She longs for a drink, a pill, something. "I helped Vincent move the money we used to foot expenses and pay off our people. I arranged meetings between Vincent, Andrew, and Alinejad off the books. I fabricated his official schedules. I… I did everything he asked of me."
She did it for Vincent because she believed in him, did it because she loved him so damn much, did it because she told him once that she'd follow him anywhere and meant it. She's a traitor to her country.
So was he.
"Because he coerced you?" Elizabeth supplies. And Nadine knows a life raft when she sees one, but it's a kindness she doesn't deserve and can't accept.
"Because I loved him," she says. "I wasn't coerced." She meets Elizabeth's eyes. "I knew exactly what I was doing." She will go to prison for this.
"Tell me," Elizabeth says softly.
Nadine swallows against the lump in her throat. "I supported the coup. I believed in it. But Andrew and Juliet became reckless in the way they were manipulating Alinejad, and allowing themselves to be manipulated by Alinejad. It was never going to work. Vincent saw it, and when he backed out, I did too."
"But you never exposed them."
"No."
"Nadine, people have died because you chose to keep their secrets," Elizabeth says, raising her voice slightly.
"The cost was too high," she admits, ashamed by the selfishness her confession implies.
If she exposed them, she ran the risk of incriminating herself. Alternatively, if she made the false claim that Vincent had forced her participation, it would have uncovered the entirely separate scandal that was their affair. Neither option could be more appealing than her silence, and Munsey knew that. He'd taken advantage of this by harassing her endlessly after Vincent's death, secure in the knowledge that she wouldn't hit back. All his phone calls, texts, burner numbers, and even the run-ins at the store—all in his relentless campaign to recommit her to Tamerlane. She had been terrified that one day soon, he'd lose his patience and just kill her instead.
Because what was the thing he'd always say?
No loose ends.
Well she is a loose end. She's unraveled their whole damn thread.
"I could have protected you," Elizabeth says.
Nadine looks up sharply. "Just like you protected George Peters?"
It doesn't make Elizabeth recoil, but it does make her angry. "Don't you dare try to place his death on my shoulders when your silence makes you at least twice as culpable," she snaps.
Nadine dips her head, immediately contrite. "I know he was your friend," she says soberly. "And I am truly sorry."
"Me too." Elizabeth sighs and presses her fingers to her temple. "You know, I have shared with you, on multiple occasions, sensitive and privileged information—"
"I have never once betrayed that information."
"No? So just my trust, then. Just your country."
"I love my country," Nadine says.
Elizabeth looks at her sadly. "Juliet said the same thing."
Nadine has nothing to say to that.
It doesn't matter though, because Elizabeth pulls herself together quickly enough. "We'll have to arrange a meeting with the Attorney General, of course."
Nadine dips her head. "I understand." The AG, Nadine knows, holds no love for traitors.
Elizabeth knows it too. "I doubt she will show you any sympathy," she says. "She showed none to Juliet."
/
"You know it's never going to work," Nadine tells him. She stands by the entryway with her arms crossed, unwilling to move any closer until Vincent acknowledges her point. "Alinejad is manipulating all of you."
"I know," he mutters distractedly, staring out into space. So deep in thought that he hadn't even looked at her once. "We have to pull out."
"We do," she confirms. "We're never going to be able to pull it off. The least you and I can do is step back and try not to get buried under the fallout."
"No fallout," he says.
"Vincent please," she snaps, "don't be naive."
He looks at her sharply. "No fallout," he repeats. "Not on you."
She shakes her head and tries not to let her nerves show; her fear. "You can't promise that."
"I promise it," he says firmly.
She looks away and says nothing. She doesn't believe in his promises; she can't. If even one person finds out, they will all rot in prison for treason.
Vincent crosses the room to stand right in front of her, but she won't meet his eyes. "Hey," he says gently, and tilts her chin upward with his finger, holding her there until she meets his eyes. "I mean it. I will always protect you. I promise."
Her voice breaks on her fear. "And who will protect you?"
/
Nadine has a visitor.
Elizabeth is already seated and waiting at the table when the guard leads Nadine inside the visitation room. Nadine hesitates before lowering herself into the cold metal chair, her chains clattering harshly in the silent room. To say she is surprised would be a lie.
The guard secures her restraints to the metal furnishings and moves to stand in the corner of the room.
"Marsh ruined you," Elizabeth says without preamble. "You can't even see it because you're still infatuated with him."
"We were in love," Nadine says simply.
"You know that isn't a good enough reason."
"You've never done things you hated for the person you love?"
"There are lines I'd never cross. I've never betrayed my country for the person I love."
"If Henry asked—"
"He'd never ask that of me."
"We should all be so lucky," Nadine spits acidly.
Elizabeth narrows her eyes at Nadine's tone. "You chose to fall for a man who would never truly belong to you. You allowed his manipulations and ambitions to cloud your judgment. That was your decision, Nadine. Your mistake."
"You married your college sweetheart and he settled for teaching ethics to twenty-year-old idealists. So I don't expect you to understand—"
"Tread carefully here," Elizabeth warns quietly.
"—But some day, he may ask you to do unspeakable things on his behalf, and you'll do them no matter what. Because he asked. Because you love him. And then you'll know."
Elizabeth shakes her head. "That isn't me."
"It's all of us," Nadine says gently. Impulsively, she reaches forward and grasps Elizabeth's hand, the way Elizabeth once took hers. It causes the guard to tense up, but Nadine pays him no mind. She holds Elizabeth's hand tightly and though Elizabeth doesn't return her desperate grip, she doesn't pull away either. "It's all of us," Nadine repeats. "One day you'll see that."
Elizabeth pulls her hand free and stands up. She leaves the room without looking back.
/
Nadine slips into to Vincent's office at the end of the day, twenty minutes before he will leave to meet the plane. He's going to Caracas alone. Without her.
It's just for one weekend, true, but it was supposed to be their weekend together—without his wife, without their work, without Tamerlane hanging over their heads.
She closes the door and flicks the lock smartly, then saunters over to his desk. She drapes herself over the back of his chair and leans down, brushing light, teasing kisses along his jawline. "Have a safe trip," she whispers. "I'll be waiting oh-so-patiently for you to come back and—" she closes her teeth gently on his earlobe and tugs on it until he groans "—make it up to me."
He turns his head and captures her lips with his, kissing her with a steamy intensity that never fails to make her weak in the knees. He tangles his fingers in her hair and wraps his other arm around her waist to pull her into his lap.
She reaches into her pocket and extricates her little memento as she kisses him, but before she can slip it into Vincent's chest pocket, he seizes her wrist and pulls away. He raises one eyebrow expectantly.
Nadine merely smiles and releases her hold on the pendant tucked safely into her palm, letting it dangle in the air between them. The tiny Buddha sways gently in his view, suspended from a simple gold chain. She lowers it into his pocket.
"Something to remember me by," she murmurs, and then kisses him sweetly on the lips.
I walk through my days like a ghost in a dream,
But the field carries on and my past follows me
It's hard moving on from the things you done wrong,
When they play in your head like an old fashioned song...
—Brandi Carlile, "The Things I Regret"