“So, what kind of crisis do we have on our hands, Dad?” Kurt asked.

Sue stepped forward, handing Kurt a folder. “Her name is Marcella Guevara. She’s a house-keeper at the White House.”

“And for obvious reasons,” Kurt said, looking through the contents of the folder, “You can’t fire her.”

“Right,” Sue confirmed. “We just need you to squash this. Make her dissolve into glitter, or whatever it is that you do.”

Kurt turned to his father, looking deep into his eyes. “I need you tell me right now, Dad. Is there any reason at all for me to believe that you’re not being completely honest with me?”

Burt looked at his son for a brief moment. “Of course not, you know I love Carole. I would never do this to her. Never!”

“Ok,” Kurt said after staring at Burt for a few minutes longer, “I’ll call you when it’s handled.”

Kurt strode quickly into the offices of KEH & Associates. He had very little time before Sebastian’s deadline.

“What do we got, guys?” he said to the group gathered in the conference room.

“No one at the pub remembers seeing him,” Santana said. “We showed his picture around to everybody. He wasn’t there.”

“Goddamn it, Sam!” Kurt mumbled. “Ok, Artie, see if we can get him on traffic cams or something that puts him in the area of that bar at the time of the murder. Santana, go loot around in his apartment and find a receipt. Mike, if Sebastian shows up with his goon squad, hand Sam over, no questions, but go down to the station with them and buy us as much time as possible to establish his alibi. Blaine, you’re with me.”

Without waiting for confirmation on their orders, Kurt was marching out of the conference room towards the elevators, leaving a dumbstruck Blaine standing in his wake. The curly-haired man blinked a few times, looking at the spot Kurt has just been standing in.

“This is part where you move your ass, hobbit!” Santana sneered at him, pulling him out of his daze. Blaine sprinted out of the conference room towards the elevator just as Kurt was stepping into it.

It didn’t take Kurt and Blaine long to locate Marcella Guevara.

“Why are they always at the Jefferson Memorial?” Kurt muttered to himself. “Alright, Blaine, here’s the deal. When we approach her, you just stand there. You do not say a word. You want to see what we do: this is the not fun part of it. Are we clear?”

“Uh, yeah,” Blaine said, trying his hardest to match Kurt’s strides.

The two men slowed their steps as they approached a woman sitting on a park bench with her dog.

“Cute dog,” Kurt said as he stepped closer to Marcella.

“Thanks,” she said with a smile.

“Golden retriever?” Kurt asked from where he was now sitting next to the woman on the bench.

When the hell did that happen? Blaine thought to himself, Damn, he really is good!

Blaine was pulled from his thoughts when Marcella began telling Kurt some anecdote about her dog, who was named Sully. Blaine could tell Kurt was about to go in for the kill; there was always an evil glimmer in Kurt’s eye right before he ripped a person to shreds. Blaine knew all too well to avoid Kurt when that glint appeared.

“Look, Marcella,” Kurt said when the woman stopped speaking. She looked shocked that Kurt knew her name since she hadn’t offered it during this entire conversation.

“There’s really two ways this can go. The first is you can quit your job and move to some quiet town: Louisville or Atlanta, perhaps. Get a new job, find a dumb guy, marry him, and keep your mouth shut.”

Kurt paused for a moment. “Or, you can continue to spread lies about the President, and we’ll go to the press with every skeleton in your closet, and you know they’ll have a field day with that. We know about the credit card fraud, your sixteen sexual partners in two years, that nasty case of gonorrhea you had in high school, the stealing from previous employers. I know all about it, Marcella. You will be ruined; look what happened to Monica Lewinsky, and she was telling the truth.”

Marcella had started to cry during this onslaught of dirty little secrets that she was certain no one knew about. “Why are you doing this?” she choked out, “I’m a good person.”

“No, you’re not. The President is a good person. Good people don’t tell lies about other good people. If you keep talking, I will hand everything over to CNN, you won’t be able to find another job anywhere. Your career in Washington is over.”

Marcella was sobbing when Kurt had finished speaking. “Who are you?” she managed to say.

“Who I am is not important,” Kurt said pointedly, “What’s important is that you make the right decision.”

With those words, he stood and walked away.

Once they were out of earshot, Kurt turned to Blaine as they walked. “If you’re ever subpoenaed, you were walking by and heard that exchange. You don’t know me outside of someone who you dated in high school. If you’re not subpoenaed, that never happened.” Kurt pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, hit a button, and waited for someone to answer.

“It’s handled,” he said, promptly ending the call.

Kurt and Blaine entered the building just as Sebastian arrived, accompanied by several police officers.

“I believe you have something that belongs to me, Hummel,” Sebastian said with a self-satisfied grin. “Why hello, Blaine.”

“Can it, Smythe,” Kurt said, looking at his watch. “I still have four minutes. You and the village people can wait right here.”

Kurt and Blaine walked through the office’s frosted glass doors, disappearing from Sebastian’s sight.

On the other side of the glass, the two men walked into the conference room to see Puck, Artie, and Santana huddled around a laptop.

“Please tell me we’ve got something substantial,” Kurt said with a sigh.

“Oh, you’re definitely gonna wanna see this,” Artie said as he turned the laptop towards Kurt and hit play.

“Oh my sweet dear mother of god,” Kurt gasped. “And this clears Sam of the murder?”

“Time stamp coincides with T.O.D,” Santana answered. “Troutymouth is in the clear.”

“Blaine –” Kurt turned to where he thought Blaine was standing, only to find an empty space. “Where did he go?”

“I think he went upstairs to your office,” Mike said.

“Alright, Hummel, you’ve had your four minutes,” Sebastian said, entering the room. “Bring Evans out so we can get this over with.”

Kurt grinned at the State’s Attorney. “I think you might want to send the boys in blue outside for a minute. We have something to discuss.”

Sebastian narrowed his eyes at Kurt before turning to the crew of police officers and telling them to wait outside.

Once the officers were outside, Kurt motioned to a chair at the conference table. Sebastian took a seat and Kurt slid the laptop in front of him.

“So, Sebastian,” Kurt said, leaning over his shoulder to play the video. “You wanna explain to me why you were about to arrest the man that you were making out with the night of the murder?”

“Fuck,” Sebastian spat, “I knew I shouldn’t have gone to that bar.”

“Got a little drunk, did we?” Kurt said with a slight laugh. “I guess that means you’ll be dropping the charges then? Or do I need to leak this to the press?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“You never do, Seb, you never do!”

Kurt and Mike met Sam on the steps outside the police precinct. The three men exchanged smiles, handshakes, and hugs.

“You know, Sam,” Kurt said, “We may never find out who killed Mercedes, but she would’ve accepted that you were gay. She probably would’ve been thrilled.”

“She knew,” Sam said, dropping his head. “It was a political thing; we thought people would respond more to what I was trying to do if I had a wife.”

“So, you and Sebastian, huh?” Mike asked, trying to lighten the mood.

Sam chuckled a little, trying to hide the blush that crept up his neck and cheeks.

“You’re totally gonna see him again, aren’t you?” Kurt cried.

“I mean, he almost arrested me,” Sam said, “The least he could do is buy me dinner.”

Kurt found Blaine curled up on the couch in his office, crying. The sound of Blaine’s sobs caused Kurt’s heart to tighten, and in a flash, he had his arms wrapped around Blaine.

“What’s wrong, Blaine?” Kurt asked once the shorter man had stopped crying for long enough to speak.

“Everything,” he replied shakily. “I don’t know how you do it. I just saw you destroy a woman’s entire life over something we may or may not know to be true. How do you sleep at night, Kurt?”

“Ok, first of all, that woman said she had an affair with my father,” Kurt spoke firmly. “If my father tells me that woman is lying, then I believe him. Secondly, I have had to make some terribly hard decisions in my life that have basically left me cold and dead inside. I’m not proud of them, but they made me who I am.”

“Like breaking up with me?” Blaine whispered.

“What?” Kurt heard the question, but was thrown by it none the less.

“One of those terribly hard decisions. Was one of them breaking up with me the way you did?”

“Yes.” Kurt hoped that Blaine was not looking for anything more than that.

“Then why did you Kurt? At least tell me the reason. I deserve that.”

Kurt hesitated for a few minutes, opening and closing his mouth and looking for the right way to break this news to Blaine.

“This is not a pretty story, and you’re definitely not going to like a lot of what I’m about to say, but I need to you listen before you cut in and try to speak, ok?” Kurt said when he finally found the courage to continue the conversation.

Blaine nodded his head to confirm that he understood what Kurt was telling him.

“A reporter approached my father back at the start of his first campaign for office,” Kurt said, shuddering as the memory washed over him. “Apparently, somehow, someone hacked your father’s e-mail account and…”

Blaine leaned forward to urge Kurt to continue the story. Kurt worried his lip between his teeth for a while before giving up the most damning piece of information he had ever discovered.

“Blaine, they found kiddie porn on your dad’s e-mail.”

“What?” Blaine roared. “That’s ridiculous! You broke up with me because of something someone supposedly found on my father’s computer? Are you really that fucking selfish Kurt?”

“What happened to you shutting up and listening to me?” Kurt said, cocking an eyebrow. “That’s not why I broke up with you.”

“Ok, then what was it?” Blaine was breathing heavily, but in Kurt’s eyes, at least he was listening.

“The only reason this reporter hacked your father’s computer was to get dirt on my dad and on us; anything to smear his good name.” Kurt continued. “I had to protect you from that. I figured the best way to get this guy to back off was to take you out of the equation. I mean, obviously I was right, because the story never went to print. Blaine, it was never that I didn’t lo—”

Kurt’s phone vibrated to life on the coffee table. Glancing down, he saw that it was Mike calling.

“It’s Mike, give me half a second, and we’ll hash this out right here right now,” Kurt said to Blaine as he picked up the phone.

“What’s up Mike? What? What did the note say?” Kurt’s face became panic stricken. “What did you just say? It said he called her what? I’ve gotta go, Mike.”

Kurt threw his phone across the room, shattering it against the exposed brick wall. Kurt stood up and grabbed his coat, making his way towards the elevator.

“Kurt?” Blaine said as he, too, stood. “Kurt what’s happening?”

“Marcella Guevara killed herself.”

Blaine started to walk towards Kurt. “You know this wasn’t your fault. You can’t bla—”

“Not now, Blaine,” Kurt said firmly. There was no irritation in his voice, just firmness. “Stay here, I’ll be back in thirty minutes. An hour tops. Please don’t leave this office. I swear to you that we will finish this conversation when I get back.”

As he had done many times that day, Kurt left before Blaine could respond. Blaine flopped back down on the couch.

“I love you too, Kurt.”