Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 76846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
I drove back toward the massage parlor, telling myself that there was nothing I could do for Elizabeth, that she had made her own decisions, that there was nothing for me to feel guilty about.
I just barely fought back the urge to go and sit outside of her office building, knowing I was practically putting a target on my back if I did so, but wanting to make sure she at least made it home from work safely.
If she needed my help, I reminded myself, she would ask for it.
But she didn’t.
Not the day after the shooting.
Or even the day after that.
But late on the third night, my phone rang.
And she was frantic on the other end.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Elizabeth
I always found the senator frustrating.
Hell, that was probably being nice.
He drove me up a wall most of the time when he was in the office, spouting off his opinions and ideas that would get him nowhere because, well, they were not only antiquated—like the man himself—but they were getting crazier with each passing day.
Maybe it was the lack of sleep on my part—not to mention the debilitating fear I felt every waking moment—but I almost jumped down the man’s throat no fewer than ten separate times when he finally came into the office nearly toward the end of the workday on the third day after the shooting.
He was in rare form, ranting and raving about what he heard some daytime talk show say about him.
“It’s supposed to be about my politics,” he’d grumbled, throwing out an arm, and nearly slapping an intern across her face.
I’d caught a snippet of that show earlier, thanks to one of the staffers who always tried to keep us updated on what was being said about Michael.
Apparently, they’d made endless jokes about his line-less face, and his too-dark tan that made his too-white teeth look like Chiclets.
I actually had a little much needed laugh myself.
They were only expressing the very things we were all thinking.
I mean a few of the interns at one point had tried to come up with a plan to discuss the excessive tanning with the senator. In the end, though, no one had the balls to bring it up to him.
Which meant that Michael just kept doing what he was doing. And that made him fodder for the comedians and talk show hosts.
“Senator,” I said, trying for an authoritative, but calming voice, “how about we have a few minutes alone?” I suggested, and the staffers looked thankful as they gathered their things and scurried out of the room.
He started in again on the program, but I had just about enough of it, likely thanks to the telltale pressure I was feeling in my temples, leaving me to wonder if it was just going to be a headache, or if I had another all-night migraine ahead of me. So I needed to get this over with as quickly as possible.
“Senator, how about you have a seat?” I suggested, waving toward the other side of the tufted leather couch I was seated on.
Normally, I attempted to stay as far away from the senator as possible.
What can I say? Sometimes—okay, a lot of times—men in power thought that any woman nearby was open game. I learned early on in my career to make sure I hurried right out of events as soon as all the official work was done.
I had no interest in getting felt up by a politician.
It wasn’t my goal to become one of these men’s mistresses or wife.
It didn’t help, in Michael’s case, that I looked alarmingly similar to his mistress. Same wavy blonde hair, same blue eyes, same general body type. The only real difference was she liked to pile on the glam, and I didn’t have time for my makeup to get all runny or smudged, so I went light on it.
The senator sighed as he wrestled his tie loose before dropping down on the couch.
“Why did you send everyone away?” he asked, and there was something slimy in the smile he shot in my direction.
“I need to talk about the more… sensitive matters involving your campaign,” I said, watching as he stiffened.
“Has Aaron caused more problems?” he asked, meaning his illegitimate son with the heavy cocaine addiction.
“Aaron is always… in touch,” I admitted. I’d given him my number early on, so he stopped calling the office, where other people might be willing to use that information against the senator.
To that, Michael shook his head, looking a little more human for a moment. “That was a mistake.”
“It might be smart never to call your son a mistake out loud. It’s not a good thing to get accustomed to saying, because it might slip out accidentally in the future.”
“He’s not my son,” Michael insisted, chin jutting out. “I have my boys already.”
He also had a daughter, but he never mentioned her. The two of them had a falling out twenty-some-odd years ago when she’d gone on a news program and begged everyone in Brooklyn to vote for anyone other than her father.