Primary Season Read online

  I drank some of my own beer and tried to keep my expression blank.

  “We all know Patrick’s a flirt.”

  “You’re damn right about that,” I said.

  “Anyway, I heard he kept Kelly on staff because she knows everyone and she runs that office better than anyone else. Plus, who knows what Kelly has on him?” Heather studied me. “I just want to make sure you don’t…end up like her. I know it’s none of my business, but don’t let Patrick manipulate you. It won’t end well. Trust me.”

  I thought about the text message on my phone, the one waiting for a reply. Probably a good thing that I hadn’t answered. Perhaps Heather had a good point. Patrick had made all kinds of promises about what he wanted to do after the election, but right now, that’s all they were: promises.

  He could change his mind whenever he wanted, and where would that leave me?

  When I found Alex in the hotel lobby after breakfast the next morning, she greeted me with an icy smile and tight eyes. Not the expression I wanted to see on her face. I cringed.

  “You should have today’s schedule in your email,” she said. “Not as many planned events as yesterday, and if you want to, I thought we’d invite the media along this afternoon as we do some old-fashioned canvassing of a few neighborhoods.” Alex shoved her hands into her pants pockets. “Makes for a nice visual.”

  “I reviewed the list on the elevator.” I looked down at my Omega watch. “Good work.”

  “Thank you. And if you need it, there’s a coffee station just around the corner. I know how much you like coffee.”

  “That’s not the only thing I like,” I said, lowering my voice. “I also like it when people return my text messages.”

  “There wasn’t anything to say.”

  “Wasn’t there?”

  “I had work to do. Someone needs to make sure this campaign doesn’t go off the rails.”

  My attention flicked across Alex’s body, taking in the smooth curve of her hips, the swell of her breasts underneath the black blazer, and the way a small strand of pearls danced across her neck. I wanted to kiss that neck, and those lips. Hell, I wanted to do more than just kiss them.

  “I waited up last night, hoping to hear from you,” I said instead.

  “Too bad. You needed your rest.” A small flicker of a smile danced across her face.

  “In case you’ve forgotten, I’m your boss, and when I message you, I expect a reply.”

  “Or what?” she said, overemphasizing the O. “What will you do to me?”

  The red stain across her lips seemed darker and richer than usual, and it emphasized her stark-white, almost perfect teeth.

  “You don’t want to find out.” I searched her face for a flicker of anticipation, but I wasn’t sure I found it. “Don’t test me.”

  Alex made a move as if to step past me, but I caught her elbow and pulled her behind a large column in the hotel lobby.

  “Listen,” I whispered, once I was reasonably sure no one else could hear us. “I know things are complicated right now, but I can’t shake the feeling that there’s something else bothering you.”

  She glanced around the column.

  “You can tell me. I promise.”

  “Okay,” she said on her next exhale. “I had a good chat with Heather last night. Illuminating. She…elaborated…on some of the things that happened in the DC office.”

  “Ah,’’ I said, still speaking so that only she’d hear me. “She told you about Kelly.”

  Alex’s left eyebrow raised.

  “Kelly misunderstood things.”

  “Seems like that happens a lot to you.” Alex chewed on her lower lip as she studied me for a breath. “You know, when it comes to women, you like to keep things interesting.”

  “That’s one word for it. I’ll admit my past is unconventional, but that doesn’t mean the future has to be that way, too.”

  “You’re my boss.” She closed her eyes and sank against the column. “I keep going back to that. We both have a job to do, and that job is to get you elected.”

  “So let’s do that,” I said, tightening my grip on her. When she opened her eyes, I was almost afraid she’d end the moment by simply walking away from me. “We can think about the future later.”

  Alex didn’t reply.

  “I have a private dinner meeting tonight with Senator Jameson and his daughter, Julie, at the Palmetto Club,” I said. “Kathryn can’t go; she’s flying to New York this afternoon to have dinner with her father and do some damage control with the Van der Loons. I could really use someone on my staff there tonight.” I swallowed. “Will you join me?”

  “I don’t— I mean, I…”

  “Please,” I said, not caring that I was begging her. “I can’t think of a better person to be there than you.”

  Her mouth twisted, pulling on one side of her face, but she didn’t break my gaze.

  “The campaign needs you,” I said. “I need you.”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “Good.” I smiled. “And wear your black wrap dress. It’s my favorite.”

  “Do you know how hard it is to be the only Democratic senator in the great State of South Carolina?” Dwight Jameson said after the waiter at the Palmetto Club poured a round of coffee for the table. He spoke in a thick, slow, careful drawl. “Do you know how hard I had to fight for this?”

  “I can guess,” Patrick said.

  “Guessing is all you can do, son. The Republicans don’t know what to make of me. Like seeing a purple leopard in the jungle.” He laughed and gave his daughter a look. “But I like the fight. A challenge is good in life, and it keeps things interesting.”

  “And that’s why I’m asking for your endorsement.” Patrick sipped his coffee. “We’ve worked together on several bills in Congress, and we know each other pretty well. I like to think we’re of the same mind on a lot of things.”

  “We are.” Dwight paused as another waiter arrived with four servings of chocolate mousse. “But I don’t make it a habit to endorse candidates prior to the primary. Haven’t for the last two cycles, and I don’t plan on doing it this time, either.” He picked up his spoon and gestured at the rest of us. “Dig in.”

  As I scooped out my first bite, I cleared my throat. A three-hour dinner with Senator Jameson and his daughter at one of Columbia’s most exclusive clubs hadn’t accomplished a damn thing, and as soon as we finished our desserts, the moment might slip away from us forever.

  Time to throw a Hail Mary pass.

  “Senator Jameson, why did you run for office in the first place?” I asked, just before I took the first bite of mousse.

  “I was young,” the Senator mused, his eyes crinkling. “And I thought I could make a difference. I thought I’d be able to help people.”

  “I’m not a reporter.” I smiled. “Give me a real answer.”

  Julie Jameson giggled. She hadn’t said much at dinner, either.

  “Okay, I’ll bite.” Dwight settled into his seat and studied me. “I suppose because I knew that no one else could do the job as well as me. No one else could handle it the way I could.”

  “Same with Patrick,” I replied, nodding. “No one else is going to work as hard or do as much as Patrick Blanco. You’ve seen Howard Sayers. Heard from him. Maybe even talked to him. My guess is, you know exactly what we do.”

  I leaned forward to get my point home.

  “He doesn’t get it. He simply doesn’t, Senator. He doesn’t have Patrick’s experience or the commitment, and I’m not talking about time in elected office. I’m talking about heart. I’m taking about drive. And I’m talking about grit.” I gestured to my boss. “Grit is what separates the ones who try from the ones who succeed. If you endorse him, you won’t regret it.” I lowered my voice. “And trust me, you’ll be the one to ride this train all the way to DC and beyond. He’s going to remember who was there with him first. Don’t you want to be one of them?”

  Dwight Jameson studied me for a long
breath, and I stared right back at him, willing my words to sink in and take effect. Finally, he grinned. “She’s a pistol, Patrick. Where did you find this one?”

  Patrick smiled back at him. “What can I say?” He tapped the table next to my dessert plate. “Alexandra is one of the best. I wouldn’t be where I am without her.”

  “I’m not going to make my final decision tonight.” Dwight wiped his mouth with the white cloth napkin. “But I’ll think it over and have someone in my office contact you tomorrow morning. That’s the best I can do.”

  “We’ll take it,” Patrick said, not bothering to hide the hopeful excitement in his voice. “I look forward to hearing from you, sir.”

  As the four of us finished our meal, the conversation shifted from politics to small talk. Then, as Dwight told a joke, Patrick’s fingers brushed mine under the table.

  “You did it,” I said in the elevator once Alex and I returned to the hotel after dinner. I punched the button for our shared floor and the door closed, walling off the two of us. “If he endorses me, it will be because of you.”

  Leaning against the elevator railing, she smiled to herself and glanced down at her shoes. “I’m not taking credit for that.”

  “You should. We just had a three-hour dinner and no movement on the issue until you stepped in.”

  “I was just eager to get out of there.” She looked up at me, and I caught a faint hit of her perfume. “I can only drink so many overpriced glasses of wine at stuffy dinners before I want to leave.”

  “Don’t ever run for public office, then. You’ll have to do that, and eat fried butter on a stick at county fairs, barbeque made by local yokels in towns you can’t remember, and pies everyone insists are the best in the nation…” I trailed off and waved a hand.

  “Sounds like I should expect to gain an automatic thirty pounds.”

  “You’d still be beautiful,” I said, my voice falling, even though no one else would hear us. “Nothing could take that away from you.”

  Then I took two steps, shoved her against the elevator wall, and kissed her.

  I couldn’t help myself—not that I tried to stop it. My mouth forced hers open and her soft body melted into mine; I knew she liked it, and that she wanted it, too. Our tongues feverishly entwined, and my hands went everywhere in the span of ten seconds. I tangled my fingers in her hair, cupped her jaw, raked my palm across her neck, teased her breasts, and pulled her hips toward mine. Through it all, my lips never broke away from hers.

  Until the elevator dinged our arrival and the doors opened to the empty hallway.

  “I can’t take it,” I said. “I don’t want to wait. I want you now.”

  “I want you, too,” she said under her breath. “I keep trying to deny it, but I do. I don’t want to lie to myself anymore.”

  “Five minutes,” I whispered in her ear. “Let me drop off something, and I’ll be at your room in five minutes.”

  She didn’t argue.

  The five minutes felt like five hours.

  “I thought you wanted to keep this professional,” I said in a mock-serious tone when she answered the door to her room. “No more blurred lines.” She stepped aside to let me walk in, and I closed the door behind us.

  “I’m allowed to change my mind, right?”

  “I was hoping you would,” I said as I reached for her. “And damn, I’m glad you did.”

  My lips met hers. I walked her backward until the bed buckled her knees and we both fell on the mattress, our lips never parting. I combed my fingers through her hair and skimmed my hand down her neck as I murmured her name between kisses. God, this felt so good.

  “Let’s get you out of those clothes.” I said when I couldn’t take any more. “Now.”

  I untied the strings of her wrap dress as Alex kicked off her black pumps. My mouth traveled down the swell of her chest to the top of her breasts. She pushed herself into the mattress, and closed her eyes. I teased her with my touch, elongating the moments as we explored each other. After our lips met again, we collapsed on the bed. She moaned against me and I opened her dress, trying to savor everything about her. She unbuttoned my shirt and yanked it over my shoulders; I followed her lead, raised up, and pulled the rest of it from my body. Then I kicked off my loafers and stripped off my pants. I was already hard, and it showed through my boxer shorts.

  “So much for being professional,” she whispered.

  “Professional is overrated,” I said as I returned to her on the bed. “Tonight, it’s just me, you, and this room.” I kissed her jaw, her cheek, and then her lips. “There is nothing else. No one else. Just us.”

  She smiled. “Just us.”

  “I’m going to devour you,” I said with a growl. “But first, I’m going to savor you.”

  “So…I didn’t expect that tonight. At all,” she said in the darkness a few hours later as we still lay beside each other.

  I rolled over, raised up, and propped my head in my left hand. I studied her face, which I could barely make out in the moonlight. “And if I have my way, it won’t be the last time.” I stroked her shoulder and the top of her right breast with my index finger, drawing an invisible line up and down her body. “Of course, it’s entirely up to you, but I know what I want.”

  “We hardly know each other,” she said.

  I frowned. “That’s not true. I know plenty about you.”

  “Oh, really? Like what?”

  “You went to Tulane, you’re from Omaha, you can drink anyone under the table, and you’re great at your job.” I got out of bed, walked over to the minibar, and produced two Diet Cokes from the small fridge. “You have great taste in underwear, and you can fuck like no one else.”

  “Not good enough,” she said as I handed her one of the drinks. “That’s all surface stuff, and not the real me.”

  “All right. Shoot. Tell me something I don’t know.” I climbed back into bed and kissed her nose. “Something secret.”

  “Hmm.” She twisted her mouth. “Let me think.”

  “I’ll go first. Not really a secret, but it is a funny story.” I paused. “When I was twelve, I got into a huge fight with the school bully. His name was David Erlichmann; he and I planned it for like three weeks. It was afterschool, on the playground at Warren G. Harding Elementary.” I raised an eyebrow. “And he’d been calling me ‘Fatso Blanco’ for as long as I could remember. I punched him in the nose, and he fell down crying. Bleeding everywhere. We thought his nose might be broken.”

  “So you won the fight?”

  “I did.” I started laughing at the memory. “But then I felt so bad about it that I had him come with me to our house, just two blocks away, and I confessed everything to my mom. I was grounded for three weeks.” I shook my head. “I was one of those kids who couldn’t just roll with things. I always felt so bad about everything.”

  “What happened to David?”

  “He’s a lawyer in Cincinnati now. Married, two kids. We still keep in touch some.” I shrugged. “Sort of became best friends after that. At least, throughout high school.”

  Her gaze roamed over my body. “So I just had sex with Fatso Blanco, huh?”

  “Guilty as charged.” I glanced down at my chest. “But I like to think CrossFit has helped with that.”

  “And now I know why you go so much.”

  “Try to never miss a class.” I kissed her. “I’m really not that bad of a guy underneath. Just driven. A perfectionist. Focused.”

  “And you want to be president more than anything else.”

  “Of course. Doesn’t everyone?” We kissed again, and then I smiled against her lips. “Your turn.”

  “Okay, I thought of something,” she said as she pulled away. “My first time wasn’t…good.”

  “No one’s is. Except mine.”

  She laughed and playfully socked me in the arm. “I mean it. Senior year. Homecoming. I was queen.” She nodded as if to confirm something she figured no one would believe. “And my boyfr
iend at the time was a guy named Justin Brandeis. We were— He said he loved me and I believed him.” Alex raised an eyebrow. “We had sex, and it was okay, but little did I know, he was filming it with this camera he’d hidden on a chest of drawers across from the bed.”

  “Jesus Christ.” I recoiled. “Did he put it on the Internet?”

  “No, but he threatened to.” She rolled her eyes at the memory, and I thought I saw a flash of pain beneath her beautiful eyes. “It made for a—let’s just call it an interesting senior year. A lot of people at school saw it and everyone had an opinion.” She shook her head. “Probably why I went to Tulane and never looked back. Omaha doesn’t have much for me.”

  “And that’s why you’re so driven. You’ve seen what life looks like without a safety net.”

  “Yep.”

  “Of course now, here you are, sleeping with your boss.” I grinned. “I have to admit, I’m glad you are.”

  “Good,” she said, and pulled me toward her. I took the soft drink out of her hand and set both of them on the nightstand.

  “Where were we?” she asked.

  “Right here,” I said, and my lips found hers.

  I woke the next morning about five minutes before my usual alarm. We didn’t have anything on the schedule until eight thirty but I’d planned on working out and getting a head start on the constant emails, the pile of which grew larger with every passing day.

  Instead, I turned on the light and stared at Patrick for a long time. He slept fitfully, turning, twisting, and frowning as he dreamed. I shook him a few times, but he didn’t stir until I turned on the TV.

  “What time is it?” he asked in a sleep-coated voice. Seeing CNN’s morning show on the screen, he straightened up in bed.

  “Around five.”

  “What are they saying? Anything important?”