I have no idea how much time passes, and then the door opens, and Rick walks in with Rachel in one arm and his free hand holding Cara’s.
I jump up, waiting for them to tell me what to do. I feel so helpless. Jake gingerly lifts Grace to her feet before gracefully gaining his own. He shakes Rick’s hand, patting him on the back before turning to kiss Cara’s cheek.
“Black?” I hear Jake ask, and Cara bites her bottom lip as tears well in her eyes. My heart goes out to my friend, but I’m also dying to know where Ryan is.
“He was shot.” She sniffles.
“I know, honey,” Jake replies.
“It was my fault.”
“No,” Rick bites out.
“He’s right,” Jake says. “Ryan did what he was going to do, what I knew he was going to do.”
Rick shoots Jake a pointed glare that says they’re going to talk later, but for now, he’s letting it go. Clearly, Jake had all the plans, while everyone else only had bits and pieces.
Jake’s phone rings, and he pulls it out of his pocket. “Alexander,” he whispers to Rick and Gus, who seem to know what he means.
“Hello?” Jake answers.
“What the fuck is going on?” I hear a man’s voice roar, and Jake moves to the other room.
“I should take her upstairs,” Cara says, and lifts her hands to take Rachel.
“I’ll be there in a minute,” Rick replies as he transfers the weight of his eight-year-old daughter from his arms to her mother’s.
“I’ll keep you posted,” Jake says as he pockets his phone before turning to Rick. “Where is he?”
“Bethesda Memorial,” Rick answers, and I realize they’re talking about Ryan. He’s in the hospital.
“If the press reach out,” Jake says, turning to me, “he was injured in a hunting accident. He’s taking time to recover but will be back on duty soon.”
“So he’s well?” I ask and realize that one question showed more about my true feelings than I intended, and I instantly want to pull the words back into my mouth. One glance at the gentle but concerned looks Rick and Jake are now both wearing tell me all I need to know. And it’s not good.
“We don’t know much,” Rick says gently. “He’s still at the hospital.”
“Sure, sure,” I say quickly. Too quickly. “I’m just trying to form my plan of attack.” I can see no one believes me, but that’s fine.
“I’ll have Grace call you when I know more,” Jake assures.
“Sure,” I respond. “I should go.”
“I’ll have Gus drop you off on the way,” he says. “We should be going too.”
“My car—” I start to say, but then I realize Ryan picked me up this morning and how weird it was that he showed up all sweet and friendly on my doorstep after he hit it and quit it—again—last night. “That would be appreciated.”
“Of course.”
“I can get a cab or an Uber if it’s too far out of your way.”
“It’s no problem,” Jake says. “Shall we?”
“Of course.”
Grace and I follow Gus and Jake out to the car, and he opens the door. We all file in before Gus closes it behind us. He climbs in the passenger seat, and the driver takes off.
I sit silently in my seat while we ride. The sun is setting, and it glows a beautiful muted orange and pink through the tinted windows of the car. I see Grace turn to me a couple times out the corner of my eye, but I don’t react. I just pretend like I don’t notice her.
I hold in my sigh of relief when we pull into my driveway—just barely. I somehow manage to hold it together and not fling open my door and run screaming from the vehicle and into the night—again, just barely.
Gus steps from the front passenger seat and opens my door for me.
“Thank you,” I say to him quietly before turning to the other occupants of the backseat. “Thanks for the lift. I’ll see you Monday.”
“I’ll call you if I hear any news,” Grace says gently, and the way she watches me makes me nervous. I know she sees more than I want her to. I’m good at holding in my emotions. I have to because of my job and who I am. But with Grace, it’s like everything is laid bare. “Are you going to be all right?”
“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?” I ask and pray she doesn’t call me out while I stand on the curb in front of my best friend’s husband, who just so happens to be the president of the United States, and his secret service agents.
“Just wondering,” she says, eyeing me suspiciously.
Gus shuts the door behind me and walks me to my front door. I pull my keys out of my purse and let myself in.
“Thanks again, Gus.”
“Any time, ma’am.”
The heavy front door shuts behind me with a thud. The click from the latch sounds throughout the quiet room, and I stand there, staring at the cold marble floor where Ryan fucked me and left, as I wait for the sound of the president’s car pulling safely away.
I had thought, for the briefest of moments, that maybe he could be mine. I was so hurt and angry after he left me. And when he came back to me again and again, I still knew he wasn’t for me to keep, and I let him have me anyways.
And as always, I was angry afterward.
But now I’m scared.
No. I’m not scared. I’m terrified. I’m terrified I’ll never see his smile when someone says something he finds amusing, even if it’s almost never me who does it because I frustrate him beyond belief. And I’m terrified I will never see the hungry look in his eyes when he wants me, that I’ll never feel the way he makes my body melt into his hard one.
But most of all, I’m terrified I’ll never get the chance to tell him how sorry I am that I disappointed him, that I couldn’t be all he wanted me to be, because I learned the hard way a long time ago that I can only be me and no one else.
Finally, I drop my bag on the table under the big gilt-framed mirror in the entryway. There’s a large copper bowl at one end, and a tall crystal vase full of fresh cut flowers at the other end. My purse, I often set in between. I fish out my phone from its depths, make sure the ringer is on as loud as it goes, and set it down.
My hands shake and my legs feel weak. My heart is racing, and I don’t feel so good. I haven’t had a panic attack in a long time. Now isn’t the best timing for one, but they never seem to come when the time is right anyway.
I don’t want to take medication, because I need to be alert when Grace phones with news, so I make my way into the kitchen and hold the kettle under the tap to fill it. I place it on the burner to heat while I pull down a mug and drop my favorite tea bag into the cup with the string and tag hanging perfectly down the side.
What I could really use is two Xanax and half a bottle of chilled chardonnay, but that’s not going to happen.
When the whistle on the kettle blows, I jump and then turn off the burner while trying to force my heart rate to slow down. My hand shakes as I tip the kettle to pour the water into my mug, and I have to brace it with the other. I’m sure I look like a ridiculous adaptation of an actor on a cop show.
I set the kettle back on the stove and wait for my tea to steep. It’s hot. I could never drink anything that was steaming hot, so not only will it need to steep, but it will also need to cool down after that. This, I know, will take some time.
So I pace.
I have to move my body when there is this much nervous energy bouncing around inside me like a bunch of demented pinballs in a broken machine that won’t reset. So I walk all around the ground floor of my home.
I check my phone what seems like a million times, and there is not one message or missed call about Ryan. There is one from Grace though.
GRACE: Are you all right?
ME: Fine, why wouldn’t I be?
I don’t want her to worry about me, so I keep it vague. She doesn’t need any more stress in her life. While I have never had one, I’m sure it can’t be good for the baby. I would never forgive myself if something happened to G
race or the baby because of me.
ME: Go relax. Stress can’t be good for my godchild. Go read that baby book you love so much.
GRACE: You’re an asshole. You know how much I hate that book.
ME: I do know, and I also know I’m your asshole.
GRACE: That you are.
ME: Go away.
GRACE: Fine. Call me if you need me.
ME: I will.
I won’t. I’m pretty sure we both know it too. But that’s all right. I’ll be fine, because I always am.
I grip my phone in my hand. It’s been well over an hour, and even longer since Rachel was rescued and Ryan was shot. What the fuck is going on? And why haven’t we heard anything? I’m pretty sure that if something happened—good or bad—Grace would have phoned. She’s my person. She wouldn’t let me down. Actually, I know for a fact that if Ryan died, Grace would be here to hold me while I cried and mourned the man who would never be mine but who I care for anyway. Her team of secret service agents would look on uncomfortably, because Grace knows, even if I’ve never shared the words with her of the complicated emotions I feel for him. She would do whatever was needed if I were headed for a crash of that magnitude. So he’s not dead. Thank God.
But still, I have to know.
So I drop my phone in my bag and scoop out my car keys before running to the garage. I open the garage door, jump in my car, and drive like a tasteful bat out of hell toward the hospital. It wouldn’t do for me to get arrested for reckless driving. The Associated Press would just love that.
I pull into the parking lot, unsure where to go, so I park by the emergency room and walk as quickly as I can through the automatic doors and straight to the desk.
“Can I help you?” the nurse asks me, and I freeze. There is no way in hell they are going to give me the information I need, so I do the only thing I think of on the spot, which is undoubtedly the wrong thing to do. I lie.
“Yes. My boyfriend was injured earlier today in a hunting accident, and I was told he’s here.”
She looks at me for a long time and must see something in me that she can trust, which is both wonderful and horrifying at the same time. The panic inside me is still welling up. I need to know Ryan is okay. Until the, I’m drowning in it.
“He went into surgery a little while ago,” she says softly, and my heart seizes in my lungs. Surgery. Oh God, it’s worse than I thought. She takes in the tears welling in my eyes and continues. “He should be out soon. You can go through those doors to the elevator and take it to the fifth floor. Heddie is the nurse there. She’ll have more info for you.”
“Thank you!” I say before I run for the doors. She pushes the button to unlock them right as I hit it and push through.
I take the elevator to the fifth floor like she said and push through another heavy door with a little rectangular glass window in it into another waiting room. There aren’t many people, but it also isn’t empty. There’s an older man holding a purse and a jacket in his lap. And then there’s a woman, probably ten years older than me, who’s beautiful with short, no-nonsense blonde hair and fair skin with just a few attractive wrinkles by her eyes. With her are two teenagers. The girl sits with the woman while the boy stands. He looks at me for a second, and then I look away.
“Hello, can I help you?” the nurse who I assume is Heddie asks, and since my little white lie downstairs worked, I try it again up here, thinking I’ll get the same results, but boy am I wrong. I would never have imagined how wrong I would be.
“Yes,” I answer with confidence I should not feel. “My boyfriend was injured in a hunting accident earlier. I was told he was up here in surgery.”
She looks at me for a moment, and I’m hoping she doesn’t realize who I am. That’s always a possibility when your face is on C-SPAN and every cable news outlet only every damn day. “And your boyfriend’s name?”
“Ryan Black.”
I am so wrapped up in my own panic that I don’t feel the tension of the room go wired. I should have. I’m good at reading a room, and that’s no lie. But this time, I don’t feel it. I’m too driven for my need to find out if he’s all right. I need to see it with my own eyes.
“What did you say?” the teenage boy asks from across the room, and I freeze.
“Nothing,” I say, turning to him with a gentle smile on my face. “I’m just trying to find out some information about someone. I’m sorry to have disturbed you.”
I should have noticed that the beautiful blonde and her daughter turned to look at me as well. Or that the nurse was looking a little nervous just now. I don’t take in any of these things. Instead, I press on with my harmless white lie like an idiot.
“Did you say Ryan Black?” he asks. They might recognize his name. It’s no secret the president’s aide-de-camp is named Ryan Black. It’s also a common first and last name, so who knows. Either way, I don’t think twice about answering.
“Yes, why?”
“Because this is his wife and children,” the nurse answers before the boy has a chance to. “I was trying to find a way to tell you, but sometimes ripping off the Band-Aid is best, child.”
“I’m sorry?”
“He’s my dad,” the boy says kindly, not angrily. “You’re his girlfriend?”
“Umm…”
“My name is Caleb, but most people call me Cabe,” he says gently like he’s talking to a spooked animal, and he takes a slow, intentional step toward me. And then another.
“I think there’s been some kind of a mistake,” I whisper.
“I don’t,” he says, and I see now that his dark eyes and hair frame a face still a little soft with the last bit of youth, but this almost-a-man undoubtedly was born to Ryan. Shit. I need to leave. “I’d like to talk to you.”
“I think I should go.”
“No!” he says sharply. “Don’t do that.”
“I’m so sorry,” I say on a sad smile. “I intruded, and I didn’t mean to.”
“Lacy, go get Dad,” Caleb says to the girl, and now it’s my turn to shout.
“No! Don’t do that, honey,” I reply, softening my tone. “I’m so sorry.”
“Lacy, go,” he says again. His eyes never leave mine.
“No, no, there’s no need to do that.”
“Lacy, baby, I think you should go get your daddy,” the blonde says, and my eyes swing to hers. “Now.”
She doesn’t look angry, more inquisitive, and she speaks in a melodic twang that’s a softer version of Ryan’s. It breaks my fucking heart, because I know without a doubt this beautiful woman and their two gorgeous children belong to Ryan like I never would.
“Let’s just talk,” her handsome son says as his sister gets up and pushes through the door. I swing my head back to look at him, and I feel my panic surge to new levels.
One thing is certain, and I should have been paying attention to my gut, because it’s never steered me wrong before. I don’t belong here, and we all know it. I refuse to step farther into the room and sit down to talk—or worse, wait for Ryan who is apparently fine to come and set me straight in front of his beautiful family. God, now I know why he was so angry after he took me. He didn’t want to, because he has a family at home waiting for him.
The truth slaps me in the face.
In all the things I have said and done in my life to get where I am now, I never compromise my morals. I grew thick skin, and I can take a heavy dose of criticism, but never, not ever did I lower my standards. That is until I let Ryan Black fuck me on the marble floor of my foyer and I became the other woman.
I feel sick to my stomach.
“Dad will be here in a second,” the girl says when she pushes back through the doors.
I can’t believe this happened. This isn’t me. This is not who I am, and if I’m anything, I will stop this right now. So I do the only thing I can.
“I’m so very sorry,” I say softly, letting out the full meaning of the words I’m feeling for what I’ve done. “I shouldn’t
have come here.”
And then I turn and run.
“Wait!” the blonde with the tinkling bell voice shouts, but I push through the doors. I hit the button for the elevator again and again. God, please let the doors fucking open. “Caleb, do something.”
And then praise Jesus and all the baby angels, the elevator doors slide open, and I practically jump inside, hitting the button for the ground floor as I do. Ryan’s son is there just as the door is about closed, and I will never for as long as I live forget the sad expression on his face that says just how sorry he is that this is happening.
“Don’t do this!” he shouts, and then he’s gone.
I don’t wait to find out what happens next. I run out of the elevator, through the emergency room, and out to my car long before Ryan, his son, or any other member of their beautiful family can find me and tell me what an awful person I am.
I jump in and pull out of the lot, not sure where to go. I don’t want to go home, so I drive around for the longest time. My phone rings over and over in the seat next to me, but I don’t answer it. I pull into a fast food drive-thru and get more junk food than I should. I already feel sick, so this won’t change that.
It’ll only make it worse, voice tell me, but I ignore it.
But as I drive away with my greasy paper sack, I find I’m not really hungry at all. I sip my shake on the way home, pull into my garage, and park my car. I toss the takeout bag on the counter and chuck my shake cup in the trash. I open the fridge and pull out an open bottle of wine. Pouring it in a glass, I then tuck the bottle under my arm before scooping up my paper sack and walking into the dark living room. I set my bounty on the coffee table and plop down onto the couch.
I don’t bother to switch on the lights, but I do turn on the television to an old movie channel. It’s a black-and-white flick, and you can just tell it’s not going to have a happy ending. Thank God. I don’t think I could handle that right now.
The Press Secretary's Passion (A Presidential Affair Book 3) Page 6
