by Amy Faye
"I knew you could handle it, or I wouldn't have hired you. Even if you didn't know it yourself. I never doubted for a second."
She can't keep the smile off her face well enough to hide it from him.
"I don't want you blind-sided by this, Miss Owens, but I made a few calls last night, and I made a bargain with Ellen Holden."
"Okay."
"I said I'd be on her show next Thursday. Exclusive. I figure that's the first time we give a serious sit-down interview, and then we back off for a while. That sound alright?"
It had better, because the deal was already made, and Adam Quinn was no liar. The accusation wouldn't stick. He'd never been a liar before this, why would he suddenly start to be one now? The answer is obvious enough on the face of it—he wouldn't—but you maintain a reputation by doing it, not by relying on the reputation while you lie your ass off.
"We can make that work."
"Good girl. Now, I need something else. Maybe talk to some of the others about this. I've got a guy coming in, you'll be working alongside him. Think of you as my shield, and him as my sword."
"A guy?"
"I don't know if you've heard his name before. You might not have, you haven't been in Washington too long."
"Okay," she says. Quinn doesn't know if she thinks he's condescending to her. He very well may be.
"I also got in touch with Tom Delaney, and he'll be joining the campaign."
She looks down for a moment, and then nods. "Of course, sir."
"I need you two to sit down, and I need you to figure out how much of a mess you can make in the next eight days. Ellen's got to have plenty to discuss if we're going to make the splash I know we're all hoping for."
She nods. "Yes, sir."
Adam smiles. Now, back to work. He's got a business to run. Then a Presidential campaign for dessert.
Chapter Five
Linda settles into her seat and tries not to think too hard about the looks that she was certain that he was giving her. It's nothing personal. If it was, then it didn't mean anything.
But she could deny the hard gaze that he leveled at her. The way that it made her feel weak. Like a child, all of a sudden. Was it something wrong with her?
She wasn't sure. Couldn't begin to say. And even if she could, she wouldn't want to try if she didn't have to.
Sure, he's got a long history with women. And women have a long history with him.
Sure, he's the man that she was thinking a lot more about than she probably should have been, ever since she was old enough to think about men that way.
That all added up to the reason that she was absolutely imagining things. She could play it cool, though. She'd already had to learn how to do that.
This was just a particularly advanced application of playing it cool and keeping herself under control, after all. Nothing to panic over and certainly nothing to write home about. She turns towards the TV and settles in with a note pad.
At some point, Tom Delaney's going to show up, and then they're going to have work to do. So she'll just have to catch up on whatever she misses later. More than likely, there won't be much to miss, thankfully.
Not until she and Tom get to spreading all kinds of saucy rumors, anyways. It feels strange to think about it, really. They should be trying to keep rumors locked up. Keep everything quiet.
But if the candidate wants controversy, then she can at least try to keep that controversy contained. And if that candidate is Adam Quinn, then that goes double. Jesus flipping Christ. It really is real. He's really right there.
She lets herself steal a glance over. Even at a desk, he's got impeccable posture. His back to her, he looks imposing. Larger than life.
There's an old joke in Hollywood, people expecting actors to be taller. To be bigger. They shoot films that way. They shoot everything that way.
People naturally attach importance and size together. Someone who's important must be very large indeed, and the camera helps to create that image. Important people fill the frame. They zoom in to make people look as big as possible.
Linda's met a few celebrities. The experience is one that she knows well enough. It's always a surprise when you find out that some hot stud is actually five-seven, when he looked big and imposing on screen. It's the magic of camera-work.
Adam Quinn doesn't have that. She met him and immediately thought that he looked so much bigger than he did on television. Like there was something to him that the camera couldn't contain.
The door to the office opens. Maybe they should have had separate rooms for separate things. But it wasn't her job to make decisions like that. Adam knew how he wanted it, and he'd set it up as a massive bullpen.
Linda looks over her shoulder. A man smiles at her and raises his hand as Adam turns to look as well. He's got a toothy look to him. Predatory. She's never seen him in person, but Linda is surprised that Tom Delaney is just like Adam.
She'd seen his picture, once or twice. You have to know who he is, because he's essentially a nuclear bomb in the political world, and you need to prepare for every option at least a little bit.
He looks average from the photos. Tired, maybe. Sometimes. A little past his prime, maybe. From the photos, at least.
Looking at him now, he doesn't look anything like he's past his prime. He doesn't look aged at all. He looks every bit like the mean son of a bitch that his reputation would present him as. If Adam Quinn were a lion, he'd be a hyena.
One proud, the other mean. Neither one of them is something that you want to fuck with on a safari. Those cool little hats aren't going to keep you safe, and your rifle's going to do piss-all if you let them get the upper hand.
"Tom. Glad you could make it on such short notice."
"Please," he says. He's got a memorable voice himself. He speaks with a growl, like Louis Armstrong. "I was already in town. Hoping you'd call ever since I heard the announcement yesterday morning."
"You know me so well, Tom. This is Linda Owens. You'll be working with her. She can fill you in on the details of what you'll be doing. We can catch up later."
"You got it, Adam. I'll hold you to that."
"I wouldn't expect anything less," Adam answers. He turns back again and Tom steps up to the leather sofa that Linda does most of her work from.
'Hyena' doesn't capture Tom Delaney well, either, she realizes. Hyenas are small. They're dangerous because they're mean and they run in packs. But Tom Delaney, he's dangerous all by himself. The look that he rests on her is like an animal looking down on a piece of meat.
"Miss Owens. I saw you on the television last night. Let me guess—Adam sprung that interview on you completely by surprise?"
"Not at all," she answers. What sort of impression is she supposed to give him? What sort of impression does he want from her? And what will he do if she steps out of line?
"Oh, you don't have to be coy with me. I know exactly how much of a son of a bitch Adam Quinn can be."
"I was on my way to the bathroom when I ran headfirst into him."
"Yeah, that sounds like him. You know he left me in Vegas with no car and no shoes?"
"I hadn't heard that one."
"No, I suppose you wouldn't. You'd have heard it if I'd done it the other way around, though, wouldn't you?"
"I suppose so."
"It was a good time getting home. Fun. I'd do it again in a heartbeat."
"Then come to Vegas again with me," Adam calls over his shoulder. "I'll help you lose your money again."
"I would," Tom answers. His gravelly voice has something vaguely alluring about it. A shiver hits Linda again like a lightning bolt, caught between these two titanic men. "But I've got a campaign to run."
Chapter Six
There's good and bad things about having no time for yourself. Every two years, Linda gets to put her life on hold. If there's something left after a year, then she gets to press play again. So far, there hasn't been much luck in that department.
At least this time
, though, Jim left her at a good stopping point. So there's that, at least. She got to press pause on her life, and in that time, whatever ache that's there can go away. Easy as can be.
She got along without him very well. Quite well indeed. Except when she smelled the pine-scented air freshener in her car. It reminded her of his body wash. Sharp and refreshing, a startlingly clean smell.
She couldn't avoid it as well as she would like. She should have gotten rid of the air freshener. Replaced it with cinnamon flavor, or birthday cake, or tropical fruit, or anything else but pine.
But she didn't. She had too many other things to worry about with her time. Shopping for an air freshener wasn't one of the things that she could worry about. Not in a rental car. Not when she'd just be leaving to go on the campaign trail proper come January.
She shivered against the cold and turned up the heat. It came out readily and only blew that pine scent stronger into her face. She closed her eyes and opened them again.
There was a solution to the problem. There was always a solution. She missed Jim. She could call him up. But then she'd have to face the fact that he left her. It wasn't a mutual decision; it wasn't a fact of her job that she was currently without any sort of companionship.
She closes her eyes. There was another solution, of course. Some people in politics have good sense. Not many, and none have enough to be able to go without her services.
But some of them have the good sense to fuck their wives instead of their mistresses. Others, less so.
Still others, somewhere in between, know how to keep their affairs quiet and keep them from attaching strings. Which is exactly what Eric Lang had done.
He'd never been capable of keeping anything a secret from her. He was a terrible liar, and it was honestly a surprise that she'd managed to get him into Congress at all. 'Moral Majority' her ass.
Nor, in spite of his strict promises of secrecy, had he been able to cover up the apparently quite wild sex parties that he frequented.
Linda frowns. She's not the sort of woman to go to one of those. Nor is any man she might be interested in the sort of man to go to one. Right?
Who would go to one of those parties? Nobody that she knew of, not off-hand. Nobody would be caught dead, except maybe Eric Lang. A famously randy man. Womanizer. Couldn't keep his hands off women, and they had a warm relationship with him right back.
Women who weren't Linda Owens, at least, who had on more than one occasion had to make clear the fact that she wasn't particularly interested in what he was offering.
And she still wasn't. But a good fuck would certainly take the edge off. That, by itself, meant nothing. She wasn't going to go picking up guys, not now that she was on TV. She wasn't going to hire someone. That was absurd.
Which left her with precious few options, and the phone number of a man who owed her several favors and somehow managed to have discreet affairs—in spite of having different women every night.
There must be some kind of trick to it. Some kind of system. She could—
Linda pulled into her parking spot and with that shut the thought off by stepping out of the car.
No. She was fine without it. If it was still bothering her by the time she reached her apartment, she could give herself the night off and lay down with no pants on and something that was very much not cable news on the TV until she had completely forgotten about any edge of nervous arousal that had built up.
She hefted her bag onto her shoulder and made it over to the elevator. She had too much work to do to worry about that kind of thing anyways. It would pass in a minute. What on earth kind of rumors could she start that wouldn't stick?
More than that, what kind of rumors could they start that would stick? The question seemed strange to ask. Rumors stick. They're quite good at sticking, surprisingly so.
And yet, the fact was that she had seen rumors come and go about Adam Quinn. Rumors that he was sleeping around on his wife—rumors that, apparently, were true. Rumors that had done little to hurt his public image and apparently hadn't prevented a presidential run in his mind.
And if the preliminary opinion polls meant anything, which they of course did not, then they didn't prevent a presidential run in the minds of the American people, either.
There was a question how Eric Lang managed to find himself with so many women. How he managed to keep it quiet. What that would have done to his campaign, it was impossible to say. Or, it was impossible to say how deep a hole he'd dig for himself.
He'd either lose the race at best, lose his place in politics completely in all likelihood, and very possibly never work again at anything.
There was no question how Adam Quinn managed to get with the women he got with. Nobody who saw him would question it. He was the kind of man who fucked supermodels. He was very much the grown-up version of the high school quarterback who had easy access to all the cheerleaders.
And as far as how he kept it a secret, that much was easy, too. Unlike Congressman Lang, nobody needed to call him up to find out what he did to keep the women quiet.
It was a very easy system indeed: He didn't.
Chapter Seven
It's been three weeks since Adam Quinn has gotten laid. Not so much a choice, or even a result of striking out. Just a fact. A result of his other choices. No need to call someone and make it happen. No need to put much effort into it. They'd come to him, or they wouldn't.
Only, he hadn't been in a position for women to come to him, and only now were his teeth starting to feel on edge. Now that he'd been working nonstop for almost eight years to make the presidency happen, it was finally moving, and it was moving fast, and he was moving along with it.
Which should have been fine. It was fine. And now that it was all paying off, everything was moving so fast that there wasn't time for much else. The extra time he did have, what little of it he had, he had to spend on running his business.
As much as it might seem easy to do both—it seemed that so many people thought that running a nearly trillion-dollar-a-year-in-cash-flow business was as easy as cake—it was proving to take up all of the twenty hours a day he had to spend.
And try as he might to get over it, the lack of relief was starting to frustrate him more than it probably should have.
Adam laid his head back. There were options. There were always options. But you don't play before you're done with your work. You don't eat your dessert before you finish dinner.
There were three things that he needed to get done with the rest of his day. First, he had to send out a memo to his campaign staff. Delaney's idea, which was interesting. Linda seemed upset that she hadn't thought of it herself.
How do you start a rumor? Well, there's a simple way to do it. First, you give information to someone who is just dying to tell someone else. A campaign staffer.
You don't even have to be behind the leak on purpose, not if you know that they'll do it all for you. And, as it happens, that's exactly what they were planning on doing.
Of course, there was one problem, and that was identifying the leak. Tom had a talent for that. He could almost smell weakness in someone. It was fascinating. When he needed someone else to do his dirty work, he'd find them.
When he needed a snitch, he could find them. But it would take time. Time that they didn't have. So instead, they'd have a good old-fashioned honey pot. Something that would be impossible not to leak.
They'd make it look good, privately giving out information. And then they'd identify a small group by the details that they gave out. A half-dozen get to hear, under the strictest confidence, that he'd been around the block with a model. The other half, one of his campaign staff.
Of course… if he had to name names, he knew who he'd pick. She was a damn attractive woman, that much was clear. Not that he needed Linda Owens, or anyone else on his staff, to decide that he was giving some kind of favorable treatment to women who put out.
But she'd okayed the deal. Okayed it right to his face. So she k
new what sort of rumors would start, and she must have known that it was alright. They'd be able to debunk it easily. His whereabouts had been known from the minute he got up to the minute he went to sleep for weeks.
But someone… someone would bite. And then they'd be able to see where the shortest path between two points happened to lie.
That was when the fun would begin.
Adam settled down into a seat and started writing. He'd been composing the emails in his head for a while. A firm, strong denial. A denial of something nobody had accused him of. There was absolutely no evidence that he'd been caught sleeping around with anyone.
Certainly not his campaign manager, and certainly not Miss America. It was completely absurd muckraking, and there was no reason to believe any of it. And if you were to be caught discussing such smut, then you would be fired.
He checked the recipients. Checked the text of the emails for consistency. Then he sent them off and laid his head back. How many reports would come through, exactly? He hoped that his people were honest. That they wouldn't be caught up in something like this.
He'd hired them personally, after all. He'd tried to vet every one. If his staff had as many holes as cheesecloth, then he had some very real soul-searching to do. Serious questions about his own judgment.
But if he had questionable judgment, and if he was unable to find good people, honest people, people who didn't spread rumors, then he'd have found out decades ago. He couldn't have built his empire on the backs of a bunch of desperate liars.
Now he just had to hope that he was good at hiring the right people… only, not good enough. No leaks meant no rumors. They'd have to take the dangerous risk of actually leaking things themselves. And that would be the worst of all available worlds.
Because then, the story wouldn't be 'the untouchable Adam Quinn,' but rather 'Adam Quinn, the man who spreads stories about himself.'
That wasn't the image he needed for himself. He'd built his media persona, his entire media empire, out of muscle and blood and with strong intention. How much of a fool, specifically, would he have to be in order to let himself destroy it?
