by Amy Faye
The chair they've got her in is only slightly more comfortable than a seat made of razors, but she's got to ignore it, because this rally isn't about her. It's not about her, or really even about Adam. It's about the future President of the United States, Mr. Adam Quinn.
It's a lot of weight for anyone to carry, without a doubt, but if anyone can handle it, if anyone can turn the press around, it's him. The lights are blindingly bright already, and he hasn't even come on yet. Rock music that doesn't seem to have any particular identity other than 'electric guitar and drums' blares out of the speakers.
It's supposed to keep the crowd's energy up. After the first couple of speakers—she'd been one of them, by necessity rather than choice—the crowd was supposed to be a little feverish. With a little bit of luck, hopefully they've done their jobs.
When Adam steps out, it's a mess. A thousand people want his attention all at once, and what's worse, for a long, sickening moment she suspects he'll give it to them. Hands reach out from the crowd, voices raise in alarmed desire to get him to just notice them, please, for an instant.
His back is to her. It feels natural, somehow. Her body flushes with arousal before she can stop herself, at the thought of what could come later. She has to get control of herself. Everyone else is pressed in around her—no doubt the heat of the stage is what's getting to her.
Adam's speech goes without a hitch. He hits all the notes we discussed. It's short, it's dramatic, it's effective. It's everything we wanted.
And yet… something is bothering her. Something that she doesn't want to admit. The crowd isn't reacting. They should be reacting, but they're just… not. Her breath catches in her throat. What's wrong? What did they do wrong? What do they need to do next time in order to fix it? What's the problem?
Deep breaths. She's going to figure it out. That's not the problem.
The problem is when the question and answer portion begins. This was supposed to wipe away the dating gossip. Gossip was the last thing that they needed if they wanted to be successful. It was downright boring, and it wasn't helping poll numbers, even if they had finally stabilized after the leak.
They needed to have people talking about the things Adam cared about—his platform. Jobs, tech growth, education, foreign relations.
Not where he may or may not be laying his head at night. The first person to come up is a picture of the tech-industry. A minor win. She'd have to thank whoever was picking these questions, because they needed to pick right.
He cleared his throat and hesitated for a moment. And then he finally summoned up the courage to ask his question:
"What do you have to say to the rumors that you're in a secret relationship, Mr. Quinn?"
Linda's eyes closed. This was going to be a long night. A long night that didn't help anyone at all.
Chapter Thirty-Five
"That was a disaster." Adam's voice sounded low and angry, even to him. Almost intimidating, but no more than the worst that he'd ever done. The fact that he had to be so upset, though… that was unexpected. At least, it was unexpected when the evening had begun.
The minute he'd walked out in front of that crowd, he'd known. He'd seen it in their faces. The cheering, the excitement, it wasn't what he expected. It felt off, and he'd known from the first word out of his mouth that they'd tuned it out.
Too much of the same-old routine, not enough change. Not enough surprise to pull them out of their rabid thirst for celebrity gossip. Was this all he'd amounted to? A famous person who was trying to run for President?
Was the only reason that people were drawn to him that celebrity, their chance to see one of their small gods celebrated on the grandest stage of all? There was something in the pit of his stomach that told him that eventually, the sheen would wear thin on that.
He could still win. But he'd have to win as a politician, not as a celebrity that they hoped to get cameras on just one moment longer. The gossip was helping, in its own way, but he had to redirect it.
"I'm sorry, Adam, it was my fault. I should have known better." Linda's eyes don't quite meet his.
Part of him wants to agree with her. She should have known better. But so should he. So should all of them. They weren't going to change the momentum of the country without changing their message.
"Don't beat yourself up," he says softly. His fingers tap on the table. "I want to know what happened, and I want to know how we stop it from happening next time."
"The crowd wasn't hot enough. We needed them to be losing their minds. The first few rallies, they were. But it needs to keep going. We need momentum, and we didn't realize how much that momentum had been sapped by the girlfriend rumors."
"Then why don't we address them?"
"It would just be letting them continue to think of you as a gossip-rag star, rather than a serious Presidential candidate," Linda says. But her heart's not in it. She sounds like she's a little bit shocked by how everything went, altogether, and Adam really can't particularly blame her for feeling that way. "We just have to, I don't know. We have to find some way to get their attention back onto your policies, your politics."
"Tom?"
"We can use your celebrity status, and make the hype grow, sure. But Linda's right. Eventually, we have to pivot towards the Presidential campaign, rather than just growing your personal brand."
Adam looked up at the ceiling and took a breath. Neither of them were saying anything that surprised him. Everyone expected something like that would have to happen, or he'd have to cut and run. Let someone else take the Presidency, because there's only so far that people will vote for a cult of personality.
"Okay, how do we do that?"
"A splash?" Linda sounds unsure of herself as she floats the suggestion. "We come out with something sufficiently interesting that people forget about the little celebrity stuff?"
"Okay, like what?"
Tom is keeping uncharacteristically quiet, Adam notices. He's barely said a thing the entire time. Whatever's got him distracted, if he wants to talk about it, he will. But he's not even dropping hints, really. Not speaking unless spoken to.
"I don't know, maybe… a project?"
"What sort of project?"
"Well—I don't want to step on any toes here."
"Say your piece," Adam says, with a hint of impatience. This isn't the time for Linda to suddenly get cold feet and pretend that she doesn't know what she's talking about. If that was what he wanted, then he'd just have hired anybody. This is weeks too late for her to get starstruck and deferential.
"You've mentioned in passing, a few times, that your company's been working on a space-shuttle program on television?"
"Sure. But it's not ready for full-time."
"No, I know. If it was, I assume you'd have talked about the details. But what if we talked about where that was going? Your plans for the future, to revitalize industry by re-igniting the space race?"
He takes a breath and considers the idea for a moment. "'Space race' implies that you're racing with someone, though. Are we?"
Tom's gravelly voice finally cuts through the dialogue. "We can find someone. That's not a problem. You think this is a good distraction?"
"I don't know," Adam answers honestly. "I suppose it's as good as anything."
"Then we go with it. Give it a few days, and then we go to a smaller crowd. Maybe a press conference, maybe we get on the line with MSNBC."
"Go with the conference. I prefer the crowds."
"Alright, then." Linda scribbles a note on a pad of paper. "I'll have Jay take care of it in the morning."
"Good." Adam takes another breath. The temperature in the room seems to be lowering. No more freaking out. "Then let's get to it. We don't have time to be wasting it here, talking amongst ourselves. I'll get to prepping notes, I'll have them in your hands by tomorrow, Tom. Take a look before we get prepped, and we'll try to have put together by Friday. Sound good?"
It sounded good to him. In his mind, it was as good a pl
an as they could possibly get. Now if only that plan were going to all work out the way that they wanted, they might really be able to turn this around.
They'd better, or else it was all going to go bad. He couldn't afford another embarrassment like they'd suffered tonight. Not if he wanted to keep the momentum going.
And once the momentum was lost, once they had a few bad nights, it was only going to get worse. Whatever energy they'd managed to gather over the past few weeks would be gone, and his Presidential hopes along with it.
Chapter Thirty-Six
The first step of anything major that Adam Quinn had done in decades was makeup. If he had his way, then they would have been able to skip that step. But they couldn't, in spite of his preferences. Because there were things that people did because of tradition, and there were things that were done because they were smart. And in the case of makeup, well… it was the smart thing.
People can think clearly, if they try hard. But most of the time, they don't. They prefer to use their intuition, and their intuition tells them that a good-looking person won't lie to them. It's not logical, but it makes sense.
Nobody casts an ugly hero in a film, because ugly people aren't heroic. It's a sad statement on the world, and the people in it. The better that Adam looks, the better that people will receive his ideas. There's no way around it. It's a simple reality.
He closes his eyes as a heavy makeup brush smacks him several times in the eyes. An unfortunate, unavoidable part of the job. His job, first and foremost, is to succeed. As a businessman, he has to find ways to get people to accept his policies, get people to buy his products, and scrape the hard edges off of his personality, just enough that people aren't offended by a womanizing playboy.
That's what some called him. More would do it, if he didn't play nice. But again, it is his job to do so. And he does his job, whether it's to wear makeup or to stand on his head.
"Lin, do you have those teleprompter edits I asked for?"
He opens his eyes in spite of the battering brush. Linda appears before him like an angel.
"They're in."
"Good."
Linda's a little breathless. "You're on in ten."
"Go me," he answers, with less enthusiasm than either of them would probably have wanted. There's a weight in the air. It's the weight of the very real question of what's going to happen if things don't turn around for this. If they don't get people energized.
There are no second chances in politics. He could run again, but he won't. Most people never do, and the rare occasion that they do, it's almost never with a star that burns as brightly as the first time. People don't like a loser, and it only takes one.
In Adam's case, all that goes double. When he announced, two months ago, he was a joke candidate. Or, at least, that was what everyone said. He was never going to be serious, and he shouldn't be taken seriously. But he'd insisted on being taken seriously in spite of all that.
And if he kept it up, then eventually, they'd have to take him seriously. But if he failed this time around, then it wouldn't matter that he'd gone further than anyone ever thought he could. They'd take it as proof that they were right all along, and he was never going to amount to anything. People can win or lose—there are too many factors to ever be certain of anything.
But if you lost because you were a born loser, because you were the wrong fit… Well, he would be branded a born loser. The way they'd tried for years to do already. And he'd never recover, not in politics.
The woman working on his hair runs a last couple of brushes through, and then steps back to admire her work. Adam doesn't get a look. They're in a hurry, as the deadlines creep closer and closer. A heavy brush hits his shoulder, slapping off any dandruff that might have fallen down onto the shoulder of his jacket.
And then they're pulling out the paper jabbed under his collar to catch any stray hair, giving him one last look, and waving. He closes his eyes another moment to put his head back where it needs to be. Deep breath and out into the crowd. It feels like being thrown to the lions.
He opens his mouth to speak, the lights bearing down on him. His eyes hurt from the brightness, but as they adjust he can see the dozens of reporters waiting for him. It's a small group, compared to the speaking engagements he's used to, but a crowd nonetheless.
And he already knows what's coming next.
He can't have another big loss, and he's going to strike out if he sticks with the same old stuff.
So this time, just once, Linda's not going to like it, but he's going to have to throw the press another curve-ball.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Linda didn't regret not going onstage until the first microphone showed up in front of her face. The question was one that she didn't understand at first.
"Is it true?"
Her face screwed up in confusion. "Is what true? The conference, I think, spoke for itself."
That was a lie. Or at least, it could have been a lie, because she didn't know. Maybe he'd been engaging in some kind of performance art, and none of it made a lick of sense to anyone. But that wasn't the Adam Quinn she'd known so far, and she suspected that it wasn't likely that he would suddenly start doing it now.
Another voice spoke up this time. "When did the two of you start seeing each other?"
And it was right around that moment that the entire world dropped into sharp clarity, as if she'd suddenly put on glasses for the first time after a lifetime of near-blindness.
What the fuck Adam Quinn had been thinking when he'd decided to answer their inane questions, and what he'd been thinking when he decided to admit that it was in fact his campaign manager that he'd been seeing, well… it was done now.
She tried to keep the screwed-up confusion on her face as best as possible, in spite of her new-found understanding of the question and why they were asking it.
"Seeing each other?"
A third voice. "Are you denying that the two of you are romantically involved, Miss Owens?"
"I can't say," she snapped. "I need to consult with Mr. Quinn and the rest of my team before I answer any questions."
"But you're not denying it, then?"
The way that they looked at her was like a pack of dogs looks at a piece of steak being dangled in front of them, after days of hunger. No, in their case, days was wrong. It hadn't been days for them. It had been weeks of starving. Almost three weeks now.
They'd wanted it so bad they could taste it, and now here she was.
She didn't answer the question, so another voice called out. The crowd was slowly gathering around her as she walked, microphones and digital recorders and cell phones being pushed close to her face, so they could get as much of whatever she was going to say as possible, as soon as possible.
"Did you get the job because you slept with him?"
A fire lit up inside her, one that she should have snuffed and responded to professionally. She didn't.
"No, I did not, and quite frankly, I resent the accusation, you—" She managed to cut herself off. She could almost imagine the grin on Tom's face if she'd gotten the whole thing out before her brain managed to hit the emergency shutoff. She'd have had to resign but Lord, would it have felt good when she said it.
She took a step, and it was like trying to walk through a brick wall. Nobody moved. A hand reached through to grab her wrist, clothed in a dark suit and attached to a thick arm. She let him take her and pull her through as the crowd of reporters continued their feeding frenzy.
"Are you alright?"
Her hand moved automatically at the sound of his voice. His arm twisted and the slap stopped prematurely in midair.
"You put him up to this, didn't you?"
Tom pulled her through the halls quickly enough that she was having trouble keeping up. She forced her legs to keep moving in spite of it. There was no other choice, after all. She'd either follow, or she would be dragged, but he gave no indication that there was any choice in between.
He didn't
answer right away, and she didn't repeat the question. A woman in a red skirt-suit saw her and the glint of recognition in her eyes hit her in the gut as she slapped the belly of the man beside her, who hefted a camera onto his shoulder and started moving before his face showed any understanding.
They went through a door and Tom closed it up behind. His voice growled low. "Are you okay? Did you say anything?"
"I know better than that, Delaney."
He looked genuinely concerned for a moment, and the way his eyes bored into her made her knees want to buckle under her. The thumping in her chest wasn't entirely from the adrenaline pumping through her after trying to escape. Even now, down the hall, she could hear the woman's cursing at the lost opportunity.
"You do know better, don't you?"
She pressed her back against the wall and took a deep breath, trying to still the beating of her heart just a little bit. Then he leaned in close to her, and instead of slowing down, it just sped up. Skipped a beat. And as he leaned in closer still, her knees shook, and she didn't stop him.
Not until her phone beeped in her pocket.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Linda watched Adam's face as he read, and she was surprised to see the lack of response there. He should have been thinking… something. Anything.
But he wasn't. No emotions at all, as his eyes scanned the page. Then he started back at the top and went slower. His eyes moved less, focused more on the words.
And then he got to the bottom of the page and looked up, tossing the paper onto the table where it was promptly forgotten about, as if she had never given it to him.
"What's this?"
"You read it, you tell me."
"It's a joke, is what I read," he says, and pushes his chair back. "You know I'm not going to accept that."
Linda's eyes closed. "You're going to have to accept it, Mr. Quinn."
