by Haley Cass
She’d had thoughts before having the girls of possibly writing her own novel at some point in the future. But she’d been working at Hunter College full time and had been contemplating taking on a doctorate program, not to mention, well, being the wife of a very busy Senator. Who was both a public figure and was becoming known as a trailblazer when it came to how many projects she was involved in and leading.
In the past years, she would never say she’d developed even nearly the taste for the political game that her wife had. But she could say, now –
finally – with confidence that when it came to involving herself in Charlotte’s initiatives and campaigns that she’d found her own taste for them. And it was a time and energy consuming taste.
By the time they’d even conceived Madelyn, Sutton had already decided that she wouldn’t go back to being a professor after her maternity leave until however many children they had were older. And likely not even then, if she was being honest with Charlotte’s career trajectory.
Then Madelyn had been born, perfect and beautiful and time consuming. And by the time Madelyn was nearly two, they’d opted to use Charlotte’s egg for her to carry their second baby, which had resulted in a more complicated pregnancy than her first.
But Ellie had been born just as perfect and beautiful and now doubly as time consuming with both girls. No matter how much Charlotte insisted that Sutton should go back to work if she wanted and that they would make it work – which, she knew that they would if that was what she wanted –
she just… she knew it was the right thing for her to take that time off.
She did enjoy working as a literature professor and wouldn’t have minded doing it as a legitimate career. But the thing that Charlotte just couldn’t understand on a personal level given her own utter passion for her career, was that there was no burning desire inside of her for work.
She’d sated her need for doing something else beyond her family by collaborating with her mother. She co-wrote a book with her in her newest historical fiction series, she’d made an addition into one of the anthologies her mom’s publishers had released – a whimsical, light romance. Those projects were smaller, helped her improve, and got her creativity flowing in a way that she felt thrilled by.
It was more than enough for her to be happy. She had her daughters, her wife, her family, her Regan, her occasional writing side work.
Then, though, Madelyn had started preschool and Ellie was so introspective – meeting all of her appropriate milestones and so responsive to the world around her, but seemed to take it all in with wide eyes and soft coos – and the free time she’d had seemed abundant. There was too much of it and not enough to do, and after a conversation with her mom, she’d started writing her own book.
It had taken only three months for her to write her novel and in that time, the only person who read it was Regan. Who somewhat demanded to read it as soon as Sutton would jot down ideas in her presence.
By the time she revealed it to Charlotte, the rough draft had been complete. And even though she knew she could have probably written utter garbage and Charlotte would never think so, she’d been nervous.
She’d been entirely unprepared for the way her wife’s eyes had been wide and surprised when she’d finished devouring the draft. “This is what you’ve been working on?” She’d asked, sheer shock laced into her tone.
She’d felt sheepish, wondering what her mother was thinking now that she’d been sent the same copy. “Um. Yes? Do you – what do you think?”
Charlotte had been thoughtfully quiet for a few seconds, her voice contemplative. “I think I was expecting something… that you’d done before. Something like what you’ve worked on with your mother, or even some of those romantic tales you spin, and I know if you wrote either one of them, they would be incredible.” A sly grin took over her face, admiration shining from her eyes. “I think I’ve been with you for so long and you still shock me.”
The look had stolen her breath right out from her, feeling herself delight in the praise even as her cheeks flushed. “You think it’s really good?”
Because the literal suspense novel that had ended up formulating in her mind when she’d sat down to write – intending to write just what her wife had thought she would be writing – had shocked even herself.
“I think,” she’d begun slowly, approaching Sutton in a nearly predatory way. “That my wife is a damn genius.”
After receiving similar praise from her mother and then the rest of her family and friends, she’d finally sent it to Nicholas after several weeks of her former mentor-turned-coworker-turned-friend demanding to see it.
From there, everything had gone so fast, leading up to tonight…
She took a deep breath. “Well, you know how Nicholas had sent it to his connection at the publishing house?”
In fact, Nicholas had promptly sent her novel off without telling her first in an entirely unsurprising move.
“Of course.” Charlotte nodded, urging her on.
“Well…” She blew out that breath, her forehead furrowing as she ran over all of her thoughts, trying to process them. “I met with Kym, who’s apparently one of the executives,” she shook her head in disbelief. “And she said – well, she said that she’d accepted the novel because of her friendship with Nicholas and because, um, my name would garner interest no matter what.” She bit her lip, thinking about how that comment had made her feel sick.
And with the way Charlotte’s eyes set, looking like fire wove through them and the way her jaw set, she knew she was feeling the same thing.
“She said that to you? She had to audacity –”
Quickly, she placed her hand on her wife’s forearm, stroking the soft skin there as she interrupted, “Yes, she said that, but then she ended up quite… giddy.” It was the only word she could think of to describe it. “And said that she actually genuinely loved the plot and the writing and the characters.” The astonishment she’d felt at hearing those words from someone whose job it was to find, read, and publish some of the best novels that had been written in the last decade still sat wondrously on her shoulders.
She could feel the tension drain slightly from Charlotte. “Well, Sera,”
her main character. “Is quite like you. It’s impossible not to love her.”
She grinned, wide and unbelievably bashful, as she looked down at her lap, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Actually, she was based more on you.”
She cleared her throat before Charlotte would disagree with her, as she knew she would. “But she – she asked about the future ideas to follow up, and when I told her I only had just started coming together with outlines for the next part, she… she offered me a three book deal, with the first one to be expedited. I’m going to be on the shelf in less than a year.” The amazement that rocked through her was echoed in her voice as she looked back up at Charlotte, eyes wide.
The loose deal had been drawn up over dinner, with the promise of a contract to be sent to her and Charlotte’s lawyer to be reviewed within two weeks. And Sutton had ridden that high all the way home, up until she’d
walked through the door, checked in both of her daughter’s bedrooms to see them sound asleep, before telling Charlotte in breathless wonder. “They want to publish me.”
Then had come… well, everything else.
She drew in a sharp breath as Charlotte quickly, smoothly leaned forward, surging up to her knees to cup Sutton’s jaw and murmur, “I’m so proud of you.”
The sheer, burning love that swept through her at the sincerity in her wife’s eyes nearly took all of her breath away. Even before the rest was swept away in a yelp, as Charlotte pushed forward again, maneuvering her swiftly onto her back, a breathless laugh on her lips even as they both paused, automatically waiting to see if the sound had woken up the girls.
Her knees automatically came up to bracket Charlotte’s hips as the silence of their home remained as much, and she grinned up at her wife.
“We are so lucky that they both sleep like rocks.”
“So incredibly lucky,” Charlotte echoed, nuzzling her way down Sutton’s neck. “We’ll have to thank Isla for those strange mobiles she sent claiming to have sleep therapeutic powers one of these days.”
“We didn’t even hang them up.” She giggled, thinking about the incredulous look on Charlotte’s face when Isla had given them the hideous mobiles when she’d been pregnant with Madelyn, before turning her head into the pillow to muffle both her laugh and the gasping breaths she knew were sure to come.
She could feel her wife’s smile against her. “Semantics, darling.”
***
New York Times Bestseller List
20 Feb 2032
1.
A Touch of Truth by Sutton Spencer
Two women. One disappearance. A million motives. And it seems no one really cares.
Except for her.
Seraphina Thorne never thought that when socialite Emilia Michaels asked her only weeks ago to write her life story, she would actually be writing the story of her presumed death. But when nothing adds up the way it should, she can’t find it in herself to overlook the suspiciousness everyone else seems to simply accept.
In digging deeper Sera pieces together Emilia’s past, what happened to her, and what’s really the truth. The truth that someone will go to any lengths to keep hidden…
Praise for “A Touch of Truth”
“If you believe you know what you’re getting into after reading Spencer’s profound collaborations in Katherine Spencer’s Honor Within series – guess again. Spencer – writing under her maiden name in homage to her literary roots – reaches a level that is entirely different: gripping and authentic with an adrenaline rushed plot and a heroine you can’t help but root for.” – The Washington Post
“Absolutely electrifying! Your heart will be pounding through the entire journey. The wait for the next book, The Rumor of Ruin, is going to be excruciating.” – Publishers Weekly
“A masterful play on words that will seduce the reader within minutes. Filled with vividly depicted scenes, flawed and full characters, and nerve-ending cliffhangers, A Touch of Truth is nothing short of astonishing.” – The Atlantic
Part 7
Charlotte wasn’t entirely certain if it was her who was buzzing or if it was the entire energy of the building around her; perhaps it was a combination of both. She just knew that she knew she was standing on the precipice and she didn’t think she was going to sleep tonight no matter what.
There was the buzzing around her that had only gotten more intense in the last few days leading to this, and yet it felt… somehow different than she’d imagined.
Different, in a good way, but in a way that was hard to explain, even to herself. Which in and of itself felt foreign to her.
The office that had served as her primary campaign base for the last year was milling with people, and she watched them as she tapped her fingers on the edge of her desk, only separated by the main room of her campaign quarters by a glass wall, before light brown eyes fell to her desk, running over the pictures there, which somehow only seemed to magnify this buzzing energy.
She paused, though, on the picture of her grandmother.
It wasn’t one of her private, family photos. Not one of her on a holiday or at her wedding to Sutton or sitting with her daughters; those were at her home.
For her campaign office, she’d chosen and framed the picture of her grandmother that had been taken when Elizabeth had become the Senator of Virginia in 1980. It had happened before Charlotte had been born, her grandmother in the portrait was younger than Charlotte could remember her being in her own memory.
She would recognize the way she looked, anywhere, though.
It was the look in her eyes as she stood in the office Charlotte could remember well; her eyes sharp, with her arms folded over her chest, a small smile just playing at the corners of her mouth. Challenging and knowing all at once. Like everyone else in the world was just a pawn to be played in her endgame.
“This is it,” she murmured, reaching out to brush her fingertips over the top of the picture frame. “Everything you did for me, everything you
taught me… tonight is it.”
Because tonight was the night of the election she’d been waiting for, for her whole life.
The plan she’d formulated when she’d been barely in high school, painstakingly repurposed and revised for years, under the tutelage of her grandmother. With the input of her trusted family members and friends.
Put into practice into this life she’d built with Sutton.
This election against Dylan Becker, a war “hero” and the very antithesis of who she was and what she stood for and what she wanted for the future of this country, had been an uphill battle from the start.
The past two years had been a thrilling and stressful test in her endurance. Using all of the skills she’d learned, taught herself, and cultivated in her fifty years, until everything had been stretched thin.
“Thank you for everything,” she whispered, lightly running her thumb down the silhouette of her grandmother in the picture frame. “I’ll make you proud.” She promised, conviction in her tone only a fraction of what she felt inside.
No matter what the outcome of the election was, she vowed. She didn’t want to face the chance that this wouldn’t work out the way she’d always planned, despite it being a very real possibility.
Her lips tugged into an unstoppable smile, though, as she slid her gaze to the photographs of her daughters, perched next to her grandmother.
Madelyn grinning brightly at the camera, a headband neatly threaded through red hair, and a hand on her hip with the other slung over her little sister’s shoulders, and Ellie’s smile smaller, more reserved, her two front teeth missing while her dark hair was a little rumpled from having been playing before Sutton had snapped the picture.
Her daughters, who she could have lined the office with pictures of, and she wouldn’t be able to see enough of their faces. Madelyn’s thoughtful head tilt, and Ellie’s natural pout… she looked up and out of her office, easily seeking them out in the crowd.
She didn’t know when or how that happened in the last years, but sometimes she felt like she could zone in on them in the world’s largest crowd. It was getting late, but she and Sutton had agreed to let both of them miss their bedtime tonight, to be here the moment everything would change.
It was their future too, after all, and Charlotte’s stomach rolled in that uncontrollable feeling of anticipation and excitement, the weight of what
was surmounting in front of them making the air feel thicker by the moment. Madelyn sat on the edge of one desk, laughing heartily at something Regan was saying, while Caleb milled around with Ellie piggybacking onto him like a koala.
Her girls. Her girls who she hadn’t failed, hadn’t damaged, who somehow became twin lights in her life in a way that she’d never imagined.
Who she’d woken up to this morning as they’d both climbed into her bed and wrapped her into a tight hug, with Madelyn proclaiming, “I can’t wait
’til you win!”
She’d laughed then, filled with the need to at the very least be powerful enough to protect her from any of the negativity that her campaign could have brought to her family’s doorstep.
And she’d done that, she thought, with a nod at herself, smoothing her hands down the sides of her dress. There’d been a lot of bumps along the way, but her family was unscathed.
Her family.
If someone had told her twenty-five years ago that this night would come and would happen like this, she might have laughed in their face.
Certainly would have thought they were unbalanced.
And yet, out there she had a family. Not only her parents, brothers, and Dean, she listed off silently, her eyes seeking them out in the crowd.
But her own daughters, too.
Regan, who’d joined and e
ffectively managed her communications team in a last minute need. A woman whose company she’d hardly managed to be in who she now trusted as much as she trusted anyone who wasn’t her wife.
The Spencer family, all of whom were out there for the night, a group who had become brothers and sisters that she’d never asked for, who were never afraid to tell her their thoughts, but who always showed up no matter what.
And…
Her gaze fell to the final picture. One that had been taken of Sutton on her last book tour two years ago. Her wife was tired from having taken a mini-tour – it had lasted only one month compared to the three month tour her editor had wanted her to take following the booming success of the final book in her trilogy.
The Woman in the Window had outsold even the first of her novels, had been the number one bestseller for consecutive months, and Charlotte couldn’t have been prouder if she tried. She’d adjusted her schedule even before Sutton could possibly ask if she thought she should go on the tour.
She’d been exhausted, but she’d been luminous when she’d read selections from the novel and answered questions from the crowd. And the picture in question had been snapped at the perfect moment in time. Just as Sutton had realized that Charlotte had brought the girls to surprise her on her last stop.
It was sheer joy that was captured in that moment, she knew, as she sighed lightly, happily, staring at the picture with warmth settling low in her stomach.
She’d had a plan her entire life and somehow that plan had been completely reworked and reimagined but had still brought her to this night.
To this reality that felt better than any dream she’d had in the past.
Her eyes skated over Sutton’s picture again, biting her lip as something seemed to shift deep in her chest. Like a knowledge that settled over her, blanketing her with a certainty in that moment.
With that in mind, she pushed herself off of where she’d settled against her desk minutes ago to take a moment for herself. A quick glance at the clock informed her that she had less than ten minutes before the election was officially called.
