“That’s why I called you,” Max said. Then exhaled. “So is it a deal?”
“Oh, it’s a deal, all right,” Jackson said. “I’ll be the fool of fools to turn down this deal.”
Max nodded. He still felt burdened, he knew all of this could still blow up in his face, but at least he was getting somewhere.
TEN
It was well after midnight but Gina remained awake until Dutch made it to bed. She lay on her back, in her short, silk gown, as Dutch, in his boxer’s, climbed in beside her. And he, too, lay on his back as both stared upward, like a couple with too much to talk about.
Dutch looked over at Gina. He still couldn’t get over the terror he saw in her eyes when she saw Liz on his lap. “You’re okay?” he asked her.
Gina shrugged. “Not sure,” she said.
Dutch moved over, wrapped his arms beneath her, and pulled her on top of him. He removed braids from her face and kissed her on her lips. “What can I do to make you sure?” he asked.
“Have you ever had sex with her?” Gina asked, refusing to mix words.
Dutch waited a moment before responding, his eyes still seeing a little of that horror in hers. “No,” he said.
Gina traced her finger around his luscious lips. “Did you want to have sex with her?”
Again, Dutch hesitated. “Yes,” he admitted.
Gina’s heart dropped. “Why didn’t you then? She turned you down?”
Dutch shook his head. “I never asked. I didn’t want to harm our friendship. I needed her friendship.”
“Something harmed it, though,” Gina pointed out, “because I’ve never heard you so much as mention her name since we’ve been together. Not once.”
Dutch placed his hand on her bare backside and began squeezing and rubbing it. “We had a situation that changed things,” he said.
“And what situation was that?”
“There was some concern that she was a security risk.”
Gina’s eyes stared at Dutch. “A security risk? What kind of security risk?”
“It was never proven at all. Just a lot of suggestions that perhaps she was overstating the severity of certain hot spots around the globe to keep the US engaged and to keep the military industrial complex in full force.”
“Why would she want that?”
“The rumor was that she had a side deal with the neo-cons, who ultimately wanted a war with Iran to ensure Israel’s security.”
This interested Gina. “Well was this true?”
Dutch shook his head. “No.”
“But you fired her anyway?”
“She resigned.”
“But after being forced out, right?”
“Right,” Dutch had to admit. He began rubbing her butt harder, holding his squeezes longer, feeling a hard on coming as he continued to touch her. “But I accepted her resignation because politically there was no other way around it. I was two years into my first term, my chances for a second term were bleak, and I was feeling it from every side. So I blinked. I’m ashamed that I did, but I did.”
Gina studied him. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. I’m sure you had no choice.”
“I had a choice,” Dutch said. “And I chose my political career.” He smiled weakly. “Worst choice I ever made.”
“But you aren’t certain she wasn’t a security risk---”
“I am certain, Gina.”
“How could you be certain?”
Dutch exhaled. “It’s complicated, babe.”
“Try me.”
Dutch looked at her. “She loved me too much to have harmed my presidency, all right? I didn’t accept her resignation because I believed that nonsense they were telling on her. I accepted because in politics perception means more than reality. And to the public, it would have been the height of irresponsibility to keep a perceived security risk in my administration.”
“So why did you bring her back to your administration?”
“Because I don’t give a shit anymore, not about any public perception, not about any of it. And because she really is excellent at what she does. She’ll keep you safe. And that, my dear, is all I’m interested in.”
Gina smiled. “So you don’t want to rub her booty?”
Dutch slapped Gina’s butt, causing her to yell ooh and then laugh. “What do you think?” he asked, rolling her off of him and onto her back. “The only booty I’m rubbing, fucking, or otherwise tampering with is yours,” he said, his finger on her lips. “Got that?”
Gina smiled. “Got it.”
Dutch stared momentarily at her, his love for her plain but expressive face swelling within him. He kissed her, and continued kissing her as he slid out of his boxers. His penis quickly stiffened and jutted against her.
His kisses moved from her mouth to her neck as his muscular thigh pushed her legs apart and his finger slid into her vagina.
“I love you, Regina,” he said as his kisses intensified. “I love you so much.”
“I love you, too,” Gina replied, wrapping her arms around him, her body swaying to his touch.
His kisses moved down, from her neck to her breasts to her chest to her mound. By the time his tongue slid in, she was already squeezing the sheet. By the time he began to lick, she was arching her back and bucking against the intensity. And by the time his manhood replaced his tongue, and his thick penis slid into her vagina, her body relaxed to the massaging calm of his thrusts.
For the longest time he thrust into her, with his gyrations slow and controlled. Gina allowed every muscle in her body to feel the easiness of his in and out. Her vagina began to fill with juice as his slow movements began to increase. And then he pulled out, turned her onto her stomach, and reentered her from behind.
As soon as he did, the intensity increased. And then his thrusts began to increase, as his penis moved further and further into her until his massive balls were slapping against her buttocks. And she screamed out. She couldn’t help herself. The feeling of the man she loved fucking her brains out, rending her so overcome with the sensation of it that her control broke.
Dutch’s control broke too, as he fucked her, as his penis slid so deep inside of her that he could feel her walls constrict around him and create an encasement so tight and juicy that he couldn’t hold on any longer. And he released. Like a flood he poured into her and both of them reacted, with his ass jutting up and his big body slamming her down. And then the final push-in as he emptied every ounce of himself. He left nothing in reserve. He left it all inside of her.
After a moment to ease his hyperventilation, he held onto her as he rolled onto his back, and rolled her onto his stomach. He rested his hand on her vagina, grabbing it in a protective hug as they both settled down from the high their lovemaking always took them on.
By the time she eased off of him for her own comfort, he still could not let her go. He wrapped her into his arms, and she moved into them gladly, as they kissed once more and then gradually slid into a peaceful, companionable sleep.
That next morning bought anything but peacefulness. It started early. Gina had showered, dressed, checked in with Little Walt in the nursery, and was entering the East Wing of the White House, balancing coffee and her schedule book as she made her way to the office of the First Lady, when she heard someone talking vigorously in one of the side offices that as early as yesterday was vacant. The door was opened, so she peeped in.
What she saw surprised her. Liz Sinclair, dressed beautifully in a short grayish-green dress, was seated on the edge of the desk, her long, shapely legs crossed, a pair of black-rimmed glasses on her big, pretty eyes. Boxes were all around the office, as if she was just beginning to settle in.
Seated in the chair in front of the desk was the president, his legs crossed also, looking his regular elegant self. He, in fact, was listening intensely to Liz, as if he wasn’t the busiest man on earth but had nothing but time on his hands. Gina was pleased to see him so relaxed. It was the person who was relaxing him that concer
ned her.
Especially the way Dutch looked at her. Gina could see that every now and then his eyes would trail down the length of Liz’s legs, as if he was really admiring the view, but how could he not? Liz was sitting right in front of him with all but a neon light in her lap.
Not that Gina believed anything other than renewed friendship was going on. After the way Dutch made love to her last night, after the way Dutch always treated her, she couldn’t see him entertaining the thought of going down any romantic roads with any other woman. But they were living in Washington, and in this town where even a joke could get twisted into an international scandal, all bets were off.
Liz kept on talking. “It really was a game changer,” she was saying. “And I refused to ever again have a comedian for a client. Flat refused it. I didn’t care what their agents were offering me.”
“Good morning,” Gina said, moving further into the office.
Dutch looked over and saw her and smiled. “Good morning,” he said. “You’re up early.”
“For me you mean?”
Dutch chuckled. “That’s what I mean.”
Gina looked at Liz. “Good morning.”
“How are you?” she asked. “Love that suit.”
It almost sounded like a put-down coming from a stylish woman like her, but Gina went with it. “Thank-you,” she said.
“I’d better run,” Dutch said, rising, “before they send out distress signals.”
“Oh, don’t go,” Liz said, flapping her leg, so desperate to keep Dutch’s attention that it almost looked pathetic to Gina.
“I leave you in good hands,” Dutch said with a smile and turned to his wife. “Take care of her, babe,” he said, kissing her on the lips.
Gina loved when he kissed her, loved the nearness of him, the clean, fresh smell of him. “I’ll do my best,” she said.
“You ladies have a good day,” Dutch said, and left.
“You’re a really lucky woman,” Liz said in what Gina viewed as the first honest remark she’d made yet.
“I don’t know about being lucky, but I’m extremely blessed, yes.”
“I mean who wouldn’t want Dutch Harber?” Liz was smiling now. “That man is the total package.”
Gina, however, remained all business. “I wasn’t aware that an office had been assigned,” she said.
“You mean assigned by you?” Liz asked. “No, I would not have expected you to assign me anything. That’s why I went to Dutch. Since he’s the one who hired me, I consider myself working directly for him.”
“Oh, do you now?”
“Yes, I do. I thought that was clear.”
“Well let me make something clearer to you, Miss Sinclair: you work for me. Not my husband, not my husband’s people, but me. He asked me to put you on my staff, and I agreed to do so, but you work for me. Now if you have a problem working for me, if you find me to be objectionable in any way, then I would strongly suggest you uncross those beautiful legs of yours, slap that fake smile off of that beautiful face of yours, and sail your beautiful ass out of this White House.”
Liz was taken aback by Gina’s forcefulness. She had expected to find a woman under siege; a woman so overwhelmed with the hate she had to endure day in and day out that she wouldn’t have any fire left.
She was wrong.
“Well,” Liz said, still smiling, but more to save face than to pretend gaiety, “I guess your reputation is well earned.”
When Gina wouldn’t respond, when she wouldn’t ask what reputation was that or something akin to that, Liz went on. “You are known, as I’m sure you’re aware, as the bitch of the beltway.”
This hurt Gina more than Liz would ever know, but Gina wasn’t about to show it. “One more comment like that,” she said, “and I won’t give you the choice to leave. You will be fired.”
And on that, Gina turned to leave. Liz’s smile was now completely gone. So the bitch is tough, she thought. But two, she also thought, could play this game.
“What I need you to do for me,” Liz said in an attempt to reassert her own authority, and Gina turned back around. “I need you to provide me with your daily, weekly and monthly schedules. I need to know at all times where you are, where you’re going, and where you hope to go. I need to be included on every manifest that includes you, and I need to accompany you, in your limo, whenever you leave the White House. But even when you’re in the White House but not in your office, I need to know exactly where you are.”
Gina stared at her, slapped on her own fake smile, and then left.
ELEVEN
Dutch and Crader were in the office discussing the latest attempt by the Speaker of the House to once again change the date of the White House conference on immigration reform when Gina arrived. Dutch could immediately tell, by that firm look on her face, that she was pissed.
“What’s the matter?” he asked her.
“That woman, I’m telling you Dutch, may be more than I can bear right now.” Then she glanced at Crader. “Hello, Crader.”
“Ma’am,” Crader said. “Need me to get lost?” he asked Dutch.
Dutch shook his head. “What did she say?” he asked his wife.
“It’s not what she says, it’s how she says it. I know she was once worked for you and has all of these glowing credentials, I know all of that. And I respect that. For a woman to become the security chief at a big corporation like Harber Industries is quite an achievement. But I just get the feeling whenever I’m around her that the last person on the face of this earth she wants to protect is me.”
“Protect you?” Crader found himself asking. “Who is this woman that she needs to protect you?”
“Liz Sinclair,” Dutch said, and Crader nodded. “I see,” he said.
“You know her?” Gina asked.
“I’ve never met her, but I’ve heard about her. I thought she left DC in disgrace or something or other?”
“She did,” Gina said.
“She resigned,” Dutch said, “but I’ve invited her back to work on Gina’s staff.”
“As my bodyguard,” Gina said.
“Your bodyguard?” Crader asked. He looked at Dutch. “Death threats?”
Dutch and Gina exchanged glances. Gina knew that any time they get such hate mail, it does something to Dutch. Once he even considered resigning his presidency and walking away from it all. But he thought about Little Walt and didn’t want his son to grow up thinking that he was a quitter.
“There’s been quite a few,” Dutch said to his friend. “It’s beginning to concern me.”
Crader nodded. “Anything I can do you let me know.”
Dutch nodded. “I will. But I have total confidence in Liz.”
“At least one of us does,” Gina said.
“Excuse me, Mr. President,” Belle spoke into the desk intercom.
Dutch pressed the button. “Yes, Belle, what is it?”
“Loretta King wishes to see you and the First Lady. She says it’s a matter of some urgency.”
Gina looked at Dutch and Dutch immediately pressed on the Nursery TV monitor that sat on his desk. Nurse Riley was playing with Little Walt.
“He’s okay,” Dutch said to Gina, causing her to outwardly sigh relief. “Send her in, Belle,” Dutch said to his secretary.
Within seconds LaLa was coming through the door, and she came with a DVD.
“What is that?” Gina asked her.
Crader was there, which caused LaLa to hesitate for a second. Her heart still pounded at the sight of him.
“You can talk around him,” Dutch said, misinterpreting her hesitation, “he’s a friend of the family.”
“What’s going on, La?” Gina asked her.
“I received a call from a reporter at Fox. They wanted to know if your office would comment on a taped interview that was to be broadcast on their network within the next twenty minutes.”
“In twenty minutes?” Gina asked. “When was this interview taped?”
“App
arently late last night. They didn’t want to go live with it until all of their legal ducks were in a row.”
Gina frowned. “What kind of interview is this?”
“They sent a snippet,” LaLa said, “just the part of the interview they particularly want you to comment on or, even better, agree to a sit down interview yourself.”
Crader took it from her hand and moved over to the DVD player attached to the TV. Gina and Dutch again exchanged glances, both unable to shield their worry; both relatively certain that this was going to be bad.
As soon as Crader pressed Play, it was clear that it was bad. Max Brennan was being interviewed, by an older, male reporter, in what appeared to be a studio.
“Let me make sure I understand you correctly,” the reporter was saying. “Are you saying that you know for a fact that Roman Wilkes and the First Lady had an affair?”
Gina’s heart dropped as soon as she understood what the interview would be about. Dutch, however, showed no outward change, although he, far more than her, was raging inside.
“I’m telling you that I not only know this to be a fact,” Max said to the reporter, “but I was the one sneaking Roman Wilkes into the White House to be with her. Whenever the president would be out of town, or across town attending some extensive meeting somewhere, Wilkes would show up and the First Lady would personally ask me to escort him to the Residence. Once,” he said, and moved around in his seat, for some dramatic effect it seemed to Dutch, “I caught them in the act.”
“The act of making love?”
“Yes,” Max replied. “They were in the Lincoln bedroom. The First Lady was naked and so was Roman Wilkes. I saw it with my own two eyes.”
Gina’s heart began to pound. She sat nervously on the edge of Dutch’s desk, to steady herself. LaLa moved over to her and placed a hand across her shoulder. Dutch could not take his eyes off of Max.
“And he wasn’t the only one, either,” Max went on.
“What do you mean?” the reporter asked.
“There was another man the First Lady used to entertain. I don’t remember his name or anything like that, but he favored Roman Wilkes, let’s just put it that way.”
DUTCH AND GINA: A SCANDAL IS BORN Page 10
