Girl Three

by Tracy March

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Jessie had never been inside her father’s multimillion-dollar Kalorama home and had never expected to be. Yet they sat in his hushed library, surrounded by walls of bookshelves, adjacent to one another in two of three matching leather and brass-tacked chairs.

  Jessie had hesitated as he’d led her to the seating area, panic rising. The chairs were arranged in front of a massive fireplace with a mahogany mantel and a live fire that crackled and spit. She’d flashed back to the night she’d been aboard Philippe’s yacht, fire raging around her, her skin searing. But she’d sat and faced the flames.

  She’d called her father, instead of 911, after Philippe had shot himself. What had happened would affect them both. For once, she’d needed his advice…and his power and connections and emotional distance.

  He had come quickly when she’d called, arriving with a man named Yang. Jessie covered every detail of her confrontation with Philippe. Her father listened attentively, his expression neutral, as if he were on the bench. He’d assessed the scene, sent Yang off on an errand, then called the police chief and advised Jessie what to say to him. After she’d repeated her story to the chief, her father asked her to pack a bag and go to a hotel. She’d gone back to the Embassy Circle Guest House and had a sleepless night despite their warm welcome.

  This morning had been strangely quiet and somewhat surreal. There’d been nothing in the news or online about Philippe’s death, or about Sam. No pictures. No videos. Nothing had seemed to change except Jessie.

  “Philippe killed Sam,” her voice trembled. “He murdered Ian.” Her throat ached from smoke inhalation and the pressure of tears. “I suppose he got what he deserved, by his own hand, but I’m still having a hard time understanding everything.”

  “Sometimes justice isn’t pretty,” her father said.

  Jessie had no argument for that. She supposed he was an expert, after all.

  They sat quietly for an uncomfortably long while, and he shifted in his seat. The blue in his eyes softened from its perpetually sharp hue. “I was blindsided when your mother died.”

  Jessie’s heart flinched at the mention of her mom, and she was shocked by the change in subject.

  “I made difficult decisions that took you and me and Sam in different directions. I didn’t think ahead.” He rubbed his thumb over a brass tack. “I knew I couldn’t handle two daughters, not without your mother. So the boarding schools seemed like a good option. Then you were gone. And I was left to grieve over losing my wife and my family.”

  He looked away from her and took a deep breath, composing himself. “The pain was devastating. To lose the only woman I’ve ever loved.” He rested his elbow on the arm of the chair and bowed his head into his palm. “I couldn’t stand to be with you and Sam. At Christmas, during the summers. Every time I looked at the two of you, I saw your mother. In your faces, your mannerisms, in the way you laughed.”

  How could he have been so selfish? Jessie and Sam couldn’t have changed who they were. And they had needed him. But her arguments couldn’t rewrite the past, so she kept them to herself. He might stop talking if she confronted him, and this was the most honest he’d been with her in sixteen years.

  “I let you go,” he said. “Thinking you and Sam would be fine with financial support and a good education. I never considered what would happen when you became adults.”

  Jessie remained silent.

  “You went off and did your own thing,” he said, as if that had been a relief to him. “But Sam stayed in Washington, got involved with the wrong people, and put herself in too many compromising situations.”

  “Did you ever think she did that to retaliate because you abandoned her?” Jessie asked. “Or maybe she was just trying to get your attention.” A log popped in the fireplace and Jessie tensed.

  He clenched his jaw. “Whatever her reasons were, I had to intervene.”

  Resentment welled in her chest. He hadn’t been concerned for Sam; he’d been worried about his career. “What do you mean by intervene?”

  He straightened. “I arranged a job for her working on the Hill, instead of lobbying for a no-win issue.”

  “No win for you,” she said. “As if it would’ve been better for her to work for Talmont. Like being associated with him would have gained her anything.”

  The sharp blue returned to his eyes. “Evidently it gained her a few votes for stem cell research. That’s more than your abandoned seduction of him gained for you.”

  The fire hissed.

  Jessie sat, mortified. Heat surged through her with the rhythm of her racing pulse. The bookshelves breathed, the books’ jewel-toned bindings undulating before her eyes.

  She couldn’t look at her father.

  “How do you know about that?” Could Talmont be so despicable that he had told him?

  “I know everything that goes on in Sam’s condominium,” he said in an I-wish-I-didn’t tone. “I own it. And before Sam moved in, I had state-of-the-art surveillance cameras and listening devices installed for her protection.”

  Jessie shuddered. Michael had said the place was clean.

  “Just like the DVD of Philippe with Sam,” he said, “there’s one of you and Senator Talmont.”

  Stunned, her jaw went slack. “You knew that Philippe murdered Sam? All this time, everything I’ve been through—you knew?”

  “Yes. I knew, and I covered it up.”

  Oh. My. God.

  Jessie sprang from her chair, the pain in her thigh searing. Several spiteful retorts sprang to mind, but she chose to stay silent and walk away. She had nothing left to say to her father. She’d made it to the library door before he spoke.

  “Run away, Jessica. Just like you always have.”

  She stopped, her back to him.

  “Don’t stay to hear the reasons why I covered up Sam’s murder, why I asked you to stay in Washington, why I sent you those pictures and the DVD. Don’t try to understand…just judge.” He paused. “God knows you come by that honestly.” His words were softer and remorseful, as if he regretted that she’d turned out like him.

  Don’t try to understand, just judge.

  She faced him, the room looking darker than it had before, the shadows deeper on his face.

  He nodded toward her chair. “Sit.” An invitation, not a command.

  She went back to her chair and lowered herself into it, keeping her burned leg straight. When she was settled, she looked him in the eyes. “I’m listening.”

  “I could’ve gone after Philippe immediately. But he would have claimed diplomatic immunity, like he told you. He would have been punished, lost his post, and been shunned back to Canada. But he had deep connections there—deep enough that Canada’s government was unlikely to waive his immunity. Meanwhile, all hell would’ve broken loose with the sensitive information he’d have released about Sam.”

  “The videos and pictures?”

  “Which are now in my possession,” he said, stunning Jessie. “And countless other indelicate details about her life. About her extortion scheme, her egg donation, the party drugs. Her ongoing affair with a married senator.” He glanced away from Jessie when he referred to Talmont. “All the things you’ve discovered since you’ve been here. But you wouldn’t have understood them in context if you hadn’t stayed in Washington. The players, the power, the passions. I couldn’t have conveyed them to you any other way.”

  The oversized clock above the mantel struck eight p.m. Jessie waited through the chimes, counting backward. Eight, seven, six…

  “You weren’t trying to protect Sam,” she said. “You only wanted to protect yourself.”

  “I was trying to shield all three of us, and other people who might’ve been implicated peripherally and unnecessarily hurt.” He looked at her, frustrated, as if he wasn’t making himself clear. “If I had gone after Philippe, the resulting scandal would’ve destroyed my life and yours. Sam’s, too, even though she was dead. At least I let her go with dignity
.”

  Jessie nodded, considering what he had said. Thinking it might make sense.

  “You see,” he said, “sometimes people compromise themselves to reach noble goals.”

  She thought about the things she had done illegally, immorally. All to avenge Sam’s murder.

  He held up his hand. “I’m not saying that it’s right, but it’s a good lesson for someone who might be sitting on a Presidential Commission soon.”

  Jessie felt manipulated. As if he’d pulled every string, orchestrated every movement, and watched every videotaped scene.

  “Is this your idea of parenting?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “No. I botched that years ago. It’s my way of offering you insight, as unorthodox as it is. Of giving you the empathy to be a better person than I am.”

  She had no idea how to react to his contrition, except to keep accusing. “But I almost died—run over, burned, drowned. Philippe could’ve killed me.”

  He smoothed his hand over the crease in his black slacks. “You take pretty good care of yourself. I wasn’t really worried. There was someone I trust looking out for you.”

  Jessie cocked her head and narrowed her eyes. “I don’t understand.”

  He got up and stepped over to his desk. “You will in a minute.” He unclipped his cell phone from his belt and made a call.

  She strained to hear anything on the other end of the line but all she heard was the sizzling fire.

  “It’s Croft,” her father said. “Are you close by?”

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Several minutes later, the doorbell rang. Jessie’s father went to answer it, leaving her in the library to dread what was coming next. She laid her head back on the cool leather chair and gazed up at the stonework over the fireplace and the rough-hewn exposed beams in the A-frame ceiling, none of it familiar to her. She was a stranger in her father’s house.

  The hollow feeling made her long for home—her little cottage on the vineyard. Far away from Washington, where she could recover and try to make sense of her father’s scheme. But that would take time. Maybe forever.

  The fire had died down. It warmed her feet and danced in her peripheral vision, but she couldn’t stare at it straight on. That would take time, too.

  Footsteps clicked on the tile in the foyer, then clacked on the library’s hardwood floor. Her back to the door, Jessie lifted her head and straightened but didn’t turn to see who’d come in. She was done with her father’s games.

  “Jessica.” Her father walked past, then faced her. “I think you know Michael.”

  Her blood stood still.

  Michael stopped next to her and dared to meet her eyes. She held his gaze long enough to see his please-let-me-explain plea, but then looked away. His eyes were weary, with an undercurrent of vulnerability that she hadn’t remembered.

  Her heart balled into a fist. “You were working for my father?” Her voice came out weak and dazed. She covered her mouth with her hand, fearing she might throw up.

  Her father sat in the chair across from her and offered the one beside her to Michael. The leather creaked beneath them.

  “He wasn’t working for me,” her father said. “He was working for you.”

  “Don’t speak for him.” Jessie’s energy returned, fueled by betrayal. She glared at her father, then at Michael. “Speak for yourself.”

  Michael nodded. “After I left the Secret Service, I was hired by your father to watch out for Sam. He also gave me referrals to build my security consulting business.”

  “What?” Jessie asked. “That doesn’t make sense. Why didn’t anyone mention that you were Sam’s bodyguard? Why didn’t you?”

  “No one knew,” Michael said, avoiding her gaze.

  “He wasn’t a bodyguard in the traditional sense,” her father said. “I hired him to monitor her, report her activities, and to make sure she was safe.”

  Jessie scowled. “Like a snitch? Who followed her around, but she didn’t know?” Then she remembered what her father had said about installing surveillance equipment in Sam’s condo. “And you watched her on camera, listened to her conversations, invaded every aspect of her privacy—without her knowledge?” The pitch of her voice rose with each question. “How can you justify that?” She pressed her fingers to her temples. “To make sure she was safe.” She mocked her father’s voice. “All that, for what? She’s dead.”

  Michael bowed his head and a silent moment passed. “I was off at the time, attending my dad’s funeral.”

  Jessie stiffened against the pang of sympathy she felt for him, and the sadness in his voice. “Did you know that Philippe killed Sam?”

  “No. Your father chose to keep that information from me, too.” His words were scathing and resentful.

  “Well, at least you didn’t lie about everything while you were following me around, eavesdropping and monitoring the cameras…” Jessie’s thoughts skidded to a stop. Michael knew about her abandoned seduction of Talmont. He might have seen the embarrassing drama play out before she’d changed her mind.

  Her father gave her a knowing look. “There are things that we’re all going to have to forgive.”

  She could swear that was the first time she’d ever heard him utter that word.

  “Michael proved to be loyal, honest, and dedicated,” her father said. “Difficult to find in this city. Anywhere, for that matter.”

  Michael faced forward, the fire reflecting in his eyes. He held his chin high, his neck tense, as if he were expecting a punch.

  “He’s tempered like you, Jessica. So when you came for Sam’s funeral, Michael and I agreed on another contract.” He reached inside his sports jacket, pulled out a folded packet of papers, and slid it across the table toward her. “Have a look at the highlighted clause.”

  Suspicious, she unfolded the papers and scanned the documents. On the second page, a section highlighted in yellow read: Physically and emotionally, refrain from developing a relationship with Jessica Ryan Croft.

  One look at Michael told her that he knew what she’d read.

  “I had a choice,” Michael said. “To adhere to that contract, or risk my reputation and career in Washington.”

  Even now Jessie winced at her father’s strong-arm tactics.

  “He chose you.” Her father emphasized each word. “He lied for you, obfuscated, quit—then turned around and saved your life…twice.”

  Twice?

  Her father nodded. “Philippe didn’t kill himself. Michael was there. He shot him from outside the window.”

  Jessie sat speechless for a moment, then turned her gaze to Michael, her heart heavy with guilt and fear and hope. “I’m sorry I—”

  Michael gave her a look that told her it was okay, that they’d resolve their differences later—away from her father.

  She understood.

  Her father tossed the contract into the fire. Jessie turned away. The light in the room flared as the paper burned.

  “That,” her father said, “is the past. Now we figure out how to move forward.”

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Jessie’s stomach fluttered at the distant sound of gravel crunching beneath tires. She stepped into her bedroom and stood in front of the antique cheval mirror, giving herself a final once-over. Tugging her lip between her teeth, she second-guessed her outfit—a camisole and a ruffled taupe cardigan, and jeans tucked into suede boots. Sam’s boots.

  She swiped a lock of hair behind her ear. “You look fine,” she told herself. Since when was she so concerned with what she wore at home on a Saturday in late February?

  Since now.

  Since the vehicle churning up gravel belonged to Michael.

  It had been a month since she’d left DC. A month of sifting through her emotions about Sam, her father, and Michael. A month of living with the stranger she saw in the mirror.

  The floorboards on her covered front porch creaked, then came several sturdy raps on the door.

  She opened it
and faced Michael. Her heart tumbled.

  He stood there with a nervous half smile, holding a bouquet of pink tulips in one hand and balancing two Starbucks cups in the other. He had a newspaper clutched under his arm, and the breeze blew his hair across his forehead. “Looks like I’ve got the right house.”

  Jessie smiled. She took the cups and tipped her head. “Come in.”

  She led him back to the small kitchen—updated in ivory and sky-blue. Sun streamed through the window across the table for two. She set down the cups next to a plate of cookies that Lois had baked for them.

  The moment her hands were free, Michael took her in his arms, letting the newspaper fall to the floor. Tissue paper crinkled as he clasped the bouquet at her back. He pressed her head to his chest, his lips to her hair.

  She relaxed against him, her stress easing.

  “I missed you,” he whispered. “But taking some time was the right thing to do.”

  She had left Washington the day after her father had come clean about how he’d set up both her and Michael. Their emotions had been too raw to make sense of them at the time. They’d agreed that if they had any chance of being together, they needed some time apart.

  Jessie pulled away and held him at arm’s length. He looked different than she remembered. Still remarkably handsome with his five-o’clock shadow and tousled hair, still fit and sexy. But not as tense through the jaw or as tight around the eyes. Maybe this was Michael, relaxed.

  “I missed you, too.” As she put the tulips in a vase and set them in the sun, the awkwardness of everything unsaid settled between them.

  “It’s a balmy forty-five degrees outside,” she said, her insides a bundle of nerves. “Want to have our coffee on the porch?”

  “Yours is hot chocolate.”

  Jessie smiled. He’d remembered her order from Kramerbooks. Michael picked up the bulky newspaper from the floor and grabbed their drinks. She put on a jacket and they went out on the small porch. It faced west, along with two white rocking chairs and a huge pot of pale yellow pansies.

  They sat in the crisp morning air, rocking.