DUTCH AND GINA: THE SINS OF THE FATHERS

by Mallory Monroe

  “I doubt it too,” Dutch said, sadly. “It was a set up.”

  “Some friend,” Gina said again. Then she looked at Dutch. “Do you consider the matter resolved?”

  Dutch exhaled. “Inasmuch as it can be with a snake like Max. We’ll see,” was the best he could say about it.

  Gina looked at Dutch. He seemed satisfied, if not completely triumphant, but she still felt uneasy. As if more was brewing. As if that calm, normal life she had been praying for ever since she married Dutch Harber, was slowly but decidedly slipping further and further away.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Dutch Harber, in his tailored Italian silk suit, entered the West Wing the next morning feeling better than he had in weeks. The situation with Max might not be resolved in the long run, but at least it didn’t blow up in their faces. Besides, Max was no fool. Crader had already made clear what would happen to him if he crossed the president. If there were more pictures in his possession, or some videotape somewhere, he had enough moxie to keep it under wraps. So, in Dutch’s mind, that catastrophe at least seemed averted for now.

  But as was becoming the norm for his life in Washington, however, another catastrophe met Dutch just outside of the Oval Office when he walked up and saw his son-in-law lying prone on the bench. He still wore his suit from last night’s birthday celebration, and his blond hair, which was usually pristine, was a spiky, hot mess.

  “Christian?” Dutch said aloud, causing Christian to jump and then open his eyes. When he saw the president standing there, his briefcase in hand, ready to get to work, he quickly sat up. And then stood up.

  “Mr. President, sir,” he said nervously, raking his hair in place. “Good morning.”

  Dutch, however, was frowning. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was. . .” He just stared at Dutch, his blue eyes troubled.

  Dutch looked around. It was early, but the West Wing was beginning to come alive again. He began heading for the entrance into the Oval. “Come with me,” he ordered the young man.

  Christian followed Dutch into the Oval Office, waited in front of the desk as Dutch walked around to his seat behind the desk. Dutch flipped through some documents on that desk that were already awaiting his perusal, and then he sat down. When he sat down, Christian sat down, too.

  “What happened?” Dutch asked him.

  Sex happened, Christian thought, as he recounted to Dutch what he witnessed after returning home from Gina’s birthday bash. He had work to do in his study, so that was where he ended up. When he began hearing noises downstairs, slapping noises, he headed toward the basement. Sam, apparently, had heard the same noises because she was already down there.

  And they both saw it.

  “Saw what?” Dutch asked. He was leaned back in his swivel chair, his hand under his chin, rubbing it, as he stared at his son-in-law.

  “We saw Jade and Marcus,” Christian said, his face distressed. “Making out.”

  Dutch frowned. “Making out? They were fucking?”

  Christian swallowed hard. It wasn’t exactly the word he would have chosen. But it was exactly the right word. “Yes, sir,” he said.

  It wasn’t as if it was unexpected, Dutch wanted to tell the young man. But he didn’t go there yet. “How did you go from catching Jade ‘making out’ with Marcus, to sleeping outside my office?”

  Christian let out a harsh exhale. “I went for Marcus, and pushed him away from my wife. And we started fighting.”

  It was no contest, Dutch knew. Marcus probably beat his ass.

  “It was kind of a one-sided fight,” Christian admitted. “But Sam tried to help me, and Jade made Marcus back off. I then told Marcus he had to get out of my house, but Jade said that you had bought the house for her, not for both of us, and if anybody was leaving it was going to be me.”

  “Jade said that?”

  “Yes, sir. She even got into it with her mother over Marcus. It was a terrible argument, sir, just terrible. And Miss Redding said if Marcus didn’t leave tonight, she was leaving tonight. Jade didn’t say anything. And Miss Redding packed her bags, called a cab, and left.”

  This surprised Dutch. “Where did she go?”

  “Probably caught a plane back to South Carolina the way she packed up everything like that. But I didn’t ask. I was still getting into it with Jade. She was trying to claim that it wasn’t what we thought it was and if I was a better husband to her she wouldn’t be in some basement with another man to begin with. She was talking crazy, sir. She was blaming me for her own wrongdoing. And she meant it, too. She went on and on about it. She said you weren’t there for her when she was growing up, and her mother didn’t treat her with any kind of affection, and she was playing the victim like nobody’s business. I was amazed. It didn’t even sound like Jade.”

  But Dutch wasn’t amazed. Not by a long shot. He picked up his phone, requested a secure outside line, and phoned Jade’s cell. It took forever, but it was finally answered. By Marcus.

  “Hello?”

  Dutch’s jaw tightened. “Good morning, Marcus,” he said, prompting Christian to move around in his seat. “Let me speak to my daughter.”

  “She’s asleep.”

  “Then wake her up.”

  There was resistance to his order, Dutch could tell that, but eventually Jade came onto the line.

  “Hello?”

  “Good morning. This is your father.”

  “Hey, Daddy.”

  “I want to see you here, at the White House.”

  “When?”

  “Now, Jade.”

  Jade hesitated. “Christian’s been talking to you, hasn’t he?”

  “I’ve got to be on Capitol Hill by ten this morning, so I need you over here so we can talk before I leave.”

  “But I’m not even up yet.”

  “Then get up, and get over here.” Then he thought about it. “And bring Marcus with you,” he added, and hung up the phone.

  What was he going to do with that daughter of his, he wondered.

  But he didn’t wonder long. He phoned Ralph Shaheen, head of the Secret Service, and asked if he could find out from his men if they knew where that cab took Sam Redding. He received the answer back within minutes.

  She was actually still in town, Ralph said, and had checked into the Watergate Hotel.

  Which was a fitting location, Dutch thought, considering this family of his.

  They waited in the Residence as if they were waiting on a death row execution. Solemn was the word. Jade and Marcus sat side by side on the sofa, and Sam sat alone, in the flanking chair. It took all she had to even be there after the way Jade treated her last night. But Dutch had phoned and had insisted.

  “You should have seen her, Dutch,” Sam had said to him when he phoned her. “She behaved as if Marcus Rance meant the world to her, and the rest of us could go to hell. She’s never been so disrespectful in all her life.”

  “She’s a troubled young lady,” Dutch said.

  “What are we going to do?”

  “I’ve spoken to her about therapy, but she’s told me a flat no. But I may have to take matters into my own hand.”

  “Good luck with that,” Sam had told him. “You should have seen her last night. I don’t know what happened at that party, but something snapped in our daughter. And it changed her.”

  Dutch had slapped her, that was what snapped, he thought. And she had already changed long before last night. Sam was just blind to the full import of the change.

  “I’m sending a car to get you,” he said. “I need to find out what can be done, if anything, to salvage this situation.”

  And only for Dutch did she agree.

  He had already agreed to pay off her debts. That was already in the works. And not just some of her debts, either. All of them. When he told her, she jumped for joy. She thanked him, and she thanked Gina, too. Jade could say whatever she wanted about Gina Harber, but Sam didn’t see her as anything but an ally.

  And
if there was a better man out there than Dutch, Sam had yet to meet him. He was a true friend indeed. A man whose largess had allowed her to keep her business afloat and her home as well. Paid for in full. That was Dutch Harber.

  And although she knew Dutch would have helped her whether Gina approved or not, she was pleased to know that Gina approved. That kept the stress away. And the idea that she could have stolen that woman’s husband away from her just by showing more cleavage and batting her big eyes was even more ridiculous to her now than it was when Sam first broached the subject. A man like Dutch, she believed, was too ethical to stray that easily.

  As soon as the doors to the West Sitting Hall opened, everybody sat up at attention. But it wasn’t the president arriving. It was Gina.

  “Good morning, everybody,” Gina said as she entered. She was dressed conservatively, in a white and brown cardigan sweater and skirt set, and Sam was impressed with her style. This would be the woman Wham Bam Harber would eventually settle down and marry, and it was no surprise to Sam that she would be a smart, savvy sister. Dutch, she’d inwardly suspected, always favored the sistas.

  Gina offered everyone drinks, everyone declined, and then she sat on the second sofa in the room, the one facing Jade and Marcus.

  “The president had to take a critical call from the German Chancellor, but he’ll be here momentarily.”

  “Okay, you told us, so you can leave now,” Jade said to Gina.

  Marcus looked at Jade, astounded. Or, at least, he was playing the role of a man astounded. “Don’t be rude,” he said to her. “That’s my sister you’re talking to.” He knew he had to keep Gina in his corner. He lose Gina, he lose access. He lose access, he could kiss his plan and all of those millions Thurston Osgood had been floating under his nose goodbye.

  Gina, however, just sat there. She was accustomed to Jade’s little comments. They didn’t bother her. Besides, Gina thought with an inward smile, Dutch had taken care of her little sassy butt last night, and on Gina’s birthday. A kind of ironic birthday gift.

  “So, sis,” Marcus said smilingly, as if, Gina thought, he had nothing to do with why this emergency meeting was being called in the first place, “when are we going to hook up again at Bridge Gap?”

  “I’ll have to check my schedule,” she said.

  “I haven’t heard a word from the director about that job they offered me. Board approval shouldn’t take this long.”

  “It shouldn’t, but I’m sure she’ll let you know. You have to be patient in DC.”

  Marcus didn’t like the way she phrased that, but he continued to smile nonetheless. He wasn’t blowing this chance. He had already contacted his crew. Everything was already set up and waiting for that perfect time.

  It would take only a few minutes longer before the doors to the West Sitting Hall were opened again, and Dutch and Christian came through. Jade was a little uncomfortable seeing Christian with her father, but she played it off.

  Dutch spoke and sat beside Gina. Christian spoke to Sam only, and sat beside Dutch. It was as if the lots had been cast, and the sides had already been taken.

  Dutch, however, didn’t have time to play games or to beat around any bushes. He had to be on Capitol Hill soon enough and he needed to take a break before he left. This little get together was not his idea of a break.

  “Did you allow Marcus Rance to have sex with you last night?” he asked his daughter point blank.

  Gina looked at Marcus and Jade, anger in her eyes.

  Jade decided to deflect. “You don’t know what it’s like, Daddy,” she said. “Christian acts all innocent around you, but you just don’t know.”

  “So it’s my fault?” Christian said.

  “If you were the kind of husband you’re supposed to be,” Jade answered, “nothing would have happened. And nothing happened anyway! Don’t believe that nonsense Christian’s telling you.”

  “It isn’t nonsense,” Sam spoke up and said.

  Everybody looked at her.

  “Stay out of it, Ma,” Jade said.

  Sam looked at Dutch. “In answer to your question, yes, Dutch, your daughter, our daughter, is one fucked up individual who allowed this man to hold her against a wall and do all sorts of sexual things to her.” Then Sam looked at Jade. “And it wasn’t the first time, either.”

  Christian was surprised by this. Dutch wasn’t.

  “I never caught them before,” Sam made clear, “but I sure as hell suspected it.”

  “Well, we can’t help your suspicions,” Marcus said with a smile on his face.

  “But you had sex with her last night,” Christian said to Marcus. “That wasn’t a suspicion. That was a fact.”

  “In your mind,” Marcus said, continuing to smile. “Not in my mind.”

  “Then something’s wrong with your mind because I know what I saw with my own two eyes.” Dutch looked at Christian. It was about time, he thought. “And it wasn’t an illusion what I saw last night. It was you pounding into my wife, not an illusion.”

  “Whatever, Chris,” Marcus said dismissively, which only inflamed Christian’s passion.

  “I trusted you!” Christian screamed. “I invited you into my home. I tried to be a friend to you! And this is how you repay me?”

  “I don’t owe you shit!” Marcus yelled, forgetting to smile. “Jade helped me out. And nobody else!”

  “Jade is my wife,” Christian reminded him. “We’re one in the same.”

  Jade looked at Christian. Dutch stared at her. “One in the same?” she said to her husband. “We aren’t one in the same, what are you talking about? You disgust me. All you want to do is work, work, work. You don’t even know how to have any fun. You’re nothing like me!”

  “You used to think we had a lot in common.”

  “Well, I thought wrong, didn’t I?”

  “What are you doing?” Christian asked, tears coming into his eyes. “How can you talk like this? I love you and you know it.”

  “Stop saying that!”

  “But it’s true, Jade.”

  “Then that sounds like a personal problem to me.” Her face was frowned. “You disgust me, I abhor you, and you’re talking about love?”

  Dutch leaned forward. Gina could see that he had had it with that daughter of his. “Marcus,” he said, “I want you to go back to the house, pack up your bags, and leave my daughter’s residence.”

  But Jade was horrified. “That’s my house,” she told her father. “You can’t control my house just because you paid for it. The title is in my name now. Mine. And Marcus is staying with me!”

  Dutch stared at his daughter. It felt like a game of chess to Gina. “Are you telling me, are you telling your husband, that you’re choosing Marcus over him? That you no longer wish to remain in your marriage?”

  Christian’s heart was pounding as he waited for Jade’s response. Jade seemed hesitant too, it seemed to Gina, but she pressed on.

  “That’s exactly what I’m telling you,” she said to Dutch.

  Christian’s heart plunged. He stared at his wife for a long time. He wiped his tears away but kept staring at her. He thought they could overcome many things. Even last night. Now he knew better.

  He got up, and headed out of the room.

  “Christian, wait!” Gina yelled after him, but he kept on walking. For his own self-respect, he kept on walking.

  Dutch leaned back. Even he didn’t see this coming.

  It was Sam who spoke up through the long silence. “I’m taking Jade back to South Carolina with me,” she said.

  Jade stared at her with horror in her eyes. Marcus stared too. He needed Jade to execute his plan. No Jade, no plan.

  “I’m a grown woman,” Jade said. “I’m not going back there.”

  “Yes, you are,” Sam said without hesitation. “I’m not Christian. And you don’t have me wrapped around your finger the way you do your father. I dare you to buck me.”

  It all flooded back for Jade. The lack of warmth. T
he lack of consideration. The way her mother’s word was supreme and she would knock the fire out of her if she didn’t obey. She lived in pure terror of her mother back then. And even to this day, if her mother, like now, put her foot down firmly enough, she still lived in pure terror of her mother. It was irrational and it was unreasonable. But Dutch and Gina did notice how Jade didn’t dispute her mother’s contention, nor did she say another word.

  LaLa had just stepped out of the shower inside her Georgetown home, and was drying off when the doorbell rang.

  “Great,” she said aloud as she removed her shower cap. She wrapped the towel around her body, knotting it just above her breasts, and hurried to the front door. It more than likely was one of her aides bringing over the draft copy of the speech she was set to deliver tomorrow at the women’s center. But when she looked through the peephole and saw Christian rather than an aide, she quickly opened up.

  “Christian,” she said, urging him inside. The agent in charge of her protection remained on the home’s porch as Christian entered, and she closed the door behind him.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked him.

  Christian kept shaking his blond head, fighting back tears.

  LaLa could just feel his pain. “Come on, bud,” she said as she moved him toward the sofa. “Let’s have a sit down.”

  They sat on the sofa, side by side.

  “Now tell me what’s going on.”

  “I’m so sorry to bother you, La. I didn’t mean to come here and bother you like this.”

  “Will you stop! What’s happened, Chris? Is it Jade?”

  Christian nodded his head. “The President made her come to the White House, and to bring Marcus. The things she said, La. I was amazed.”

  “What things?”

  “About our marriage. About me. She prefers Marcus over me.”

  “Marcus?” LaLa was astounded. “Jade and Marcus?”

  Christian nodded, looked at LaLa. “Yeah. I caught, me and Miss Redding, we caught Jade and Marcus making out. Fucking!” he said angrily. It was a word he’d never used before, but the president had described it correctly. “And then it’s like she blames me. She says she doesn’t want our marriage, La. She doesn’t want us to be together anymore. She says I disgust her.”