"And how do you think your chances are for the bill's passage?" the host asked next, after taking a moment to recover from the energy of Alicia's response.
Alicia sighed, her eyes dipping down. "I wish that I could promise that it would pass, as I hope," she admitted, "but it's going to be a tough call. Last time, I thought that I had the votes, but the bill didn't end up coming through. This time, I feel like my fellow senators are even more jaded and reluctant to stick their necks out for change by voting for a bill like this one."
"Doesn't sound good for your bill's chances," the host admitted sympathetically.
But Alicia smiled back at him. "Well, last time I thought the bill would pass, and it failed. This time, I think the bill will fail, so I'm hoping that it will pass!"
"Sounds like Yogi Berra's kind of logic," the host chuckled, but he was laughing along with Alicia, not at her. Her undeniable charisma had already charmed him, won him over to her side. Tanner felt a pull of longing, deep in his gut.
But more importantly, he knew that, as it stood now, Alicia's bill wouldn't pass. No bill fared better when it was introduced for a second time.
This education bill, just like the first one, would founder and die-
-unless he helped.
In that moment, Tanner wasn't even thinking of winning Alicia back. But he knew that he owed her this, that this was his one chance to make right the injustice he'd caused, the sin that had weighed on him for the last two months.
"Hey, Derrick!" he shouted casually over his shoulder.
Derrick Scott stuck his bald head out of his office. "Yes, Keegan?"
"I quit. Your campaign's the political equivalent of a dumpster fire, and I hope you burn with it. Enjoy watching porn in your office until the funds run out."
And as every single staffer stared at him, their mouths hanging open, Tanner left to go catch the first available flight to Washington.
Chapter Twenty-Four
*
Two days later, Alicia Stone sat on the floor of the Senate, fighting the urge to bite at her fingernails. It was an old habit, one that she'd suffered with as a child and fought against when she entered college. She'd weaned herself away from it, mostly by throwing herself instead into studying and typing, other things to keep her hands busy, but she still occasionally felt the urge to pop a nail into her mouth and bite down.
Her bill was next up. Funding Our Children in the United States - FOCUS. Talking about the bill on talk shows, she had realized that she needed a catchy name. That night, she spent an evening with a bottle of wine and a notepad, rearranging different combinations of words until she found a halfway decent acronym.
Unfortunately, despite all her work to drum up support, despite her upbeat tone with the reporters and on the press circuit, Alicia knew, with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, that the bill didn't stand a chance of passing. Already, she was starting to hear talk from her home state of disappointed voters growing disillusioned with her. They were mentioning her campaign promise that, if she couldn't pass her platform, she wouldn't seek re-election.
To be honest with herself, Alicia thought, she probably would end up acquiescing to their wishes. After this bill failed - if it failed, she reminded herself, try to stay positive - she didn't have much more energy to stick around and watch other bills go nowhere.
The Senate Majority leader, a disagreeably mild man called McConnor who bore the unfortunate physical resemblance to a surprised turtle, pounded his gavel on the podium and cleared his soft voice. "And now, we turn to the next bill, Senate Bill 1672, the Funding Our Children in the United States."
Here it came. Even Alicia had been surprised by how vehemently the Republicans tore into her, from the moment that she let slip that she intended to try and pass her education bill a second time. If she didn't know better, she might have guessed that they were actually nervous that they wouldn't be able to bring it down a second time with their scummy tactics!
But this time, the Republicans ended up not needing to worry about resorting to underhanded tactics. After the first bill failed, they had ruled the airwaves and television channels, pointing to this bill as everything that was wrong with the government process, why Washington remained in gridlock. Nevermind that they had voted against the bill themselves - no one needed to focus on that minor detail. Instead, this was just a small symptom of the larger problem of young, inspired people trying to drag fresh ideas into the stodgy and dusty chamber of the Senate.
Duecent had tried to talk her out of it, Alicia thought miserably to herself as McConnor droned on, reading off the sponsors of the bill. That was a man with good self-preservation instincts, if lacking in a spine. He could sense which way the wind was blowing even before it started - a great skill for someone managing a campaign, but far less useful once his candidate won her election.
As soon as Duecent heard Alicia explain that she wanted to take another crack at education, he told her that it was suicide. He fretted over how this would hurt her in poll numbers, how this would affect popular opinion of her...
He thought about everything, in short, except how it could help America.
For just a second, sitting there in the Senate chambers, Alicia found herself thinking back to Keegan Tanner. Just for a moment, she let herself daydream, picture what would have happened if the man stuck with her, stayed on her side, didn't betray her.
The bill would have passed the first time, for one thing. Tanner probably would have been out of a job, that was true, but she immediately would have snapped him up. With Tanner, instead of Duecent, acting as her chief of staff, she couldn't imagine her office running as anything less than a well-oiled machine. He'd probably have half of her requests filled even before she could speak them aloud.
And then, knowing that he wasn't just her campaign manager, but also the man taking her home each night...
For the last two months, Alicia poured her energy into her professional work. Being a Senator didn't leave much time for dating, in any case - a fact that Alicia found herself appreciating. She didn't want to think about filling that gap, trying to find another man to step into the hole that Tanner left behind.
Sometimes, late at night after a little too much wine, Alicia found herself remembering how their bodies had come together, how well she slept with him lying beside her, his arm draped lazily over her, marking her as his. He understood her, cared for her, challenged and pushed her, in ways that no one else ever had.
And, she feared, in ways that no one else ever would.
In the dark of the night, in those moments, Alicia felt tears prickle at her cheeks. She knew, deep down, that she'd loved Tanner. She never told him, never put it out there, never knew if he felt the same way. But it was love, sure enough, and that little flame still occasionally flickered to life in her breast when she thought of him.
She knew that he wasn't in Washington any longer. A press release, a couple of months old now, mentioned that he was starting to work for the Scott campaign, down in Florida. It would be a good challenge for Tanner, Alicia remembered thinking. She'd heard plenty of rumors about Scott, almost none of them positive.
And with Tanner off in Florida, maybe, eventually, she'd figure out how to move on past him and forget about him. Maybe, eventually, the last little stubborn flicker of love in her chest would finally extinguish itself and die.
"And now, we'll call the vote. If you could direct your attention to casting a vote..."
Alicia reached out for the button on her desk. The Senate used an electronic system to collect the votes from its members; instead of waiting for her name to be called and verbally stating her vote, she could simply select "Yea" or "Nay" via the button on her desk, and her vote would be automatically cast, counted, and tabulated.
A large board in the Senate chambers, mounted on the back wall, displayed the vote counts. Alicia looked up at it, trying to steel herself to watch her second - and likely final - attempt at education reform die.
/> To her surprise, the numbers in support of the bill seemed higher than she'd expected. She saw significant opposition - already, more than a quarter of the Senators had voted against the bill - but this was almost tied with the number of votes in favor! Alicia found herself glued to that screen, unable to look away, her heart pounding in her throat.
Both numbers inched upward. This was going to be a close vote! Around her, Alicia heard muttering from some of the other Senators as they also tuned in to the numbers, watching to see if the bill passed or failed.
And then, as Alicia held her breath, crossed her fingers, and prayed, she saw the number of votes for the bill pass the number of votes against it!
The bill was going to pass! And indeed, as she watched, the last few votes trickled in, almost entirely in the "For" column. Finally, with more than ninety Senators voting, the tally for the bill stood at 61 votes for the bill to pass, 33 against it.
Alicia stood up from her desk, still staring at the display as if fearing that this was some sort of joke. Her brain felt paralyzed, trapped, unable to think. This couldn't be happening, couldn't be real.
She turned and looked slowly around the chamber, her mouth hanging slightly open. This couldn't be real. She'd talked to most of the other senators, knew that they weren't going to vote for it. Most of them, sadly but firmly, told her to her face that the bill just wasn't strong enough to pass, especially after failing last time.
How could this have happened? It wasn't possible, didn't make sense.
Alicia didn't know what pulled her eyes upward, up from the floor of the chamber to the visitors' galleries that hung overhead, balconies on the second floor looking out over the proceedings. Inexplicably, her gaze rose up, moving to the middle visitors' balcony.
And there, impossible to miss, sat Keegan Tanner.
Even from across the room, Alicia knew him instantly. She saw the sweep of his hair, the strong features of his face in profile, even caught a glint from his eyes. He wore his classic black suit, although she caught a glimpse of blue at his neck - a blue tie, rather than a red one. His eyes were on the board displaying the results of the vote, and although the distance was too great for Alicia to know, she thought that she caught a flicker of a faint little smile on his face.
A moment later, however, he stood up and turned around, clearly intending to leave.
Alicia's body kicked into action without waiting for input from her mind. The next thing that she knew, she was flying forward, running out of the Senate chamber and sprinting towards the stairs that led up towards the visitors' galleries. She didn't know which exit Tanner might use to leave, but if she made it up there before he could pick one-
Her legs burned as she pounded up the stairs, her breath coming hard inside her chest. She rounded the corner, cursing these classy, professional outfits that didn't give her enough room to breathe, to move.
And there he was. Tanner stood in the hallway, still, as if waiting for her.
Alicia skidded to a stop, her shoes squeaking on the marble floors beneath her feet. Tanner looked up as she approached, and Alicia saw a complex mixture of emotions painted across his face: fear, sadness, regret - but also triumph, shining through the rest of the mix and turning up the corners of his lips, ever so slightly.
Broad, strong lips, the kind of lips that Alicia knew would deliver an amazing kiss. The lips that, try as she might, she hadn't been able to stop imagining, softly finding her own and pressing against her.
"Hi," she said.
As soon as those words left her mouth, she grimaced a little; what was she thinking? Hi? Like they'd only just seen each other a few days ago, like two months hadn't passed with no contact between them? Like she didn't remember how they separated because he betrayed her, crushed her chances of passing this bill back when it had been a slam dunk?
"Hi," he said back, a strangely unfamiliar tone in his voice. Was he nervous?
Silence reigned between them for a moment. Alicia felt her body betraying her, slowly drawing closer to him. She nodded towards the doors that led into the Senate chamber, trying to fight the heavy blanket of desire that strangled her ability to form sentences, to think clearly.
"That was you in there, wasn't it?" she asked.
His lips definitely turned up. God, she missed that smile. It really transformed his whole face, softening his hard lines and revealing his warmer side, the side that she'd only discovered after peeling back his shell, those hard shields he kept up in public.
"I don't know what you're talking about," he answered, knowing that she saw through his lie, knowing and not caring.
"I didn't stand a chance. I knew that I needed to pass that education bill, but I also knew I didn't have the votes. I went in there prepared to watch it die." Alicia paused, looking at him, fighting that fish hook in her stomach that pulled her towards him. "Why?"
"Again, I'm not sure what you're-"
"Oh, cut the crap," she snapped, the words leaping out of her before she could catch them back. Her eyes widened - she didn't mean to yell at him - but Tanner's smile grew wider, as if he'd been waiting for her to call him out on his bullshit.
"Because I needed to fix the mistakes I've made," he answered, taking another step towards her.
God, she wanted him. "And you think that's enough to fix them?" she asked, raising an eyebrow, trying not to let herself get drawn into those strong arms, let him pull her against his broad chest. "One vote is enough to make up for all the hurt you caused?"
He shook his head. "No. It's not nearly enough." For a minute, the smile left his face as his expression clouded - but his eyes refocused on her, and the smile bloomed again, brighter, like the sun coming out. "But it's a start. One step in the right direction."
"Okay, one step done." She really couldn't think. She wanted him so badly, ached for him to somehow say the right words to make it all better. She didn't know what those words could be, but she needed him to say them. "What next?"
Less than a foot between them. His smile grew softer, his chest rising as he took a deep breath.
"This," he said. "I love you, Alicia."
Everything around her seemed to freeze, the air crystallizing. What?
"I love you," he repeated. She'd asked that last question aloud, apparently. "I knew it months ago, but I was an idiot, threw it all away. I realized that I made the worst mistake of my life, and today was the first step to try and repair that damage. I know that you'll never forgive me, that I can't take back what I did, but I want to-"
"Oh, shut it," she whispered, and gave in to that tidal wave of desire crashing through her head.
She took the last step forward, closing the distance between them. His big, strong arms were around her, pulling her towards him, needing her, as she finally met those lips and kissed him.
Chapter Twenty-Five
*
"How did you do it?"
The question slipped out of Alicia in two breaths, slightly muffled by the pillows around them. Tanner, also looking significantly out of breath as he lay beside her, thrashed his way up from the tangled sheets to peer down at her. "What?" he asked.
She repeated the question. Tanner's bare, brawny arms and shoulders threatened to distract her, but she could hold out for a few more minutes, she insisted to herself. After all, they'd already broken her dry spell - twice. She didn't need to be a total slut, just throwing herself at this man, over and over-
Scratch that. She wanted to do exactly that. As soon as Tanner answered, she said to herself, she'd jump his bones again.
There was a decent chance that she'd kill the man from pure sexual exhaustion, or at least temporarily cripple his ability to walk for a few days, but it was worth it.
Tanner, meanwhile, tried to assemble his thoughts. She wanted to ask him about politics now? While they both lay naked in her apartment, still gasping as they rode out the aftershocks from their last shared orgasm?
Still, he tried to pull together a coherent answer.
<
br /> "How did I get the votes?" he repeated the question back. "The same way that I killed the bill a few months ago. Talked to people, presented the bill in the right way to make them agree with it, called in a few favors."
"But if you got all of those people to see it as evil before, how could you get them all to flip and instead see it as good-"
He pulled her in closer, still marveling at how she fit so snugly in his arms, the tingle of her bare skin as it pressed against his own. "It's all about framing," he said. "You should know this, of all people - you're a politician!"
"A very new and inexperienced one, remember."
"Ah, that's true. I can see that I'll have to teach you a few things." He slid his hand down over the curve of her hip, and she needed no instruction to wiggle in closer against him. For a moment, he found himself very distracted from the conversation.
"But in any case," he managed after a second, "a lot of it is just playing up the strengths and talking down the weaknesses. Convince them that the bills are different enough to count, that the first one, although it failed, started the national conversation. Talk about new cost savings, even if they were in the previous bill as well. Point out how their vote on this bill, once it passes - and I promised them that it would pass - would be a great talking point in their reelection campaigns, how it would help them with some of the school and teachers' lobbies."
After a second, Alicia just shook her head. "I think I'm going to need to learn a lot from you," she said, her tone considering.
"So, does that mean that you want to keep me around? This isn't just a one-time thing?" Tanner kept his voice light, but he did wonder whether she'd considered any sort of plan past dragging him back to her apartment and ripping off his clothes.
Admittedly, he hadn't objected to any of that.
Fixer: A Bad Boy Romance Page 16
