Daniel's Christmas

by M. L. Buchman

  “I—”

  She raised a hand, palm out. “Nothing mundane.”

  That threw out the half dozen sentences that tumbled into his mind. “I’m so glad to see you. Why are you here? How…” Nope. Chuck them all.

  Daniel could converse with world leaders, charm their children, placate their wives. Why couldn’t he be coherent around Dr. Alice Thompson.

  He considered, then edged slightly away from the desk and its teetering paperwork.

  Alice tilted her head sideways as if listening to the late night silence of the West Wing.

  No sound. More importantly no light from the open door leading to the Oval Office. If Daniel could take time to do one thing, it would be what had been in the forefront of his thoughts since the last time he’d been with her.

  He leaned in to kiss those smiling lips. Raised a hand to brush back her hair so that he’d be able to watch both of her eyes close on a sigh. And—his phone buzzed.

  He cursed. “No!” He growled at Alice from a mere inch away. “Let the world run on its own for one blasted moment.”

  “The car.” Alice told him as the phone buzzed again.

  “What car?”

  “The one you ordered.”

  “I ordered a car?” All he could concentrate on at the moment was that Alice was here. So close he could feel the warmth of her skin on his cheeks. The phone’s shrill buzz was not helping the moment.

  “To come see me. There was some reason you wanted to see me. What was that?”

  The phone interrupted his response. He answered it with what he could only describe as a snarl.

  “Your car is ready, sir.”

  “Why would I want a car?”

  The agent sputtered for a moment.

  Alice rested a hand on the center of his chest, toying a little with his tie where it stuck up out of the vest. She tugged him down by it until her lips were by his open ear.

  “So that we can neck like teenagers in the backseat.” Her breathy whisper tickled.

  “Uh,” he managed. That was almost exactly why he’d wanted a car. He’d had some idea of talking with Dr. Alice Thompson face to face, perhaps over a glass of wine and getting to know her. But he’d also had a clear idea of that slumberous look he’d imagined.

  “I,” he cleared his throat twice before he could continue, “uh, won’t be needing it after all. Thanks.” He did his best to get the phone back in the cradle but knew he fumbled it badly.

  He turned back to kiss her. But it was too much, too fast. No matter how much he wanted her, it was a lousy way to run a relationship. An even worse way to start one.

  “I,” was all he managed.

  Her smile had shifted, subtley, from amused to soft. “It seems you missed me.”

  He nodded. Not trusting to words yet.

  She glanced up at him through those bangs.

  This time, his hand rose more naturally to brush her curls aside. He cupped her cheek and leaned into a kiss.

  They moaned in unison.

  Daniel couldn’t pull her close enough.

  He didn’t have the strength to take her home.

  He didn’t have the patience to take Alice upstairs.

  Daniel broke the kiss and walked away.

  Chapter 19

  Alice stumbled a half step forward as Daniel strode away from her across his office.

  This couldn’t be happening.

  For a week his voice had filled her ears, her thoughts, and was now invading her dreams. His stories of his life had wrapped around her until she could taste them more clearly than his first kiss.

  It had taken all of her bravery to come to him, to find her way back to the office of the White House Chief of Staff. To expose herself to whatever Daniel’s reaction might be.

  She watched him close a door to his secretary’s office.

  Yet Daniel had never explained his reactions during the conversation at the piano in any of those late night phone calls. He’d never said why he had turned from her and practically run from the room at that dinner with President. The man radiated such light, but some darkness tore at him. It tore at her too, like a knife.

  He closed the door to the hallway.

  Alice steadied herself with a hand on the edge of Daniel’s desk. She’d come to the White House because there was no one else she could trust to test an idea she’d had about North Korea. An idea too impossible to trust, yet it ate at her until it reaching the tipping point between skepticism and possibility.

  His reaction to her had been electric. Listening to his frustration of trying to call her had been funny and absolutely charming.

  Daniel closed the door to the Oval Office. Then he leaned his forehead against it. As if wrestling with something. How to tell her they were done? That couldn’t be it.

  Maybe she’d ruined it by coming here. On the phone, fine, but not in person. No one who knew her wanted her. All too intimidated that they weren’t the smartest in the room. All those men who couldn’t handle how easily she saw through their games and stratagems.

  Daniel was the first man she couldn’t read. She’d thought there was something there, but she’d been wrong.

  She pulled up her shields and turned to run from the room.

  Daniel hadn’t moved. He still leaned against the door. Then actually turned a key, an old brass key, in the door to the Oval Office.

  Alice could hear the bolt click home in the echoing silence of the room. Then Daniel turned to look at her, his back against the door he’d just bolted.

  She’d misjudged? Could his need for her possibly match her own for him? Her mother’s voice was asking how could she use this to her own gain, and Alice did her best to shove that aside.

  Alice’s own question dragged her across the dark green oriental carpet that covered most of the dark wood floor.

  He watched her without moving. His eyes a dark blue so intense that no shield could stop his gaze. She’d worn a knit red sweater, intricate with clockwork cables that she’d had to tear out a half-dozen times in order to make them right.

  Not once as she approached did he look down at her sweater. Not at her chest. Not at her jean-wrapped hips. Not at her sneakers, red with green laces this time. All he did was watch her eyes, and she couldn’t look away. If there’d been a chair or table between them, she’d have walked square into it.

  Only when she came to a halt did he react.

  He reached a hand as if to tentatively stroke her from shoulder to elbow, but let it brush air instead, then drop to his side.

  Alice watched him a moment longer. Trying desperately to read his face.

  For half a moment she considered calling his bluff. Perhaps toss off some funny line.

  It was a half moment too long.

  Daniel swept her into his arms. He’d have knocked the wind from her lungs if his mouth had not already covered hers. She wrapped her arms around his neck so that there was no possibility of him walking away from her this time.

  The fire of need wrapped around them despite the chill December night beyond the window. She’d never been the forward one in sex, but she had his tie pulled loose and his vest and shirt undone so that she could curl against his chest. It was as beautiful as when he’d been pumping iron over in the residence. That she’d been prepared for.

  What took her totally unawares was the softness of his skin and the heat of it. This was a place dreams were born.

  With a near shoulder-dislocating wrench, he shed his coat vest and shirt into a pile on the floor. She wrapped herself next to his warmth like a good winter blanket. It was only half a surprise that they were skin to skin. She hadn’t noticed the loss of her sweater and ever-present turtleneck.

  “Wow! Dr. Thompson.” He was holding her out at half arm’s length and looking down at her torso.

  She went
to cover herself with her arms. “What?”

  “First, you need to know that I have an excellent imagination.”

  “So?” She got one arm free and across her chest.

  With the gentlest motion he took her wrist and moved her arm out of the way.

  She’d never felt so naked in her life.

  “I never imagined how good you could look. Not even in that knock-out evening gown. You’re beautiful.”

  The heat flashed to her face. Cute? Sure, she’d been called that. But beautiful? Not that she could recall. Not ever.

  He was smiling down at her.

  “What!?” It came out with more force than she’d intended.

  “You’re blush starts lower than I expected.”

  She glanced down at the fair skin atop her breasts, the capillaries now flushed with blood attempting to release the heat coursing through her.

  Some rebellious part of her self-defense mechanisms rose to the fore. “Well, what are you going to do about it?”

  His smile grew. Grew until it lit his eyes. Damn! She could almost swear they twinkled. Why not? Christmas was coming after all.

  “I’ll revel!” And with that he leaned down and did just that.

  Chapter 20

  Alice stretched comfortably back to consciousness.

  No surprise revelation of where they’d landed. Daniel’s bedroom. Daniel’s bed. A sturdy four-poster that had belonged to an 1800s President. He’d said he liked the bed. So had she. It was a beautiful piece of furniture, and if she’d had a couple of bathrobe belts handy, she might have tied him to it. She’d have blushed at the thought, if he hadn’t suggested doing the same to her.

  In Daniel’s office, with no protection handy, they’d still done more on his office carpet than two kids ever did in any backseat. At some point they’d dressed, traversed the corridors, and used the elevator to the third floor so that they wouldn’t disturb the President on the second floor.

  Alice did her best to not look at the Secret Service agents they’d passed in the lower halls. Even if the agents didn’t reveal knowing looks, she knew they were there, carefully masked by neutral expressions.

  Some of them did smile at her as she gawked at the decorations. Even the lower level passage of the Center Hall had been strewn.

  “Last year was pretty somber, so recently after the First Lady’s death,” Daniel had told her. “I think we’re overcompensating this year, but it is terribly cheerful.”

  She couldn’t argue on either point. The length of half a football field, it had been done as a Christmas in miniature. Walls had been lined with multi-tiered villages, as if the Swiss Alps had been shrunk down to fit into the White House. You could spend a week and never see it all.

  She smiled to herself, remembering they’d spent less than five minutes in their desperate need to get upstairs.

  Here Daniel did have protection and they’d made use of it until they were so exhausted and sweaty that they’d scampered down the hall wearing only a couple of his dress shirts, through the Music Room, and up the half-flight of stairs to stand on the wintery Promenade. They’d had to dance foot-to-foot because the deck glittered with a dusting of frozen dew. They’d held each other so close that they were almost warm enough despite the freezing temperature as they watched the chill moonlight battle the nighttime lights of D.C.

  They’d scrambled back inside, plunged into a hot shower and fallen back into bed.

  Yes, she knew exactly where she’d woken. No surprise there.

  Where she’d woken alone. Also not a real shocker. It was mid-morning by the discrete bedside clock and Daniel would have plunged into meetings long since.

  The surprise instead was how she felt.

  Her body was languid and supple after such an incredible bout. Sore in more than a few spots, but Daniel was a gentle lover, even at his most energetic. Despite her fair skin, she didn’t see a single mark. Alice wasn’t sure if her body had ever felt this good.

  But that bone-deep made-of-liquid feeling didn’t surprise her either. It was the guilt. She felt no guilt about the sex, they’d both enjoyed it far too much for that.

  No, Alice felt bothered by her own silence. Daniel had again probed into her past. Ever so gently, in that immensely tactful way she’d learned was the trademark of a very successful man. But she could feel his disappointment as she again evaded describing a past she’d much rather disown. He no longer fell for her redirection and razzle dazzle subject changes. He wanted to know about her past. Didn’t he understand how little it had to do with her present?

  She dragged her lazy bones out of bed. There was a probably a maid waiting somewhere, but she did her best to reorganize the royal blue flannel sheets and the Irish Double-Chain quilt done in rich cheery golds and Kelly greens. She rubbed her fingers over it. Hand-stitched and a really fine job of it. Maybe from his family farm. She liked to think of that being his touch of home.

  The rest of the room radiated maleness, with rich walnut wainscoting and white-on-white patterned wallpaper. A massive dresser stood staunchly in the corner, matched in style to the sturdy bed. The top was decorated with just two photos. She eased over and inspected them.

  First, clearly a family photo. They were an impressive group. Daniel stood out for his beauty, but his sister could do very well in a pageant herself. The photo had captured Mom, Dad, gold retriever, and a big blue tractor the same color Daniel’s eyes had been last night. They had shone with a brilliance the moment before he jumped her. Or had she jumped him first?

  Second, was a close-up of the sister. Her look was wicked. Just her shoulders and head showing above water that must be in a flowing stream. It was apparent that she had no swimsuit and was not in the least amused by her brother’s camera. The look promised a painful retribution. Alice could feel herself smiling at recognizing the shared moment, even if she didn’t know the whole story.

  She’d have to ask.

  Which brought her back to the guilt that kept tickling up her spine. Daniel would tell her anything, and she’d tell him nothing. It was an unfair bargain and she didn’t know what to do about it. Alice didn’t want to destroy what they had.

  She turned for the shower, going past the red leather armchair that held her neatly folded clothes, including the sweater she’d lost somewhere in the hallway. Maybe it had been during their brief stop at the grand piano. No, they’d made love beneath that shortly before getting a late night snack in the kitchen. Early morning snack. The sweater had been long since gone by then.

  She stood under the hot shower spray, appreciating the pressure that could deliver a needling massage even here at the top of the building.

  The problem was during those moments they’d curled together to briefly recover. Her head on his shoulder, her hand tracing the fine outlines of his chest. Or when he’d curled against her, one ear resting in the center of her breastbone as he listened to her heart.

  He’d left her silences to speak into, and she hadn’t. She’d felt them grow and expand, take on shape in the dark of the heavily curtained bedroom.

  Alice notched up the heat in the shower a bit more, she’d always favored a searing hot shower.

  She knew what he wanted. He’d made it clear in the last few phone calls as well. No matter how intimate they were, she was terrified of destroying it by bringing up her past. To someone like Daniel, the past was everything. Filled with family and life and joy. Poster boy for a good upbringing.

  While her past hadn’t had the terror that some of her friends had, it was just not something that existed anymore. She’d discarded it all and rebuilt herself in her own image. She even had an imagined past; one she shared only reluctantly so that people didn’t probe. But with Daniel, each time she tried to pull out the granny who’d raised her after her dad had left and her mother died… It was just wrong. She hadn’t been able to lie to him.
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  What did it matter that she didn’t have a past? She was Dr. Alice Thompson, self-made woman.

  She rinsed her hair and did her best to pretend that all of the water running down her cheeks came out of the showerhead.

  Chapter 21

  “You dog.”

  Daniel just laughed which only increased the President’s smile. They sat across from each other in the West Wing presidential dining room. The European Union’s latest Greece-bailout plan covered the parts of the table that weren’t already covered with sausage, pepper, and onion sandwiches, macaroni salad, and potato chips. Tall glasses of iced tea perched on cork coasters.

  “You finally saw her.”

  Daniel nodded. Did way more than see her. He did his best to hide his smile in a large bite of crunchy hoagie roll. Knew he’d been too slow by Peter Matthews’ smile.

  “Good?”

  There were a dozen layers to the question.

  “Really good. The sandwich that is,” he spoke around a partially chewed bite, but wasn’t fooling Peter in the slightest.

  “Good.” This time the statement was definitive. The President’s approval a tangible thing of great importance.

  “I think we did way better than ‘Really good.’” A woman’s voice sounded from the doorway. “‘Great!’ would at least get you in the right ballpark.”

  Daniel stumbled to his feet and attempted to swallow nearly choking himself. Alice stood in the doorway to the dining room. She radiated. There was no other word for it. She slouched lightly against a doorframe and looked at perfect ease. Her hair, still slightly damp in spots she’d missed with the blow dryer, a shining cloud about her face. Her eyes were wicked.

  The President rose much more elegantly and crossed to her. He took her hand, and shook it with that perfect, real sincerity that Peter Matthews brought to everything he did.

  “Good afternoon, Dr. Thompson. Care to join us for lunch?”

  She nodded her assent and crossed to the table.