Pursuit of Happiness

by Carsen Taite

  “They look so happy.”

  She turned toward Stevie. Was that a tear she spotted in the corner of Stevie’s eye? She wouldn’t have pegged Stevie to be so sentimental, not after the fierce delivery of her testimony before the judiciary committee, but then again Stevie had managed to personalize sentencing guidelines—not an easy feat. The realization left Meredith torn between fondness that her date had a heart and fear that she might expect more than she had to give. “They do,” she whispered. “It’s a pretty grand affair.”

  “It is, but I was talking about the way they look at each other, like no one else is in the room. Like none of this,” Stevie gestured at the room, “matters. The president of the United States is in the room, but it’s like they could be standing in the middle of a condemned building with dirt floors and still be just as happy because they’d found each other.”

  Whoa. Stevie’s statement packed a ton of emotion, and Meredith shifted in her seat. Was that the kind of relationship Stevie wanted? One that ended in dreamy looks and I dos exchanged in front of all the people in your life? Hell, they were only on their second date. She stared at Stevie who was refocused back on the front of the room, and took a breath. No, she was just blowing things out of proportion. Weddings brought out the sentimental in people, which was probably why Addison had pushed her to bring a date so she’d have someone to focus all her gushy feelings on after she witnessed their outpouring of emotion. Well, gushy wasn’t in the cards. She resolved to spend the evening having a great time and not get bogged down in any greater meaning. In a minute, Addison and Julia would be hitched and they could get to the fun part of the date. She hoped Stevie liked to dance.

  An hour later, the party was in full swing and she and Stevie were on the dance floor with Rook, Zoey, Addison, and Julia. “I can’t believe I’m dancing to an 80s cover band, three feet from the chief justice of the United States,” Stevie said. “No one at the office is going to believe me when I tell them about this.”

  “Especially not when you tell them the president was doing the electric slide at the very same party.” Meredith inclined her head to where Garrett and Julia were doing a decent job with the steps of the line dance.

  “They look like great friends.”

  “They are as much as any politicians can be.”

  “Are you saying politicians can’t be friends?”

  Meredith heard the edge beneath Stevie’s question. “Not at all, but this life can get complicated. Fast.”

  As if on cue, Julia’s deputy chief of staff tapped her on the shoulder, and she and Garrett stepped to the side of the dance floor to huddle. Addison and her brother, who’d been dancing before, glided over to Meredith and Stevie.

  “Is something up?” Meredith asked.

  Addison shrugged. “Life as usual at our house. I don’t know what Julia’s going to do with herself in two years when social interruptions and late night wake-up calls are no longer par for the course. In the meantime, I’m not working, so let’s have some fun. I happen to know where there’s an expensive bottle of Scotch squirreled away if any of you are interested.”

  Meredith turned to Stevie and raised her eyebrows.

  “Oh, you had me at Scotch. The expensive part—that’s just icing on the cake. Count me in.”

  Meredith smiled and took Stevie’s arm and followed Addison and her brother Jack to a room off the side of the main ballroom. On the way, Addison waved Rook and Zoey over and insisted they join in. “What is this?” Meredith asked as they pushed their way in.

  “This is Bride Number One’s private suite,” Addison said, pointing at her chest. “Meet Bride One.”

  “Nice.”

  “Thanks. This whole affair is a little over-the-top, but you only get married once. Right?”

  “I wouldn’t know since most of my family is wedded to their careers.” Meredith raised her glass. “But if throwing a fantastic party is any indication, you and Julia are destined to be together forever.”

  Addison smiled. “My wife is conducting a business meeting at our wedding. I think we’ve gone beyond what’s proper. Besides, if you love someone, there’s nothing that can keep you apart.”

  Meredith caught Stevie watching her as Addison spoke, but she couldn’t get a read on her expression. Wistful? Maybe a trace of pain? Definitely not longing, and the realization robbed some of her joy, which made absolutely no sense considering her resolution to treat this entire evening as a casual outing. Deciding not to dwell on it, she turned to Addison. “Okay, Bride One, where’s this Scotch you were bragging about?”

  “Jack, grab that bottle from the cabinet, please.”

  He did as his sister asked and read the label before setting it on the table. “Twenty-five-year-old Balvenie single malt. Nice.”

  “It doesn’t hurt when your wife sits at the right hand of the president. President Garrett had a bottle delivered to each of our suites. When we finish mine, we can go plunder Bride Two’s supply. Zoey, can you grab some glasses from that shelf over there?”

  Zoey handed them each a glass and then stuck hers out toward Jack. Rook stepped up and placed an arm around Zoey’s waist. “Hey, babe, I didn’t think you were big on Scotch.”

  “Not normally, but I’m not about to pass up drinking pure gold. Since this is probably the only time in my life I’ll ever drink anything this expensive, count me in.”

  Stevie stepped up. “I’ll drink to that. Public servants lining up for a sip of fancy liquor.”

  Meredith laughed and joined them. Jack had just begun pouring when Julia burst through the door with Jennifer by her side.

  “There are five hundred wedding guests waiting for us to cut a cake and you clowns are in here drinking.”

  Meredith raised her glass. “You make it sound like we’re having a kegger. We’re having fancy drinks. When we’re done here, we’re going to your suite and drinking your bottle.”

  “You’re going to want to be sober for what I’m about to tell you.” Julia glanced back at the closed door. “This can’t leave the room for the next hour. Understood?”

  Meredith didn’t have to look to know that most of the people in the room were looking Stevie’s way since she was the only one not part of the group. “We get it. State secrets and all that. Pretty sure you’re safe in this crowd of attorneys and soldiers.”

  “Connie Armstrong is about to announce she’s pulling out of the race.”

  Rook let out a low whistle and Addison shook her head. Meredith froze with the glass of Scotch halfway to her lips. She set it on the table, needing to be perfectly sober for this conversation. “What happened?”

  “Information is still coming in, but it appears that the network at her Dallas headquarters was hacked and emails have been leaked. I haven’t seen them yet, but word is they are pretty damaging. There’s a meeting scheduled at Connie’s office in an hour.”

  Addison moved to Julia’s side. “Tell me you don’t have to go.”

  “You couldn’t make me. But, Rook, I’m afraid that means—”

  Rook set her glass down. “On it. Zoey, you should stick around. I hear the cake’s fantastic.”

  Meredith watched Rook dash off, and she reached into her bag, itching to make a call. Surely someone she knew had some inside info on what was about to come out. Whatever it was, it had to be big to take someone like Connie Armstrong down.

  “Do you need to go too?”

  She looked up into Stevie’s eyes. What she needed and what she wanted were tangled up in the way she felt about this woman. She couldn’t let that happen. Torn between wanting to go and wanting to stay, she searched her gut for answers, but Jen appeared at her side before she could settle on a plan.

  “Mere, we should go.”

  Jen was right. Whatever news was breaking could have huge ramifications for their entire party, and everyone who valued their political future would be wise to stay on top of it. She trusted Jen to vet the news, but if this news was big enough to interrupt a
bride at her wedding, then she wanted to hear the developments firsthand.

  “It’s okay. Duty calls. I get it.” Stevie smiled. “Trust me. I’ve left plenty of dates in the lurch for an emergency client call.”

  Meredith ignored her sister’s urgent press on her arm. “Are you sure? I’ll ride with Jen, and Erica can take you home.”

  “Nonsense. I can find my way. Go, take care of business.”

  Meredith leaned forward and kissed Stevie lightly on the cheek. “Erica will drive you. It’s the least I can do for bailing on you. Have a great time. I’ll talk to you later.” She motioned to Jen who dutifully handed Stevie a business card with Erica’s number on the back, and with one last glance at Stevie, made her way to the door.

  Another reason not to get serious about anyone: having to bail on dates midway through because one of your Senate colleagues can’t run a tight ship. She dared not look back because she knew if Stevie were still watching her, all the reasons would dissolve in a puddle of regret.

  * * *

  “You feel like stalking the cake table with me?” Zoey asked.

  “I’m guessing you’re used to this,” Stevie said.

  “I don’t know that I’ll ever get used to Rook being on call twenty-four seven, but since I used to be married to a job that sent me places on a moment’s notice without ever asking how I felt about it, I know what it’s like from both sides.”

  Zoey’s words were an echo of the assurances she’d offered Meredith only moments ago, and she wondered if Zoey meant them any more than she had. The truth was, unless someone’s life was in jeopardy, she wasn’t certain she’d rush off to deal with a crisis in the middle of a date on a Saturday night, but politics had its own set of rules. Rules that thankfully she didn’t have to live by. “I should probably go.”

  “Nope. I’m overruling you,” Zoey said. “I could use help edging out these DC insiders who are already circling the cake table. Besides, cake is the very best reason to come to a wedding. I think it might be illegal to leave before you’ve gotten your share.”

  “Oh, you do, huh?” Stevie glanced across the room and saw Julia and Addison standing by the gorgeous, many-tiered cake. Thinking Hannah would never forgive her if she didn’t provide her with a detailed report on the tasting, she reluctantly agreed. “Okay, I’m in. But you have to stick with me. I recognize a ton of faces in this room, but only from TV.”

  “Deal.” Zoey led them over to a cocktail table on the edge of the dance floor, close to the head table where a photographer was shooting pictures of Addison and Julia cutting the cake. “How long have you been with the PD’s office?”

  “I started right out of law school, after an internship with the office before graduation.”

  “Dedicated.”

  “Or crazy. It’s not exactly the golden ladder of legal professions.”

  “Consider your audience. I get consulting offers all the time, but leaving the service has never been an option for me.”

  “Where are you stationed now?”

  “I have a tenured position at McNair, which makes it easy, but I spent most of my military career jumping from base to base, mostly overseas. It’s been an adjustment staying in one place, but being close to Rook makes it worth the effort. The only land mines I’m in danger of now are the ones that are buried in campus politics. Not my favorite, but definitely not life-threatening.”

  Stevie got it. Her career wasn’t without its fair share of politics. The federal public defender—head of her office—was usually a political appointee, and the philosophies of the office often shifted with a change at the top. But for the most part, she’d managed to steer clear of bureaucratic squabbles and focus on her cases. Until last week when she’d appeared before the committee to talk about sentencing guidelines, but even that came with the bonus of meeting Meredith Mitchell.

  “Have you known Meredith long?” Zoey asked like a mind reader.

  “Not hardly. We met last week. A work thing.”

  “That bodes well. Rook and I met at a work thing. It wasn’t the most fortuitous start, but it worked out well for us.”

  Stevie returned Zoey’s smile but not her enthusiasm. Tonight had been fun, but she could have fun with her coworkers on a night out at happy hour. Besides, fleeting fun, full of interruptions wasn’t what she was looking for, if she was looking for anything at all.

  Later that night, reclining on her couch with a beer, Stevie flipped through the channels looking for something mindless when MSNBC showed up on her scroll. She hesitated for just a second before stopping her search and tuned in to hear the anchor recapping the stories of the evening.

  “While many of Washington’s elite were gathered at the National Buildings Museum for the wedding of Chief Justice Addison Riley to President Garrett’s chief of staff, Julia Scott, Democratic presidential hopeful Senator Connie Armstrong was hunkered down at her DC campaign headquarters bracing for the fallout from tonight’s leading story. Earlier this evening, Justice United, the website notorious for breaking scandalous stories, published dozens of damaging emails from the Armstrong campaign on their website with promises of more to come. We’re still analyzing the information that’s been released, and I’m turning now to our DC correspondent to detail what we know so far.”

  Unable to resist now that she felt like she was part of the story, Stevie leaned back and watched the show.

  “Thanks, Brian. We’re only going to discuss what we’ve managed to authenticate so far, but even with this little bit, it’s a dark day for Armstrong.” He pointed to the screen beside him, and an image appeared of an email exchange between Connie Armstrong and one of her high level staffers. He spent a few minutes outlining the issue, but Stevie could clearly see that Connie had authorized firing a female staff member who’d threatened to report alleged sexual abuse from Connie’s chief of staff, Dan Nealy.

  The correspondent flashed a few more slides and then kicked it back to the anchor who introduced a panel. She didn’t need to hear their back and forth to know that Connie Armstrong’s campaign was in trouble. Her own words came back to haunt her. Connie wasn’t her first choice for the Democratic nomination, but she was probably the strongest candidate in the race. Maybe she could make a comeback.

  Wondering what Meredith thought about the breaking news, Stevie started to reach for her phone to text her but stopped short. Meredith was busy, and this little dalliance was over. She’d seen enough tonight to know that no matter how much they connected one-on-one, she and Meredith would never run in the same circles, and Meredith’s life was all about running in circles. Tomorrow, she’d have brunch with Hannah and dish about her night of being Cinderella at the ball, and then she’d tuck away the memory as a once in a lifetime experience.

  Chapter Four

  Meredith sipped the cold coffee and held back a shudder. Any caffeine was better than no caffeine considering how many more briefing papers she had left to read, and she didn’t have the energy to get up and make a fresh cup.

  “Go home,” Jen said. “I’ll read the rest of those. You could use a good night’s sleep. Or better yet, get laid, but be discreet. Hey, what about that woman you brought to the wedding last weekend? She looked like she’d be fun in bed.”

  Meredith picked up a pencil and threw it across the table with deadly aim. “You know that line you walk between sister and staffer? You just crossed it in about a dozen different ways.”

  Jen raised her hands in protest. “What? I was merely making an observation. You’ve been going ninety to nothing all week. If you don’t get some rest or,” she paused to offer a meaningful grin, “relaxation, you’re going to implode. Besides, I set up a meeting for tomorrow morning with the DNC, and you’re going to want to be fresh for what they have to say.”

  Meredith set her mug down hard. “No, Jen. I told you, we’re not wading into this.”

  “They requested the meeting. Are you really going to deny them the opportunity to make their pitch?”

>   Rumors had been swirling around the capital since Connie had bowed out of the race about who would be the best person to take up the party banner, but the pundits were lukewarm about the rest of the candidates left in the field. The twenty-four-hour news cycle meant they’d quickly run out of things to say about the remaining players, so cable news had turned to the topic of new blood and just who could enter the race and turn the primary on its head. Meredith’s name was topping every list.

  “I wouldn’t mind hearing what they have to say, but under very different circumstances. Whoever leaps to the front of the line is going to have a lot of catching up to do. Considering we haven’t been in the race at all, there’s no way we can get up to speed.”

  Jen tossed a file on her desk. “Not entirely true.” She pointed at the file. “Take that home and read it. Michael’s been hard at work over the last year gathering data, and all his projections have you ahead in the polls within a week of entering the race.”

  Meredith didn’t open the folder containing their brother’s handiwork. “Those numbers are just fluff. People like the bright, shiny new candidate. Does he have polls showing projections closer to the New Hampshire primary?”

  “Matter of fact, he does.” Jennifer picked up the folder and shoved it in Meredith’s briefcase. “Erica’s waiting for you out back. The numbers don’t lie. Go home, sleep on it, and we’ll talk in the morning before the meeting. If you’re really not interested, I won’t push you, but all the planning in the world won’t create this perfect storm of opportunity. Don’t waste this chance. The motto for the day is fresh face wins the race. There might be something to this.”

  Meredith slid into the back seat of the car and stared out the window as Erica drove to her apartment near the Capitol while Jen’s words played over and over in her mind. As aggravating as it was, Jen was right. Politics was fifty percent planning and fifty percent chance. Her long-term plan consisted of finishing out her current Senate term before considering a presidential run, and if Armstrong were to have won, then waiting another four to eight years before mounting her own campaign. Stepping in now seemed incredibly risky and chaotic. But what if this was her best chance to secure the Democratic nomination?