Chapter Seven
Now
It’s three a.m when I return to the White House and head inside. Upstairs, I peek in on the kids and find them all safe and asleep.
While not having complete privacy chafes me sometimes, the retired Secret Service agent knows that, while in the White House itself, I can actually relax and sleep with the thought that Portia, Petal, Pixie, and Pyro are beinglooked after by skilled, trusted agents, many of them agents I trained.
It means I know I can silently make my way to our bedroom and ease myself into bed with my wife and close my eyes. She snuggles up next to me, sniffing me, kissing me. The past couple of nights when I returned from Kevin’s the sadist made a return to try to back her the fuck down.
Tonight? I’m too exhausted, mentally andphysically.
Fortunately, it seems her earlier interlude with Prophet has also quieted something within her.
“Is he okay?” she asks in the darkness.
That’s such a loaded question. He’s definitelynotokay. But I’ve been able to rein in a little of my own rage at her inability to fucking deal without Prophet’s guiding hand on her shoulder, temper my response.
“He needs time.” I kiss her forehead.“You need to keep eating.” I know he got her to eat at least a little. Usually when she has one of these spells, if we can just get her to eat something of substance and keep it down long enough to digest it, it’ll kick-start her body into demanding food again. I know she doesn’t do it on purpose. She’s not anorexic, it’s not a deliberate cry for attention. This predates Prophet’s entry to herlife, and it’s nothing more than her body’s stress mechanism.
“Yes, Sir.”
Oh…wow.Yeah, I can hear it in her voice. She’s not doing well, either.
Unfortunately, she’s the leader of the free world, and I can’t coddle her in some ways.
I lie. “He wants you to resume full duties, game face on. I know you were going to send Elliot to that thing tomorrow night alone, but you need to go. You wereoriginally scheduled to go, anyway.”
“What about Secret Service?”
Dammit. She has been paying attention. “They probably didn’t decrease the detail when you made the switch. Talk to PPD first thing and ask. If you’re good to go,yougo. The election’s coming up, and you know Lauren would want you to get back out there.”
It’s a turn and burn, a fly-in to Chicago with an appearance on the tarmacthere, a dinner in town that they’re using a chopper to transport her to, and then back to the airport and in the air to land at Andrews by eleven Eastern. She’ll be back here by midnight.
I hear her sigh. “Okay.”
Relief hits me. She’ll be busy, Leo will be with her, and it’ll give Kev a chance to unwind and process.
Although Leo and Elliot might be a little miffed at the schedule change. Leowas going to travel with Elliot instead of his usual body man.
Then again, I strongly suspect Leo and Elliot make a literal definition of “body man” when they’re together.
I personally tapped Leo to be Shae’s body man. I worked with him in the Secret Service, and he’s damned good. He nearly died in a small-plane crash while on duty, but he’s made a full recovery. Unfortunately, the limp he stillhas forced him into an early medical retirement. He’s multi-lingual, a literal weapon with his body, and gay.
Elliot is in the closet for his own reasons, most of them political. Once he makes his run for the White House, he’s probably going to come out, but he doesn’t want to before then and I respect his reasons.
I haven’t told Shae or Kev that I’m pretty sure Leo and Elliot are a down-lowitem of their own. No proof, not that the Secret Service agents would talk, but it’s a feeling. The way the two of them look at each other, the heated gazes I’ve seen them exchange, especially when they don’t think anyone’s paying attention.
I’mpaying attention. Because I know what it’s like to have a powerful man own your heart and not be able to scream it to the world.
Been there, done that,got the heartache for it.
Meanwhile, I know Leo will keep Elliot’s secrets every bit as well as he does ours, which is another reason I hired him for Shae. I trust him to keep her safe in all situations, and to watch over Kev.
It’d be nice if we lived in a world where these kinds of things didn’t matter when it comes to the kind of job a politician can do, but we don’t, so there you have it.
* * * *
The next evening, I’m sitting in the living room and watching TV with the kids before it’s time to send them to bed when I receive a text via Signal on my personal cell.
