After a few minutes, he cries himself to sleep in my arms, and I can finally let go and give in to my exhaustion. He nearly always sleeps through the rest of the night after a nightmare.
Now, so can I.
And this is just one of countless reasons why there’s no way in hell I’ll let Grace win.
* * * *
“Humor me, Grace.”
“This is a pain in the ass. Why can’t we just tell people it’s none of their business how we got together?”
I snort. “Are you new here? Have you actuallymetthe press in this town? This is DC. That’s worked exactlyzerotimes in the history of American politics, Grace.”
It’s the second week of September and, not counting that first day when she hit me with the bomb, this is my sixth visit to Grace Martin’s apartment. She’s currently scouring her daily appointments, personal cell phone records, and comparing them to a written printout I brought with me of Elliot’s past campaign appearances, as well as currently planned ones. This is to try to coordinate as much as possible where it looks like the two of them could have snuck time together outside the White House or Elliot’s residence. She hasn’t booked any travel yet for future events.
While she does that, I’m sitting on her couch and cruising through shows on the Netflix app on her Fire TV. She turned it on for me so I could kill some time while she worked on this, per my instructions.
What she doesn’t know is that I now have her Amazon password. It’s the same as her Netflix app, which she gave me the password for.
She left her laptop open during my second visit, while she was on the phone and stepped out of the room to talk. Grace isn’t nearly as smart as she thinks she is. Which, she believes she’s brilliant.
Because my first visit here, she showed me how she can text people by voice through Alexa on her Fire TV. She does it all the time, apparently.
Including texting me.
Gotta love technology.
Hopefully, Leo won’t be too growly with me about stopping by his apartment earlier while he wasn’t home and then leaving again almost immediately. When I told him I had errands to run this evening, I could sense him biting his tongue not to ask.
Unlike Elliot, he’s…
Well,stalky.
No, I’m not telling him where I’ve been going.Duh. Kind of the whole point of me sneaking around to handle this. He’s the body man to POTUS and knows that, sometimes, errands have to be run. It’s work, so he’s not going to interrogate me about it too much.
I mean, itiswork, technically.
It’s protecting VPOTUS.
That the Venn diagram of what’s work and what’s personal about this sitch makes a perfect fricking circle is irrelevant.
“This fucking sucks,” she grouses.
I make a production of dragging myself to my feet from the couch. “You want a martini? I think you’ve earned one.” It’s not even eight o’clock yet. I still have plenty of time before I need to return to campaign headquarters.
“Yes, I want a martini.Gawd.” She rolls her eyes. “If you’re going to torture me, at least ease the pain.” She waves me toward the kitchen. “You know where everything is.”
I laugh. “Coming right up.” Yes, I know where everything is, because I’ve made her martinis several times now.
I head into the kitchen and mix them. Then, sipping mine, I carry them out to the living room and set hers in front of her on the coffee table.
She slams half of it back almost immediately and waves her other hand at her laptop. “I have to say, Jordan, as aggravated as I am at you over this, it gives me hope.”
“Why’s that?” I eye her over my martini glass as I sip.
“Because you’re doing some detailed work here. Obviously, you’re all-in. I will admit you’ve apparently thought this out even farther than I have. I’m impressed. And it bodes well for your future.”
I shrug and play with my toothpick full of olives. “Not going to fuck it up. It has to be believable. Better to have it all ironed out now, so Elliot doesn’t have any reason to stall you when you corner him, and no one in the press can catch us in a gaping lie.”
