DUTCH AND GINA: A SCANDAL IS BORN (12 page)

And just when he was about to move her off of him, amazed that he would allow himself to get so caught up in a moment that he didn’t stop it before it happened, the door to his office opened, and Gina walked in.

NINE

Although Belle, Dutch’s secretary, had been told by Allison that the president was not to be disturbed, his secretary relied on his other edict too: that his wife never had to be announced when she needed to see him, regardless of whom he was entertaining at the time.
 
So she wasn’t announced, and walked right in.

Gina’s sudden entrance into the Oval Office allowed her to see what was happening before any reactions could take place.
 
She saw this woman, this incredibly attractive, bosomy woman, sitting on her husband’s lap.
 
She saw that this woman’s hand was on her husband’s face.
 
And when Dutch stood her off of him, and the two of them were now standing up, she could see that his midsection had definitely reacted to that woman’s contact.

 
Gina then closed the door, her eyes unable to stop staring at her husband.
 
Dutch with a woman on his lap? And that woman wasn’t her?
 
It seemed surreal to her, unbelievable even though she had witnessed it with her own two eyes.
 
She knew he used to be a player, Roman and everybody else she knew loved to remind her of that very fact, as if womanizers never really changed their spots.
 
But she knew Dutch.
 
And she knew he would never do something like that to her.
 
But seeing him like this, in an obviously compromised position, made her less sure of him than she’d ever been.
 

Belle had warned her before she entered that he had company, and she had expected he would be in a meeting of some sort as he usually was, but she never expected this.
 
And suddenly she felt alone, and lost.

Dutch felt as if everything about his life right now seemed upside down.
 
Especially with the press commenting about his child every night as if they had a right, and insinuating that his highly moral wife was somehow unfaithful to him.
 
They were calling Gina unfaithful, when he was always the screw up.
 

And the thought of it, of the way they were treating her, was eating him alive.
 
But now his inability to stop a scene before it unfolded caused him to mistreat her too; caused him to disrespect her too.
 

His heart dropped.

“Come here, Gina,” he said to his wife.
 

Gina hesitated before moving toward Dutch and his companion, her bright brown eyes never once looking at the companion, but staring at Dutch.
 
How could he explain this away, she wondered?
 
Women didn’t just sit in a married man’s lap.
 
And more to the point, a married man didn’t just allow a woman to sit in his lap.
 
What other explanation, she wondered, could there possibly be?

When Gina reached Dutch’s side she fully expected him to pull her in his arms and apologize effusively, or some other such display of remorse and affection, but Dutch didn’t even touch her.
 
He, instead, looked her dead in the eye.
 

“She was in my lap,” he said, “and I should not have allowed that to happen.”

Yes, it shouldn’t have happened, Gina thought, finding it so obvious that she wondered why he mentioned it.
 
Because she needed to know why did it happen, not just what happened, and who was this woman to begin with.
 

But she still couldn’t look away from her husband.
 
She still couldn’t look at the woman or the walls or anybody or anything else but her husband.
 
All her life she’d been let down.
 
Every relationship she’d ever had ultimately turned horribly bad.
 
Every one.
 
Not Dutch too, her heart was screaming.

“Let me back up,” Dutch said, surprised by his own sense of ineptitude.
 
“This is Liz Sinclair, babe.”

That name actually sounded familiar to Gina.
 
She looked at Liz.
 
The most obvious thing about the woman was that she was beautiful.
 
Remarkably so.
 
Where Gina’s eyes were big, hers were bigger, her bosom larger, her curves more enticing.
 
She seemed to be more of everything Gina was.
 
And that was why it seemed even more terrifying to Gina.
 
A woman like this, with so much going for her, seemed far more tailor made than she was for a man like Dutch.
 
And this drop dead gorgeous, African bombshell had been sitting on her husband’s lap.

“Liz and I met while I was a businessman in Boston.
 
She was the security chief for my father’s company.
 
Max tapped her to work with us on my Senate campaign.
 
And then she was one of my national security assistants during my presidential bid.
 
When I won election, I made her my national security advisor.
 
She left in my second term.”

Gina didn’t know what to say.
 
Not only was this woman great looking, but she had an even longer history with Dutch than Gina had.
 
And was once his national security advisor?
 
Gina began to wonder if she stood a chance against a woman like this Liz Sinclair.
 
It was an irrational thought, she knew, but it did cross her mind.

“We hadn’t seen each other in nearly four years.”

Gina still didn’t get it.
 
“And she just happened to be walking pass the White House and dropped in to say hello?” she asked.
 

Liz smiled.
 
This woman was sharp herself, she thought.

“No, Gina, I invited her to meet with me.”

Gina looked at Dutch.
 
“Why?”

Dutch exhaled.
 
“Come and have a seat,” he said.
 

Liz sat down in her own chair as Dutch took Gina and sat her on his lap.
 
Although Liz continued smiling, Gina could see a stormy look in those big eyes of hers.

“I asked Liz to come and work on your staff,” Dutch said to his wife.

Gina looked at him.
 
“Work on
my
staff?
 
Why would she want to work on my staff?”

“She’s a security expert, Gina.”

“Since she used to be your national security advisor, I assumed she was.”

“Not just national security,” Dutch said as he and Liz exchanged glances, “but security period.
 
She was once chief of security for my father’s firm.”

“Dutch, what does any of this have to do with her working for me?”

Dutch shifted his weight.
 
Gina could feel his penis engorging beneath her.
 
“With this craziness that’s going on in DC, I want you to have some personal protection.”

“Personal protec. . . You mean like a bodyguard?”

“Only until things settle back down.”

“But the Secret Service---”

“Beyond the Secret Service.
 
I need to know that you have an additional layer of protection.”

“But why?
 
Because the press is stirring up their usual silliness?”

“Because there have been threats, Gina,” Dutch said, pulling her closer against him.
 
Liz looked away.

“The Secret Service briefed us on those,” Gina said, noticing Liz’s reaction.
 
“Remember?”

“I know.
 
But I’m still concerned.”

Gina looked at Dutch.
 
That worried look on his face wasn’t about the fact that she had caught a woman on his lap, but because of his concern for her.
 
She leaned against him and wrapped her arms around him.
 

“I’m all right, Dutch.”

“I just want to overreact a little, okay?”
 
He kissed her on her cheek.
 
“Will you let me handle this, babe?”

“But is it really necessary?”

“Probably not,” Dutch admitted.
 
“But until I can say certainly not, I’ll feel better if Liz was around.”

Around me or around you
, Gina wanted to ask.
 
But she didn’t.
 
Dutch, she knew, wasn’t that kind of man.
 

But this Liz person, she thought, as she looked over at Liz, easily seemed to be that kind of woman.
 
Dutch trusted her, she had that in her favor, but somehow Gina wasn’t entirely convinced.
 
A woman as great looking as this one had to feel as if she was entitled to the best.
 
And Dutch, no matter how you sliced it, was the best.
 
Which meant, Gina thought warily, that this new addition to her staff was going to be a blessing, or quite the curse.

“Have you accepted the president’s offer?” Gina asked Liz pointblank, finding it odd that a woman of her supposed stature would want to work on a First Lady’s staff.
 

“Yes,” Liz said without hesitation, causing Dutch to look at her admiringly.
 

“Why?” Gina wanted to know.
 

“Because the president asked me.”

Gina wanted to get snippy and say something like,
oh and if the president asks you to jump off a bridge, you’d do that too
?
 
But she couldn’t go there.
 
This woman hadn’t done a thing to her.
 
The fact that she was beautiful and had been caught sitting on her husband’s lap wasn’t that woman’s fault.
 
Dutch bought her here.
 
Dutch allowed her to sit on his lap.
 
Dutch seemed to trust her with his life, whereas Gina wasn’t sure if she could trust her as far as she could throw her.

But Gina trusted Dutch.
 

“Welcome aboard,” she said to Liz, digging deep and finding just the right smile to make it clear to this new addition that there was not now or ever would be any daylight between her and her husband.

“Thank-you,” Liz said, digging deep to smile too.
 

“Thanks for having dinner with me,” Christian said to LaLa as they relaxed at a table within a busy K Street restaurant.

“You don’t have to thank me, Chris, geez.
 
I enjoy your company, you know I do.”

“But?” Christian said.

“No but.
 
I enjoy your company very much.”

“If I was older, would you date me?”

LaLa smiled.
 
“In a heartbeat.”

“So why can’t you date me now?
 
Just because I’m in my twenties and not my thirties?
 
How weird is that?”

“It’s not weird, Christian.
 
It’s just a fact.
 
You’re nice and kind and smart and cute as a button.”

“But you prefer an old man?”

LaLa laughed, grabbed her paper towel and tossed it at him.
 
He smiled.
 
“I prefer somebody my own age, yes, alright?
 
Satisfied?”

“She admits it finally,” he proclaimed.

Across the room, near the back, Crader McKenzie doused the ash off of his cigarette and sipped from his glass of wine and watched LaLa laugh it up with some handsome young man who seemed enamored with her.
 
Crader could understand why.
 
There was something about that female.
 
He couldn’t just look at her and say what.
 
But something, he thought, staring at her.