For the Love of Gina: The President's Girlfriend (19 page)

“Get
out of my brother’s sight!” she screamed at Dutch above the agents’ arms and
elbows.
 
“You don’t deserve to be in his
presence!
 
You said he didn’t exist while
he was alive.
 
He was invisible to
you.
 
A nobody.
 
A thug nobody could love!
 
You hated him so much that you wouldn’t claim
him.
 
So you can’t claim him now! Get out
of my brother’s sight!
 
Get out!
 
Get out!
 
Get out!”
 

Then
she broke down in tears.

Many
members of the audience, including the pastor, hurried to Brandy to put her
back in her seat.
 
Others members just
stood there, or sat there, stunned by her display.
 
And all eyes were on Dutch.
 
Gina looked at him too.
 
He continued to look forward.
 
He continued to maintain the cool dignity he
was known for.
 
But he wasn’t fooling
Gina.
 
He was devastated.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Gina
woke up Monday morning after a fitful night’s sleep.
 
The weekend had been like a blur to her after
a funeral that was so painful she could hardly speak about it.
 
Dutch held her during their entire trip back,
and she appreciated him being there for her, but when they arrived back at home
she needed to be alone.
 
To her surprise,
Dutch seemed to instinctively understand that and didn’t ask to stay the
night.
 
After Brandy’s outburst, he
probably needed some time alone too.
 
She
didn’t see or hear from him at all on Sunday.

Now
she was awake, lying in bed and feeling tired even though she just woke
up.
 
Little Walt was in Florida, with
LaLa and Nikki, and she missed him terribly.
 
But she was also glad for the break.
 

She
thought about DeAndre.
 
He was such a
handsome young man.
 
She even saw a
little bit of her father in his strong jawline.
 
A little bit of herself even.
 
And
the idea that she didn’t get to know him, and that he had to die so horribly
and in such distress, distressed her.
 
It
distressed her mightily.
 
But Brandy’s
assertion that Dutch was ashamed of him and didn’t tell Gina about him for
political reasons was nonsense to Gina.
 
She knew Dutch.
 
Regardless of
what Brandy or anybody else said about it, she knew he believed at the time he
was looking out for her.

She
turned onto her back and started thinking about Dutch.
 
The love of her life.
 
And despite their issues, he was still and
would always be the love of her life.
 
He
was a good man who still felt it was his honor to take care of her.
 
She understood that.
 
But loving a take-charge man like him, who
more often than not made decisions for both of them without consulting her,
came with a price.
 
In DeAndre’s case, a
very high price.
 
And she felt it was
only right, for his sake as well as hers, to take this time in her life to make
sure she could live happily on those terms.

She
looked at the clock on the nightstand.
 
It was almost eight.
 
Early for
her, given when she normally got up, but she got up anyway.
 
And went to brush her teeth and run her bath.

Dutch
walked out of the guesthouse half an hour later and headed across the sidewalk
to his waiting SUV.
 
Addison had the
backdoor of the vehicle opened and ready, with the morning smoke pouring out of
the exhaust pipe as it waited to drive away, and Dutch was about to jump in and
leave.
 
But as he thought about Gina and
wondered if she was up and okay, he decided he’d better check.
 
He therefore handed his briefcase to the
agent and made the trek across the estate to the main house.
 
He used his keycard to enter through the
backdoor, disarming their silent alarm with his card as he did, and made his
way upstairs.

Halfway
up, however, he heard a loud crash sound.
 
As soon as he did, he ran.

“Gina!”
he yelled as he hurried down the corridor and into the master bedroom.
 
His heart was thumping.
 

“Gina!”
 
He looked at the bed and saw that it was
empty.
 

Then
he looked toward the en-suite.
 
“Gina!”
he yelled again, as he hurried in that direction.

“I’m
okay,” Gina was saying by the time he entered the master bathroom and saw her, in
the tub, flat on her backside.
 
She was
attempting to stand up and get out.

“What
happened?” Dutch asked with a frown of concern as he hurried to her.

“I
slipped,” replied Gina, upset with her own clumsiness.

Dutch
grabbed her under her arms and under her knees and lifted her easily out of the
tub.
 
Although Gina normally would have
insisted that she was okay and didn’t need all of this attention, she didn’t
insist any such thing this morning.
 
Because she knew she wasn’t okay and she did need attention.
 
Her brother was dead, her marriage was on the
rocks, and she needed all of the attention she could get.

She
buried her face in Dutch’s chest as he carried her to the bed.
 
Dutch had grabbed a towel from the rack as he
left the bathroom, and when he laid her, facing up, on the bed, and saw the
anguish on her face, he began to dry her off himself.
 
He thought he was doing her a favor this
weekend by giving her some space.
 
Now he
wasn’t so sure.

She
closed her eyes and placed her forearms over her forehead as Dutch slowly dried
her naked body.
 
At first she felt
nothing.
 
Just her body being dried.
 
Then suddenly he stopped, right after he dried
her breasts and her stomach, and she opened her eyes.
 
He was standing there, the towel still in his
hands, staring down at her.
 
And that
look on his face was unshakable determination.

“What’s
wrong?” she asked him.

Dutch
shook his head.
 
“We can’t do this
anymore, Gina.
 
I can’t do this
anymore.
 
My wife was in pain this
weekend, undeniable pain, and I couldn’t comfort her?
 
You needed your space.
 
I understand that.
 
You felt you needed to bear that burden, that
awful burden, alone.
 
I understand that
too.”

But,
to Gina, his eyes didn’t show understanding.
 
They showed hurt.
 

“I
know what I did was terrible,” he said to her.
 
“I know I should have told you about your brother.
 
I should have.
 
But I didn’t.
 
And I am so sorry that I didn’t.
 
I make no excuses for that.
 
What
Brandy Clarke said to me at that funeral, she had every right to say it.
 
I deserved it.
 
You know I did.”

Dutch
had to fight back tears as his soft eyes turned hard.
 
“I can’t undo what I did.
 
I can’t go back and change any of it.
 
I thought I was right at the time.
 
I didn’t care about what other people wanted
and needed.
 
I had to look out for
you.
 
I thought I was doing the right
thing.
 
But I wasn’t, Gina.
 
I should have told you and gave you the
respect to decide for yourself.
 
You’re
not my child, you’re my wife, and I should have treated you that way.”
 
The tears came.
 
He couldn’t fight them any longer.
 
“I was so afraid of somebody else hurting you
the way Marcus hurt you that I couldn’t think straight.
 
I couldn’t bear you going through any more
pain.
 
So I did what I did.”

Again
he had to settle back down.
 
He felt as
if he was being held underwater, and he couldn’t break free.
 
But he knew he had to keep swimming, keep
praying that he would see surface soon.
 
“Hold it against me for the rest of my life if you have to,” he went
on.
 
“Despise me for what I did to you
every time you think about your brother.
 
But I am telling you right here and right now that this trial separation
is over.
 
Either we’re going to be
together completely, or not at all.
 
I
will never again walk into my own home and see where my wife had fallen in the
tub, and I a part of me have to hesitate and wonder if I’m allowed to touch
her.”

Dutch
frowned and shook his head.
 
“No, Gina,”
he said.
 
“That can’t be.”
 
He looked at her.
 
“That can’t be.”

Gina
was staring at him too.
 
And her heart
was mixed with so many emotions that she knew she couldn’t respond
emotionally.
 
“You were looking out for
me,” she suddenly said.
 

Dutch
looked at her closer.
 
Did she mean it?

“Brandy
was wrong,” Gina continued.
 
“You weren’t
trying to hurt anybody.
 
You were trying
to protect me.
 
When I got up this
morning and went into the bathroom, I remembered the last time we were happy
and how you woke me up that morning and carried me into the bathroom.
 
I remembered how concerned you are for my
wellbeing every single day.
 
How you
phone me.
 
How you’re always asking if
I’m okay and what can you do to make it better for me.
 
And as I stood in that tub, I kept wondering
what was wrong, not with you, but with me!
 
You’re out of your damn mind
,
I said to myself.”

Dutch
managed to smile and wipe away his tears, even though his heart was begging to
hear more.
 
To hear those words from her
he needed to hear.

“Here
I was,” Gina continued, “with this wonderful, great, gorgeous man by my
side.
 
A man who made it his business to
look out for me.
 
To make me the center
of his universe.
 
And when he did what he
did, when he looked out for me and decided that I’d had enough heartache from
one half-brother thank-you very much, I get angry with him.
 
I leave him.
 
I treat him as if I hadn’t given him permission to be the boss; to be
exactly the man I wanted him to be all those years we’ve been together.”

Gina’s
face turned even more serious, and Dutch realized that her tears were
gone.
 
This was past feeling now.
 
She looked at him.
 
“You run this,” she said to him.
 
“You’re the head of this family, Dutch.
 
You run this.
 
And if I’m going to be with you I have to understand that.
 
Most of the time, almost all of the time,
you’ll make the right decision for our family.
 
Sometimes, like with DeAndre, you won’t.
 
But that’s the price I’ll have to pay to be with a man like you.”

Dutch
stared at her.
 
“But do you want to be
with a man like me, Gina?” he asked her.

Gina
stared back at him.
 
“Let’s put it this
way,” she said with a smile.
  
“Only a
fool wouldn’t want to be with a man like you.
 
And I’m nobody’s fool.”

Dutch
smiled grandly for the first time in a long time, and then he moved on top of
her, wrapped her into his arms, and gave her the kind of kiss he’d wanted to
give to her ever since they parted.
 
He
gave her a big, fat, sloppy kiss.

“I
love you so much,” he said when they finally stopped kissing.

“I
love you too,” she replied.

Then
they stared into each other’s eyes.
 
A
long, painful stare.

“I
promise you, Gina,” Dutch said, then he stopped.
 
Then he tried again.
 
“I promise that I’ll let you know, the next
time, if anything,” he started to say.
 
But Gina placed her finger on his lip and stopped him herself.
 
And then she shook her head.

“No,
Dutch.
 
Don’t promise me anything.
 
You continue to make decisions for this
family based on what you believe is best.
 
I can’t allow you to second guess your decisions or feel you have to
consult me when you believe you’re protecting me.
 
All I want you to do is to protect me and
your son.
 
And yes, your daughter too.
 
Protect us.
 
Look out for us.
 
And I’ll look
out for you.
 
That’s the only kind of man
I know you are.
 
That’s the only kind of
man I want you to be.
 
The day you take
off those pants and hand them to me, is the day I kick your ass to the
curb.
 
Understand?”

Dutch
laughed.
 
Gina touched those lines of age
on his strong, sincere, handsome face.
 
He wasn’t a young man anymore, she thought.
 
He couldn’t take much more of this separation
drama.

“I understand,”
he said, and then he leaned down and kissed her passionately again.
 
Until she sneezed.