Loving the Senator (Capitol Affairs #1) (3 page)

Now.

Thankfully I was sitting.

Going to court in a few w Victoria. Monday?

Early. Need to see u.

11 ok?

Don’t forget. Looking forward to it.

Don’t forget? Was he kidding?

He needed to see me. I wanted to stop working and go to him. The idea of pretending to be sick crossed my mind. But Victoria needed me, and I had to put my career first even though it killed me. I couldn’t run over on my lunch hour either. I would never make it back in time for court.

I wanted to tell Thomas, but I waited. I tell him everything, yet I needed to keep this to myself. He would never shut up and might accidentally tell someone. He looked over at me and must have noticed something was wrong. He ran over to my desk, flailing his arms around and laughing.

“Are you going to get sick? You look ill. Did that mean, nasty Victoria scare you? She did me. I’m pulling my balls out of my ass right now,” he said, rubbing my back.

“Nothing is wrong. I’m fine. Just too much champagne last night and my head is killing me,” I lied. I rubbed my eyes.
Focus
. More people came in the office, and the place got loud.

“I have Ibuprofen if you want it,” he said. He sat on the edge of my desk facing me. He looked so cute with his gray pullover sweater and yellow scarf. Only Thomas could pull off that style. He was gorgeous with blonde hair, blue eyes, and a very muscular body. When we met in college, I wanted to date him. That changed one night at a party when he made it clear, women weren’t his thing.

“I will be okay. Why are you are acting weird this morning? Did you have sex last night? You always act mega weird after a good roll in the hay,” I teased.

Since he started dating his new boyfriend Bruce Xiong, I had to listen to their “sexcapades” as he called it. They fought, and then had crazy make-up sex. I sensed it the next day because he always acted more annoying.

“Well, yes of course. We had our celebration sex after the election. Alex looked hot last night. Oh and, by the way, I noticed you dancing with him; you little skank,” he smiled. Thomas was at Alex’s election party. He didn’t stay long but made an appearance when I was dancing with Alex.

“He asked me to dance, big deal. He only asked because I ran his campaign, and it was the right thing to do. His girlfriend watched it all,” I said.

“Say what you want, honey. I sense you have a thing for him. That’s why you were so concerned about him this morning. I haven’t seen you that concerned over anyone. You know, maybe, I have a thing for him. He might’ve been coming to visit me last night,” he said, laughing and walking back to his cubicle.

“Good luck with that!” I yelled.

“Well, signal me if I need to call 911. I don’t want you flat-lining in your cubicle, honey. You look pale,” he laughed.

“You’re an ass,” I smiled. Before he sat back down, he smacked his butt, pretending to gallop like a horse. Victoria walked out of her office and gave him a glare that could kill. His face got beet red and I couldn’t help but quietly laugh at him. My day went from dreary to fantastic in just a few minutes.

Chapter Three

I woke up earlier than was necessary Monday morning. I had anticipated my meeting with Alex all weekend. I got out of going out with Thomas to the club and spent the weekend working out and preparing for an upcoming case. Sunday night, I had gone to sleep early, though I tossed and turned the entire night. I had been in his office many times during the campaign, but this time was different. Since I had taken the day off, I dolled myself up more than usual and picked out an outfit I normally wore going out on the weekends. I straightened my shoulder-length red hair and wore my signature red lipstick. My new designer jeans fit my ass perfectly and I added a sweater that hugged my breasts. I topped it off with a distressed leather coat and knee-high boots, my new Tom Ford sunglasses, and the Gucci purse Beulah bought me for getting into law school. Lastly, I put on the gift Alex had given me seven years ago. I didn’t wear it the entire campaign. I didn’t want our past interfering with his election. I wanted to see if he remembered it, and what his reaction would be when he saw me wearing it.

I walked into his familiar office building, stopping off at the restroom to freshen up. I spritzed on my perfume and reapplied my red lip stain. He always stared at my lips when they were red and glossy. I walked into his office, ready to see the man I wanted more than anything.

“May I help you?” the receptionist asked as I approached her desk. Susan, who I used to see during the campaign, wasn’t there. It took me by surprise to see this new person. She was an older woman with a pointy nose and a sour expression on her face. I caught her eating grapes at her desk and then tried to hide them when I got close.

“I’m here to see Senator Conrad. I’m Prudence Romaine. Is Susan out today?” I asked, smiling at her.

“Susan is out with the flu. I’m a temp in for a couple of days. Do you have an appointment, Miss Romaine?” she asked. She adjusted her black skirt suit and then the blue scarf around her neck. Her gray hair hung in a short stylish bob just above her ears. She tapped her manicured fingers against the keyboard searching Alex’s appointments for the day.

She was the total opposite of Susan who always smiled, liked to tell dirty jokes, and complimented me on my hair whenever I came to Alex’s office.

“Yes, I have an eleven o’clock. I love your scarf,” I said. I hoped to make her smile.

“Thank you. Please take a seat, and I will inform Senator Conrad that you are here,” she said. I caught a glimpse of a smile as I sat in the waiting area listening to bad elevator music. I had told Alex he needed to change the music and put in something more upbeat, but he never did.

It wasn’t but a couple of minutes later when he came out of his office. The sight of him floored me. I almost couldn’t get up from the chair and walk. He took my breath away every time I looked at him, and to see him with bruises broke my heart.

His eye was partially shut and had a bruise underneath them. I felt guilty knowing I was the reason he’d gotten into an accident in the first place. I wanted to take him back to his office and kiss away his pain, stroke away his anguish, and have my way with him on his desk, immediately.

“Hold my calls while I’m with Miss Romaine, Margo,” he said. The heat crawled up my body. He just stood there and was focused on me as he spoke to this temp. I wished I could’ve read his mind.

“Yes, Senator.” She smiled at him, but gave me a suspicious once-over as I walked back into his office.

“Have a seat, Prudence,” he said, taking in my outfit. His look was somewhere between appreciative and shocked. I had never dressed like this when I worked on his campaign, and he seemed completely unprepared.

I took a seat in one of the big leather chairs in front of his desk. I inhaled deeply enjoying the scent of his office, a combination of Alex’s cologne and the leather. A huge mahogany desk full of papers and books sat in the middle, facing the window and a perfect view of the city. Law books covered the cherry bookshelves along with pictures of people I assumed were his family and a giant dog. My mood changed as my eyes landed on a photo of Alex and Jade sitting on the beach. I noticed that picture before when I was in there, but this time was different. This time it gave me a sour feeling in the pit of my stomach.
What was I doing there?

“Excuse the mess. It’s nuts around here right now. I’ll be glad to get settled in my new office soon.” As he spoke, he straightened his tie and smiled.

“You’re banged up pretty bad, Alex,” I said, wanting to touch him.

“It’s no big deal. I’m just sore. I’m lucky it wasn’t worse. My car’s banged up more than I am.” He sipped his glass of water while looking me over from top to bottom and trying not to make it too obvious.

“How did you explain this to Jade?”

The air between us crackled with electricity.

“Jade is history. She left me at the party. It’s better this way. It was time.” My face flushed.

My phone vibrated in my purse, but I silenced it.

“Do you need to take that?” He nodded toward the phone.

“No, they can wait.”

“I wanted to ask you something for a long time. Now since this whole election thing is over, I guess it’s okay for me to discuss it.”

“Ask me anything, Prudence.” His tone contradicted his words, as if he anticipated the question he knew I would eventually ask.

I shifted nervously in my chair. “Why were you in Ohio with my mom?”

He grabbed his glass of water, took a long swig, and walked to the window, looking out.

“I went to law school in Ohio, and our families were close. Both my father and your grandfather were senators at the time. They vacationed together, and we spent many weekends at their house. After your mom ran away, your grandmother found out about your mom’s drug use. She was mortified to learn she had a child and was living in a trailer in Ohio. She asked me to find you and bring you and your mom back to her. She thought since I went to school with your mom, and we were the same age, I could convince her to come home.” He stopped talking, and I had the impression he had much more to say.

“You weren’t in a relationship with my mom?” I asked shifting in my chair again. I had to know if he had banged my mom back in the day, even though I hated having that image in my mind.

He turned quickly towards me.

“Dear God, no. When I got there and saw what a mess she was, and what was going on in that trailer, I wanted no part of what she was offering. My focus was on getting both of you, if not just you, out of there and to Beulah’s.”

He paused for a minute again, took another sip of his water, and sat on the edge of his desk. He continued as I cleared my throat in preparation for what came next.

“She tried, several times to get me to do things with her. She was relentless sometimes. Your mom was not the same person I remembered when we went to school together. She was unrecognizable to me and I felt so sorry for both of you. When I tried talking her into taking you to your grandmother, she flipped out. The next day I found her unconscious, overdosed on heroin,” he said. He kept his eyes on me the entire time he talked.

“I remember that day. My best friend Veena came home with me, and you came to tell me they’d taken my mom to rehab. You offered to take me to visit her the following week.”

“Yeah. Within a day after she got out, she used again. I even took her to an AA meeting, but she snuck out and met a few of her friends and back to drugs she went. How is Veena? Do you still talk to her?”

I could tell he felt guilty, like maybe he didn’t do enough. But he was wrong. He had done more than he realized. More than my own family had done for me, and my mom.

“I haven’t seen or spoken to Veena since I left. I tried to contact her, but I have never heard back.”

Suddenly, I was very out of sorts. I hadn’t expected to dredge up old feelings. Veena was my best friend in school and lived in the trailer park with her grandmother and sister. We were inseparable most of the time, and she was with me the night my mom told me to get out. I missed her terribly and would love to see her.

“Why didn’t you just bring me back here and not tell her? You could’ve sneaked me out of that hell while she was in rehab.” I didn’t mean for it to sound like I thought he didn’t try hard enough.

Alex’s face grimaced as if he was in pain. But I couldn’t tell if it was from his injuries or my questions.

“I could have, and be charged with kidnapping and a career in politics never would have happened.”

I nodded my head in agreement and couldn’t stop looking at those lips and his handsome face. Knowing the details of how he had cared for me, and my mom, even back then, made me want him more.

“Well, you did take a bullet for her.” I kept shifting around in my seat trying to get comfortable as his eyes burned into me.

“I took a bullet for
you,
Prudence. When I heard those thugs talking about hurting you, I went crazy. I couldn’t allow it. You had been through enough,” he said.

My heart hurt when he admitted that. The more he revealed, the deeper in love I fell.

“Where did you get shot?” I asked putting my hair behind my ears since I was nervous.

“Right here in my stomach.” Alex pointed to the spot right above his belly button.

“I spent two weeks in ICU and had part of my intestines taken out. I nearly died trying to rescue you. My failure has haunted me for the past seven years, Prudence. I couldn’t get you out of my mind, and not in a sick perverted way. I just wanted you to have a good life. I wanted your mom to come to her senses as well. She was so smart in school and had everything going for her.”

I thought I had worked through those feelings and I was ready to hear everything. Beulah had me seeing a psychologist twice each week and then a psychiatrist once a month. From the day I was born, my mom never hugged, loved, or offered any real physical contact to me. It wasn’t until I had moved in with my grandmother that I was touched in a loving way. My mom wasn’t on the “hard stuff” when she gave birth to me, in the back of the van. That didn’t start till later. She just looked at me as a burden to her and an intrusion to her way of life.

Alex stood up again and walked to the window. He looked to be in deep thought. I wanted to walk up behind him, wrap my arms around him, and hold him tight to me. I wanted to thank him for all he had done for me and my mom. To appreciate him and make sure he knew he hadn’t failed me. He didn’t let me down. The scent of his leathery cologne put me in the mood to strip him naked and take him right in his office. His truth was my foreplay. I was beyond ready. He turned around again as I started to speak.

“I haven’t talked to my mom either. I’ve tried so many times to get in touch with her, and she has not responded to me. I’ve written to her once a month since I left and I send her a card on holidays and her birthday, but have received nothing in return. I’m not even sure if she’s still alive.”