President's Girlfriend 07 - What He Did for Love (21 page)

“Mrs. Harber,” the reporters kept shouting.  “Mrs. Harber!”  Then one of them, a respected print journalist, managed to ask a question.

“Very nice outfit, Mrs. Harber.  Is that Versace, ma’am?”

Dutch’s heart slammed against his chest. 
Please don’t answer that
, he was silently saying to his wife. 

Gina apparently heard his silent prayer.  She smiled as she and LaLa headed for their waiting limousine, and said nothing.  She was no novice anymore.  She wasn’t about to respond to any shouted-out question from the press, not even a fashion one.

And it was soon clear how right she was.

“How can you wear Versace, ma’am,” that same reporter shouted out, “when the country is under attack?”

Gina almost stopped in her tracks. 
What the fuck
, she almost verbalized.  She expected them to say something crazy, but not
that
crazy.  But she was an old hand at the tricks of Washington now.  She kept smiling and kept stepping.

Dutch sighed relief.  “That’s my baby,” he murmured under his breath.

But that didn’t stop the reporter.  “How can you and Mrs. McKenzie eat at this fancy restaurant when the entire nation is grieving the loss of so many of our fellow Americans?  Don’t you have anything to say to those grieving families?  Or you just don’t care?  Is it all about you, ma’am, or is it about the American people?   Mrs. Harber, how can you walk away when the country wants to hear from their First Lady?”

But Gina did just that. She kept on walking.

Another reporter, however, turned to LaLa.  “Mrs. McKenzie,” he shouted, “is it alright with you that Shannon Corcoran is your husband’s new chief of staff?”

LaLa knew why the question was asked.  Shannon Corcoran used to be a Republican congresswoman from Florida who switched to the Democratic party a few years ago.  Her constituents, however, didn’t like her decision and she lost her reelection bid.  Now she was working for a Democratic administration and some in the party still didn’t trust her.  But Crader did.  And that was enough for LaLa.

And Lala was savvy to the ways of DC, too.  She ignored the question and kept walking too.

But as proud as Dutch was of Gina earlier that day, later that night he was far more angry with her than proud.

They were in the White House Residence, in the Family Room, and Little Walt had already gone to bed.  Dutch was seated in the chair, and Gina was on the sofa.

“Are you out of your mind?” he asked her.  “Against my better judgment I let you go to a restaurant here in DC, and just like that they’ve turned that simple act into a negative story about you.  You’re walking around in Versace, they declare, while the country is mourning.”

“There’s no connection and you know it, Dutch, come on.”

“Of course I know it.  And they know it too!  But that doesn’t stop them from printing that filth in their newspapers.  That doesn’t stop them from making your wardrobe and restaurant choice the subject of full panel discussions!  Call me old-fashioned, Gina, but I don’t like my wife’s name being dragged through the mud.  In fact, I hate it!  And you’re asking me if you can go to Newark for an entire week?  You couldn’t go to a restaurant down the street without being abused by the press, but you expect me to let you go out of state for an entire week?  You’re out of your
got
damn mind if you expect me to go along with that, Gina.  No.  The answer is no!”

“But it’s been weeks, Dutch.  You expected an arrest in a matter of days when you made that promise to the American people.  But it’s been weeks!  It took years before they caught Bin Laden. It may take years before they make an arrest in these bombing attacks.  I was just getting back into my business, Dutch.  And I need to go back to that.  Sitting around this White House day in and day out is painful!”

“You don’t have to just sit around all day.”

“Okay, what else can I do?  I entertain this woman’s group and that woman’s group, but it’s the same thing.  We sit around talking all day.  You won’t let me go to shelter openings, or speak to groups away from the White House.  You won’t let me do anything until you have an arrest in the case.  But it could take years, Dutch.”

“Or a matter of days.  We don’t know how long it’ll take.  But there’s no way in hell I’m letting you go to Newark right now, when we know so little about who’s behind these attacks.  Not now, Gina.  Not now!”

“You can come with me, Dutch, if you’re so worried.  Come with me.”

“You know I can’t get away from DC at a time like this!  You know that!  So stop fucking with me about this, Gina, I mean it.  You’re not going and that’s final!” He said this and slammed his hand on the arm of the chair.

Gina looked at him with a determination in her eyes he’d seen only once before.  When she defied him and went to visit Marcus Rance in prison.

“I’m going,” she said.  “With or without your blessing, I’m going.”

But Dutch was equally determined.  “If I say you aren’t going, you aren’t going anywhere.  You hear me?  Don’t try me.”

Gina’s heart began to pound.  But he made her so angry sometimes!

“It’s my job---” Dutch began, but Gina interrupted him.

“Stop saying that.  You don’t have any job when it comes to me.   Stop treating me like I’m some child.”

“It’s my job to protect you, Gina,” Dutch continued as if she never said a word, “and I intend to be masterful at that job!”

“Protect me how, Dutch?  By keeping me under lock and key in this place?  By refusing to even hear what I’m trying to tell you?  By making me more and more unhappy every single day that we have to stay here?  Is that your idea of protecting me?  Then I don’t want your protection, Dutch.  I don’t need it!”  She said this and then ran out of the room.

Dutch just stood there.  To hear her say she didn’t need his protection made him feel as if she was also saying that she didn’t need him.  And the thought of that reality scared him almost as much as any terrorist could have.

He ran his hand through his silky black hair.  He knew his decision to be overly protective of her could backfire.   He knew he didn’t marry a wallflower and after a while she would resent his overprotectiveness.  But he was willing to incur her resentment if it meant she and his son would remain safe.  He was even willing to incur some of her hatred. 

But he wasn’t willing to lose her respect.  He wasn’t willing to go so far that she would one day say that she didn’t need him.  He needed her like he needed air to breathe.  He could not imagine what his life would be like if she stopped needing him.

He took a slow, halting walk down the corridor to the master bedroom.  When he walked in, and saw Gina sitting on the bed Indian style, with that look of determination and frustration still on her pretty face, he knew he had to compromise.

He placed his hands in his pockets, pushed himself away from the doorjamb, and walked up to the bed.  Gina didn’t look up at him until his big frame was standing in front of her.  She hated when they fought, but she also knew she had to stand her ground on this one.

She looked up at him with such fierceness that Dutch almost became angry again.  Here was a man trying to protect his wife, and she was fighting him about it?  To hell with her!  But he looked harder, and saw that pain in those big, fierce eyes of hers, and his anger left again.

“You can’t go to Newark for an entire week, Gina,” he said.  “I can’t allow that under any circumstances.  I’m sorry, but I can’t.  But I’ll agree to let you get away from this town, and from me, for a couple of days.  With conditions.”

Gina couldn’t believe it.  Dutch was compromising with her, and on something this grand?  But what conditions?  “What conditions?” she asked him.

“On the condition that you remain at our estate and hold all of your BBR meetings there.  Roman, and whomever else you need to meet with, can meet you there.”

Dutch knew Roman Wilkes was still in love with Gina, and he knew he would probably make a play for her.  That was only yet another reason he didn’t want her to make this trip.  But he trusted Gina.

“Two days and you remain at our estate.  Take it or leave it.”

“With security everywhere, I’m sure,” Gina said.

“You’d better believe it,” Dutch replied.

But for Dutch to agree to any days was progress to her.  She smiled.  “Okay,” she said.  “I’ll take it.  You’ve made me very happy, Walter Harber!”

“At least that’s one of us,” Dutch said, and left the room.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The next night, well after eleven, LaLa had no intention of going into Crader’s office.  She had a meeting in the Roosevelt Room and was already running late.  Even the fact that he could be heard in his office yelling at somebody wasn’t enough to drag her in there.  Crader yelling at somebody was nothing new to LaLa.  But when she heard him threaten someone, she felt she needed to make sure his infamous temper didn’t get the best of him again.

She had to bypass his secretary’s outer office to get to his.  Which meant his voice was especially loud for her to have heard him in the corridor.  And she was right. 

“I mean it, Kirk!  Don’t you think I don’t mean it!” Crader was in full yelling force as LaLa entered his office.  Shannon Corcoran, his chief of staff, was standing beside his desk. 

She smiled and pushed her blonde hair out of her face when LaLa walked in.  She wasn’t an especially pretty lady, but she had an unaffected charm about her that even LaLa could understand.

“Hi,” she said to LaLa as she walked in.  “He’s not too loud, I hope?”

“Just a bit,” LaLa said, looking at her husband.  And he was animated.  So animated that he didn’t even realize LaLa was in his office.

“Okay, Kirk.  Call my bluff.  Don’t believe me you cocky motherfucker!  I’ll see that you never work another day in this town!  Try me!  Print those lies and try me!”

Then he slammed the phone on its hook.  Now LaLa was really worried.  The person on the other end of the line was obviously a reporter, and he obviously was threatening to print something embarrassing.  Which, if it involved Crader, LaLa was sure it meant that some female was also involved.

“Your wife says we’re too loud,” Shannon said to her boss. 

It was only then did Crader see LaLa.  And his already dour look turned downright anguished.

“What is it?” LaLa asked.  She stood at the head of the desk, facing her husband. 

Crader seemed defeated.  “That was Kirk Bennegard over at the Daily News.”

“Okay.”

Crader ran his hand over his face.

LaLa was growing impatient.  She knew it was bad.  She knew Crader well enough to know that it was very bad news.  “What, Crader?  Just tell me.”

Crader looked at Shannon.  “Give us a minute, Shan,” he said.

LaLa could detect a slight hesitancy in Shannon, as if she was hoping to be in on the conversation.

“Sure,” she ultimately said and made her way out of the office.  When she left, LaLa looked, once again, at Crader.

Crader opened his suit coat and placed both hands on his hips.  “They plan to run with a story in tomorrow’s edition that will claim that I’m having an affair with Shannon.”

“With Shannon?  With your chief of staff?”

“Yes.”

“Well is it true?”

“Of course it’s not true, La, what do you take me for? You know I’m giving my all to our marriage.  I’m not thinking about that woman or any other woman.”

But LaLa was still suspicious.  Reporters got the story wrong more often than not, but their stories usually were grounded in some basis of truth.  Crader was going on as if the story was completely baseless and there was no reason whatsoever for the reporter to even suggest such a thing.

“But why would they plan to accuse you of having an affair?”

“Because they’re a pack of vultures, why do you think?”

But he could tell La wasn’t buying it.  He exhaled.  “Because, a long time ago, there might have been a night.”

LaLa frowned.  “There might have been a night?  What does that mean?”

“You know what it means, La.”

But LaLa was too stunned to believe what it meant.  “Are you telling me that you and Shannon---”

“No!  Not now, no!”

“But in the past you did?”

“One time, La.  One stupid time.”

LaLa’s heart began to pound.

“It’s nothing new, La.  It happened a long time ago.”

“Was it. . . Was it before we were married?”

It sounded as if she was clinging to some hope.  It broke Crader’s heart.  “Yes,” he said.  “It was before we married.”

It was a relief, but LaLa knew her husband.  That look of concern wouldn’t be about some woman he slept with long before he met LaLa, because he knew that wouldn’t be of any consequence to her. 

“Were we engaged at the time, Crader?” she asked him.

When he didn’t answer, she knew she had read it right.  Her heart squeezed in anguish.

The look that came over her face, as if life itself was seeping out of her, caused Crader to feel every bit of the prick he was.

“It was just a one-night thing, La,” he tried to explain.  “It was nothing.”

But she would have none of that.  “Why didn’t you tell me then?  If it meant so little to you.  When you said you were coming clean with me, why didn’t you mention it, Cray?”

“It was before we were married.”

“But we were engaged.  Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”

“How could you ask me something like that?  It meant everything to me.  You’re the one I asked to marry me.  You’re the one I wanted to be my wife, La, not any of those other women.”

“But you said you were coming clean with me, Crader!  You said you had told me about every woman you’d slept with.  Why didn’t you mention Shannon Corcoran?  Why, Crader?  Because you loved her?”

“No.  Hell no!”

“Then why?”

“Because.”

“Because why, Crader?”

“Because . . . Because I didn’t even remember it, La,” he said honestly.  “I didn’t even remember it to mention it.”

LaLa knew that should have made her feel better.  The fact that her husband had had an affair that was so inconsequential to him that he didn’t even remember it.  But it made her feel worse.  What kind of man was this, she wondered, that treated women so callously?  He slept with a woman, the most intimate thing he could possibly do with another human being, and he didn’t even remember doing it?