Campaign For Seduction (13 page)

“Thanks for that report, Liza,” Kevin said, wrapping up the segment. “I know you’ve probably had another eighteen-hour day and your feet are hurting. Where are you heading now?”

“Well, the day isn’t over yet. I’ve got to get out of here and hop on Senator Warner’s plane for the trip back to Washington and I’m hoping they haven’t left without us. That’s assuming that the weather issues out of the Midwest don’t ground us anyway.”

As she signed off, Liza felt the biggest surge of excitement
she’d felt all night, and that was saying quite a bit. Senator Warner would sit for an interview with her tonight on the plane, and she couldn’t wait. She’d been off the campaign trail for a few days, back in the studio substituting for the nightly news anchor, who’d been out with the flu, and she hadn’t seen the senator.

It wasn’t smart and it wasn’t convenient, but God—she was so anxious to see him right now she’d happily sacrifice her right arm for the privilege.

The campaign went into full damage control mode starting the second the senator climbed on board the plane later that night. After standing in the aisle to address the initial barrage of questions, he went into the conference room for a more formal setting and was interviewed by each of the major networks.

Jillian, who’d been campaigning with him, hovered on the periphery with Adena and other staffers. Journalists waiting their turn stood around in the packed space, listening and taking notes. Off-camera they all yawned, grumbled about being tired—it was past two in the morning by then and weather kept delaying their takeoff—and wished for a hot pizza and a warm bed.

Not the senator. With the upbeat attitude and enthusiasm that Liza was beginning to realize was a deeply ingrained part of his personality, he explained, over and over again, why he hadn’t quit the campaign.

One by one, all the other correspondents finished up and returned to the back of the plane until only Liza, Takashi and Brad were left. She’d just grabbed her notes and taken a step or two toward the now-vacant interviewer’s chair, excitement burning in her cheeks and throat, when—oh, God.

The senator sat in his interview chair with his elbows resting on his knees and his face in his hands. His shoulders were stooped and his spirit seemed crushed. It was a posture of utter defeat and absolute exhaustion, as though he couldn’t walk one more step or give one more speech if his life depended on it.

Liza had never seen him look so forlorn.

She had to do something.

Galvanized by the sudden and urgent need to comfort him, she took two quick steps in his direction—before Adena swooped in.

Get away from him, Liza wanted to yell, but she said nothing because she had no right. So she watched, seething, as Adena beat her to him, put her hand on his back and leaned down to whisper something in his ear.

The senator murmured something low in response and grinned at Adena.

They were lovers.

The horrifying certainty crept into Liza’s mind on silent cat feet and the sudden and unexpected jealousy was a kick to the gut. All the old insecurities she’d felt when she discovered Kent was cheating on her roared to the surface like the snarling beasts they were, and she wanted to rage at both the senator and Adena.

But then common sense intervened.

Calm down, girl. Take a deep breath. Think.

The senator hadn’t made her any promises, had he? No. He was a free agent, wasn’t he? Yes. And not that it mattered one way or the other, but Adena was married.

Liza didn’t do relationships anyway.

The jealousy still bubbled inside her, a cauldron of ugliness in her chest, and she couldn’t stop herself from speculating.

Would the senator have an affair with a married woman? No. She didn’t think he would. From everything she’d seen and read about him, he was a principled man guided by his strong inner compass. Moral men sometimes fell short, true, but Liza’s gut told her this wasn’t one of those times.

So…the senator and Adena were just colleagues. Very close colleagues.

Liza’s jealous heart didn’t care.

She was debating whether to approach the senator when, without a word, he got up and disappeared into his private cabin.

What the—?

Where’d he go?

Bewildered, she looked to Takashi, who gave her a don’task-me shrug.

After a few minutes, irritation set in. All the other journalists had gotten their interviews tonight—why not her? And why didn’t someone bother to give her some explanation about his disappearance?

“What’s going on?” Fuming now, she marched over to Adena, who was flipping through some papers at the table. “Where’s the senator?”

Adena raised one sleek eyebrow and gave Liza exactly the kind of hateful look that made Liza want to smack her every time she saw her. “Liza. How nice to see you.”

Liza was in no mood for Adena’s nastiness. “Excuse me,” she said, “but we’ve been standing over there for two hours waiting for our interview, and now that it’s our turn, the senator just walks off. Would you please tell me—”

“Liza?” the senator said.

Liza wheeled around. He stood in the doorway with a sandwich of some kind in one hand, an open bottle of beer in the other and one brow raised at her rudeness.

“What’s the problem?” he asked.

Chapter 12

“W hat about my interview?” Liza demanded.

The senator finished chewing, swallowed and raised his sandwich for her to see. “Well, you see,” he drawled, taking another bite, “it’s been kind of a long day. I missed dinner. I thought I’d get something to eat and then we’d do the interview in here.” He indicated his private cabin. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“Fine.”

Was that her voice? Snapping like that? Wow. She really needed to dial it back a few notches, didn’t she? Turning over her shoulder to address Takashi and Brad, she stalked into the senator’s cabin.

“Let’s go.”

The first thing she saw was the Senator’s late supper on the side table: a gooey peanut butter and jelly sandwich—it looked like crunchy peanut butter and blackberry jam—spread on thick slices of whole grain bread, a handful of Cheetos, a Granny Smith apple and several enormous macadamia nut cookies.

Oh, man.

He ate Cheetos? How could she resist a man who ate Cheetos?

Tonight’s music added to her ambivalence. The current selection was Al Jarreau’s “Since I Fell for You,” a breakup song of such beauty and misery that her soul ached for hours every time she heard it.

Swallowing hard, she tried to stay focused and aloof. Being sarcastic always made that easier, so she gave it her best shot.

“Is this the best they could do for you, Senator?” She caught his eye while Brad set up the camera for the interview and someone turned off the music. “Peanut butter and jelly? Did you make some heads roll in the galley tonight?”

He’d been taking a long pull on his beer, but now he lowered his arm and flashed that boyish grin at her, to devastating effect. “This is what I asked for. It’s the best meal I’ve had all week.”

“And people said the former president was a good old boy.”

He laughed and quickly sobered. “It’s good to see you, Liza,” he said, low.

Liza’s equilibrium did a cartwheel or two but she frowned and tried to ignore the swooping sensation in her belly. “Are we about ready? It’s late.”

A shadow fell over his face and she ignored that, too.

Once everything was set up and Brad was ready with the video camera, Liza and the senator settled into chairs facing each other. She fumbled with her pen, now as anxious to get away as she’d been to see him in the first place.

She opened her mouth to ask a question, but he spoke first.

“So you think my Rocky music is hokey, eh, Liza?”

How the heck did he know about that? “Have you watched the coverage tonight, Senator?”

Dumb question. Of course he hadn’t had time to watch the coverage. One of his flunkies must’ve told him what she’d said.

“I try to watch here and there, whenever I can.” He actually enjoyed catching her off guard. The turkey. “I like to stay in touch.”

“The music was over the top, Senator.”

“Ah, but it helps me make my point. And even you said it was perfect.”

So much for hoping he hadn’t heard that part. Flushing furiously, Liza fought to reclaim her journalistic detachment. “And what’s the point?”

He answered in full presidential mode. “The point is that we are the underdog, but we knew that going in. Senator Fitzgerald is a fierce campaigner. I didn’t expect her to make it easy for us, and she hasn’t. But we’ve got a little fight left, so don’t count us out.”

“Tenacity is all well and good, Senator.” Thank God they were back on firm interviewer/interviewee ground. “But this primary season has already dragged on and party leaders, meanwhile, are growing concerned—”

His brows sank low over his eyes, darkening his face.

“—and on the other side, Governor Grant will cinch his party’s nomination by the end of the week.”

“What’s your question, Liza?”

“My question is this—when is enough enough? The numbers are not good and—”

“I understand the numbers.”

“—people are wondering if you’re damaging the party at a time when it should be coming together. What do you say to them?”

His expression turned to stone, as jagged and unforgiving as an Acapulco cliff. “Liza, I didn’t know that democracy could be damaged by letting people vote. There is a process in place that needs to play out. I plan to travel the country and tell voters what makes this campaign different from Senator Fitzgerald’s.

“After that, the voters need to vote and their votes need to be counted. People can decide when they have all the information. Not before. And I don’t think this process should be shortened or circumvented because a few pundits and a few party leaders think it would be easier if we packed our bags and went home.”

Man, he was fierce. Despite all her best efforts to see him as another sound bite-spewing politician, she never could. Especially when he was such a true believer. And all her pitiful efforts to keep him at arm’s length were useless at best, ridiculous at worst.

Still, she was a professional with an interview to finish.

“Let’s switch gears, Senator. Assuming we can ever get out of New York, the campaign is headed back to Washington for a couple of days of retooling and regrouping. What’s on your agenda?”

“A nap.”

They laughed together for one delicious moment, and Liza
prayed her growing feelings for him weren’t shining like a lighthouse beacon on her face.

“What are your plans after your nap?”

“After my nap it’s back to meeting voters.”

She asked a couple more questions, nothing tough, and then it was over.

“Thanks, Senator.” She stood and unclipped her mike. “I really—”

But he was already gone. Looking over her shoulder she discovered, with an unpleasant start, that he’d stalked off to his desk in the corner, kicking his soccer ball out of the way as he went. It ricocheted, hard, off the cabin door.

Vaguely alarmed, Liza exchanged raised-eyebrow looks with Takashi—she’d never seen the senator upset like this, ever—then followed him.

“Liza,” Takashi said.

She ignored his hissed warning. When he muttered a curse, she ignored that, too. She hoped he would continue to keep their secret, but at that moment she didn’t really care one way or the other.

Only the senator mattered now. Reaching out, she touched his arm.

“What—” she began.

He cut her off and leaned down in her face, nothing but a snarl of heavy eyebrows and glittering eyes. “Is that what you think? That I should call it a day and go home?”

Whoa. Of all the things she might’ve expected him to say, this wasn’t on the list. Startled, she blinked and tried to compose her thoughts.

“It doesn’t matter what I think. I was asking on behalf of viewers—”

“But what do you—” for emphasis, he jabbed his index finger at her chest “—think?”

Liza, who was no dummy even if she had lost all objectivity where he was concerned, saw where this was going. With a vague but growing sense of panic, she shook her head and backed up a step.

“No one cares what I think.”

“I care.”

Everything crystallized for Liza in that one second—the euphoria of listening to his speech, the crowd’s excitement, his absolute determination to earn the voters’ trust and be an outstanding president.

More than that, she grappled with his intelligence, humor and heart. Remembered how he’d allowed himself just that one private moment of despair a few minutes ago and was now ready to climb back into the saddle and fight another day.

He was amazing.

“I asked you a question,” he said. “What do you think?”

Though she would’ve liked to hide behind a scowl and a sarcastic comment, she could no more deny him in his moment of need than she could speak Farsi.

With a fortifying breath, Liza took a huge emotional risk. Expressing intense emotions had never been her thing, especially since her divorce, but maybe, just this once, it wouldn’t hurt anything.

“I think that you have the heart of a lion, Senator. I think the country would be lucky to have you as president.”

More frightening than saying the sentence aloud was his reaction to it.

After a sharp breath and an arrested moment during which he tilted his head as though he couldn’t be sure he’d heard correctly, a change came over him and it wasn’t subtle.

It was…oh, God, it was a blazing look of absolute adoration and worship.

They weren’t alone, though. She had to remember that. Off in the corner Takashi was talking loud on his cell phone, and Liza knew he was reminding them of his presence without confronting them directly. Even so, she couldn’t be bothered with Takashi now.

“I don’t…deserve that kind of faith,” the senator said.

His voice grew huskier and his breath harsher with each syllable, and she knew what it cost this proud, ambitious man to make such an admission. He was showing her a piece of his soul, and she was ridiculously honored and grateful.

“Things are bad,” he continued. “I’m not sure I can win.”

“I am.”

Another smoldering look was her reward and her punishment.
He hesitated, apparently hovering between keeping his mouth shut, the smart thing to do, and telling her how he felt.

Liza wanted any confession he’d give her, even if it tormented her later.

“You’re under my skin, Liza. I couldn’t get you out now if I wanted to.”

Having opened the door on her feelings, Liza let a few more creep through even though it was against both her nature and her better judgment.

“I know the feeling, Senator.”

A faint smile lit his face.

Staring up at him now with the connection between them growing stronger by the second, Liza felt as if she had so much to tell him.

If only she knew where to start.

A movement out of the corner of her eye reminded her that now wasn’t the time anyway. Reluctantly looking away, she saw Jillian standing across the cabin, watching them with such quiet understanding that Liza felt exposed and had to lower her gaze.

“Well,” Liza told the senator, “I should get back to the peon section of the plane. I’ll see you later.”

“Okay.”

Liza’s whole body drooped with the pain of leaving his presence. Everything, including gathering up her notes and walking to her seat at the back of the plane, seemed as if it would require much more energy than she could ever generate. But then she caught a glimpse of Takashi, who was giving her the concerned, tragic look she’d seen him give starving orphans in Africa, and it helped. Automatically she straightened her spine and raised her chin because nothing strengthened her backbone like pity.

“Let’s go.” She headed toward the door to the conference room. “Time’s ’a’ wastin’, and I’m starving.”

Her renewed brusqueness actually seemed to relieve Takashi. With an approving wink, he fell in behind her, but then the captain’s voice came over the intercom to announce that they’d been grounded for the night because of the weather and would be stuck in New York.

Everyone groaned.

The two of them were discussing their hotel arrangements for the night when a voice called after them.

They turned in time to see Jillian walk up and give Takashi an apologetic smile. “Can I borrow Liza for a minute?”

Uh-oh. What could Jillian want? Oh, but wait. Maybe she’d decided to grant Liza an interview.

Galvanized by this cheering thought, Liza put a hand on Takashi’s arm, eager to get rid of him and glad for the commotion as people packed up their belongings and got ready to deplane. The dull roar would make it easier to speak with Jillian with a modicum of privacy.

“I’ll catch up with you in a minute.”

“Great.” Takashi’s curious gaze flickered between the women, and Liza braced for the worst, but he left without comment.

Jillian took Liza’s elbow and navigated her back through the crowd to the conference room.

Always eager for the next great get—Jillian had never spoken to the press about the governor’s betrayal, and the idea of a comprehensive interview with her got all of Liza’s journalistic juices flowing—Liza plunged right in.

“I’d love to interview you, Mrs. Taylor. You know that, right? Is that what this is about?”

“Call me Jillian, Liza, okay? I’ll never sit for an interview about my personal life with you or anyone. I’d rather have you as a friend.”

“Friends.” Liza couldn’t keep her face from falling at the loss of the interview she’d thought was hers. “Great.”

Jillian laughed. “You can socialize with friends, right?”

“Of course,” Liza said dully, still trying to conquer her disappointment.

Satisfaction or something like it skated across Jillian’s face. “Then I’d love to have you stay at my townhouse in the city tonight instead of at a hotel. Beau is home in Richmond, so you can keep me company.”

Liza floundered. Stay…with her? What was up with that? Why would Jillian go to the trouble? It was great to have new friends and all, but they were barely acquaintances and Liza liked her privacy.