The Wedding Sisters (10 page)

It was the greatest moment of her life up until that point. In some ways, still one of her life's great moments.

The next day at the beach, he acted like he barely knew her name. And the summer came to a quick and anticlimactic end. But Scott knew enough people in the periphery of Meryl's social circle in high school and later in college that over the years she would occasionally run into him at a party. But that hadn't happened in decades.

“Crazy. Weren't we just kids on that beach? Time flies, right?”

She nodded, thinking that he hadn't changed a bit. He was still the sun-kissed beach boy, object of her urgent, youthful desire. A few gray hairs and crow's-feet couldn't compete with that memory.

Camille shifted impatiently. “We should get going,” she said.

Scott nodded. “So listen, I'm in New York for a few weeks, getting a show off the ground. We should grab coffee.”

He pulled out his phone. Meryl realized he was waiting for her phone number. She recited it, feeling vaguely uncomfortable giving out her number to a man. But he was just an old childhood friend. Well, “friend” might be overstating it. But if friend was overstating it, then it was certainly nothing more than that and therefore harmless.

Meryl arrived back at her apartment more restless than when she'd left a half hour earlier. And she forgot all about waking up Hugh.

 

eight

“D.C. is finally starting to feel like home,” Meg told Stowe.

It was a strange thought to have walking through the white corridors of the Russell Senate Office Building. But she realized, following Stowe to his father's office, that it was true. Of course, she would never admit this to her mother. She knew Meryl still had a fantasy that Meg would somehow end up back in New York, finding a way to parlay her journalism career into a job at
The New York Times
or even CNN's New York office. There had been times when Meg thought along those lines herself. But that was before Stowe.

“My father just said the same thing.”

Reed was in D.C. only a few times a month, but today was one of those times. There was a vote on the floor, and so it was a quick stopover in Washington before heading back to Pennsylvania.

Along the edge of the rotunda, a CNN reporter was conducting an interview. Meg felt an itch to get to work, but Stowe wanted her to stop by Reed's office to meet his new communications director, a woman named Hunter Cross.

“Knock knock,” Stowe said, opening the door Reed's office.

“Kids, come in,” Reed said, standing behind his desk and waving them forward.

Perched in the seat in front of him was a striking woman with shoulder-length auburn hair wearing a chic tweed dress. She stood to greet them, her smile as bright as a beauty pageant contestant's. But her eyes, falling on Meg, were cool and appraising.

“Meet Hunter Cross, my new director of communications,” said Reed, beaming.

“Hi, Stowe—good to see you again,” Hunter said.

Again? When had Stowe met this woman before?

“This is my fiancée, Meg Becker,” Stowe said, either ignoring Meg's quizzical look or missing it entirely.

“Ah, the journalist,” said Hunter. The phone in her hand buzzed. She glanced down, frowning. Then she turned to Reed. “Stackhouse has a Web site live. Presidential exploratory.”

“What?” Meg said, reaching into her bag to find her own phone. Senator Leland Stackhouse had promised her an exclusive if he was going to announce a bid for the Democratic nomination. Heart pounding, she quickly scrolled through her e-mails. Nothing.

“No tip-off for you?” Stowe said.

Meg looked at him, shaking her head. She loved that he understood her work. Still, they tried not to talk politics too much. While they weren't so diametrically opposite as, say, Mary Matalin and James Carville, they did have their differences. And of course, Reed and Tippy considered her a raging liberal.

“Don't feel bad,” said Hunter. “I'm sure his people are working with their contacts inside CNN. It's very hard to break into that circle.”

Meg looked at her, incredulous. “I have my own relationship with the senator. I'm sure this was an oversight.”

Hunter gave her a smug grin. “Of course it was.”

Meg turned to Stowe. “I have to get to the Hill, see if I can catch him before the vote at eleven.”

“They're calling the vote early, Meg, so I'm heading over. You can ride with me,” Reed said, grabbing his jacket.

“Great.”

Meg texted her editor that she was headed to the Capitol building to try to get something for them to post by noon—to make sure their camera guy was on-site. At worst, she'd get a few quotes for an article. Hopefully, she'd get an on-camera interview that they could post on the homepage.

She followed Reed to the basement level and through a redbrick corridor. The senators traveled to and from Russell via an underground rail car. Climbing into the red vinyl seat across from Reed, she checked her phone for updates.

“So what do you make of this Stackhouse business?” Reed asked. “Does he have a shot?”

Meg smiled. “I think you and I both know he doesn't. But he can certainly shake up the debate.”

Reed nodded. “Well said.”

She liked Reed. She knew a lot of people found him intimidating—his good looks and his wealth set him apart from most politicians. But he reminded her so much of Stowe that she found it easy to be herself around him. Much more so than around Tippy.

“I want to try to get something on camera,” she told him. “For Poliglot. I wish he'd given me some notice about this. He'd promised.”

“Politicians!” Reed said, shaking his head.

“Exactly.”

The car sped through the tunnel, wind whipping her hair around her face and making it difficult to talk. She checked her phone again. A text from Amy,
Omg did you see Page Six?
No, Meg had not seen Page Six. She stopped reading the New York gossip column in college. She wished Amy could say the same, but her younger sister had a never-ending thirst for anything to do with the limelight.

Crazy busy,
she texted back.
Call you later.

The car stopped. Reed helped her out. He was distracted now, also checking his phone. They took the stairs.

“I'll catch you kids for dinner when I'm back in two weeks,” he said.

“Yes!” she called after him.

He headed for the Senate floor while she made her way to a small anteroom off to the side.

Leland Stackhouse was waiting for her. “Kevin told me you want to do a quick on-camera,” he said. Leland Stackhouse was a fifty-two-year-old three-term senator from Wisconsin. He was white-haired, tall, and lanky. He wore bad ties but had a winning smile and, because of his policy and personality, was normally was one of Meg's favorites. But not today.

“What happened to the heads-up?” she asked pointedly, not about to let him off the hook.

“It's just a Web site, Meg.”

She pulled a compact mirror from her bag and reapplied lipstick.

“I'm ready when you are,” the cameraman told her.

Meg motioned for the senator to stand closer to her, in front of a United States Senate emblem and a bookshelf. Under bright lights, cameras rolling, she asked,

“How close are you to actually running for president?”

“I've set up an exploratory Web site called DemocratsforProgress.com to see if there is a path for me, a base, outside of Wisconsin. I'll probably know by April.”

Meg nodded, then named the other contenders for the nomination. “They speak to the same base that you're going after. So why you?”

“This is what I have to offer: Progress is not just a word, it's a concept that has to be put into action. Who has an alternative to the floundering foreign policy our current president has enacted? We can't pretend that we'll have peaceful coexistence with enemies abroad—or domestically. But neither can we make a move toward isolationism.”

Meg heard her phone ring inside her bag. Damn it, she forgot to turn it to vibrate. Senator Stackhouse didn't miss a beat, and while he'd started off with platitudes, after a few minutes, she felt she got a couple of good sound bites, and the video would be worth posting. When they finished, he thanked her, and she said, “I don't want to be surprised again in April. A text next time? Smoke signals? Make me work for it—I don't mind. Just keep me in the loop.”

He laughed. “I have to get to the floor.”

She nodded, already distracted, checking her phone. The missed call was from Amy. She frowned. What was going on?

*   *   *

Jo woke up next to a sleeping Toby, with a dry mouth and her eyes nearly swollen shut from all the crying. The first thing she did was look at her phone. Four new messages—all from her mother and sisters.

Her stomach churned, and she ran to the bathroom to vomit. The bathroom was surprisingly small, considering the scale of the rest of the apartment, but that's the way it was in the old buildings.

She flushed the toilet when she was finished and rested her head on the cold marble floor. It felt good.

“You alive in there?” Toby rapped lightly on the door.

“Unfortunately.”

She hauled herself up, pulling so hard on the towel rack, she was afraid it would come down bringing the wall with it. She looked at herself in the mirror and groaned. It was as bad as she expected.

Opening the door, she found Toby wearing only his drawstring pajama pants (plaid, preppy, totally cute) and bare chested. His blond hair was tousled, his cheeks full of their ruddy European color. He was a gorgeous specimen—a gorgeous specimen she got very up close and personal with last night, if her memory served.

Disaster.

How could she have slept with him? Cheated on Caroline! No. Caroline was the one who'd cheated. Fell in love with someone else. And left her. Forever. Tears started to sting the back of her eyes again. God, was she
ever
going to stop crying?

She brushed past Toby, out of the bedroom, blindly headed for coffee like a heat-seeking missile.

Mercifully, Toby did not follow her. She pulled open the cabinets until she found the yellow box of Gevalia coffee pods. What she really needed was a latte, but that would involve venturing into the outside world. She felt brittle, fragile—completely helpless. What was she supposed to do now? Every day of the past three and a half years of her life had revolved around Caroline. Or at very least factored her in heavily. Today was not—could not—be any different. Should she call? Should she just go back to the apartment and wait for her to show up? She had to come by eventually if only to collect her things.

Jo slumped over the black marble countertop. As the caffeine hit her system, she felt a sense of urgency, a certainty that she had to get back to the apartment as soon as possible.

It was all clear to her now: Caroline was just having relationship jitters. Meg's engagement had inspired Jo to want to jump into the relationship deeper, but it had the opposite effect on Caroline. Totally normal! The last few Sunday night dinners had been so wedding-centric. Meg's guest list, Meg's dress, the bridal shower … Jo didn't take it too seriously, but maybe it was freaking out Caroline.

She had to talk to her—and now—tell her she understood, forgave her. Really, they were lucky they hadn't had a bump in the road before now. And the guilt over straying must have made Caroline confess. She didn't
really
want to break up—she just wanted absolution.

The fog of misery slowly lifted. Jo looked around for her phone but couldn't find it. Grabbing her mug, she rushed back to the bedroom, sloshing coffee on her shirt.

The shower was running. That was what she needed, but there was no time. Standing by the bed, the sheets still rumpled—Oh God, poor Toby! She was such a jerk.—she dialed Caroline. It went straight to voice mail.

“Hey, babe. It's me. Look, I want you to know that I totally get it. Yes, I lost it a little last night and, I mean, you weren't making the most sense. But I think we just need to talk. I'm coming back to the apartment. If you're home, please just hang out till I get there.”

She looked up to find Toby standing in the doorway, his hair wet, a towel around his waist.

“Can you give me a ride back to Brooklyn?”

“Are you sure you're ready?”

“I live there,” she snapped.

Toby looked hurt.

“Sorry, Tobe—I know you're trying to help—and you did help last night. I was a total basket case. And you were … you were so great. But Caroline and I are going to work this out.”

“Okay,” he said. “But do you want, I mean, should we talk about what happened last night?”

No, negatory, not in this lifetime. How could she talk about it when it was something that never should have happened—something she would pretend never did?

“I'm okay with just letting it sort of be, you know what I mean?” she said. She kissed him on the cheek and then looked through her handbag to make sure she had her keys.

*   *   *

Meg called Amy when she was just outside the Poliglot office on North Capitol Street. “Is everything okay?” It was starting to rain, and she was eager to get to the video to start transcribing it.

“Did you read Page Six yet?”

“Are you serious? Amy, I was in the middle of an interview when you called.”

“Check it now. On your phone. Call me back.”

Irritated, Meg hung up and opened her browser to the
New York Post,
scrolling down to the gossip section.

It took a few heartbeats to realize what she was looking at. A photo of her and Stowe—a shot taken last month while leaving the restaurant Filomena with Reed and Tippy—was on Page Six.

Sister Act Too

Turning work into play has been mastered by a pair of Upper East Side sisters: Poliglot editrix
Meg Becker
gets cozy with fiancé
Stowe Campion
, son of billionaire Pennsylvania
Senator Reed Campion
, while little sis
Amy
goes from
Jeffrey Bruce
flak to future Mrs.
Andrew Bruce
. A walk down the aisle has never looked more like a climb up the social ladder.