Campaign For Seduction (6 page)

“Takashi.” He held out a hand. “The Pats lost last night. That’s another large you owe me.”

Takashi, who had the unfortunate habit of betting on every losing team in the NFL, NBA, or any other sports league with three letters, looked around with a sheepish grin and they shook. No money would ever change hands between them and they both knew it, but it was always fun to rub Takashi’s face in another loss.

“The Celtics are still in play, though, Senator. Should we make it double or nothing?”

“No. I want to leave you some cash for your retirement years.”

Maybe Takashi said something else, but John’s entire existence was now centered on Liza and he didn’t hear it. She’d glanced up from her clipboard long enough to give him a tiny smile that made him unreasonably happy.

“And how are you this morning, Liza?” John took excruciating care to keep his expression friendly but not intimate and his voice exactly the same as it’d been when he’d greeted Takashi.

Her color heightened as she looked up with a wry twist of her lips. “Not as good as I’d be if you started your day at a decent hour.”

Staring at her, smelling the flowers on her skin, wanting her, John felt the first cracks in his discipline and hated her for it.

Why, at this critical moment in his life and the country’s future, had this woman arrived to torment him? If he couldn’t have her, he shouldn’t want her. Not this damn much.

“Takashi.” God, he couldn’t take his eyes off her for a second, even when he was talking to someone else. How crazy was that? “Give us a minute.”

Takashi hesitated, as though he knew that what was on John’s mind was nothing innocent, but then he walked off. Right about then, an unwelcome thought crept up on John, screwed with his mind and gave him another reason to be angry with this woman who jammed his circuits at every opportunity:

Was something going on with her and Takashi?

None of his business, but tell that to his knotted gut.

He stared at Helen of Troy and tried not to think about how much he wanted her sweaty, moaning and naked in his arms. That was hard enough. Not thinking about how much he wanted to
spend time alone with her and learn everything about her life was impossible.

“You shouldn’t have kissed me,” he told her.

Chapter 6

R eaching for a coffee mug, John tried to keep his voice even and his hands steady.

Liza, unfortunately, didn’t cooperate and had the nerve to sound huffy. “I already apologized, Senator—”

“The damage is done.” He put sugar in his coffee and stirred it roughly until it sloshed over the sides. Cursing, he reached for a napkin. “I’m having a little trouble getting the genie back in the bottle. What do you propose we do about that?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

She looked up at him with those wide eyes, the model of innocent bewilderment, as though she couldn’t understand what the big deal was and why he insisted on yammering about it.

“It was one small kiss that’ll never happen again. Why should we get all worked up about it? We’re both professionals, aren’t we?”

Choked with sudden anger, John gaped at her. Nothing she could have possibly said would have goaded him more. One small kiss? Was that what she was calling the job she’d done on him
with her lips the other night? When she’d given him a small taste of heaven and then snatched heaven away?

Because it sure as hell hadn’t been one small kiss to him. It’d been the unwelcome explosion of something huge, the insertion of a Liza chip into his brain that sent him off on endless fantasies of Liza naked in his bed when he should be thinking about health care and Social Security.

Seething, he fired the words out like bullets. “One small kiss?”

Hitching up her arrogant chin, she shrugged and gave him a cool, distant smile designed for the sole purpose of telegraphing how meaningless he was in her life, how forgettable.

“I can be professional, Senator. Can’t you?”

She was good. He’d give her that. If not for the telltale patches of color high over her cheeks, he’d want to strangle her for her indifference when he was panting after her like a dog with his first bitch in heat.

A beat or two passed during which she stared at John without blinking. He got her silent message loud and clear. Whatever attraction she may have felt for him came a distant second behind her career and always would—end of story.

John understood. This was right and appropriate.

Period. Whew. Bullet dodged.

And still he felt the overwhelming need to rise to her challenge. To demonstrate in explicit detail that she couldn’t just kiss him senseless and then pretend it meant nothing. To explore the budding attraction between them and see where it led. To claim both prizes he wanted: the presidency and Liza Wilson.

The Sitchroo meeting began a few minutes later, after the senator formally welcomed Liza and Takashi to the group.

The two of them occupied one corner of the conference room and tried to be quieter than church mice at St. Peter’s Cathedral while they observed the proceedings. The senator’s staffers, twenty or so of them, all juggled laptops, cell phones and coffee, and all looked bright-eyed and eager to conquer the world.

The plan, which had been finalized after much negotiation between the senator’s people and the network, was the following: in addition to trailing the senator all day, which Liza was doing
anyway, he’d answer a few of her questions at the beginning and end of every day.

These segments would air on the network’s morning and evening news shows, and Liza would continue to provide analysis several nights a week on the network’s cable affiliate. She’d also use all the behind-the-scenes footage for a one-hour special, Inside Sitchroo, to air either after the primary season ended or, if the senator won the nomination, after the general election in November.

Liza and Takashi’s instructions for today and every day were therefore the same: shut up, observe and shoot. After the meeting ended in a little while, Liza would have five minutes to question the senator about whatever she wanted; then she’d do the morning show, and then they’d all traipse off for another full day of campaign activities.

Simple, right?

Not even close.

The trying to be quiet and observe part was generally no problem for Liza. Trying to banish the senator’s taste from her mouth, well, that was impossible.

He still wanted her. The heat in his eyes had been banked since the other night, yeah, but it was still heat and still there. It was real, this attraction between them. Powerful, real and dangerous.

She’d almost convinced herself that she’d imagined the whole interlude with him the other night, but seeing him again proved that the worst-case scenario was not a figment of her imagination. He was as violently attracted to her as she was to him, and every endless day on this campaign was going to be a tormenting exercise in futile longing and unfulfilled desire.

Spending time alone with him had only thrown gasoline and kindling on her fire. He was genuine, to her everlasting dismay, and she liked him. He was also shrewd, funny and nice. What you saw with him was what you got, and she couldn’t be more furious about it. What was he trying to do to her by being likable? Why couldn’t he be a jackass like everyone else?

And why, Liza thought as she irritably uncrossed and recrossed her legs in this uncomfortable chair, was she evaluating him as though he were relationship material?

Feeling glum about her apparent lapse in sanity, Liza watched and tried not to doze while a couple of staffers debated the latest poll numbers. Had she thought covering Sitchroo meetings would be exciting? Ha. So far this morning it’d been a yawn fest. The only good thing about it was the opportunity to stare at the senator, and since her breasts always swelled and ached at the sight of him, that wasn’t really a good thing, now, was it?

He wore today’s dark power suit, white shirt and yellow tie and looked as though he’d been sent over from central casting to play the president in some blockbuster action-adventure movie. Everything about him aroused her, including his hands, which were the current objects of her obsession.

Those long fingers with their neat nails were now wrapped around his omnipresent soccer ball, the one he allegedly couldn’t think without, as he strode around the room listening to various reports from assorted people. That was another bit of trivia about the senator: his relentless energy rarely let him sit still for long and he did his best thinking, or so he said, while holding his soccer ball and pacing.

When Adena changed the topic to the tabloid photos of Francesca Waverly, which had just hit the stands, Liza stopped daydreaming and started paying attention. Waverly was a size-two Hollywood airhead with no talent and a bikini collection vast enough to outfit every woman in America. What had the senator been doing with her? The question suddenly had a whole new relevance.

Takashi passed Liza a copy of the magazine, which was flipped open to the right page, and Liza studied the picture with a bitter taste in her mouth and a concrete ball in her gut that felt a lot like…jealousy.

Under the caption Business and Pleasure? was a close-cropped photo of the good senator smiling down at the starlet—she of the big eyes, thirty pounds of hair and teeny-tiny dress—while holding her in his arms at a fundraiser in L.A. just before Liza came aboard the campaign.

The article had the usual speculation about whether the two were involved in a “secret relationship” because they’d “seemed so much in love,” according to “sources close to the campaign.”

Liza snorted and tossed the rag to the floor with a loud flap of paper.

The senator’s sharp gaze swung around to her and he paused, the soccer ball pressed between his palms. “What’s that, Liza?”

Liza gave him her sweetest smile around gritted teeth. “Nothing, Senator.”

He studied her with narrowed eyes before turning back to Adena. “What were you saying?”

Adena shot Liza a glare—Liza wasn’t being quiet enough, obviously—before answering. “We’ve released the full video and posted it on the YouTube Web page.”

The senator nodded with grim satisfaction. “Good. I don’t have time for any Francesca Waverly nonsense. What’s next?”

Full video? What full video? Liza, who hated being in the dark on anything, looked around at Takashi. He was already tapping on his laptop. Without a word, he turned the screen to Liza and hit Play.

The two watched a ten-second clip without sound that showed the senator working a receiving line with dozens of people. He got to the eye candy, smiled and extended his hand. Ignoring this gesture, the starlet threw herself into his arms and gave him a hug. The senator looked startled but laughed, extricated himself and moved on to the next person in line without looking back.

That was it.

That was it?

Of course that was it. The senator had already issued a statement saying he didn’t have the time or inclination for dating. This only proved it. He’d had that woman in his arms only while on the receiving line.

Feeling suddenly light and airy, Liza couldn’t suppress a satisfied grin—until she looked up and caught the senator staring right at her with an I-told-you-so look on his face.

Liza wiped her face clean.

He held her gaze for a beat or two and then turned away.

Liza fidgeted. Get a grip, girl, she told herself, disgusted.

The senator resumed the conversation he’d begun while Liza was watching the video. “But you still haven’t told me anything specific.” He strode back and forth in front of the windows,
through which yellow streaks of the coming dawn were finally visible. “Why should we get excited about nonspecific threats?”

“The field office doesn’t have anything specific,” said Barbara Klein, one of his top advisers, a note of frustration growing in her voice. “The two things they keep pointing to are the Internet chatter from those same supremacist groups, which seems to be getting more vocal as your coverage increases, and the interest surrounding your upcoming Midwest visit.”

Coming up to speed, Liza realized the new topic at hand was the senator’s stubborn and continued refusal to use the secret service protection he was entitled to as a presidential candidate. Idiot.

“That’s it?” he asked.

“That’s it,” Barbara said. “But we have to be aware that some supremacist yahoo may try to make a big name for himself by taking a shot at you.”

Thank you, Liza thought. Finally—the voice of reason.

The senator, however, did not seem convinced. He frowned, collapsed in his chair, stacked his wing-tipped feet on the table, leaned back and stared out the window. No one said a word. Then he stretched out one long arm—his gold cuff link winked from the snowy sleeve of his shirt—and bounced the soccer ball on the desk.

“Roy?” he asked, still staring at the sunrise.

Roy Martin was the cocky liaison from the private security firm that provided protection for the senator on the senator’s own dime. Liza, who had a violent allergy to smarm and arrogance, had never liked him one bit, and she wasn’t starting today.

The SOB shrugged as though having to explain the security procedures in place to ensure someone’s safety was an annoyance. “You know the drill, Senator. We work with the local police at each venue. We’ve got the electronic equipment we need and the visible manpower. Everything is covered—”

“Except for the countersnipers and helicopters,” Liza murmured, unable to stop herself because her head might explode if no one pointed out the obvious. “Those are appropriate measures the secret service could provide to manage the kinds of crowds the senator has been drawing.”

There was an audible gasp from somewhere. Every head turned
in Liza’s direction, and every mouth gaped. The senator dropped his soccer ball, and it rolled across the floor. Adena looked angry enough to throw Liza out of the conference room by her scruff. Takashi, sitting next to Liza, emitted a quiet groan, probably because he knew about her generally well-managed but sometimes uncontrollable streaks of hotheadedness and impulsivity.

Oops.

Had she said that aloud when she was supposed to be a quiet little church mouse? Well, so what? Someone in the room needed to outline the flaws in this little plan, and she’d sat quietly with her blood boiling for long enough. The senator’s life was on the line here, and everyone was acting way too casually about it for her taste.

The senator sat up, dropped his feet to the floor and shot her the kind of withering look designed to make her shrink into a chastened pile of nothingness where she sat.

“Liza,” he drawled, his heavy brows slashing over his eyes, “when did we put you on the payroll?”

Liza hated being silenced, especially when she was making an important point. Still, she was, first and foremost, an unbiased journalist who kept her opinions to herself. Speaking out was inappropriate and unprofessional and she needed to shut up.

“Sorry.” The word tasted bitter on her tongue. “Please continue.”

“Oh, good, everyone,” the senator said. “We have Liza’s permission to continue our meeting.” Mollified but still irritated, he shot her another dark glance before turning back to Roy. “You were saying?”

“Between our resources and the local police,” Roy said, “Things are—”

“You don’t have bomb-sniffing dogs, either,” Liza interjected, her bullshit tolerance factor now well into the negative digits.