Chapter Seven
Stacia sat ona dais in front of the capitol building as her father stepped up and put his hand on a Bible, his words garbled and disjointed. She tried to stand, but her feet were planted on the ground, butt firmly in the chair, as she watched the disaster unfold. At the end, he turned and glowered at her, his finger pointing at her.
“It’s all your fault.”
She jerked awake, a fine sheen of sweat breaking out across her body. A binder crashed to the floor, papers scattering around her. She lunged for her laptop before it slid also. She struggled to catch her breath, trying to figure out her weird dream. Her cell phone buzzed,Hail to the Chief, the theme for the President of the United States, which was her father’s ringtone.
Realization dawned.
She grabbed the phone and clicked it on. “Father.”
“Where have you been? I had to call you twice.”
His thoroughly put-out tone made her cringe; the familiar urge to apologize welled up in her and the words were out before she could catch them. “I’m sorry. I was sleeping.”
It was after eleven at night, but her father never cared. He expected everyone to be available at his convenience, never mind their own lives.
He grunted, clearly not happy or pacified in the least. “I hear you have a new client. I told you I would find you a place.”
She grabbed the remote and turned down the volume before settling back against the pillows. “I thought it was best to step away from politics for a while.”
“So, you went to sports? Anastasia, I raised you for something higher, better than…than something so bourgeois, so blue collar.”
She smothered a laugh. “And politics is cleaner? Please.”
“It may not be cleaner, but it’s noble. Making our country a better place to live.” His high and mighty tone lent a preachy quality to the same old speech she’d heard for most of her twenty-eight years. She was so tired of the bullshit.
But it never mattered. She never mattered. Only the job. Always the job. And she was sick of it.
“Agree to disagree. What do you want? It’s late and I have a lot of work to catch up on.”
“So, you were sleeping? Hmmm. Anyway, I want to discuss this latest job. I don’t feel it’s the right position for you.”
“For me or for you? Are you afraid I’ll be tarnished by working with an athlete and, by default, you’ll be tarnished?”
“I’ve made it very clear how I feel about athletes and the drugs they abuse. I’m the head of the Senate committee on steroid use, for God’s sake. Having my daughter work with one of them, well, it negates my entire position, makes me a laughingstock of the Senate and weakens me.”
Her mind flashed to her father and his study, from where he was probably calling her. He undoubtedly was still wearing a suit from the day or a tuxedo if he’d had an event to attend that evening. His attire would be immaculate. His posture stiff and unbending, much like his values and opinions. Everything in its place, neat and tidy, all according to plan. His gaze would be sharp, cutting deep into flesh and bone with just a glance, clear through to your heart.
There was nothing weak about Senator Kendall.
“Well, just tell everyone that I’m your big disappointment. It won’t be far from the truth.” If he felt this way about her working with Jason, imagine what he would say if he found out she had slept with him? A rebellious part of her wanted to tell him, to see if she would finally get a reaction from him, more than duty.
“Don’t be melodramatic, Anastasia. I’ve contacted your boss about an alternative, more acceptable form of employment.”
Before she could fully absorb his words, action on the television caught her attention. “Oh, hell no. No. No. No. No!” she chanted, her voice rising with each word. She grabbed the remote and turned up the volume, dropping her phone in the process. Her father demanded her response, but she was fixated on the screen, on the image of Jason Friar pinning a reporter to a locker and obviously threatening him.
“Oh, nonononono,” she moaned again, despair punching her in the gut. What the hell was he thinking? He’d promised! Did he have a death wish or something? Or was he just another man who didn’t give a damn about his impacts on other people, on her?
She grabbed the phone. “I have to go. And Don’t. Call. Michael!” She clicked it off without waiting for a response, cutting off the sputtering at the other end. She would pay for cutting off her father but right now, she had bigger things to worry about. Mainly, Jason Friar’s meltdown in Detroit, as the lovely sportscasters on ESPN were calling it.
I’m going to kill him.
*
“Thisis howyou fix his image?”
Cole slammed a newspaper down on the desk, pushing aside other papers and rocking the coffee cup.