16
Damon
When the next evening came, I supposed that Bea was thinking something like, ‘it’s a nice thought but I can’t actually go through with it’—not so soon after the gossip site photo had served up a questionable public reputation for her and with the campaign still getting up to speed. It was a time to be overcautious, not to be dating one of the Secret Service agents present to safeguard the tedium of normality.
To my surprise, she came anyway, and I didn’t even have to issue any further temptations, waiting outside the front of her house and leaning back against the front of the Audi in a manner the rest of the suits would probably consider a disciplinary offence. I’d always played my approach confidently, even though the thought of being with Bea caused nerves to circle inside that other women had failed to stir. I looked pretty smart in my undercover suit, but I was the one in awe when Bea turned up at the door looking more beautiful than any woman I’d seen before.
She wore an elegant black dress that had a shimmery sort of sheen to the fabric, and it seemed to glisten in reminiscence of the stars we’d lain under and enjoyed together. The sparkle of young love I thought doomed to die was simply refusing to burn out. Any yearning that I’d been suppressing since that abrupt text was demanding to be set free once again, without compromise this time, even though we knew the brilliance of coincidence turning in our favor was fleeting.
There were no words to express how flattered I was that she had gone to such an effort just for a guy like me. Being in a phony situation that meant I was now able to see Bea in more social circumstances, even if only in passing or from a distance, had led me to a false presumption that even if she took up my offer she might do so more casually than before. I was now a secret extension of her personal life that many would’ve been inclined to treat more lightly, rather than still dressing to impress.
“You look like an angel,” I said, once she was within arm’s reach.
“An angel wouldn’t be lying to her parents about going to a college fundraising event,” she replied with a devious smile. “But thanks, anyway. You look great too. So are you ready to go?”
“Yes, but remember I’m an agent and working,” I said with a wink. “You have to sit in the back of the car, otherwise people might ask questions.”
“Of course.”
Bea did as I said, and soon I was behind the wheel and driving out toward a skyline and a brilliant sunset that was already fading to pink, then blue, as it would until the drama of the day was just a memory. In a few hours it would start all over again with another bright dawn, but I was in no mood for that to come around. The night could take as much time as it liked, and tomorrow deserved no consideration.
“You know, you’re not lying at all, really,” I said. “All I’m doing is my job, and you’re simply obeying your parents’ wishes to not go out alone again.”
“Oh, really?” she asked. I could see her arching an eyebrow in the rearview mirror.
“Absolutely.”
“But do you really think it’s the right thing to be giving my parents half-truths?”
“Of course. You’re a politician’s daughter, that kind of thing should come second nature to you,” I said with a grin.
“That’s one way of looking at it,” she replied, with a slightly melancholic laugh.
“He should be proud of you, in fact. It shows you’ve learned from his example.”
“Then I wonder why you’re dating me—but thanks!”
“Really though, Bea,” I went on, keen to encourage her to make the most of her freedom, having now seen first-hand the many restrictions on her life and finding that I pitied her—in spite of her family having all the privileges I once thought were the root cause of my own problems when growing up. “Everyone is playing the same game, it’s just that yours appears to be a bit more isolated.”
“You don’t think we have absolutely nothing in common then?”
“Not at all. You know, I was thinking about what you said the other day—about what’s right or wrong. The funny thing about life is that we can never know for certain. Sometimes what feels rights seems wrong and the other way around, because what we see upfront is not the same as what lurks in the background. And you know what I think?”
“What’s that?”
“The bigger the front, the bigger the back… the more scope for complication, I mean. Everything we see is just a show, what’s beneath is something else.”
I wanted her to know that I understood at least a little of where she was coming from, though I hoped it didn’t come across as looking to make out like I had her life completely figured out, just because I’d been around the house for a couple of days. What I said was based on personal experience, and I knew it to represent the first tiny step into suggesting there was a little more about myself that she wasn’t aware of. Bea had always been so upfront with me, and I respected that too much to want to hide my past, only doing so was fraught with difficulty.
“My family is like that,” Bea replied, not appearing to be put out by my analysis. “What’s really going on at home is a whole different story. Yeah, my Dad is a great man who’s fighting crime and goes to church, and the state economy is flourishing thanks to him, but he’d never treat his own daughter like shit if the right thing was the only thing that he’s concerned about.”
Without knowing whether Bea was referring to something recent or not, I found it hard to form an opinion on her father from what little I knew. I couldn’t pretend to have much admiration or respect for the political class, and I did need to dig deeper to discover that Governor Bentley was not always the smiling and genial figure I’d seen in the media. It was tempting to suppose that I should have withheld some respect for Bea’s parents in that they’d raised a wonderful daughter. Then again, I regarded my own sister in higher esteem than anyone else I’d ever met and that was with no help from our parents, unless thick skin and resilience was the only lesson that children really needed teaching.
“It’s all part of the black and white game of the world,” I said.
“The black and white game,” Bea replied, thoughtfully. “I like that; it’s when we start figuring out the gray areas that we start to really figure out what’s going on.”
Hearing her speak with what I considered to be such a depth of perception, I couldn’t help to dare feel just a little optimistic that the dark life I was hiding from her did not render me completely hopeless. If there was real integrity behind her words, then maybe she would have the ability to see beyond the surface when the time came and understand that my past and my life decisions didn’t necessarily make me a terrible person. At the same time, my mind screamed with warnings. Our worlds were so far apart and, although I’d embraced the mission as my only possible means of getting close to her, I was engaged in an undertaking established to compromise her family.
Suddenly a hundred truths were looming over our growing affection and budding relationship. Of the two of us, I was the only one to know that the real demons that might turn up to hurt us were due to arrive wearing a friendly face, just like when the mob sent someone to kill you.
There was just no way of getting around this truth. When it came to hearing that I was a hitman, the revelation would be painful for Bea, and it would only get worse the closer we became, so I needed to let her know sooner rather than later.
But how the hell could I do that without scaring her off forever?