CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Cameron
Another hellish week dragged on, made more so by the impending debate with Blakely that was drawing closer by the day. It didn’t matter that I was the one the media singled out for his debate skills and that my father had never excelled in public speaking. My father played armchair quarterback, lecturing me again and again about what to say, and since I was politically inexperienced and his son, I respectfully sat there and took it.
But I couldn’t say I actually absorbed it. No, it all bounced off me like I was wearing a suit of armor.
Because the truth was, I didn’t fucking care.
What Cassandra had said wasn’t right. I didn’t hate the idea of being an attorney. I hated certain aspects of it. Lying, pandering, overpromising, presenting an image that was far from realistic. I wanted to help people, and make the world a better place, but I sure didn’t like the shit I had to do to be afforded the opportunity. As senator, I knew it would be more of the same.
Wednesday afternoon, my father called me into his office. I knew it was something shitty because he never warned me ahead of time about that. When I went inside, he introduced me to Alan Larsen, the conservationist from the EPA who’d been providing us our data. He was a small, slight guy who looked like a stiff wind could blow him over, with a bad comb-over and bad acne scars. He had a clipboard in his battered briefcase, which he pulled out and handed to me. “This is the data you wanted.”
I stared at the facts and figures, my head pounding. “What does this mean?”
“It says, quite obviously, what you’d been hoping. That the swampland will remain and that the area will eventually be conducive to supporting a similar ecosystem as what currently exists.”
My father nodded proudly in a We got those liberal tree-huggers by the balls way. I looked at Dr. Larsen. “Eventually? What do you mean eventually?”
“Well. The project is rather extensive. There is a good chance that in the building itself, it may impact the area, what with the excavating, and the tree-clearing that’s necessary.”
“All right. But don’t we need to investigate that?” I said, turning the papers over in my hands. “I mean, if we go on saying the toads aren’t going to be harmed, and then we go and wipe out an entire species—”
My father interrupted. “By then, they’ll have forgotten all about it. That’s the way these liberals work. Toads are the topic du jour. But next week it’ll be whales off the coast of Brazil or manatees or wolves. Trust me.”
I stared at my father. “I’m sorry. If we assert something, we should have our ducks in a row. Why did we make that original decision if we didn’t have all the data? I’m not fucking going to be held responsible for this.”
“You won’t be. Trust me,” he said, looking at the conservationist. “We’ll just blame the EPA.”
The idiot EPA agent nodded along dumbly. Was Larsen in my father’s pocket? I knew how this worked. The EPA would just blame us, or someone else, and no one would ever take the fucking responsibility. I jumped from my chair. “No.”
Even though I was standing above them, my father did his best to stare me down. “Sit down, Cameron.”
I shook my head and looked at Larsen. “What will it take to do a study on the effects of building?”
Dr. Larsen began to speak, but my father cut him off. “We don’t have time or the money. It’s set. We break ground on Saturday.” He stood up, as did the doctor, and they shook hands. “Thank you for coming, Dr. Larsen. An assistant will show you out.”
After I’d shaken his hand, and he left, my father closed the door and his jovial smile dissolved in an instant. “What the fuck are you doing, boy? When you make a decision, you need to stick by it!”
My teeth squeaked, I ground them together so hard. “I didn’t have all the information.” I left out the one glaring part: My father might have played a large part in the withholding of it. “Now that I’ve had a chance to consider it, I’m not so sure that this is the best course of action. There has to be a way to make both sides of this argument happy.”
He stared at me like I’d just bitten the head off a chicken. “Of course not. You want to make those toad-lovers happy? I’m talking about a billion-dollar investment here, and you’re talking about a slimy creature that eats its own shit. Do you seriously care about a fucking toad?”
“They have a valid point,” I offered calmly. “And we lied.”
“We didn’t lie. We just didn’t tell all the truth. Besides, this development is going to help a lot more people than you know. The residents of the town are crying out for it.”
“All right. But that doesn’t negate the fact that those against the development have a valid point. If we all respect these viewpoints, we can come to an agreement. I think in the end, we essentially want the same things.”
“The same things? I don’t want to make nice with a frog, do you? I say, kill all the frogs! Let them roast! Progress is the name of the game.” He looked away from me and shook his head as he stalked back to his chair and collapsed into it. “Same things, my ass. We’re divided for a reason. This is an all-out war, and the only way to have war is to have someone to fight against.”
Of course my father would think that. They’d nailed his ass to the wall during Shadygate, and he’d never give any Democrat courtesy again. “I—”
“My firm has sunk everything into this development, and we’re getting it done. Now. We’re not going to all play ring-around-the-rosy on that land and sing ‘Kumbaya’ to a bunch of fucking frogs,” he said, his voice even but hard. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a card, which he handed to me. “Speaking of war, you have a meeting with this man next week.”
I studied the card. It said Dick Evans, Private Investigations. “About what?”
“About what? What do you think?” he said, crossing his arms. “Boy, you’re about to go into your first debate, and you have no clue what you’re up against. You might say you do, but you don’t. The press may say you have a silver tongue, but if Owen catches wind of anything untoward, he’ll rip it clean off, leave you there with your ass hanging in the wind. You need to fight fire with fire.”
My eyes shifted from the card, to him, and back again. “You can’t seriously be saying what I’m thinking you’re saying.”
“You don’t go into war without ammunition,” he said, taking the card and stuffing it back into his breast pocket. “And Dick is the best in the business. He’ll get the goods on Blakely if he hasn’t already.”
I shook my head. “I want a fair fight. I don’t need this man to uncover dirt about my opponent so I can sling it back at him and humiliate him and his family. That’s bullshit. I’d rather lose the damn race.”
He scoffed at me. “And you really think Blakely would do you the same courtesy?” He leaned forward, his palms flat on the surface of his desk. “I guarantee you he’s already digging around for ammunition of his own.”
“Like hell he is,” I said flatly. Besides referring to me as “green” and “wet behind the ears” a few times to the Inquirer, Owen Blakely hadn’t said much about me at all.
“Even so. Meeting. Next Thursday at nine sharp, at my residence,” he said, his eyes as hard as steel on me. “Now get the fuck out of my office.”
Gladly. I reached for the door.
“Cameron,” he said, and I knew the words were going to sting worse than any punch he could deliver. “Being soft isn’t going to do you any favors at this debate. You know, I’m not sure you’re man enough for this.”
Truthfully, I wasn’t sure I wanted to be.
I tried to skirt out before he could say more because I knew where this was headed. His question came out before I could leave. “When the fuck are you going propose to Bernadette? It would be a nice media distraction right before the debate.”
I bristled. “Since when did a proposal become a media distraction?”
He shook his head at me, disappointed. “Get a ring, boy. There’s one at Tiffany & Co. that will do real well. Six figures and twelve carats will make all the headlines.”
I scoffed. I knew that ring well. The conniving woman had planted the glossy picture in my wallet weeks ago, so I knew it would meet with her approval. I’d even looked at it online, my hands sweating as I tapped on the keyboard. In a particularly low moment, I even came close to ordering it, just saying “fuck it” and getting it over with.
“You need to make plans, boy. It has to be perfect. Violin music and fireworks and shit.”
I said nothing. Did it not even matter that he knew what a high-maintenance bitch his future daughter-in-law was? “Would you like to write out my words on notecards?”
He grinned that big ole shit eating grin that I hated. “I’d be happy to. I’ll also plan every detail. This weekend work for you?”
Fuck no.
No weekend would work for me. Besides, this weekend was for Cassandra. The second my thoughts turned to her, desire and guilt and frustration flooded in.
I needed to get it through my thick head that Cassandra didn’t want me. If she did, she’d tell me her real name, tell me details of her life… she’d let me in.
It was clear that I wasn’t who she wanted, not long term anyway. And I couldn’t keep stringing us both along. At some point we’d get caught and she’d become the target for the tabloids and media.
I needed to just call it quits after this weekend. Then again, I’d made no promises, and she’d had no expectations, which was why she’d revealed so little about herself and kept telling me that none of this mattered. But there were possibilities there, possibilities that thrilled me unlike anything else in my life.
The problem was, the time for exploring those possibilities was running out.
Just get it over with. Let her go. Get back on the path you were destined for.
“Next week then?” Damn, Dad wouldn’t let it go. “You could invite her to dinner at the Stone Bistro in the city.”
I was so fucking tired of this. “Sure, why not.” My voice was devoid of any emotion. “Why don’t I just rent out the rooftop too, maybe hire the Monteverdi Choir for the background music.” I snorted. “Maybe even knock her up that same night. It would be a nice two for one, wouldn’t it?”
Dad ignored my sarcasm and gave me his best politician smile, clapping his hands together. “Perfect. We’ll drop the video the morning of the debate. You’ll cinch it, son.”
I just stared at him, disbelieving. He’d feed me to the wolves if it bought him a single vote.
I shook my head. What did it matter?
I’d known for years that this was my lot in life. I’d known my wife would be carefully chosen, a woman the people of America could look up to and respect.
I’d known it. Prepared for it. Surrendered to it.
And yet…
Without another word, I left my father’s office and turned my thoughts toward Cassandra and Saturday. I told George to make sure my Mustang was ready and called the maid service to have them ready my house in Rock Hall on Chesapeake Bay. It was a small, private cottage I’d bought on a whim, totally in secret a few years ago, using layers of companies as a cover to hide my name. I’d never taken anyone there before. I’d only used it for solitary weekend getaways, whenever I had the chance to get away, which wasn’t very often. Not even my parents knew of its existence. But when I thought of escape, I thought of that place.
And now, I thought of Cassandra.
There was no one else that I could trust to share it with, but her.
My phone pinged.
I just stared at the message. It was confirmation that the Stone Bistro rooftop had been reserved in my name for Thursday at seven p.m. There would also be a bouquet of white gardenias, Bernadette’s favorite, and a bottle of her favorite champagne.
Vomit gurgled in the back of my throat.
How the fuck had it come to this?
Part of me wished the world would end this weekend, and I could spend my last few moments with Cassandra, in the only place in this fucking world I wanted to be. I ached to see her again.
And I tried.
It wasn’t until I was sitting in the back of my limo with my internet opened to Google, that I learned I had absolutely nothing to go on with Cassandra. I couldn’t think of a single search term. All I knew was that she was twenty-three, came from a family of attorneys, was a liberal, and likely middle-class. None of that was any help, which led me to an unsettling realization. I could lose her so easily. She could slip out of my life the way she’d slipped into it, and I’d have no way of getting in touch with her. I only hoped that she would be where she said at the agreed upon time. All she’d have to do was simply not show up, and I’d never see her again.
The thought only made me feel more desperate, more out of control, and ultimately, more foolish.
But what was more foolish than trusting someone so deeply, when I didn’t even know her real name?