My thumb hovers over the SEND button on my phone, and I stare at the tiny, blueish screen, suddenly uncertain about the text I’m about to send.

It’s dead quiet in the Super 8, the orange glow of the parking lot lights leaking around the edges of the blackout curtains. The only other light is my phone, this text I’m suddenly not sure I should send.

I want to send it. I haven’t seen Ruby in days, haven’t gotten to talk to her, to be with her through this hell, even though I’d do anything.

But as much as I really do want to drive my car through the front gates of the mansion, punch my way through a couple guards, rescue Ruby, and drive off with her, I know that’s not what would happen. I’m outnumbered ten-to-one, for starters, and I don’t think getting myself arrested for trespassing would do Ruby any favors.

If it would, I’d be in jail already. Lock me up.

Don’t tell her now, like this. Tell her in person when you see her again.

Slowly, the urge passes, and I delete the words I love you.

* * *

Sleep’s a joke. I try it for another hour, staring at the faded stains in the ceiling of this hotel room, but there’s no way I’m going to fall asleep tonight so after a while I get up, turn on some lights, and sit at the desk in my boxers.

Politics and PR has never been my strong suit, but I lived in DC for a couple of years, and I got a pretty good first-hand view of it. The married congresswoman I slept with was a master of it, at least until she got caught with me.

I close my eyes, phone in my hands, and try to remember anything she told me, but it’s not like we did a lot of talking. If we had, maybe I’d have gotten out of there earlier, though probably not.

Get out ahead of the story, I can almost hear her saying, into her phone. Control the narrative.

I rub my eyes and try to figure out how on earth the Senator is going to try to control the narrative. He’ll probably have a press conference. That’s politics 101.

And he’ll probably try to find a way to keep Ruby from appearing, or at the very least from speaking. He can control lots of things, but he can’t control what comes out of her mouth when there are cameras around.

I sigh.

Great, so he’ll have a press conference and keep her locked away for a while.

God, I’m bad at this part.

I wind up spending an hour setting up alerts for every iteration of the Senator’s and Ruby’s names that I can think of. By now I’m just waiting for the news to hit, pacing back and forth in my hotel room, glancing at my phone every thirty seconds. The sun starts to come up outside, and the pale yellow light starts leaking through the curtains.

I get dressed, still waiting, and open the curtains. There’s nothing on my phone, and my stomach is in knots, a heavy, horrible feeling in the pit.

No one believed her, I think, disbelief and astonishment heavy on my heart. Everything she’s been through, this fucking genius plan she figured out, and no one believed her.

On the table, my car keys catch my eye. It’s a ten-year-old Hyundai. The airbags are pretty good. I don’t think I’d even break anything if I drove it through the gates.

I wouldn’t get all the way to Ruby, obviously, but it would bring the news cameras out, and maybe I could convince some of them to look into the Senator a little more deeply...

Just as I’m about to grab my keys and go, my phone buzzes, and I snatch it off the table, pulse racing. There’s an alert, thank God, there’s an alert. It’s from some trashy political gossip blog, but it’s something.

“Yes!” I shout at my phone, and click to open it. It quotes her email almost in its entirety, picking out salacious key phrases to highlight in bold.

Then, before I can finish, there’s another alert. And another, and another.

Now they’re rolling in, so fast I can barely skim one article before I get another one. First is just blogs, but after a few minutes, the more serious news outlets get in on the game, too: Time, CNN, the BBC, the New York Times.

They’re all skeptical — it does sound insane, after all — but he’s going to have to respond, and he’s going to have to prove that Ruby’s there of her own free will. Which he can’t, because she’s not.

I can’t stay here, doing nothing, even though I don’t know what to do just yet, so I get into the car and drive into town, phone buzzing away. I don’t go to the mansion, because I’m afraid that the temptation to drive through the gates will just be too strong, so I drive aimlessly.

I get gas station coffee and don’t drink it. I drive by the Starbucks where I met Zeke, just for something to do.

And then, finally, the alert I’m waiting for comes through.

He’s giving a press conference at nine. From the front steps of his house, behind the gates, presumably surrounded by security. There’s no mention of whether Ruby will be there or not, just him.

I’ve already got a bad feeling about this.