***
“It’s all over the news,” Steven said as we walked in.
Matthew went straight over to the television and stood in front of it as both Senator Masson and Rod Stillwater were totally crucified in the media. The newscaster talked about the huge lack of security and how those two men were even more responsible for it than the president.
“The President can’t save everyone. We have these other people so they can do their jobs. But since that isn’t happening it’s time for our leader to lead. Get rid of the dead weight mister President.”
Matthew just smiled and made his way back to his office. I started to follow him, but he shut his door so I left him alone.
Things were turned upside down and I needed some time to wrap my brain around everything. It had been one of the longest days I had ever had at work and all I could think about was heading back to my apartment and getting some sleep.
I felt better about everything and I was ready to move forward. I didn’t even care how I moved forward, I just knew that the times were changing very quickly and I needed to stay with the change and ride it out. My plan was to make it to the next wave and I knew that Matthew was going to be y key to that next situation for me.
I didn’t wait for Matthew to open his door when it was time for me to leave. Instead, I just knocked and peeked my head into his office.
“I’m exhausted, I’m heading home. I’ll see you tomorrow,” I said as I smiled at Matthew.
He was intently examining a large stack of papers and hardly looked up to acknowledge that I was even in the room. His pile of work seemed huge, but I wasn’t about to offer to help him. I needed sleep and that was exactly what I was going to do.
“Goodnight,” Matthew said as he went right back to work.
A feeling of disappointment flowed through my body but I wasn’t exactly sure why. I was tired and I needed sleep so I certainly didn’t need Matthew coming home with me or anything like that.
I turned and left the office and made my way across the street to my apartment. There was a police car that zipped pass me and I started to think about the Vice President and what might have happened to him.
When Matthew was in front of me I had such a hard time thinking that he could have done anything to hard the Vice President. But when I was away from Matthew, the idea that he was somehow involved in the Vice President going missing, well that scared the crap out of me.
Matthew hadn’t seemed worried at all that the Vice President was even missing. He didn’t seem to care and I had to wonder if he had something to do with it. My gut was telling me that he must have been involved. I didn’t know how or to what extent but I felt like Matthew had been involved in the VP’s disappearance.
The other thing that I wanted to know about was why Matthew had been so upset when we left the White House. It was odd because Matthew could control his emotions so well when he was around other Senators. I couldn’t figure out what could have bothered him so much that he had started to lose his temper.
I called Matthew on a whim and the second it started to ring I wanted to hang up, but then Matthew answered the phone.
“What’s up?” He asked curtly.
“Why were you upset at the White House?”
There was a pause and I could tell Matthew was contemplating how much information he wanted to tell me. But I was his chief of staff now, he needed to share what was going on so I could help him.
“The President wants Masson for the VP position.”
“Even with all the controversy regarding the Senate Arms Committee?” I said in surprise.
“Yes.”
“So what can we do? More scrutiny of his committee? Does he have a girlfriend or lover? We could throw some information to the press and see what sticks.”
Another long pause and I waited for Matthew to answer me.
“I’m coming over,” he said and then hung up the phone.
I couldn’t tell from his tone of voice if he was upset with me or if he just wanted to talk more privately than our cell phones would allow. But I quickly changed into my sweatpants and pulled my hair up into a ponytail. I wanted to be ready for bed the second our conversation was completed.
His knock came on the door only about ten minutes after we hung up the phone. When I opened it I was absolutely not prepared for what happened next.
Matthew walked into my apartment and shut the door behind him. He grabbed my hand and brought me straight to the bathroom and turned the shower on. Slowly he took my clothes off, but he didn’t say a single word.
“What are we doing?” I asked him.
He put his finger up to his lips to signify for me to be quiet. I obliged and didn’t say anything as I watched him take his clothes off as well.
He pulled me with him as we stepped into the warm shower and I still had no idea what was going on. His look was intense, not like the one I was use to seeing when he wanted to have my body. This look was something much more serious.
“We can’t talk about this stuff on the cells phones and your apartment could even be bugged. We need to remember that at any time we could be under surveillance.”
I laughed at first because I thought he was joking. Did Matthew really think that we were being listened to? It seemed a little farfetched. There were so many more important people in the world I doubted anyone would want to hear our conversations. But I stopped laughing when I saw that Matthew didn’t think it was funny at all. Matthew was dead serious about his concern for being monitored.
“At the White House, I felt unease. Maybe it was just the news about the two of us. Or maybe it was just the bombing; but I didn’t feel comfortable at all. Plus Masson and the President were way too cozy for my good.”
I didn’t bat an eye at his comments. They all were probably very true, but it wasn’t something that we could control.
“Why are they going with Masson?” I asked in an effort to change the subject.
“I’m not sure they are, but it sounded like they were. Masson has a long history, he’s old and people trust him. But he’s not the best one for the job. We need to find out if he really embezzled from the Senate Arms Committee or not.”
“I really thought you already knew that,” I said with a giggle.
“No, I set up the publicity to make it look like he had been involved in something sinister, but I guess they are finding more and more information that is showing someone on the committee was actually embezzling.”
“What else do we need to do? How can we get you into the VP position?”
“Senator Masson has a plethora of women in his history, we could start pulling them out and see if we can get some traction on that with the media. But I need something fast. I need to know that he’s got too much negative publicity for him to even be considered.”
I thought about it for a moment as I let the warm water run over my body. There was no reason not to enjoy the hot shower while we were talking about our political future.
“A man,” I said with a grin. “We can leak that his affair was with a man.”
Matthew grabbed me and pulled me under the water with him and started to kiss me. His kiss was passionately filled and I could hardly pull myself away. I liked it when Matthew was like that. I liked when his passion filled the room we were in.
“I fucking love you,” Matthew said and he continued to kiss me.
“Love?” I said skeptically.
“Yes, I’m not afraid to say it. I don’t know what our future will bring, but you just officially won me over with your reaction to all this publicity. You get me, you get that we might have to do things that we aren’t one hundred percent proud of. But we are only doing them for the greater good.”
“I understand sacrificing one thing for another. It’s collateral damage in the real world. You don’t need to be in a war setting to feel the effects of collateral damage.”
Matthew looked at me and I felt his eyes penetrate through me. Quickly he flipped off the shower and grabbed my soaking wet hand and pulled me over to the bed.
“Collateral damage?” Matthew said as he appeared to not understand what I was trying to say.
“Yes, when you hurt someone or something that is not intended to be hurt.”
Matthew smiled as his wet body pressed up against me. It felt weird and unusual to be in bed and be soaking wet. I liked the feeling, even though the air on my skin had me shivering within moments.
“I’m glad you understand about collateral damage,” Matthew said as he kissed me.
“Yes, and I’m sorry, but you might be collateral damage on my way to be the first female President.”
I tried to keep a straight face but I broke down and started to laugh. I didn’t want to be President. I wasn’t exactly sure what I wanted for my career in Washington, all I knew was that I didn’t want to do anything without Matthew by my side.
No matter what was going on between us, we were a good team and I wanted to keep that intact as much as possible.
“I might be collateral damage?” Matthew asked as he laughed.
“Yep.”
“I’ll be your collateral damage anytime.”
As our bodies slid together, I felt a new closeness to Matthew. Our life was about to be forever intertwined into the history books. We were going to be one of the most memorable political couples the United States had ever seen. If only I could figure out what our next step should be.
We made love like we hadn’t done in what seemed like a very long time. I could hear his phone ringing from the bathroom, but neither of us were about to stop our pleasure to go check it. The ringing continued over and over again until we had finished with a glorious erotic explosion and Matthew finally decided to get up and see who wanted him.
“Oh, my God,” Matthew said as a look of shock crossed his face.
“What is it?”
“He’s dead. The Vice President is dead.”
I was instantly confused. I really had thought that Matthew had had something to do with the Vice President disappearing. But the look on his face appeared really genuine as Matthew stared at his phone and sat down on the bed.
“Dead? What did you think had happened to him?”
I tried to ask the question in as easy terms as I could will out accusing Matthew of anything. Matthew just held his finger up to his mouth to indicate we couldn’t talk there.
“I don’t know, I thought he ran off with a girlfriend or something like that,” Matthew said.
“Oh, well that’s horrible that he’s dead. Now what?”
I couldn’t tell if we were talking for real or making up some wear conversation just so someone listening would have a full conversation to report. I was baffled though because I had genuinely thought Matthew had been involved.
Matthew grabbed me and pulled me out onto the balcony. He pulled my ear toward his mouth and I felt his breath on my neck.
“He was supposed to be drunk in a brothel in Las Vegas,” Matthew confided in me. “He wasn’t supposed to die.”
“But you were ready to take over,” I said as a look of confusion filled my face.
“Yes, I expected they would push him out for his bad behavior. I expected we would have had much more time to organize and move forward. Now we need to get me in that damn office.”
I shook my head in agreement with Matthew…we needed to get him into that Vice President position. Whatever we had to do to make that happen, it was time to get moving on those things. It was time to take control of the situation and make things happen that we needed to happen. It was time for total concentration and focus so we could get the prize we so desperately wanted.
“You need to get Masson out of the picture. We can’t wait for an investigation into his committee. We can’t wait for anything at all. You need to take care of him,” I said in a tone that I had never heard myself say before.
“Anyway I can?” Matthew asked me.
“Yes, get rid of him.”
The power and deceit in our conversation sent a high energy surge through my body. I had never been part of a plot before. I had never wanted to be part of something so sinister. It felt good. I hadn’t expected that being bad would feel so damn good.