Madame President - Tara Sue Me Page 0,54
the wrong way, I apologize. I assumed you, being who you are, knew better than most the impossibilities.”
I tilt my head and take a step closer. “What impossibilities, and what about me?”
“You’re a successful, good looking man, you of all people should understand why those rooms in the East Wing will remain unused.”
Any other time I’d have considered it a victory to have Anna confirm she found me attractive, but the resolute sound of her voice wouldn’t let me.
“I’m crushed you find me merely good looking,” I say, attempting to get a smile out of her, and failing. “Even so, I’m not quite sure I understand why that means I would know anything about the East Wing.”
“Because,” she says. “No man wants everyone to know his wife holds more power than he does. No man wants to be the First Gentleman.”
Ah. That explains it. Anna typically dates assholes from the sound of things.
“Who fed you that line of bullshit?” I ask.
“It’s not bullshit. It’s the truth,” she says. “Do you know how many times I’ve been asked out since I announced I was running for president? None. Not once. And you can’t consider Captain Phillips a date.”
None. And when she’d asked me out, I’d turned her down. Damn. Never before have I wanted a chance for a do-over so badly. But unfortunately, she’d offered herself to me on a silver platter once and would no doubt never do the same again.
“You are aware that many people find you to be a bit intimidating, right?” I ask her. “I mean, even outside of you being President.”
“I’m just a person,” she says, as if anything could be that easy.
I shake my head. “You will never be just a person. And I hate to break it to you, but you weren’t able to pull off the just a person routine even before you became President.”
Her eyes widen in surprise. Is it possible she has no clue how people view her? Does she not see how enamored people are when she’s around them? It blows my mind she might think the interaction she has with others is normal.
Or maybe, I think. Maybe she doesn’t think anything of it because people have always treated her differently. Like they could tell when she was eleven that she was someone special.
“You don’t seem to have a problem telling me exactly what you think either about me or anything else,” she says, and I can’t argue with her there.
“True,” I say. “But I did go to law school with you.”
“Only for a year and a half,” she says, catching my gaze and then looking away. “It’s not like we were all that close.”
She’s the President of the United States and I’m a reporter. I bring nothing to the table she either needs or wants. I have nothing to give her. Nothing. But with her statement that we weren’t close, I realize I have something to give after all.
The truth.
“I don’t have many regrets,” I tell her. “But most of the ones I do have involve you, and only one pertains to leaving the way I did. The others….” Odds are she may prefer that I don’t tell her, but I want her to know. Suddenly, it seems massively important that she knows. “I regret waiting so long to introduce myself to you because I was fascinated by you the first time you spoke in Torts. For not telling you I only volunteered as a translator because I watched you do it, and I thought it would give us something in common once I worked up enough courage to talk to you.”
“What?” She spins around so quickly, she teeters unsteadily on her heels. I reach for her instinctively, my arms going around her in an effort to keep her upright. She straightens up, but I don’t let her go. I like the feel of her in my arms. It’s like I’m holding a stick of dynamite, and I know I’m going to get burned, but I don’t care because I want to keep it in my grasp just a little longer.
“Every woman I meet, I compare to you,” I whisper, my voice made rough by the feel of her warm body pressed against mine. “And every one comes up lacking.”
Her lips part slightly, and I shouldn’t. I know it. She knows it. But I can’t stop, and I lower my mouth to hers. The first brush of our lips is light and soft. I tell myself that’s enough, and