Madame President - Tara Sue Me Page 0,7
out of here, your meeting must not have gone very well,” Gabe says.
Gabe is one of my best friends, and had it been anyone other than Anna I’d turned down, I wouldn’t hesitate to tell him all about the last few minutes. But it was Anna, or more to the point, President Elect Fitzpatrick, and Gabe isn’t just anyone, he is a high-profile journalist who works for the largest news network in the country. Jane Doe asking me out on a date isn’t newsworthy. Anna Fitzpatrick, soon to be POTUS, on the other hand, he may think is.
For the first time, I wish I had told someone about knowing Anna. When she asked me to escort her, all I could think about was my resolve to keep my distance from her, and I blurted out my answer too quickly. It was a knee jerk reaction. What I need is a friend to talk with and I don’t have one because I’ve never spoken about Anna to anyone.
“It really wasn’t much of anything,” I tell Gabe.
Because we are good friends, Gabe knows when I’m feeding him a line of bullshit. Like now. But likewise, he’s not going to push me for an answer.
“And it was personal,” I add.
As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I realize my mistake. Gabe sees the opening and latches onto it.
“Personal, huh?” He raises an eyebrow. “How can it be personal if you’ve never spoken to her?”
He’s right and there’s no good way to reply back. Damned if you do. Damned if you don’t. The best thing I can do at this point is to take the conversation in a different direction.
“Talking about personal,” I say. “Why are you Gabe and I’m Mr. Hazar?”
He looks slightly taken aback by my question. Then he blinks and replies, “I told her to call me Gabe when I interviewed her for the second time.”
Of course he did. That’s the kind of person he is. Me, on the other hand, it’d never in two million years occur to me to tell someone to just call me by my first name. Especially if that person was running for president.
“And she did it?” I ask. “Just like that?”
“Just like that,” he replies with a smile.
Chapter Six
Her
Hotel Suite
New York City, New York
David has us staying in Manhattan for the night. It’s late now and I should be tired after a day of endless meetings, a working dinner with David to solidify my cabinet member picks, and telephone conferences after that, but I’m wide awake.
David, God bless him, must have been able to see how not well my meeting with Navin went. He hadn’t even blinked when we spoke privately before meeting the CEO of GBNC and I announced I’d be attending the balls alone. I don’t care how good David thought it’d look for me to attend with a member of the press. It’s time to mix up the way we do a few things. America knows I’m single and I’m not ashamed of it. That, I thought to myself, was that.
But it wasn’t. I’m wearing a path on the carpet from my pacing. It’s ridiculous. I have so many things to do, so many plans I need to make, and instead of doing any of them, I’m thinking about him. Why he turned me down. I need to stop.
I sit on the couch in my hotel room and turn on the television. Of course, when it turns on, it’s showing GBNC, and of course, Navin is the first thing I see. He’s with Gabe and a few of the other anchors. They’re having a round table discussion and I should turn it off because if they’re not talking about me, they will. On a normal day, I don’t mind watching the various media outlets talk about me, but on a normal day, I’m not turned down by Navin Hazer, one of their senior ranking members. I turn it off with a huff and close my eyes.
For once, I don’t stop my mind from going down paths I’d long ago vowed never to walk again. I bargain with myself and promise only to remember the beginning. The very beginning.
I was talking with a group of fellow law students on one of our first days of classes and Navin walked in. All the females and a good number of the males watched as he strolled into the room. His eyes swept over me and I was certain I saw a flicker