The President's Wife - Kathy Myme Page 0,56

over in my mind.

I have feelings for the President. Not only that, but… we slept together. And then he turned his back on me, pretty much literally. He’d hightailed it out of the room this morning lightning fast.

With a groan, I curl up into an even tighter ball on the couch.

Oh my god.

What kind of situation am I in? How am I supposed to process this information?

An expression comes over Dad’s face. “Has he hurt you, Veronica?”

I don’t know how to answer that. Of course the truth that I want to scream out loud is a resounding ‘yes’.

Yes, he’s hurt me.

Yes, I’ve run away because of him.

Yes, thinking about him at all makes me feel like the world is ending.

Instead, I settle for a simple nod.

“Then he’s a bastard too,” my dad decrees. “Didn’t I always tell you to stay away from boys?”

“I’m twenty-four, Dad,” I remind him, although the corners of my mouth twitch. Dad will always be the same.

“Come on,” he says. “I’ll take you to your room. You look like you could use a rest. We’ve got a lot to talk about, but we’ll deal with it later.”

“My room?”

“You need to sleep, Veronica,” he says sharply. “You look so tired. More tired than I’ve ever seen you.”

I feel it. The constant crying on the plane ride probably didn’t help my complexion… or the temper of the people sitting around me. I’d tried to keep it down, but I feel a little bit bad for them.

Dad takes me to my room. The familiar sight of my childhood bedroom is warm and embracing. Everything is exactly as I left it.

Without even bothering to get changed, I slip under the covers still dressed in my clothes. The heaviness of the blankets and the comforting sight of the room pulls me into sleep at a record speed.

When I wake up, it’s to a knock at the door.

Groggily, I raise my head. “Dad?”

“It’s me,” my Dad confirms. “Sorry about waking you up, but… there’s someone here I thought you’d want to see.”

The door creaks open. I shield my eyes from the light, wondering who on earth I’m meant to be looking at.

I don’t have to wait long.

Lacey is standing in my doorway, taking in the sight of me cocooned under the covers. She looks as gorgeous as ever. A sight for sore eyes if I ever saw one.

“Lacey!” I cry out, shocked. “You’re here.”

“Bet you weren’t expecting me,” she says, smiling. But there’s worry in her eyes too. “Veronica… we have a lot to catch up on.”

“How are you here?”

“Your dad called me after you came back,” she says. “I came straight over. I heard about Trevor on the news, Veronica. It sounds terrible.”

“It was.” My chest tightens.

“Did he hurt you?”

“No, he… he didn’t manage to. David stopped him.”

“David? As in, the President?” Lacey asks, sounding just as shocked as she should. “God, girl. You need to fill me in. What’s going on? Am I going crazy or did this engagement come on really quick?”

I take in a deep breath. There’s a lot I need to fill her in on.

And so I tell her everything.

There’s a lot to get through. My internship, bumping into the President, the photographs… It’s a lot to get through. I still haven’t wrapped my head around it myself, not entirely.

“So it’s all a lie?” Lacey looks like her head is about to explode. “Your engagement… it’s all been pretend?”

“Sorry for lying to you,” I say, looking sheepish. “It’s just… I had to. They didn’t give me a choice.”

“This is insane,” Lacey says, running a hand through her hair. “I mean like, literally crazy. I did think something must be up, considering you definitely haven’t been dating anyone but Trevor in the last few years. But wow. This kind of thing can’t happen in real life.”

I’d love to agree, but… this is my life now. Somewhere out there, someone is writing a Wikipedia article with my face on it about my ‘engagement’ to the President.

Oh my god. I probably have a Wikipedia page all to myself.

Remind me never to check that one on Google.

“What are you going to do?” Lacey asks. By now, she’s sitting next to me on the bed, close enough to pat me on the arm. “How are you going to handle this?”

I gesture to my blanket fort. “This is how I’m handling it.”

Lacey stares blankly at me for a second. And then she shakes her head.

“Hell no,” she says.

“Sorry?”

“Veronica, I’ve known you for a