The Rebel King (All the King's Men Duet #2) - Kennedy Ryan Page 0,39
on your phone all the time.”
I don’t bother telling him I’ve reinstated that photo of us in the tulip field as my phone’s screensaver. Lennix would have a conniption if she knew, afraid someone would see us together. I’ve yielded on enough. The hell if I won’t at least have a photo when she’s a whole continent away.
“I don’t mind being whipped as long as she’s the one holding the belt.”
“Be right back. I need to go mourn your manhood.”
“Ironically, she makes me a better man. She’s the most important thing in my life, and I got a lot of important shit in my life, brother.”
“I know. We’ll keep her safe, even though she’s being a brat about it.”
“Watch it. No one calls Nix a brat but me.”
“When was the last time you told me what the hell to do?”
He’s right. I’m invested in his security firm, but I’ve never been Grim’s boss. Everything he does for me is out of friendship, years of it.
“Also, why couldn’t you fall for some nice girl who would be quiet when you gave her jewels, suck your dick before breakfast and follow you all over the world instead of trying to elect the next president?”
“One out of three ain’t bad.”
It takes him a second to catch it, and his guffaw draws an answering chuckle from me.
“Lucky son of a bitch,” Grim mumbles.
“Exactly, and as soon as I get back to the States I plan to take full advantage of my good fortune. Being away from her is hard as a motherfucker.”
“Well, we know precisely where she is at all times. At least you didn’t punk out on the tracker.”
“I love her,” I tell Grim softly, seriously. “I don’t own her. You don’t hold back someone like Lennix because the beauty is in how she flies. I want to see her soar. I just want to make sure she always lands safely. You know?”
Grim is silent on the other end for a moment. “I’ll keep working on Keene. Dude’s dead as a doorknob, but if by some miracle he shows his pretty face, we’ll see it.”
Pretty face? The image of wild blond curls rioting behind the Abe mask comes back to me.
“You prepared a file on him, right?” I ask, biting the inside of my jaw.
“Yeah, of course.”
“Send me everything.”
15
Lennix
It feels good to be out on the trail again. When Owen announced his candidacy, the response was exactly what I expected. Pandemonium. He’s the best candidate I’ve ever managed, and the most exciting one the American public has seen in a long time.
Hope generates a unique energy, and that’s what I sense in these crowds, in these people as we travel the country and lay the groundwork for what will be a massive campaign. Hope that Owen is as good as he looks. That he might effect change to actually make life better for them. That he’ll make this country better. No matter how many campaigns I manage, or scandals I have to spin, or counterfeit candidates I meet, on the inside, I’m still like every eager face crowding the front of Owen’s stage.
I still hope for the real thing.
“There’s a long road ahead,” Owen tells the people huddled into their coats and scarves in the February cold. He leans into the mic, his blond hair disheveled by the bitter wind. “But that just gives you more time to get to know me.”
With that boyish grin, he’ll be collecting hearts and votes for the next year and a half, all the way to the booth next November.
“And I hope when it’s time to pull that lever,” he continues, “you’ll remember Owen Cade. For the people.”
The applause is thunderous when he steps away from the podium, waves and walks offstage. Never far away, his two security plain suits flank him as soon as he hits the ground and starts signing autographs, air-kissing babies and posing for selfies. We often make rock stars of our politicians. Large crowds, theme music, slogans. Owen, with his three-hundred-dollar haircut and five-thousand-dollar suit, somehow makes people struggling to pay rent feel he understands their pain. Never having gone a day in his life suffering any lack, he does seem to understand the plight of working people. I marvel again that Warren Cade raised Maxim and Owen. From such a privileged background and with such a jerk for a father, they both managed to become good men, empathetic and caring about others who have a lot less.