Chapter Twenty-Seven
After dinner with Nick and Scotty, Sam took to the sofa with a fresh ice pack, not that it did much to alleviate the swelling that had her eye nearly closed. She took a call from Jeannie.
“What’s up?”
“How’s your face?”
“Ugly and swollen.”
“I hope he gets in a lot of trouble.”
“He was already in a lot of trouble before he hit me. What’s going on?”
“I wanted to tell you I have leads on three local wakes tomorrow for women in the age range we’re looking for. Ironically, all of them have sons with names that start with the letter D. I sent you an email with all the info.”
“Good work. Keep your eye out for more that may come online overnight.”
“Will do. I also wanted to tell you I went back to the hospital and brought Michael with me this time. We had a good talk with Angel and Roberto and made ourselves available to them for anything they need going forward. I hope it helped a little.”
“I’m sure it helped a lot. Thanks for doing that, Jeannie.”
“Thanks for asking me. It’s good for my recovery to know I might be helping someone else. But enough about me. This thing with Offenbach is unreal. Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine. Just a little damage to my ugly mug. Fortunately, there’re no state dinners or other public obligations on the calendar for the next week or two.”
“It’s unbelievable that he thinks he can assault you that way.”
“He’s in a lot of trouble and needs someone to blame. I was handy.”
“Carlucci told me his wife kicked him out and is filing for divorce and sole custody of the kids.”
“She didn’t waste any time.”
“Would you if you were her? Five kids and a sixth on the way, and he’s having an affair?”
“A, I never have to worry about my husband doing what hers did, and B, I’d do the same thing if I were in her shoes, which I will never be.”
“So would I. Although I’m too newly married to ever even consider such a thing. I feel sick for her. Six children and he’s screwing around. It’s disgusting. Everyone is talking about it at HQ.”
“There’re plenty of other skeletons in closets in that building. People should keep their yaps shut.”
“Um, yeah, the day that happens around here there’ll also be pigs flying in hell.”
Sam chuckled. “Very true.”
The agent working the front door admitted Lilia, and Sam waved her in.
She wore a sharp-looking yellow summer suit with sky-high heels and her trademark pearls.
Her dark hair was cut into a chin-length bob and her brown eyes conveyed warmth and affection.
Sam had been prepared to dislike her, but had grown to adore Lilia for her sense of style, her insane organization skills, her knowledge of Washington’s inner workings and her willingness to roll with the craziness Sam had brought to her well-ordered life since becoming second lady.
“Hey, Jeannie, I have to run. Call me if anything new pops.”
“Will do. Feel better.”
“Thanks.”
Lilia approached the sofa and stopped short when she caught a look at Sam’s face. “Oh my Lord! What happened?”
“I caught a fellow officer in flagrante delicto, and since he’s married with five kids and a sixth on the way and was supposed to be at a work conference and not frolicking in Atlantic City with his mistress, he failed to appreciate my superior investigative skills.”
Lilia sat in an easy chair across from Sam. “He hit you?”
“Yes, he did.”
“Oh my goodness.” She cringed as she took a closer look at the damage to Sam’s face. “How can that just happen at a place of work?”
“My place of work is a whole lot different than yours.”
“Still. It’s uncivilized.”
Sam laughed. “Perfect word to summarize police work in general.”
“And politics. Especially lately. What can I do to help?”
“Well, if you know a talented makeup artist…”
She pulled out her smartphone. “I can find someone.”
“I have no doubt you could, but I was kidding. My primary concern is that someone will say that my husband did this. I want to know how we should handle it since I can’t exactly hide it.”
“We’ll issue a statement that you were involved in an automobile accident, and then assaulted on the job.
Lieutenant Holland is back to work after being hospitalized overnight, and is working to catch the perpetrators of the recent spate of drive-by shootings that have terrorized District residents. ”
“Damn, you’re good.”
“Thank you. That’s my job, and I don’t think anyone would dare to say your husband hurt you when the whole world can see that he’s mad about you.”
“Yes, he is,” Nick said when he joined them, unleashing that potent smile on poor Lilia, who flushed.
Sam held out a hand to him, and he sat with her on the sofa. “Lilia already has the perfect statement to explain away my latest disaster.”
“Excellent,” Nick said, squeezing Sam’s hand.
“Needless to say, we’re being overrun with requests for comments about the current situation from you both. I wonder if you’ve given any thought to a public statement?”
Sam glanced at Nick, nodding.
“We have, and our plan is to meet with the Nelsons,” he said. “Depending on how that goes, we’ll either make a statement expressing our support for the president and first lady, or I’ll testify in the hearings.”
“That’s very interesting,” Lilia said. “Do you mind me asking what you hope to gain from the meeting?”
“I want to see their eyes when they tell us they had nothing to do with it,” Sam said. “I’ll know if they’re lying.”
“I see.”
“Do you approve?” Sam asked.
“Oh, well, it doesn’t matter if I approve.”
“It matters to me.”
“Then yes, I approve. I think it’s a good idea for you to speak directly to them and have the chance to ask your questions and determine whether they’re sincere.”
“That’s good to know.”
“You should also know that everyone who works for you and the Nelsons is on edge about what’s going to happen. The White House is fraught with a nearly unbearable level of tension.”
“I’ve seen that myself,” Nick said, “and I’m sorry it’s come to that.”
“You have nothing to be sorry about,” Lilia said fiercely. “This was done to you, not the other way around.”
The more time Sam spent with Lilia, the more she liked her—and she wasn’t known for liking a lot of people.
“We appreciate your loyalty,” Nick said.
“It’s my pleasure to serve you both.” She reached into the briefcase she’d brought and retrieved a document.
“I took the liberty of compiling some additional information about Christopher Nelson that you may not be aware of. Such as, did you know he was expelled from four different boarding schools?”
“We had no idea,” Nick said.
“He also has a sealed juvenile record.”
“That I did know,” Sam said. “We had no luck getting a judge to unseal it during the investigation.”
“I haven’t seen his actual record, but people talk, and the word is he was heavily into drugs—dealing and doing—which is what got him kicked out of school. His father was a prominent senator from South Dakota, who swept his son’s misdeeds under the rug to keep them from becoming public.”
“He basically set him up for what came later by valuing his political career more than his own son,” Sam said, glancing at Nick. “That sounds familiar.”
“Graham O’Connor made similar mistakes with John and paid for them dearly,” Nick said.
Knowing how painful it was to think about what’d become of his best friend and boss, Sam cradled his hand between both of hers, wishing she could crawl into his lap and wrap her arms around him the way she would have if they’d been alone.
He sent her a small grin, letting her know he appreciated her support. Their silent communication was another thing to love about him.
“I’ll leave this here in case you need it.” Lilia placed the report on the coffee table. “Everything in there has been substantiated by at least two people who would know. I hope I can count on your discretion in not revealing your source.”
“You can absolutely count on our discretion,” Sam said. “We appreciate the limb you went out on to put that together.”
“I wanted to make sure you have all the information you need.” She pulled another piece of paper from her bag.
“On another note, we’ve received dozens of new requests for you to speak at events pertaining to fertility, learning challenges, paralysis and law enforcement, to name a few.
I’ll leave this here, and you can let me know if any of the invitations interest you. ”
Sam had received rave reviews for her keynote address to the fertility group.
“We’re still getting emails from women who were touched by your infertility journey.” Lilia produced another stack of pages that she placed next to the others on the table. “I printed out a sampling of them that I thought you might enjoy.”
“Wow, it’s so nice of them to write to me.”
“You can’t know how much you touched people who’ve shared your struggle. For them to know that someone like you has been where they are is so helpful to them. The staff has been reduced to tears by some of their letters.”
“Someone like me? I’m a regular person.”
Nick and Lilia laughed at that.
“Sure you are, babe. Just a regular girl running around putting murderers in jail while serving as the country’s second lady.”
Lilia pointed to Nick. “What he said.”
The front door opened, and in walked Dr. Harry Flynn. His gaze immediately locked on Lilia, who flushed an even brighter shade of pink this time.
Very, very interesting.
“Hello there,” Harry said as he joined them, appearing to have come straight from work, judging by the white dress shirt and pinstripe navy tie he still wore.
He had dark hair and eyes and dimples that were nothing short of dreamy.
“I hear our favorite cop-slash-second lady has gotten herself into yet another scrape.”
“You heard correctly,” Sam said, flashing the injured side of her face. Combined with the bruise under the butterfly bandage on her forehead, she was a hot mess.
“Yikes.” Tipping his head for a better look, he said, “I think it’s an improvement.”
“Haha,” Sam said. “Very funny.”