“Hi, Matt,” the kid said, his face brightening.
“Thank God,” Pat said. “I’m going to be late. I have to pick my daughter up from band practice.”
“Where the hell is his mom?” Matt snapped, ignoring Grayson.
“With Tom somewhere.”
“You mean I finally get a meeting with HGG and he’s late?”
Pat stood up, slung her purse over her shoulder. “Is that where he went?”
“What do you mean, where he went?” Matt demanded.
“Hey!” Pat exclaimed, holding up a hand and scowling mightily at his tone. “Tom left earlier, said he had a meeting at the Four Seasons. He said you could meet him there when you got in. You don’t like that, take it up with him, not me.”
The information shocked Matt so thoroughly that he could only stand there, immobilized, as Pat walked past.
“You want to read my book with me?” Grayson asked.
“Wait!” Matt said, pivoting sharply toward Pat. “Are you telling me that he left without me? That he went to that meeting alone?”
“He didn’t go alone. He took Rebecca with him. Look, I really have to go,” she said, and walked out, leaving him standing there, his blood percolating up to a full cauldron boil.
He could not believe it. After all he’d put up with, after all the time he had devoted to Tom’s campaign, gratis, and this was the thanks he got? Matt felt a rage coming on like he had only felt once or twice as an adult, and both times in a courtroom. Slowly, he turned and looked at the kid. He frowned darkly.
Grayson took a step back, his hazel eyes widening slightly.
“You wanna go for a little ride?” Matt asked.
Grayson thought about it for a moment, then nodded.
Chapter Twenty-Two
In accordance with our principles of free enterprise and healthy competition, I’m going to ask you two to fight to the death for it . . .
MONTY PYTHON
Rebecca glanced at her watch a second time, worried that Tom was getting a little carried away. She had only intended to be gone a half hour, no more, and she thought of Grayson with Pat, his least favorite of the campaign staff. “She smells like milk,” he had once told her, wrinkling his nose. Rebecca thought she’d have to excuse herself, send someone back for Tom when he suddenly looked up, beaming. “Matt Parrish!” he called loudly, and Rebecca’s tummy did a funny little flip. Smiling, she instantly glanced over her shoulder—but her heart seized when she saw the look on Matt’s face and Grayson beside him. Something had happened.
Tom turned toward the three men he had come in “to say hello to,” and as Matt reached them, he said, “I’d like you to meet Matt Parrish. You may have spoken to him on the phone.”
“Of course!” Mr. Martinez said. “Many times!”
“Mr. Martinez? Pleasure to finally meet you in person,” Matt said, unsmiling as he extended his hand.
Rebecca leaned over Grayson, ran her hand over the top of his unruly hair, and asked if everything was okay, to which Grayson dropped his gaze and shrugged.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” Matt said to Tom and the three men. “I ran into a little problem.”
“Late?” Tom asked, looking at his watch. “Oh no, you’re not late! Rebecca and I are a little early.”
They were early? But Tom wasn’t even certain these three gentlemen would even be at the Four Seasons.
“But now that everyone is here, I guess we should get a table and talk about this little campaign thing I have going,” Tom laughed, gesturing toward a table.
“Be right with you, Senator,” Matt said. “I need to give Ms. Lear some of her son’s things.”
Ms. Lear? That didn’t sound very promising.
“Take your time,” Mr. Martinez said pleasantly. “We’ll order a Mexican martini for you, if you’d like.”
“That would be great,” Matt said, and forced what almost passed for a smile.
“Gentlemen, what do you think of a superhighway running from Dallas to Brownsville?” Tom asked as he ushered the three gentlemen toward an empty table.
Matt turned his hard smile to Rebecca; it faded to a sneer.
She did not like that look—it made her feel cold and vulnerable. “I’m sorry you had to bring Grayson,” she said, attempting to smooth over whatever was annoying him.
Matt released Grayson’s hand. “You probably thought I’d just sit around and babysit for you all day, didn’t you?”
“I left him with Pat,” she said. “I didn’t mean—”
“I know exactly what you didn’t mean,” he said, gesturing for her to walk. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to give you his things and get on with my business.”
“All right, Matt.” She took Grayson’s hand, started walking. “I’m sorry you thought you had to bring him down here, but I was going—”