A Harmless Little Game (Harmless #1)

 

“Drew? I told him I’d handle this. It’s my first chance to see you.” She shakes her head slowly. “It’s a shame it has to be like this.”

 

I draw in a shaky breath. My covers feel like handcuffs. “Right.” I shudder, trying to slough off the remaining arousal that came from the beginning of the dream, and the horror that ended it.

 

“I’m glad to see you,” I say automatically. Robotically. She gives me a sharp glance but her face relaxes into something close to a smile. I see she’s had her lips done recently. Is that where she was? At a spa for the kind of treatments where you don’t want to be in the public eye for a week or two while the swelling goes down?

 

I’ve checked off a box with my comment. She leans forward and gives me a kiss on the very same cheek she slapped. “I’m so glad to see you, too. See with my own eyes how you’re doing.”

 

“What time is it?” I fight the urge to ask her why she couldn’t come yesterday, or visit me at the Island, or—a thousand ors she could have done, but didn’t.

 

I don’t ask because I already know the answer.

 

And it hurts.

 

“Five thirty in the morning,” she says, stroking my hurt cheek. “You need more beauty sleep.”

 

So do you, I think. Like, a thousand years.

 

Something clicks for me. “You’re here because of tomorrow’s meeting?”

 

“You mean today’s meeting?”

 

I have to give her that. I give a rueful laugh. “Yeah. Right.”

 

Her eyes cloud with something deeper than worry as she looks me over, searching for something I’m pretty sure isn’t there.

 

“Yes. I’m here for the meeting.”

 

I yawn. “Just another election campaign announcement, I guess.”

 

Her eyes flicker with something worse than I saw a moment ago.

 

I peer at her. “Mom?”

 

She gives me a smile that does not reach her eyes. “Something like that, dear. You sleep. You’ll learn more in a few hours.” And with that she stands, gliding out of the room like she’s on wheels, the edges of her long nightgown fluttering behind her like fallen angel wings.

 

Leaving me wide awake, staring at the ceiling, wondering what the hell that was all about.

 

Sleep finally claims me just as the birds begin chirping outside my window.

 

Mercifully, I do not dream about rope again.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter 24

 

 

 

 

 

Daddy’s office is filled with people who look like they’re all attending a funeral.

 

Drew and Silas, in their black suits and with their blank expressions, could be pallbearers.

 

“Who died?” I joke, walking in carrying the biggest cup of coffee I could find in the kitchen. Given my weird nightmare and lack of sleep, today caffeine is going to have to be my best friend. This is my third cup already, and it’s only 9:30 a.m.

 

If I could hook up an IV right now, I would.

 

“Quite the opposite!” Daddy announces, looking around the large conference table on the other side of the room. There’s Anya, Mom, Drew and Silas standing at the edge, and three people I’ve never seen before. Two women. One man.

 

No smiles.

 

A prickly feeling starts at the back of my neck, under my breasts, right where my navel brushes against the button on my skirt. Something here is...off. Strange.

 

Wrong.

 

“Marshall Josephs, this is my daughter, Lindsay. Lindsay, honey, Marshall’s been assigned to work with you on reputation management.”

 

Marshall stands, showing himself to be the height of an NBA player, with hands the size of a turkey platter. He’s super blonde and balding, somewhere between my age and Daddy’s, with bright honey-colored eyes and the look of a man who is used to talking his way out of messes.

 

Exactly the kind of man Daddy has on his campaigns.

 

And he’s wearing a black wool suit like Drew and Silas, only his tie has tiny little images of a popular kid’s cartoon character on it. I shake his hand and give him a fake smile.

 

Daddy beams.

 

Off to a good start.

 

“Let’s get the introductions out of the way, shall we?” Daddy declares.

 

I walk over to Mom and stick out my hand. “Hi! I’m Lindsay Bosworth. And you are?”

 

Mom’s fury flickers in the twitch of her nostril for three tenths of a second, and then she laughs, eyes glowing with manufactured amusement. “Ah, Lindsay. We’ve got our old girl back.”

 

That prickly feeling intensifies when Drew shifts his weight and gives me a look that says I need to be prepared for something that’s coming.

 

But I know what’s coming.

 

Daddy’s running for senate again. Duh. This isn’t some big surprise.

 

We all stop laughing from my stupid joke and Daddy introduces me to Marcy Boorstein and Victoria Ahlmann, both part of Marshall’s “team” assigned to me. Three handlers for reputation management? Huh.

 

Four years ago I had zero.