“Maybe. Why don’t you just tell me and put me out of my misery?”
“Kate and Will, during our lunch—which included one Bloody Mary each—suggested that I would make an excellent president. What’s more, they said they would be willing to back me to the hilt, if I choose to run. Kate and Will think that, with their support, I’d sail through the primaries, and the Republicans haven’t got a great candidate available, so . . .”
“So, you have to choose between your country and me?”
Holly took a deep breath. “Not necessarily,” she said. “I was sort of hoping I could have my cake . . .”
“First Gentleman?” Stone asked.
“I was afraid you’d put it that way.”
“Holly, I would be nothing but a liability for you. The press would drag out every escapade, every woman, that’s ever happened to me.”
“Not if they don’t find out about us until after the election. Then we’d have four years for you to charm the media out of their socks, and I’d get reelected.”
Stone shook his head. “I’d be no good at it at all.”
“You’d be great at it. Look how well Will has done in that position.”
“Will’s an ex-president, and he has a son to look after, and that’s kept them off his back. I have no credentials to match those.”
“Are you suggesting that I get pregnant?”
“I’m suggesting nothing of the kind. I have a question, though, and it’s the only one you have to answer.”
“And what is that?”
“Do you really want it? Do you have the fire in the belly?”
Holly’s shoulders sagged. “God help me, I do.”
“I was afraid of that,” Stone said. “I guess that settles everything.”
“That’s not all the advice I need,” Holly said. “There’s something else.”
4
Stone resettled himself on the sofa and poured them more iced tea from the pitcher on the table before him. “Well, I hope, after that news, there’s something more cheering.”
“I’m afraid not,” Holly said.
God, what now? Stone asked himself.
“Please let me tell you the whole story before you interrupt,” Holly said.
“I’ll try.”
“A couple of months ago I attended a White House dinner for the prime minister of Britain, and seated next to me was Senator Joseph P. Box.”
Stone nodded. Everybody knew who Joe Box was: the tall, handsome senator from Florida had left both the Democratic and then the Republican Parties and now styled himself an Independent.
“We got along well enough, and as we were leaving, he asked me if I’d give him a lift. His driver was ill, and he’d taken a taxi to the White House, and he lives just a few blocks from me in Georgetown. I said of course, and when we arrived at my house I told my detail they were done after they’d delivered the senator. Box got out of the car with me and said he’d see me in, then walk the rest of the way, so my car and security left.
“I unlocked the front door and entered the security code in the keypad. When I turned around, Box had exposed himself and he demanded a blow job. I punched him in the nose, and that sent him sent him running from the house, with a bloody face and his pants around his ankles.
“I went to bed with a headache, two aspirin, and a brandy. When I woke up, the whole business seemed like a nightmare.”
“Did you do anything about it?”
“Well, it was his word against mine, and I thought that bringing charges against him would probably hurt me more than him. After all, he would be explaining the broken nose to everybody for weeks.”
“I remember reading in the Times that he’d missed an important vote in the Senate because he was hunting elk in Idaho.”
“He was in hiding for two weeks, until his nose could be straightened and the bruising went away. I took some satisfaction from that. Since he would have cast a critical vote, missing it damaged his reputation. Ironically, the bill was to make sexual assault a federal crime, and he would have cast a deciding vote against it, so it passed.”
“I hope that was the end of it.”
“It was, but I want to throw up every time I see him on TV.”
“I’m sorry you had to go through that,” Stone said.
“There’s another complication, too: a rumor that Joe Box is going to run for president as a third-party candidate.”
“What third party?”
“One he’d create for the purpose: the American Independent Democrats.”
“Surely, he would hurt the Republicans more than he’d hurt you.”
“You’d think so, but there are so many newly minted independents among the electorate, people who feel both major parties have abandoned them, that he could appeal to a lot of voters who normally would likely vote for me.”
“Still, all you’d have to win is a plurality.”
“That’s all Box would have to win, too; or the Republican, for that matter, but I think I’d have a better chance of winning, running against just a Republican candidate.”
“That makes sense,” Stone said.
“So, do you think I should still run?”
“You’re asking me to vote against my own best interests?”
“I suppose you could look at it that way.”
“Well, if you still want it, you should run, and the hell with Joe Box. And me, too.”
Holly smiled. “I was hoping you’d say that.”
“And now I’ve ruined my chances for a happy future with you.”
She laughed. “Maybe not,” she said. “I could still lose, you know.”
“Don’t worry,” Stone said. “I’m not that lucky.”
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