Page 20 of The Senator

Nash knelt next to me. He took my left hand and put change into it, offering a reassuring smile.

“You want a soda?” I felt like a lecherous old fool, not for the first time in my life.

“Diet Coke, please. I’m watching my weight.” I gave him an assessing look that I was sure said, “Why?” but I nodded and started to stand, my right knee not supporting me at all, which was embarrassing as hell.

Nash reached out a hand to help me. I was sure my face was blood red, but I took it to stand. “It’s an old football injury from high school.”

One day I’d need knee replacement surgery, but I wasn’t ready to admit it yet. I wore my stubbornness like a badge of honor.

Nash helped me up, and I turned to the vending machine, getting the two of us soft drinks. I glanced at Nash, who was fitting the plastic bag inside the ice bucket with a smirk on his face. Yeah, I was in a bit of a hurry to get out of the room and had forgotten the bag. Shoot me.

“So, uh, where are you from?” My voice was loud so I could be heard over the clatter of the ice dropping into the bucket.

Nash chuckled. “Texas. You’re from down around here somewhere, right?”

“Yes. Our hometown is southeast. Norfolk is the big city down here. Actually, Vani and I lived near there for years. Our families still live in the area.”

“What did you do before you became a Senator?” We walked to our room, with Nash opening the door he’d left unlocked by moving the dead bolt latch to keep the door from closing. It was good he’d thought to do it. The key was inside.

After we settled, I slid off my sneakers and sat on one side of the bed while Nash took the other, both of us leaning against the headboard. Nash’s bag was on the bench at the end of the bed next to mine.

“I practiced real estate law in my father’s firm. I hated it, but I’d gone to law school to study it at my father’s insistence, so it was what I knew.”

“Sounds kind of dull.” One size of his sexy mouth tilted in a half-smile.

“Dull doesn’t begin to cover it. Once I graduated UVA Law, Vani and I moved to Hampton Roads. Vani had been taking night classes and was studying to get her real estate license. I guess all those nights helping me study real estate law rubbed off on her. Anyway, she got a job working at a realty office in Norfolk, and we had a little house not far from my parents.

“I got assigned to a complicated eminent domain case against the Commonwealth because the government wanted to seize ten acres of a family farm to put in an access road for a new public works warehouse. They chose the land because it was closer to the railyard which would cut off miles of delivery—” I could see I was losing him.

“Anyway, I won. That was when the party knocked on my door. I’ve always thought it was strange that I was even noticed, but I later found out it was one of my father’s cronies who brought me to the attention of the higher ups in state politics, and the rest, as they say, is history. Now, your turn.” I was rambling, but it was an occupational hazard of being a politician.

“Okay. Cycled through eight foster homes before I was put in a teen boys’ group home. I was kicked out when I turned eighteen, and I’ve been making my own way for as long as I can remember.” There was no emotion attached to the story at all.

My first thought was that Jay could have ended up like Nash—nobody looking out for him and nobody loving him—and the idea of it made my stomach turn. “Do you know anything about your parents?”

Nash offered a steely expression before he responded. “Nope. And I don’t want to. That’s the past.”

The comment hit home. I had parents, and I wished I didn’t know anything about them. “Okay, uh, how’d you end up in DC?”

Nash took a swig of his soda before settling onto the bed, his head at the foot. He’d stacked a bunch of pillows behind him, and he looked comfortable. Myself, I was a squirming mess.

“I’ve done everything from washing dishes to roughnecking on an oil rig. I had to learn to survive on the streets, so I did what I had to do. It’s a tough world out there, Senator. Not for the weak of will or the faint of heart. In polite company, I’m considered a man of the world, but when it comes down to it, I’m a whore and an opportunist just tryin’ to get by.”

I watched Nash settle into the pillows, folding his hands behind his head, likely waiting for judgment from me. In a way, we were similar, but he faced his demons head on. Of the two of us, I was the coward.

“Of all of those jobs, which ones did you enjoy the most?” I was genuinely interested in his response.

Nash looked at the ceiling for a minute before he glanced in my direction. I took a drink of my soda and placed the glass of ice on the nightstand on my side of the bed.

The light was fading outside, so I reached over and turned on the lamp. I took in the long sight of him, seeing a handsome man who was more comfortable in the shadows than in the spotlight. That used to be me. Two terms as a senator had cured me of that notion.

“I like bartending at fancy parties. The society elite are a special breed all unto themselves.”

I nodded. He had that right. “I’m going to sound like a snobby bastard, but your incredibly well spoken for a guy who didn’t go to college.”

Again, he offered that sexy chuckle from deep in his broad chest. “I learn quick. I learned that dropping consonants and speaking like I had a mouth full of marbles didn’t get me respect from anyone, which is why I watched a lot of old movies where everyone had perfect diction. I also picked up things from people I met along the way. I am truly a product of my environment.”

And, by his logic, I was clearly a product of mine. A man in the closet with a wife who looked like she just jumped off a wedding cake, and an adopted son who was smart as a whip, with no help from me at all. Jay had the guts to come out of the closet, while I cowered in the corner of my self-imposed prison. Well, until someone decided to shove me out of it with a kick in the naked ass.

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