Page 71 of Tips and Trysts

It’s not going to be easy. It’s not without risks.

But then I think about the cum on my breasts and his knowing stare from the podium.

I smile.

Turns out, not all secrets are bad.

Twenty-Three

EVERETT

“Everett, are you sureyou don’t want anything else?” my father asks, glancing at the empty plate in front of me.

Well, correction: It’s not empty. The discarded lemon wedge from my water glass is there.

“I’m all set,” I reply, swallowing down a sigh.

“So healthy.” My father glances at my mother. “I wish I could feel full after a little side salad.”

“I think it’s wonderful,” my mother replies absently before she sips the vodka soda she always orders because it’s unseemly for a governor’s wife to drink straight spirits. Dad and I both know she’s on her third though.

Her slender, manicured hand drifts over the table to pat mine, and maybe she expected us to hold hands. I can’t remember the last time I held my mother’s hand, if ever.

My hand stays next to my uneaten bread roll and the flower-shaped pat of butter I didn’t touch.

My mother drums her fingernails on the table.Tap tap tap,they’retrimmed short and round at the tips, painted baby pink.She takes another sip. “Everett, you’re looking vibrant lately. You’ll have to tell me your secret.”

I’m tempted to tell my mother that the secret to my radiant glow is letting a camgirl come on my hand, but to be fair, I’m not sure if it was the fingering or the dick-sucking that did it. As a politician, I have to be careful about spreading misinformation, so I opt for the politically correct response of, “Thanks, Mom. That’s nice of you to say,” which turns out to be thecorrectpolitically correct response because my father nods his head in classic Warren E. Logan approval.

Yay.

My father picks up his own drink: straight whiskey like he’s shipping off to war tomorrow. “Well, now that the debate is over, and you did spectacular—” he begins.

“Spectacular,” my mother agrees.

“—such a Logan—”

“And so handsome.”

“—there’s something we’d like to tell you.”

I’m practically required to keep my spine ramrod straight around Warren E. and Vivienne Logan, which doesn’t afford me the opportunity to straighten my spine any further upon learning they have something to tell me. Cue the metaphorical spine straightening.

My brain has taken a direct flight straight to the worst-case scenarios—that they’re going to renew their vows in Montauk (again) or they’re going to rent a castle in Scotland where we’ll take our Christmas photos (again) or I’m going on a date with the Virginia Senator’s eldest daughter (again) or middle daughter (again)—and I’m already prepping my fake smile when my mother announces, “Your father officially filed today.”

“For divorce?” I ask before I can stop myself, which makes my mother gasp audibly—far louder than she gasped when the Dow plummeted at the beginning of the recession sixteen years ago.

“For Senate, Everett,” my father clarifies, pretending to laugh. He clasps his hand over my shoulder and his fingers dig into my skin.

I exhale through my nose, working through the pain while I stare directly into my father’s eyes. He stares right back, pressing even harder through the fabric of my suit jacket. Five seconds feel like decades until he releases me.

My shoulder tingles with the lingering ache, but I swallow the pain and say, “I thought you reconsidered running after last week.”

His face is alight with excitement. “Beverly got the numbers, and as it turns out, the incident—”

“Somebody tried to kill me.”

“Everett,” my mother hisses, quite literally clutching her pearls, “lower your voice.”

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