Page 116 of Where There's Smoke

Around five in the morning, after the four of us had each been through every magazine on every table, watched the fish swim hypnotic ovals around the tank, and channel-surfed a few hundred times just in case something interesting was on, a nurse appeared in the doorway.

“Mr. Cameron?”

Jesse had been nodding off but snapped to attention. “Yes?”

“Your wife is awake,” she said. “She’d like to see you.”

“Thank you.” Jesse stood. He and Dean exchanged another look, and when Jesse gave a slight nod, Dean rose too.

As the two of them followed the nurse to Simone’s room, I leaned back in my chair and exhaled. It hurt like hell not being able to be openly supportive in any capacity beyond Jesse’s campaign manager. I also didn’t want to rub anything in Simone’s face. Even if she’d given us her blessing, she didn’t need this right now, so I stayed out of her room and out of her sight. I probably shouldn’t have even stayed here; the campaign was still ongoing even if Jesse was here, and there were calls to make, polls to pore over, and staffers to be assigned to hundreds of tasks. Most of that could be done by phone or e-mail, though, and I couldn’t bring myself to leave. Maybe I couldn’t be openly supportive like I wanted to be, maybe I felt more useless than I ever had in my life, but I needed to behere.

Out of sheer boredom and frustration, I picked up the remote and clicked through the channels again. Big shock: Jesse and Simone were all over the news.

“Simone Lancaster is said to be in satisfactory condition after her health scare at the Coastal Environmental Activists’s dinner last night and is expected to be released within the next twelve hours,” an anchor said, and the screen shifted to footage of a worried Jesse striding into the hospital. “Upon learning of his wife’s collapse last night, Jesse Cameron rushed from his home in Malibu to San Diego to be at his wife’s sideand, for the time being, has canceled his appearances for the next seventy-two hours, including postponing the greatly anticipated interview with Patricia Barton.”

The anchor appeared on the screen again. “While those close to the couple have had little comment, dozens of questions have arisen. Is Simone’s collapse merely the result of exhaustion? Or is there more? Some say her recent extreme weight loss and notorious eating disorder are to blame. Others suspect a not-yet-announced pregnancy, even an undisclosed drug addiction. Still more speculate that the A-list actress, dissatisfied with playing a supporting role for her campaigning husband, may be seeking attention by—”

I clicked off the television.

“Ugh, thank you,” Ranya muttered. “I don’t know how he lives with those people”—she gestured at the TV—“commenting on every move he makes.”

I shook my head. “No idea. I think I’d have committed a felony by now.”

She laughed. “Yeah, really.”

I drummed my fingers on the armrest. Glanced at the fish. At the magazines I’d already read. At the darkened television that promised either more mindless bullshit or speculation about Jesse and Simone. Fish. Magazines. Television. Couldn’t. Sit.Still.

“I need a smoke,” I said and damn near jumped out of my chair.

“Have one for me, will you?” Ranya called after me.

In spite of myself, I laughed and turned around just long enough to give her a thumbs-up. She smiled, then buried her attention in a magazine.

There was a terrace at the opposite end of the hall, and judging by the ashtrays and lack of NO SMOKING signs, tobacco wasn’t forbidden out here. Not that I gave a shit. I usually paid attention to antismoking laws, but today? Today anyone who told me not to smoke could go fuck themselves.

I fished the pack out of my pocket before I even reached the door, and by the time I’d stepped outside, I already had my lighter out, ready to bring the cigarette in my mouth to life.

I paced back and forth on the terrace, smoking and thinking, smoking and thinking. I made myself focus on the campaign. Calls I needed to make. Schedules that needed adjusting. Staffers who could be assigned to this or that task. Events coming up. Percentage points. Polls. Jesse. Jesse.Jesse.

Holding my cigarette between two fingers, I rubbed my forehead with the heel of my hand and blew out a stream of gray smoke. The nicotine was helping. Slowly. Barely. Not a hell of a lot. But at least I was doing something. Not that pacing and smoking were productive, but it beat the hell out of sitting andnotsmoking.

I crushed the exhausted cigarette butt in the ashtray and then pulled another from the pack, not even realizing what I was doing until the fresh one was in my hand. I paused, staring at the cigarette between my fingers. Did I give in and smoke it now? Or did I wait? Two in a row? There’d been an awful lot of that lately. As the distance shrank between now and November,there would be more moments like this, even in a normal campaign. And this wasn’t a normal campaign, was it?

Why did I even bother resisting? This election was going to drive me to chain-smoking. That was all there was to it. With as much as I had on my mind today and as little sleep as I’d had, I didn’t care, and I lit that cigarette the fuck up.

The door opened behind me. I glanced back in case it was Ranya, but to my surprise, it was Jesse. He had dark circles under his eyes, and his shoulders sagged. The campaign had worn him down just like it wore us all down, but today he was the very picture of stressed and exhausted.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey.” He managed a weak smile. “Just needed some air.”

I held up my cigarette. “Same here.”

“Guess even that’s better than the air in there.” He gestured over his shoulder at the hospital.

“No shit.” I tapped the ashes in the ashtray. “How’s she doing?”

Jesse leaned on the railing, looking out at the garden below us instead of at me. “She’ll be fine. Just tired, dehydrated.” He pursed his lips. “They want to keep her for a few more hours. Maybe even one more night.”

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