The Carlton Club (53 page)

It was so easy.

And so hard.

Melanie sighed as she eased the coupe into an oceanside parking space. She tossed her car keys under the front seat, shed her light cotton windbreaker and sunglasses, and scampered gracefully down the narrow gravel path to the beach.

Usually when she jogged she could downshift her mind into neutral. Usually she could breathe the salt air and feel her strong athletic body pumping against the wind and the sand. Usually she did not think, she just felt.

But not today. Not since saying yes to Adam Drake. Since then, a taunting dialogue played and replayed in her brain.

Why are you moving to New York? You have everything you want right here. Isn't it enough?

Yes, of course it is.

Then why are you moving? To impress Brooke?

No!

Good. Because Brooke would not be impressed even if you became the world’s top model. It's just too easy.

Maybe I want to be friends with Brooke.

You think that's possible? After all these years?

It
has
to be.

So you are moving to New York to be friends with Brooke? It has nothing to do with the fact that Drake is the best agency?

Of course that matters. I love modeling. If I truly want to make the most of my career I have to move to New York.

It might really show Brooke if you became the best of the best. It is hard to stop competing after all these years.

I don't want to compete with Brooke anymore.

Oh?

I feel empty. Part of me is empty.

The twin thing.

Some
thing.

So make the move.

I am.

But remember, Brooke may not feel the same way.

I know.

Why should she?

I know! I
know.

Melanie stopped, panting, at the end of the beach. The jog had turned into a full run. Everything ached. Her arms, her legs, her rib cage, her lungs.

And there was a deeper ache, an ominous clue to how empty she would feel if she moved to New York and she and Brooke grew even further apart. It was fear of that pain that almost made her tell Adam Drake no.

Brooke doesn't really like you, remember?

I remember. But she doesn't know me. It has been so many years.

It's a very big risk.

Yes. But I have to try.

Katherine’s bestselling novel
TWINS
is now available in ebook and trade paperback.

Monday, April Nineteenth

Washington
, D.C.

Spring had come again, and with it, hope. And it was a particularly glorious spring, a fact which would later be remarked on by many Washington insiders who would long remember the brutal contrast between the beauty of that season and the ugliness it ushered into their lives. But they were the lucky ones, the ones who
could
remember. For others that spring had ended forever the possibility of memory. For them it had been a season of death.

At first light the junior senator from California was out for his daily jog. He took the Capitol steps three at a time—tricky going down, exhausting coming back up. His route took him down the Mall and out to the Tidal Basin, then back. After five years it was no longer much of a challenge—except for the steps at the end—but he always found new inspiration in the sights and sounds of the nation's capital awakening to lead the world into a new day.

And it
was
a new day. A spirit of change was in the air, and Senator Saunders was determined to be a major force behind that change. It was his destiny. He could feel it in the very depths of his being. And Fate had recently given his career a significant boost. The
senior
senator from California had just announced, quite unexpectedly, that he would not be seeking reelection. In only his second term, Tom Saunders would become the state's senior senator.

Saunders jogged past the cherry trees, now heavy with blossoms—the most magnificent blooming anyone could remember. He must, Saunders ordered himself, bring the twins down to see them. If not today, tomorrow for sure. Take the girls out of school if necessary . . .

A warning bell went off somewhere deep in the senator's brain. He had been subliminally aware of the other jogger, the man wearing the navy blue warm-up suit, and had subconsciously quickened his own pace to maintain a comfortable distance between himself and the intruder. But now the other man was closing the gap. Steadily. Deliberately.

A reporter. That had been Saunders' first guess. It wouldn't be the first time a neophyte newspaperman, hoping for an exclusive, had sought to take advantage of the senator's well-known routine. A brief phone call from one of Saunders' aides to the young man's editor would quickly straighten things out: this was strictly private time for the senator. No interviews. No interruptions. No exceptions. There would be an effusive apology. No editor could risk being on Senator Saunders' blacklist.

Saunders stole a quick glance over his shoulder. No, this was no reporter. Perhaps a military man—somebody's adjutant wanting to cut an early morning deal for his boss. Again Saunders forced himself to run faster. The man in blue was big, muscular—at best a sprinter. No way he could stay with Saunders over distance. But Saunders was wrong. The gap closed relentlessly. For the first time it occurred to the senator that the other man's presence might have more sinister implications. Saunders began to feel a sense of urgency, then desperation. He looked around for someone, anyone. There was only the man in blue. Closer now. Saunders caught a glimpse of a police car headed west on Constitution. Too far away to be of any help.

“Senator.”

Had the man spoken, or was it just his imagination? Saunders ignored him and pushed himself to run harder.

“Senator Saunders!” There was no use pretending he hadn't heard that. Saunders gave a half turn and a slight wave, the type a harried senator might have thrown to a constituent as he rushed through the Capitol on his way to a meeting.

The man in blue couldn't have been more than twenty feet behind him.

“Senator Saunders! I want to talk to you about your relationship with Maria Garza.”

Fatigue. Sudden and numbing. For several long moments that was all Saunders felt. Before he had any conscious understanding of the man's words, Saunders knew only that his arms had suddenly become too heavy to lift, and that his legs would no longer move. He was suddenly old. The fears of a lifetime had rushed down upon him in a single torrent, and he was drowning.

A total stranger. Perhaps that was fitting. In years of almost constant apprehension, Saunders had never quite been able to put a face to this moment. In the end, the most highly anticipated, most inevitable event of his life had taken him entirely by surprise. He stood still, breathing heavily, saying nothing.

It was the stranger who finally broke the silence. “I'm George Aikins of the
Los Angeles Times
.” He offered his hand. Saunders ignored it. The man shrugged. “Do you deny having a longstanding relationship with Ms. Garza?”

It was a lie.

Not about Maria. His love for Maria was perhaps the greatest truth in his life. The second greatest truth. Next to his love for his daughters. The lie was the suggestion that this man was a reporter. He was not. He was a thug, a caricature of the modern gangster made all the more menacing by a facade of condescending politeness.

“No comment.” Saunders voice sounded weak, even to himself. To anyone listening it was a confession.

“Doesn't matter.” The stranger's face and voice were filled with sympathy. “We have all the proof we need.”

Of course they did. If they knew Maria's name, they had proof enough. So what was the stranger after? Money? Saunders was anything but wealthy. A story? This was no reporter.

“So what do you want?” Saunders asked. Hardly a defiant response.

“We believe, that is my editor believes, that the people of California deserve a senator of higher moral caliber. He thinks you should withdraw from the election.”

Saunders managed to summon a tone of indignation, “You can't possibly imagine that you could get me to quit the race just like that?” He snapped his fingers in the air.

The man in blue's tone was matter-of-fact, “If you withdraw, I can promise you that we will keep the story to ourselves. What you do, as a private citizen, is your business.”

“But this is nothing short of blackmail!” The senator's indignation was now quite genuine.

The big man simply shrugged once again.

“Go ahead and print your damn story. The people of California have heard worse. I might lose a few votes, but I'll still win the election.” Saunders thought he sounded convincing.

“My editor wasn't thinking about the voters. He was more concerned about your family, those two little girls.” There was a smugness in the way the man spoke the words, as though he knew the effect they would have on Saunders, as though he had read the senator's mind.

Saunders felt the numbness return. The air felt suddenly cold and damp. He fought to suppress a chill.

On the scale of threats, some would have considered this to be a mild one. The man had not threatened his daughters with physical harm—though Saunders knew instinctively that the stranger was capable of any cruelty necessary to accomplish his goal. Still, the man had known exactly which button to push to achieve the desired effect. He could have threatened to go to the senator's wife. That would have gotten him nowhere. Senator and Mrs. Saunders were husband and wife in name only. They maintained the facade of marriage purely for the sake of the twins.

But the man had gone straight for the jugular, the children. Saunders had seen what public reports of infidelity could do to the children of a political marriage. He would not have his own children taunted and ridiculed. The senator offered one last futile bluff.

“How do I know you're who you say you are? How do I know you're with a newspaper at all?”

The man in blue shook his head slowly. A slight smirk crossed his face. “What possible difference would it make?”

The man turned and began to slowly jog away, clearly confident he had accomplished exactly what he had set out to do.

The junior senator from California watched him go, fighting the impulse to run to his office and call the
Los Angeles Times
to see if they really had a reporter named Aikins on staff. The truth of the man's words still rang in his ears—
What possible difference would it make?

FATAL ANALYSIS
is now available in ebook and trade paperback.

The website for Jack Chase novels is MedicalThriller.com.