“I didn’t say shit,” Wilson says.

I laugh to myself, my eyes falling on her retreating back. My blood is boiling in my veins as I watch her disappear. I stick my finger into my mouth, suck her sweet and acid taste, and shut my eyes. I let my head drop back and stare at the roof of the car, exhaling heavily as I lower my hand.

Keep our head in the game, I said. Though she and I both know, it’s a whole other game we’re now playing.

When I get to my apartment, my best friend from college, Beckett, is at the door, clad in jeans and a turtleneck, with his usual preppy sweater draped around his neck.

“Well, hello, Romeo,” he snickers.

I frown at the comment, open the door, and let him inside, tossing my keys and my wallet on the coffee table.

“Moody. I take it it’s the redhead,” Beckett says.

“What?” I turn round to face him, and Beckett seems taken aback by how fast he was able to bait me when usually . . . I never take the bait.

“It’s all over the news. You took her shoe shopping. How suave,” Beckett explains, snickering on the last word.

What the . . .

Charging across my living room, I turn on the television and spot the headline.

“Matt Hamilton shopping with mysterious redhead . . .”

“Jesus.” I throw the remote aside, punch my hand into a pillow, then I grab a beer and toss one to Beckett as I drop down on the couch. “This girl has me losing my mind.” I drag my hand over my face, my molars gritted hard enough to break a lesser man’s jaw.

“What’s going on?”

“She’s in my campaign. Senator Wells’s daughter.”

He sighs. “Matt, shit, man, you need to be careful.”

“Hell, I know that. You think I don’t?” I scrape my hand across my jaw, trying to loosen it, then I take a swig of my beer, drop my head back on the couch, and exhale. “I’m so wrapped up in this girl. With the tension of the election, and the fact that I see her every day, I’m going insane.” I shake my head.

It was reckless—and it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but feeding this wild thirst. Getting rid of that fucking feeling of having my hands tied. Quenching the hunger to touch her, fully knowing that she wanted it, craved it like me.

I not only want this girl, I enjoy being with her.

Growing up the way I did, it feels like a thousand and one expectations are piled on me, one after the other. It can be isolating when people put you up on a pedestal.

It wears on you, having to be the bigger man all the time, to always live up to the Hamilton name.

Everybody has always wanted me to be something bigger than I am. To guard and follow the legacy of my father and the family name.

Even as it feels as if it is my one driving desire to do just that, with her, it feels like she wants me to be nothing more than I am, and nothing less. The few moments together that we’ve had, I was able to let loose with her. Be real with her. She’s the only woman I’ve ever been truly confident won’t leave my bed and take our story to the press. The only girl I’m myself with, no mistrust there, no other agenda—not from me, and not from her.

But I also know that I may have a dose of pixie dust with the public. They’ve been forgiving with me, with my every transgression, rumored or real. But I can’t say they would be as forgiving with her if this got out.

“Yeah. I need to be more careful.” I glance at Beckett, a ton of frustration weighing on me.

Wilson’s familiar three knocks resound in the room, and he opens the door. I know what he’s about to say. The press is probably outside. And they want a statement.

“Are they all outside?” He knows very well who they are.

“Yep.”

I get to my feet. “Let’s go, Beckett—let’s give them a diversion to keep them away from her door.”

“How can you stand having to give a statement for every time you take a shit, man?” Beckett growls.

“You get used to it.”

18

RUMORS

Charlotte

By the next morning, everyone is talking about an affair.

Last night on the eleven o’clock news, the first spot featuring Matt and me appeared on a local channel. “Security camera footage of Matt and a mysterious redhead thought to be a campaign aide ‘secretly’ trying to buy shoes . . .”

I hate seeing it, I hate it with every fiber of my being, but the moments we shared . . . the lingering feeling of his hands on me at the Tisal Basin . . . it almost makes the scandalous rumors of shoe-shopping worth it.

I go downstairs to check my mailbox, only to find two reporters at my building door. I know Matt must be fielding so many more, but to me, two reporters is two too many.

“Miss Wells—”

“No comment, thank you.” I struggle to open the door once more.

“Are you and Matt Hamilton on the tape?”

I slide into the building and see my message machine blinking madly with fifty-two—fifty-two—messages. I disconnect it.

I get an email from my parents. SCANDAL, the subject line reads.

I don’t open it.

Kayla texts me.

I text back:

I’m fine, thanks for worrying. I AM NOT ROMANTICALLY INVOLVED WITH MATT HAMILTON!

Sent. Not involved, I tell myself.

Women voters are going crazy, though, and by that evening, Matt is on the news.

“It is not true that I’m in a relationship with Miss Wells. We took a hike around the Basin as we reviewed my upcoming campaign schedule, so let’s keep the focus on that.”

I turn off the TV with a heavy feeling in my stomach. I eat and think about the situation over my grilled chicken and salad, then change into my running gear. That night, I plunge myself into a run, and run like I’m running a marathon when I head to my parents’ house to say goodbye before the campaign tour.

They’re expecting me in the living room—and I know they were discussing the news. The somber looks on their faces say it all. My father only hugs me and tells me in his gruff way to take care of myself, then heads upstairs.

My mother hands me a glass of lemonade and eyes me worriedly as we sit on opposite couches in the living room. “We saw the news.”

I groan. “Not you too, Mom.”