Commander in Chief (White House #2)(47)

We turn on the television as we wash plates, only to see pictures of us on every channel. We decide not to watch.

So we head out and explore the wilderness. Matt tells me about how he would golf with his father, and enjoy just wading through the trees that surround the cottage with Loki, one of his pets then.

It’s almost 1 p.m. by the time we get back to the lodge, and I’ve never felt happier or more at peace than I do now.

We walk into the living room, then the bedroom, and Matthew heads into the shower, turning on the water. He gazes at me expectantly, his eyebrows rising a millimeter.

“Oh!” I gasp. “You want me to . . . you expect me to . . .”

Ever so slowly, he nods as he starts unbuckling and unzipping, the corners of his mouth lifting a tiny fraction. “I do.”

It’s the hottest shower sex ever. He makes love to me against the shower wall, then he pulls out and finishes off, his semen raining on my abdomen, his eyes on me, and it is the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. Hottest sex of my life. With the hottest man on the planet.

We laugh the rest of the afternoon, and make love in the kitchen, and talk policy and politics, and we even call the White House to check up on Jack, and ask them to bring him to us at Camp David by car.

He arrives hours later, bounding happily to the cottage when he sees Matt at the door, and we spend the next day walking the wilderness, with Jack barking, dashing, and wagging his tail.



After a glorious Saturday evening, going out about the camp—relishing the fact that Camp David is paparazzi proof, because of it being a military base—and then curling up in bed to make slow, foreplay-laden love, it’s Sunday afternoon, and we’re back on Marine One heading home, Jack peering out of the windows.

I look at the wedding and engagement rings glinting on my finger with a smile on my lips and then study Matt’s thoughtful profile as he gazes out the window. I can tell his mind is already drifting back to work.

I’m sad to let the calm of Camp David go. But as we approach the District, I look at the Washington and Jefferson monuments as we get ready to descend over the South Lawn of the White House and feel a sense of peace and amazement seeing the city from this vantage point. I absorb the lights streaking over columned walls, and I know that this is where Matthew needs to be. This is where he belongs. Where we belong. No matter how much we sometimes wished to freeze inside a simple, normal moment forever.





27





LIFE





Charlotte



“This girl in the photograph,” my husband says as he stares at his gift, tapping a finger to the glass, raising an eyebrow. “I want her. Always.”

“I’ll let her know,” I croak, breathless at the look in his eyes.

He sets it aside and strides to me, in a towel, ready for bed. “I’m assuming she intended to give me a hard-on, what with the come-hither look.”

I laugh. “Not a come-hither look! Alison told me to think about you and I just did . . .”

“That’s the expression on your face when you think of me?” he asks, leaning forward.

I nod breathlessly as he cups my face.

“Think of me now,” he commands, his voice husky, watching me.

I scan his face. “I can’t. I’m too busy looking at you.”

“Close your eyes then, and think of me.”

I close my eyes, giggling, feeling his eyes on me.

Then I picture him, standing there watching me, in that towel, hot as hell. I picture the expression on his face when I gave him the portrait Alison made for me, in elegant black and white, with a sleek gold frame. I picture the way his eyes drank me up, almost as if I were alive in the picture and he expected me to leap out of the frame and make a grab for him.

I start to breathe heavily, and then I feel the ghost of his touch, his knuckles running down my cheek. My lungs strain for more air as his hand drops a little more, to caress the skin revealed by my own towel.

“You’re exquisite,” he says, breathing against my lips as he seizes the back of my head, and his kiss is so deep, my toes curl and all the atoms in my body seem to shudder.

“Do you want me again?” I breathe. We just had shower sex again. We’re like honeymooners; it doesn’t matter that we’re back in the White House. I’m thirsty for him, and him for me.

“Yes,” he says, tugging my towel loose. I swoon a little when he releases his own towel and draws me into his arms, skin to skin, mouths meshing, his hands stroking down my damp skin.

The next day, after I hurried to get dressed and then watched Matt put on his suit and cufflinks to head to the Oval with Freddy, his escort, who was waiting at our door, I find, in my desk in the East Wing, a Post-it with his handwriting.



Mrs. Hamilton – I love you.



P.S. Nice skirt.



I smile. I find it funny, because I told him that I would love to answer some of the mail that the White House receives daily. It was just days ago, in Camp David, and I find myself remembering as if I were back in his arms, right there.

“Matt, you know all of the letters that arrive at the White House daily?”

“Hmm.” He’s falling asleep, my head on his folded arm, resting right on his biceps.

“You get a few on your desk every day. To answer,” I specify.