For the Record (Record #3)(59)

“That’s enough, Heather. I am not a teenager; nor am I forgetting anything. Certainly not my duties to my country or my constituents. I am taking a short road trip through Virginia with my girlfriend and will be back in just under an hour and a half. Now, is there a reason for this call?”

Liz chewed on her lip as she waited for Heather’s response. She hated being a constant source of conflict between Brady and Heather.

“Yes,” Heather snapped. “I finally got some information about those pictures from graduation.”

“What pictures?” Liz whispered.

“What did you find?” Brady prompted.

“I’m starting to see a trend here. Do you remember the lovely young woman Calleigh Hollingsworth?” Heather asked with her biting tone. “My sources tell me that she sold the picture of Liz and her ex to the tabloids. It reads like a setup to me. Ex happens to stroll into town. The girl he wrote the article with sells the photos.”

Liz opened her mouth to protest. She didn’t think Hayden would do that, but Brady shook his head. She really wanted to say something, but Heather didn’t know she was listening in.

“I’m going to have a team keep tabs on her and see if anything else suspicious comes up. I don’t want her to wreak any more havoc. I know we don’t have a real threat for the primary, but I don’t want to risk it. Any challenger is bad enough with what we’ve been through. I know Russell Kleeb has only done community activist work in Durham, but I think we should take it seriously. He’ll latch on to anything that he can, and Lord knows what we’re going to encounter come general election time.”

“We’ll make it through. Keep me posted of anything else. I’ll be in the office soon,” Brady told her.

“Loud and clear, Congressman,” she said crisply. The line died in his hand.

“Does she always do that?” Liz demanded.

“What?” he asked.

“Hang up. She always hangs up on me. It’s so annoying.”

“Oh. That’s just Heather. She is tight with her time,” Brady told her.

“Huh. I just thought she hated me.”

“She doesn’t understand you,” Brady admitted carefully. “Heather was interning for my father when I met her. I was about to graduate from college and had lofty plans to become president.”

“I believe you still have those plans,” Liz said. She was fascinated by the insight into his life and to find out more about Heather.

“I do.” He winked at her. “My father said that she was the hardest-working person he had ever met, but not the easiest person to work with. I kind of took that as a challenge, and hired her on full-time to help with my first State Senate race. She proved invaluable. Though I do have to say that she has only gotten harder to work with. She’s kind of rough around the edges, but she’s earned the right to be.”

“Rough around the edges is an understatement, but I guess I can get it. Politics is a hard world.”

“Heather sees the world in black and white. If you’re not good for the campaign, then you’re useless. The woman has no clutter in her house at all. It’s kind of terrifying.”

“You don’t have clutter,” Liz said.

“I live at the office. There’s clutter,” he said.

“Not anymore!”

“Well, you can clutter up our place.”

“I like the sound of that.”

“Me too,” he admitted. “I know Heather is coarse, but she just doesn’t think you’ve proven to be useful. She doesn’t see that you don’t have to be of a certain mold to be an asset to the campaign. You’re an asset to me. I love you. That’s what matters in the end.”

The rest of the drive to D.C. was left to the Harry Potter audiobook narrator. Liz had a lot to think about, but she wasn’t sure how to bring it all up to Brady yet. She wanted to collect her thoughts first, and she was stuck on what Heather had said about the pictures of her and Hayden being a setup.

She didn’t know how someone would act if they were setting someone up to take their picture, but she didn’t think that had been Hayden. She would have assumed some nerves at the very least. Probably more likely would be excessive touchy-feely displays to try to make the pictures look worse than they actually were, but he hadn’t done that. He had seemed too sincere in his apology to set her up like that even after everything that had happened between them.

Liz pulled into the parking garage to Brady’s apartment sometime later. He had already procured the available spot next to his Range Rover for her car. Brady grabbed two boxes of clothes and Liz carried an antique jewelry box that had belonged to her mother.

They reached Brady’s penthouse and she followed him to the front door. A smile touched her lips as she realized that this was now their place. Her stomach did a somersault as she crossed the threshold. Brady deposited her boxes in his walk-in closet. Liz followed him and placed the jewelry box on his dresser. She opened it and pulled out Brady’s locket. She liked wearing it when he left so that she felt as if she had a piece of him close to her heart.

“What’s that?” he asked, standing behind her.

“Your necklace.”

“No. That.” He reached inside and pulled out a small packet of charms. “Did you get new charms?”