Married by June (18 page)

B
EFORE THEY GOT MARRIED,
of course, they had to tell his dad that he wasn’t going to be able to accept that Senate job after all.

He thought his dad was going to kill him with his bare hands. Nolan’s face turned red and he tipped a table over. Cooper actually stepped in front of Jorie to protect her, which was something he thought only B actors did in old Westerns. But when his dad paused in his tirade to suck in a breath so he could yell some more, he heard his mom say, “Excuse me. I have a proposition to make.”

The look on Nolan’s face was priceless when Rachel said she’d recently decided that she wouldn’t mind running for office and if none of her boys were going to be the senator, she’d like to throw her hat in the ring. Pride. Love. Delight. The eager anticipation of many more years of strategizing and power brokering hand in hand with the woman he loved. Well, Cooper didn’t think there was a word for the exact expression on his dad’s face, but whatever it was, he was glad he’d been there to see it.

Jorie cried again. It was becoming a regular habit with her, but he didn’t mind a bit.

Governor Karloski was furious to see his power play dissolve as the Murphys got their way once again, but he couldn’t stop Rachel’s candidacy. Couldn’t even hint that he’d like to stop it. The first lady of Pennsylvania politics was not only smart, powerful, articulate and well connected, she was
beloved.
One strategically placed news story describing Rachel’s disappointment at being denied the nomination would not only have killed Karloski’s reelection chances, it would have sparked a full-on voter revolt. Maybe even a write-in campaign.

Not every detail Cooper had imagined in his fairy tale came true, of course. There was no wedding with tulle and top hats, just a quiet ceremony in front of a justice of the peace. Jorie did meet his college friends at a reunion and they did call him Lefty, but he never did make her shrimp kebabs even though he continued to like food on sticks.

The day Rachel Murphy was sworn in as the senator from Pennsylvania, she had a party. Jorie came out of retirement to plan it for her and every detail was perfect. Around midnight, after the last slice of cake was eaten but the band was still going strong, Jorie led Cooper onto the dance floor. He
did his best with the fox trot and she smiled as he stepped on her toes while she hummed “Love and Marriage” along with the band.