THE PRESIDENT'S GIRLFRIEND (14 page)

     Gina leaned her head against the arm he had around her shoulder and he looked at her.  T he droopiness of one of her eyes made her look so sexy to Dutch at that very moment that he felt as if she was his already.  But he contained himself. 

     “You take it, Dutch,” she said.  “All of that crap they write about you, I mean.”

     “I take it, yes, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.  I’m still a human being, I have a thick skin, but I’m still a human being.  And some people are so judgmental and hateful that it’ll stun you just like it stunned me when I first entered politics.  I mean
they are vicious
.  They know what’s right and how it’s done and everybody else is a fool, that’s how they think.  Of course they’re the real fools for being so absolute about another human being, but I just want to prepare you.”  As if anybody could be prepared for what she could face, he thought.  And again the ever-growing guilt that always came whenever he thought about the fact that he was about to thrust her into the blinding lights with him, gnawed at him.

     Gina saw the guilt in his eyes.  She ran her fingers through his soft, black hair.  “Don’t worry about me,” she said with a wry smile, “I can take care of myself.  Been doing it since I was fifteen, matter of fact.”

     “Oh, yeah,” Dutch said, staring into her eyes, lifting her braids up and dropping them back down, loving the way the up-do highlighted her high cheekbones.  “You ain’t so tough.  Know how I know?”

     “How?” she asked.  He was closer now, her body nearly on his lap. 

     He moved even closer to her face, staring at her mouth.  “Because you aren’t tough enough to stop this,” he said and pressed his lips onto hers. 

     He began kissing her, in a soft, delicate delight.  He didn’t want to rush.  He’d been wanting this since the last time he had it, and he didn’t want to rush.  Gina leaned back and enjoyed every minute of his passion, her mouth moving in circular rhythm to his, her body growing more tense the longer he kissed her. 

     And when he lifted her up and carried her to the bedroom, she felt as if she was burning with fire.  He laid her on bed and they began undressing him, tossing his clothes aside.  And then he was going after her, desperate to see her beautiful brown naked body again.  And when he did, when they were both naked, he began kissing her breasts, her stomach, her thighs, and then her womanhood.  He lapped it up, making her so wet that she was hunching her back in anticipation.  He looked up at her.  There would be no condom this time. 

     He moved up to her and entered her, his erection so stiff it felt like an actual rod entering her.  “Oh,” she yelled out as he entered her, moving in so deep, so expertly as only he knew how.  And the thought of not rushing, of taking it slow and easy, became a fairytale, because he could not contain himself any longer and began to pound.

     He pounded her with all the strength he had in him, and the enjoyment wouldn’t ebb, wouldn’t let up, wouldn’t give him a moment’s respite.  It felt so good, the fierceness of it, and he couldn’t stop pounding her.  He turned her over, entered her from the back, and continued to gyrate.  Gina held onto the bedspread, but it was a flimsy hold, as her entire body kept slipping down to him, kept being sucked in by that wonderful feeling he and only he had been able to give to her. 

     And when the release came, it didn’t seep out like a drip, but shot out like a sieve, stretching every muscle in her body as she took him in.  And he kept pounding.  Until he screamed her name and poured out his last gush that drained him of all, every solitary ounce, of his energy. 

     He collapsed on top of her.

+++

Gina thought it was a dream.  That kind of sex couldn’t possibly be true.  And then she heard her name. 
Miss Lansing.   Miss Lansing
.  But why would Dutch call her Miss? 

     She opened her eyes.  Her environment seemed so strange.  Until she remembered.  Hotel.   Fundraiser.  Dutch.  She smiled at the thought of Dutch.  Was that his hand touching her?  She looked up, at the man standing beside her bed.  Only it wasn’t Dutch.  It was Christian.  And that look on his face made clear to her that she’d been left again.  She didn’t ask this time, but quickly looked to the other side of the bed.  The indentation where Dutch’s body had been was still there.  But he was gone.

     She laid her head back.

     “I’m sorry, Miss Lansing,” Christian said.

     “Call me Gina.”

     “The president would prefer I call you Miss Lansing.”

     “Oh, he would, would he?”  Gina was so disgusted with herself, with Dutch, that she didn’t know what to do.

     “There’s no rush, ma’am.  I’ll just wait in the lobby until you’re ready.”

     “What time is it?”

     “It’s four after nine, ma’am.  Sunday morning.”

     She couldn’t believe she slept this long.  Then again, she could.  Dutch had her in his arms all night, and she felt safe and protected and so comfortable.  “I take it the president is in a different suite?  That this wasn’t his suite, after all.”

     “This was his suite, ma’am.  He’s not in a different suite.  He’s gone.”

     Gina looked at Christian.  “Back to Washington?”

     Christian nodded.  “He has to tour the tornado damage in Oklahoma and then the flood damage in Tennessee.  So he won’t have a moment to spare, or be back in Washington until probably well after midnight tonight, ma’am.  He had to get an early start, so he didn’t want to wake you.”

     “That’s bullshit and you know it!”

     Christian corrected himself.  “He felt it best he didn’t wake you.”

     That’s more like it, Gina thought.  As if he was so afraid she might want something from him, like a thumbs down on that budget bill.  And he didn’t even want to discuss it.  She came to discuss it, and it never came up.  She felt like an abject failure.  And LaLa and
Demps
and all of their employees were depending on her. 

     Or was his motives more personal?  Had all of that talk about preparing her a ruse to get her into bed, and then he pulled his disappearing act again?   Was this supposed to make clear to her that he didn’t want her, just her body?  And only when that was convenient for him?  He was, after all, the president.  Who was she to complain?

     Well, to hell with him, she thought, and moved to get out of bed.  Until she realized she was still completely naked. 

     She looked at Christian, who looked thoroughly contrite.  “Will you excuse me so I can get dressed?”

     “Yes, ma’am.  But . . .”

     “But what?”  She didn’t see where it would be up for debate.

     “I know you’re upset with the president, ma’am, and you should be.  I thought it was a . . . bad move on his part leaving you like this.”

     “Did you share that opinion with him?”

     “Oh, no ma’am, I couldn’t.  I mean, I can’t just. . . He’s the president, ma’am.”

     “And that gives him a license to treat people any way he pleases?”

     “No, of course not,” Christian said, trying him best to be reasonable.  “But, he left me behind to make sure you were okay and that you got home safe.  That’s why he made me stay here in Newark.  He’d never done that before.”

     Gina frowned, stared at Christian.  “Never done what before?”

     “He’s never, after, I mean---”

     “What you mean to say is that after he’s fucked other women in the various hotels of the various towns where he’s appeared in the past, he’s never asked you to see them safely home.  Is that what you mean, Chris?”

     Christian swallowed hard, his hands clutched together in front of him.  She was so blunt,  he thought, and so right on.  “Yes,” was all he could manage to say.

     “And I’m supposed to feel privileged by the fact that he left an escort for me?”

     Christian wanted to be anywhere but here.  “Yes,” he said truthfully again.

     “Like hell,” Gina said.  Then she frowned disgustedly.  “I’ll meet you in the lobby,” she said.

     “He’s not like that,” Christian blurted out, his blue eyes wide with apprehension.  Gina looked at him.  “I mean, yes, he’s dated a lot of women, if you can call it dating.  He’s a bachelor who’s been in the public eye for eight straight years, five as a United States Senator and three now as president, and he has to pick his moments.  I mean, with respect, Miss Lansing, who do you think you’re dealing with?  You had to know this wouldn’t be a regular kind of relationship, not with Dutch Harber, you had to have known that.  Didn’t you?”

       Gina stared at Christian.  She knew it would be a different kind of affair, she knew that going in.  But that still didn’t give Dutch license to treat her as if she was that one-night-stand he banged in Miami.  She’d never accept that. 

     “I’ll meet you in the lobby,” she said to Christian.

     “Yes, ma’am,” Christian said, and left.

NINE

Monday morning and Gina was late for work.  She walked into BBR headquarters after eleven am, three hours off of her normal schedule.  She wore shades to cover up her tired eyes, and carried her briefcase and a cup of coffee.  LaLa was waiting for her, sitting behind her desk in the office they shared, and Dempsey was seated on the edge of the desk. 

     “Where in the world have you been?” LaLa asked as soon as she walked in.  “And why didn’t you turn on your cell phone?”

     Gina had a headache out of this world and really didn’t want to hear it.  After that experience Saturday night, where she gave it up to Dutch, once again, and didn’t even get a chance to so much as mention that appropriations bill that now sat on his desk, she was too disgusted with herself to even call her friends.  And facing them today, with all of the questions she knew they had, was almost unbearable. 

     “Good morning to you, too,” she said as she moved over to her desk and sat herself and her briefcase down.  She grasp hold of her cup of coffee with both hands and began sipping it.