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Chapter 27
She had switched her phone off because she knew, if she hadn’t, she would drown in this murk. And she couldn’t. She had kids to prepare for school, breakfast to make, a presentation to deliver, a meeting to attend, and a heart to protect.
Besides, she didn’t know what to think or say.
Two missed calls from Libby, one from Roni, and three from Jordan awaited when she turned it back on.
And his texts. “Hope, I tried calling. Don’t believe everything you hear. I’ll explain.” Another said, “Please pick up.” The third had three words in it, “I’m coming over.”
She made breakfast with a tide of ache gripping her heart.
The reports had gotten worse overnight. Pictures of Jordan with the congresswoman were posted on websites that covered political gossip. In one picture, he was leaning to whisper something into her ear during a press conference. In another, he stood next to her, along with others. Just seeing him, his face, his now-familiar features, knotted her stomach.
Nothing was incriminating in any of these, but the way they were reported made it sound like they’d had sex on camera.
Hope didn’t want the girls to see this, so she kept the TV off and used her phone. Her mouth tasted like acid as she scrolled through.
“Mom, I can’t find my new socks, the ones with the cats,” Hannah called from her room.
“They’re here. I’ll get them for you,” she called back, already skimming through the clean laundry basket on the couch with one hand. She held the phone with the other, her attention divided. She found one sock then the other, then froze on her stand. She reached and plugged her earphone deeper in.
“As for our new story, Val, we hear that Mr. Delaney spent two and a half months in his hometown in California. You know that The Whisperers will look into that.”
Were they ever on a break on that show? For some reason, that was the first thought that crossed Hope’s mind when she could think again. The second was, Oh shit. She couldn’t, and wouldn’t, be dragged into this if things escalated. She had a pretty good idea now what these shows and sites were capable of.
“Mom, did you find them?”
“Yes, sweetie.”
She pulled the earbud out and walked toward Hannah’s room.
Whether any part of the rumors was true or not, she couldn’t tell. What she did know was that she couldn’t reconcile the man she had gotten to know with what was said of him.
She refused to believe the worst-case scenario which these websites painted—that he had an affair with a married woman, an affair that was still going on, that he fathered her unborn child then abandoned her to hide in Wayford then returned to D.C. for her.
She chose to believe the best-case scenario, the one Libby had texted her when her phone had been off—that he had had a fling with a separated woman, that it was over long ago, and her baby wasn’t his. Not a major sin. She wasn’t a prude to think a forty-one-year-old, red-blooded, virile, capable—God, how capable—man who looked like Jordan was practicing priesthood before he had met her.
But whichever it was, it brought things to a head—she couldn’t cope with his life. The distance, the media, being a public figure, the fame or notoriety resulting from public scrutiny, the danger in brushing shoulders with the powerful when, at any given moment, someone who didn’t like his agenda or the candidate he was working for could turn his life upside down. Her life, if she were with him. She had kids. She had an ex who would thrive on this. She couldn’t afford it.
Everything she had known or guessed from the first day they had met manifested itself now. The difference between them was too wide, too steep to overcome.
Yet, she had gotten a taste, and now loss and longing for what could have been crushed her. But she couldn’t afford that, either. There was one way left. Facts. Logic. She would use science to shield her heart.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Late this morning? That’s unlike you. I guess the news kept you up at night, too,” Avery, the ever-sensitive Avery, said the moment Hope rushed through the wide entrance into the main hall, with Hannah and Naomi in tow, each holding one of her hands.
“Hurry up, girls. Run to your homerooms, and I’ll consider not writing you down for tardiness today,” Avery added to Hannah and Naomi, who weren’t waiting for her encouragement, anyway.
“You know who I mean,” Avery continued when the girls were farther down the hall.
There was no point in denying it. Instead, Hope began walking toward her class.
“I was so saddened for his family last night,” Avery said, hurrying to walk next to her.
“He’s not dead,” Hope muttered.
“Yes, but everyone will be talking. I thought it was bizarre that he stayed as long as he did. Now I know why. But, I guess he couldn’t stay away from her for too long. Who can blame him? She’s carrying his child after all.” She suddenly halted and put her hand on Hope’s arm, making her stop her stride, too. “I hope you weren’t too hung up on him, sweetie. He’s bad news.” She chuckled at her own pun then changed her expression to one of sympathy.
