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CHAPTER ONE
Washington, DC
July 1
The second Madison Archer-Pershing climbed out of her Mercedes coupe, the night air smothered her, thick and oppressive. She refused to let it choke her as she slammed her car door behind the expensive, exclusive building she wasn’t supposed to know about.
This day had been more than two long years in coming. No more waiting. Starting now, she was taking her life back. She intended to confront her husband, Todd, in the secret apartment he kept to engage in activities that violated their vows and to tell him she wanted a divorce.
He wouldn’t care about losing her, only about how it looked. And to save appearances, he’d be ruthless. The whole family would be.
Madison was prepared.
As she marched for the covert door under the old-money lobby, the one erected so drug dealers, underworld business associates, mistresses, and hookers could enter without being detected, her heels clicked on the concrete. No surprise a lot of DC insiders lived here. The secrecy was undoubtedly what had persuaded her husband to conceal a place on the top floor.
Finding it had taken her over a year. Naturally, she hadn’t thought to look for his clandestine den of sin during their whirlwind romance or even the early days of their marriage.
Her Uncle Martin had introduced her to Todd, the only grandson of the esteemed Senator Winston Pershing, at one of those hoity, do-nothing benefits. She’d felt so out of place, but he’d set her at ease with his charm and attention. He’d asked her to go sailing the next day. A week later, he’d insisted that she was a breath of fresh air, and he was falling hard.
After Matt Montgomery’s romantic hit-and-run weeks earlier, she’d felt abandoned. Heartbroken. Oh, he’d had good excuses and he had eventually called—to hook up again. Same song, different verse in her love life, but this tune had been particularly wrenching because in a mere weekend, Matt had rewired her body and stolen her heart. The pain of his rejection had made her vulnerable to Todd’s smooth talk and BS. She’d believed every word because she’d wanted to.
At the time, she’d been twenty-four and too naive, not to mention a little starry-eyed at all the wealth, glamor, and beauty of Todd’s privileged political world. He rubbed elbows with ambassadors. He played golf with the VP every now and then. He had the Speaker of the House on speed dial. He was even on a first-name basis with the president. And he had wantedher, an average girl from Cajun Country in Louisiana. He hadn’t seemed to care that she knew more about fishing than setting a proper table or that she’d never traveled the world. God, he’d made her feel so special.
Looking back, she suspected Todd had known about her bad luck with romance. And her bad taste in men…
Weeks later, he had proposed, giant rock in hand, swearing he couldn’t live another day without her. Coupled with Uncle Martin’s persuasion, she’d seen no reason not to say yes.
Mere days after they exchanged vows, reality began to set in.
At first, she’d tried to make their union work, fixing Todd’s favorite dinners and wearing her sexiest lingerie. She had helped, supported, and cheered for him. She’d genuinely tried to understand him. Wasn’t that what married couples did? She’d listened to, empathized with, and soothed him. Whenever he’d been upset, she had given him encouragement and affection. She’d been there.
None of that meant a damn thing to Todd, and after enough of his drunken nights out and “friendships” with questionable women, she’d given up, accepting that she was merely a prop—a sweet-as-pie, small-town bride who had “reformed” him after he’d been caught in a compromising situation with a not-quite-legal Georgetown coed—something she hadn’t known about untilafterthe wedding.
The potential scandal had been hushed down to an urban legend, explained away as “misinformation,” then intentionally overshadowed by their elaborate nuptials. Money had changed hands and favors had been granted, so the press had willingly parroted the family’s fixer’s spin that the incident had been fabricated by his grandfather’s political enemies. Of course, Todd had never touched the girl.
Madison scoffed. If it wasn’t hush money or child support, why did her father-in-law write the former student a hefty check every month?
She hated the lies, hypocrisy, and fabrications. She couldn’t stand another day of plastering on a smile as fake as the Pershing family image. So she’d begun planning her exit months ago. Tonight, she would tell the son of a bitch exactly where he could go.
Under the venerable building, she passed a couple of suits with earpieces. Security. Would they prevent her from entering? Madison kept walking like she belonged. Neither man stopped her as she waltzed onto the basement-level elevator and ascended to the top floor. The doors opened into a foyer that was an impossible step up from the ultra-swanky lobby. Naturally. Only the best for Winston’s golden boy.
This morning, she’d swiped Todd’s keys while he slept off a drunk that had him stumbling in at four a.m. and copied them all. She’d returned his ring an hour before his brief appearance at the family’s Sunday dinner a few hours earlier—a ritual the Pershings undertook for the press and the public, not any real desire for togetherness. As usual, it had been somewhere between stilted and silent, except for Todd’s mother filling it with meaningless chatter about coming social events and the important members of the press the family, Madison aside, must dazzle. Since she lived in Todd’s background, unless they needed her for an appearance or a photo op, reporters were told she was “unavailable” that day. Her entire existence was a hollow lie.
She’d rather have the bleeding truth over a pretty delusion.
She stomped to Todd’s door, half expecting goons standing guard to stop her. But she saw no one.
Clearly, her darling husband hadn’t expected any intrusion on his vice this evening. All the better for her.
Her hands shook as she slid the key into the lock and pushed the door open. Since Todd often came home smelling like sweat and sex—if he came home at all—it wasn’t hard to guess what he did here. But it was early. Hopefully, he was still alone, not coked-out and having an orgy.
She crept inside, then quietly shut the door and scanned the apartment. Of course, the place would be as upper crust as Todd’s upbringing. It had a staged quality, as if no one actually lived here, merely used the square footage for show.
The contemporary sofas with their low-slung backs and minimalist pillows in creams and grays were European and had obviously been chosen by a big-budget decorator to perfectly accent the moody, monotone art above the sleek fireplace. The cost of the bleached zebrawood flooring could feed an average family for a year. It gleamed from wall to wall, giving the apartment an unbearably wealthy, hip vibe. A tall, onyx statue of a galloping horse provided an unexpected, masculine flair. It shined black in the moonlight beaming through the bare floor-to-ceiling windows with unfettered views of the city, seemingly swallowed up by the foggy night.
On the far end of the room, an overtly masculine bar ran the length of the room’s lone exposed brick wall, bisected by shelves lined with overpriced crystal and even more expensive booze. A black cabinet with mirrored doors and underlit glass countertops sat beneath, littered with a couple of glasses and an open, half-empty bottle of scotch older than her.
To her right sat a pristine kitchen—Miele appliances, white oak cabinets with marble counters waterfalling to the floor, a bold black backsplash, and a custom range hood. Pity. She doubted anyone had ever cooked here.
