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Carly’s reaction warmed him. Not that he hadn’t meant every word he’d said. Not that he wouldn’t have argued vehemently against this bill even if Carly hadn’t agreed with him. But it felt good to know he’d earned her approval. Again.
* * *
Carly couldn’t believe it when Shane stood up to oppose the pipeline bill. She’d been following the bill for months as it made its way slowly but inexorably through committee hearings and onto the Senate docket for this legislative session. Like Shane, she’d read every word of it, including the riders and amendments. And like Shane, she was appalled.
She’d done a preliminary piece on the bill back when it was still in committee. It had been bad enough when it had first been introduced, and had only gotten worse with everything that had been tacked on to it. But nobody—and by that, Carly meant the TV-viewing public—had seemed to care. The ratings on that segment had been abysmal. So J.C. had shelved the idea of a follow-up story, although Carly still had hopes of convincing him otherwise, which was why she was here today.
Now if only J.C. didn’t get it in his head that because Shane had openly opposed a bill sponsored by other senators, and Carly was involved with Shane, that made her incapable of being objective where the bill itself was concerned. Maybe some reporters couldn’t be objective under those circumstances...but Carly wasn’t one of them. “This is my story, J.C.,” she muttered under her breath. “I’ll be damned if you’re giving this one to Pearly White.”
* * *
Carly returned home, accompanied by the FBI agent who’d shadowed her footsteps all day, but who wouldn’t be replaced when he went off duty. The yellow crime-scene tape that had festooned her front door was gone, and the police cordon around her town house was gone. But even though she could stay here if she wanted to—which she didn’t—the FBI and ATF had warned her against it earlier, when they’d told her they were releasing her town house as a crime scene. The man who’d set the bomb yesterday had managed to disable her alarm system as if it were child’s play, so she wasn’t safe. Carly didn’t need the FBI and ATF to tell her that.
Which meant she had two choices. She could stay in a hotel for the duration—however long that was. Or she could stay in the cabin on Lake Barcroft she and Tahra had inherited from their parents years ago. They’d inherited the family home, too, which Carly had maintained until Tahra went off to college, after which the sisters had made the decision to sell it.
But the cabin was a different story. While they rented it out through an agency during the summer months, it was usually vacant in the winter...as it was now. It was roughly ten miles southwest of her Georgetown town house, but would add more than an hour one way to her daily commute during rush hour.
Carly had just reluctantly decided the commute wasn’t worth it—“It’s not as if you can’t afford a hotel,” she murmured under her breath as she packed two suitcases—when her smartphone dinged for an incoming text.
Shane.
Need a place to stay? the text asked.
She texted back, Hotel.
Better idea, was the response. If your offer still stands.
“What in the world?” She didn’t get it at first, then realized Shane was referring to the “just sex” offer she’d made him last night, and she didn’t know if she should laugh or cry. “Oh, Shane.”
Carly no longer believed she could maintain an emotional distance if she continued seeing him—that had been nothing more than a last ditch effort on her part to justify doing what her body wanted, to sleep with him again, when her heart warned her she was stepping into quicksand.
She could get hurt. Badly. The question was, was she willing to risk it?
Her phone dinged for another text. Carly? was all it said, but she knew he was waiting for her answer.
Yes, she typed. Her fingers weren’t quite steady, but she hit Send anyway.
Pick you up in 30.
K.
* * *
“If you don’t take care of the problem soon, it will be too late. It might already be too late.”
Marsh knew his employer was referring to the speech the senator had given today. And he knew the man was right—it might already be too late. The truth stuck in Marsh’s craw, but he couldn’t hide from it. “I know,” he admitted.
