Spend My Life with You

by Donna Hill

  “Actually I’m here to speak to you.”

  “Me? About what?”

  “I wanted to know your reaction to what transpired at the White House today.”

  Her guard went up. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She moved toward her car again.

  “What’s your take on Senator Graham meeting privately with the president about the education reform bill? Your father has run that committee for several years. We understand that you and Senator Graham have been seen quite a bit together. Did he tell you anything about the meeting?”

  This time she did get her door open. If there was one thing she’d learned growing up in a political family is that when cornered by a reporter, claim ignorance. Never let them have the opportunity to quote you as saying anything. That was as much ingrained in each of the Lawson children as their ABCs.

  “If you’ll excuse me.” She pulled open her car door and got behind the wheel, ignoring the woman’s mouthed questions outside of her closed window.

  Lee Ann backed out of her space and pulled out of the lot. Her hands were shaking. What was going on? She had no idea how much truth was in what she was told, but she was sure that there must be some kernel to have the press sniffing. And if it was true, why didn’t Preston say something to her, warn her? Worse, if it were true, how would this affect her father?

  She didn’t have long to find out. The minute she walked in the door, Desiree greeted her. The fact that she was home so early from her job at the community board was enough of an alarm.

  “I was in the office today and a reporter called about Preston.”

  Lee Ann briefly shut her eyes. She dropped her purse on the table in the foyer. “One stopped me in the parking lot.”

  “What’s going on? Have you spoken to Preston?”

  “No, I haven’t. We’re supposed to talk tonight. He said he had something to talk to me about. But he wouldn’t go into detail about what it was.”

  “Daddy must be livid,” Desiree groaned.

  Lee Ann didn’t want to think about it. Branford’s outbursts were few and far between but legendary. And once you were the focus of his displeasure, you ultimately became persona non grata. In politics, you may as well walk away from your career. Please don’t let that be what happened with Preston, she silently prayed. Please.

  “I’m sure it’s some ridiculous rumor that the press got wind of,” Dominique said while the three sisters sat around the kitchen table, jumping every time the phone rang. Dominique had closed the office early and come straight home when she got the call from Desiree.

  “How are things between you and Preston?” Dominique asked.

  “Fine.” She folded her hands. “At least I thought they were fine. I just wish I could talk to him before Dad calls. At least I would have some idea of what I’m working with.”

  “Have you tried Preston’s cell?”

  She nodded. “Voice mail.”

  “He’ll call,” Desiree said.

  They were silent for a moment.

  “Oh! I have some great news,” Dominique said. “What?”

  “The grant that you helped me with. It went through. We’re going to get the money to offer GED classes. I am so excited.”

  “Dom! Congratulations,” Desiree said.

  “That is wonderful.”

  “I couldn’t have done it without you,” she said sincerely. “That whole part of the organization is not my strength. I love dealing with the clients or going out and pitching the organization. If it were left up to me for funding, we would have been shut down a long time ago,” she said, laughing lightly.

  “It was your concept. Your step-by-step plan. You had all the information. All I did was put it together on paper.”

  “I really wish you would think about coming on board as a consultant.”

  Lee Ann shook her head. “I already have enough on my plate. Between teaching and overseeing Daddy’s local office and his agenda, I have plenty to do.”

  “And managing your love life,” Dominique teased, nudging Lee Ann’s arm.

  Lee Ann’s face heated. Even though her sisters were grown women, who she knew were not virgins, she’d never really discussed her personal life with them. They’d come to her over the years with their “boyfriend” problems. But since they’d become women, that part of their lives was only alluded to. And truth be told, as close as she was to them, she often felt like an outsider. She was the problem solver. The advice giver. The money loaner. She could never be part of the two. Not really. She wanted to change that. She jumped at the ringing of her cell phone. It was Preston’s number.

  She drew in a breath. “It’s him. Excuse me for a minute.” She walked out of the kitchen. “Hello?”

  “Lee, its been pretty crazy around here today.”

  “Around here, too. What is going on? The reporters are saying that you met secretly with the president, possibly to undermine the education reform bill?”

  “I did meet with him, but that’s not the way it was.”

  “Not the way it was?” Her voice hitched a notch. “Then what way was it, Preston?” She paced as she waited.

  “It’s complicated.”

  Lee Ann halted mid-step. “Is that all you have to say? It’s complicated! You’re damn right it’s complicated, Preston! I have reporters wanting to know my feelings about you going against my father on a bill that he’s worked on for several years. And did I know you were cutting your own deal with the president—using your past relationship with him—” Hot tears of fury stung her eyes. “Of course I didn’t know! I was blindsided like everyone else.”

  “There wasn’t enough time—”

  “You had enough time to set up the meeting, Preston, without saying anything. Not even to me. You didn’t just wake up at your desk and say, ‘You know what, I think I’ll use my old friendship with the president to further my own agenda and screw over the man who helped me.’” Her voice shook and then a chill settled over her. “That’s what it’s been about from the beginning, hasn’t it? It’s what you’re about… You use people to get what you want.” Saying the words weakened her knees. She reached for the chair.

  “Don’t do this, Lee Ann.”

  She didn’t hear his warning. “My father…me.” Images of the two of them entwined together flashed in her head. “Was I a stepping stone, too, another honorable mention on your résumé!”

  Her saber-sharp words stabbed so deep, sliced so many vital organs that to survive, for them to survive, he had to get away. “If that’s what you think, Lee Ann, then there’s nothing more for me to say.”

  Her breath stopped short. Was this it? Her thoughts veered in a dozen directions at once. Did she really believe the things she’d said? Was she right? Wrong?

  Her lips tightened over the words but couldn’t hold them back. “You’re right. There is nothing else to say.” She squeezed the phone in her hand, praying that he would say something to stop this speeding train. Tell her that she was crazy. That he would never do anything like that.

  “Gotta go.”

  Those two damning words and the soft click of the call coming to an end exploded in her ear.

  That night was the first night since they’d been together that they had not spoken before going to sleep, spending at least an hour talking about their day, laughing, whispering, promising…

  Lee Ann curled on her side, one tear following after the other.

  Chapter 14

  It was early evening before Lee Ann actually got out of bed. She’d been hiding out in her room all day. She wasn’t up to questions or conversation. She’d spent most of the day dozing off and on, reliving that awful conversation with Preston and wishing that she could take back the things that she’d said. Throughout the day she kept checking her phone, thinking that maybe she’d somehow missed a call or a text from him.

  She pressed her head into the thick softness of the down pillows and threw her arm across her face. She should have heard him out—liste
ned to what he had to say. Maybe it wasn’t as incredibly horrible as it seemed. She moaned.

  The sound of her sisters’ voices and splashing water tugged Lee Ann out of bed. She went to her window. Desiree and Dominique were at the pool engaged in one of their favorite pastimes—swimming. A reluctant half smile graced her mouth. She went and took a long shower.

  She looked in the closet one more time. Since Dominique had taken her shopping and pretty much become her fashion guru, the interior of her closet had taken on a whole new look. Gone were the dark corporate midcalf suits, replaced with fitted jackets, skirts that skimmed her knees, sleeveless tops in bold colors and silky fabrics, plenty of shorts to show off her legs, an assortment of jewelry and enough lingerie to open her own boutique. She finally decided on an outfit and went down to sit with her sisters.

  “Put on a suit and get in,” Dominique called out.

  “I’ll pass, thanks.” She walked over to one of the lounge chairs and stretched out, thankful that she’d finally decided on a pair of navy-and-white-striped shorts and a sleeveless T-shirt.

  “I’m surprised we haven’t heard from Daddy, yet,” Desiree said, pulling herself up on the deck. Dominique pulled up behind her.

  “Yes, I was thinking the same thing. Maybe it was all about nothing,” Lee Ann said, needing her hopes to be shared.

  “I’m just saying it can’t be too serious if Daddy hasn’t called trying to blow the roof off the house,” Dominique added, wrapping a towel around her waist.

  The sisters all turned at the sound of the sliding door opening.

  “Daddy,” they chorused in astonishment.

  “You girls put some clothes on. I brought company home.”

  They shared a look.

  “Who?” Dominique asked.

  “The boy who’s been stirring up all the ruckus up on the Hill.”

  “Preston is here—with you?” Lee Ann squeaked in disbelief.

  “Up front,” he said, with a toss of his head toward the house.

  Lee Ann pushed up from the chair, hurried over to her father and kissed his cheek. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know—”

  “Why don’t you go on up front and let your young man explain.”

  Her throat tightened. She pressed her lips together to keep them from trembling and went in search of her “young man.”

  Preston was pacing the living room floor so intent that he didn’t hear Lee Ann enter the room.

  “Preston…”

  Her voice caught him midstride. “Lee.” He crossed the space before she could take her next breath, and then she was in his arms, his lips covering hers.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered in her hair.

  “I’m sorry, too. I should have listened…”

  She stroked his hair, his face, the curve of his back as if assuring herself that he was really there and not part of the dream that she had of him every night.

  “We need to talk.”

  “I know.” She eased back and looked at him, hoping to see some hint of what brought him there.

  “Come, I only want to tell this once, and it’s really all thanks to your father.”

  Preston sat opposite Branford in the study with the sisters sitting around them. Preston was leaning forward, resting his arms on his thighs as he spoke, looking at each person in turn.

  “I always believed from the time I set foot in the Senate that I wanted to be involved in education reform. I believe it is at the root of so many of our nation’s problems. Lack of a good education creates the downhill snowball effect. No education, lack of employability, no jobs leads to no income, so they get welfare or rob and steal. And we wind up paying to take care of them in jails or in shelters.” He straightened up. “But the educational system we have is broken. It doesn’t work, and it doesn’t serve our children.”

  “So Preston here had some different ideas about how to provide education,” Branford said, picking up the explanation. “Community-based schools, run by the parents and the teachers…” He went on to explain his idea.

  “It sounds incredible,” Lee Ann said. “And doable.”

  “In an ideal world,” her father interrupted, “Preston knew it would never get out of committee without some real muscle behind it, and I have to admit that when he brought the idea to me I had my doubts. But he said that he wanted me to know what he was doing, that he didn’t want me to think he was trying to step over me to get to the president, and I gave him my blessing.”

  Lee Ann looked at Preston and felt like bursting with pride.

  “It definitely helped that we’d worked together in the past, but without your father’s full support…”

  “So—” Branford blew out a long breath and slowly stood “—the press only got it half right as usual.” He chuckled on his way out of the room. “I’m going to bed.”

  “Night, Daddy.”

  “Good night, sir.”

  “Well, I guess we should leave you two alone,” Desiree said, nudging Dominique, who had made herself very comfortable on the couch. “Dom!”

  “What?”

  Desi kept jerking her head toward the door.

  Dominique pulled herself up. “You’re going to get a crick in your neck if you keep that up,” she said on her way out.

  “What a day,” Preston said, stretching his arms over his head.

  “I can’t tell you how proud I am—not only about your brilliant plan but how you handled it. And how sorry I am about everything that happened between us.” Her eyes moved slowly across his face. “I know my father is not an easy man. He’s stubborn and opinionated, pigheaded, handsome, brilliant, charming and driven.” Her voice softened. “Just like you.”

  “Your father didn’t get to where he is by making enemies and stepping on people’s necks. He did it by being honest, no matter what the cost and sticking by his beliefs. It’s the kind of career I want to have.”

  She reached across the space and took his hand. “I love you.”

  “Love you right back.” He kissed the back of her hand.

  “You must be exhausted.”

  “I am,” he said while stifling a yawn. “Come home with me.”

  She smiled seductively. “You need your rest.”

  “I need you more.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Positive. And I can guarantee that I will be totally revitalized once I get you over there.”

  The moment they crossed the threshold of his house, Preston took Lee Ann into his arms. He caressed her cheek with his fingertips, trailing down the curve of her neck, setting shivers of delight that shimmied through her body.

  She sighed with pleasure, and the sweet sound of it dipped down to Preston’s soul. Her mouth was just as sweet and giving as much as she was receiving.

  Lee Ann wrapped her arms around his neck—the desire to give herself totally to him pounding in her veins.

  “Let’s go upstairs,” he breathed in her ear.

  “Lead the way.”

  He kissed the tip of her nose and then her eyelids as they walked up the stairs together. He opened his bedroom door, swept her up into his arms and crossed the room to his bed and eased them both down.

  “I dream about you every night,” she said softly.

  “Now we can make it real,” he said before taking her lips to his own in a long, deep kiss. Finally, he eased back then kissed her again, softly, almost tentative this time, teasing her.

  Lee Ann felt it in every inch of her being. Her body hummed as pleasure rippled through her in gentle, steady waves. Every tense muscle loosened. Her thighs eased apart, and Preston’s sure hands traced her lines and curves.

  He took her hand and placed it on his hardened shaft. “I’ve been dreaming of you, too.” He groaned and squeezed his eyes shut when she tightened her hand around him.

  She unzipped his pants, and he pushed them down and kicked them aside. Slowly she took him back and stroked him, feeling the veins and muscles tense and ripple beneath her finge
rtips.

  Preston gritted his teeth to keep from hollering, grabbed her hand, squeezed it once, then pulled her hand away from its hold. He eased her back onto the bed, unzipped her shorts and tugged them down over her hips, tossing them to the floor. She lifted up and pulled her shirt over her head.

  Preston inched up on the bed and switched on the bedside lamp, casting a soft shadow across her body. “Let me see every inch of you tonight.” He inched her panties over her hips, down her thighs and across her legs letting his fingers caress her all along the way, across her stomach, her inner thighs and ever so lightly across the tapered triangle that shielded the epicenter of her need.

  Lee Ann writhed and gripped the sheet when Preston’s thumb brushed back and forth across her clit. He caressed and massaged it until it stood firm and fully exposed from its protective sheath. Her body shuddered, and she cried out in blinding delight as his mouth and tongue replaced his fingers. Her head spun, and wave after wave of pleasure shot through her. The pleasure became so intense that it was almost unbearable.

  Preston gripped her hips and quenched his thirst for her.

  Lee Ann became a conduit for pleasure. Every nerve ending vibrated as his tongue flicked, laved and teased, and then he inserted one finger then another.

  Her body stiffened and arched in response. He spread his fingers and gently slid them in and out. Her ebbing and flowing moans excited him, and when her thighs spread wider and her body opened completely, he knew that he had her on the edge of coming.

  “Ohhhh, ohhhh…yesss.”

  He reached around her and into his drawer and pulled out a condom even as he continued to bring her toward ecstasy.

  “You do it,” he said in a ragged whisper. He pressed his thumb against her clit, and her hips rose and bucked against his hand. “Now.” He knew it was only sheer willpower that kept him from climaxing.

  Lee Ann rolled the condom over the swollen head and down the bulging shaft.

  Preston could barely contain himself. He moved between her parted thighs, keeping his fingers in place. He unsnapped her front closure bra, and her warm, full breasts welcomed him. Her nipples were hard and full, calling for his attention. He lowered his head and drew one into his eager mouth, and he pushed deep and hard inside her in one swift move.