"That's how I met Robin," he explained.
"Well, I trust her judgment. If she says you're the best, you're the best. I only have one question to ask before I hire you. Why should I trust you with all of my campaign information?"
The tall Frenchman studied her curiously. "I expected you to be more concerned about giving me access to your personal information," he said bluntly. Although Tess had been trying to put it more delicately, that was essentially what she was asking. Robin had already informed Louph of her situation, and even if the agent hadn't told her, she would have guessed because of the way that Louph studied her face so carefully.
"I already have a great deal of money, and I dislike people." Tess was just as surprised by this answer as she had been by Louph's size and mismatched crosstrainers. "I cannot be bribed because I am already wealthy, and I will not sell your secrets because I try to interact with as few unknown persons as possible.”
At least he's honest, Tess thought to herself. Candidness was a rarity in her business, and she found it refreshing. "Why are you here interacting with me, then?" she asked, hoping that he would continue to be truthful with her.
"A favor."
There was a knock on the door, and Robin stepped in a few moments later without waiting for a response. "I wish you'd stop bringing that up. It wasn't a big deal."
"There were armed men!" Louph protested. "They were shooting at me!"
Robin rolled her eyes, and Tess's lips curved in a soft smile. "She put on the hero act for me, too," she told Louph. "I was in a minor car accident the other day, and she stopped the other driver from pulling a gun on me."
"It wasn't a minor accident at all, he totaled the back end of your car," Robin muttered, but didn't say anything else. Tess heaved a sigh at the memory. Her rental car was reminder enough of the incident. It was nice, but she hated reaching for the gearshift and realizing it was at a different angle, and not knowing where the windshield wiper switch was by feel.
Louph did not seem interested in their conversation. Instead, he was looking at Tess's computer. "I normally recommend PCs, but in this particular instance, you're lucky that you use a Mac. Many PC-targeted viruses and programs won't affect your computer."
Sensing that Louph wanted to get to work instead of exchanging pleasantries, Tess got up from her desk and left the chair open, gesturing for him to sit. "Go ahead. Do what you need to do. I guess Robin and I will..."
"Go somewhere else," Robin said, finishing Tess's sentence for her.
"Right."
Both of them turned toward the door, and Tess only just remembered to grab her purse before they slipped out into the hallway. "I feel a little violated having someone I barely know going through all my computer files," the politician grumbled as they headed for the front entrance. "Being kicked out of my own office just topped it all off."
"No one kicked you out," Robin protested. "You could have stayed."
"He seems like the type of person that is more comfortable working by himself."
Robin didn't bother denying Tess's accurate assessment of her friend. "He's trustworthy," she said instead. "As a hacker, he likes challenges and breaking in to places he shouldn't be just for the thrill, but doing that has also taught him lots of ways to keep other people out. Besides, it's not like you have hardcore fetish porn on your computer, right?" Robin said, making the joke she had been too wary to use the night before.
Tess's response was a groan, but not an unpleasant one. Once in a while, an incredibly corny joke could ease the tension of a serious situation. "I don't – um – consume that kind of thing on my work computer. I still don't know exactly what kind of information my blackmailer has. He might not even know about Samantha," she whispered, glancing around to make sure no one else was in the hallway and all the other doors were closed. "Do you think he'll let us know?"
"Tell us how much he knows?" Robin repeated for clarification. "He might, if only to convince you to pay the money without contacting law enforcement. That's probably the rationale behind the cards and the flowers. He wants to scare you, to make you feel like it's not safe to go to the police, or anybody. If someone finds out who he is, the game's over, and there's no way for him to win."
"But neither will I," Tess realized sadly. "If I do catch him, there's nothing stopping him from releasing whatever he's got to enact vengeance."
"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it." By silent, mutual agreement, they ended the conversation when they came into the front lobby. They waved at Mike, the security guard, and headed for the front entrance.
"Want to give my new rental car a spin?" Tess asked. "I don't know about you, but I could really use a drink."
* * *
Instead of stopping at a bar or public establishment, Robin swung by the nearest liquor store and selected a moderately cheap bottle of vodka before Tess reminded her that they were going back to her campaign headquarters and didn't have much to mix it with there. "I'm not a fan of straight vodka," she said, wrinkling her nose and making Robin laugh. Eventually, they settled on whiskey instead and bought a bottle of Jack Daniels along with the vodka. Robin was slightly wary, especially considering her mother's past history with alcohol, but Tess seemed responsible enough to know her limits, and if anyone deserved a drink today, she did.
"I haven't been in a liquor store in years," Tess confessed on the quick drive back, the unopened bottles sitting comfortably between their seats in a paper bag as she drove. "And I haven't had whiskey since my early twenties at least."
"What, you sent your peons out to get your booze for you?" Robin teased. "Or do you like to order fancy wine directly from the vineyard? Liquor store brands too cheap for you?"
Tess waved her hand before setting it back down on the steering wheel. "I don't care about that. This is probably a really bad idea, though. I'm not normally the type to get drunk in order to forget my problems."
"Nah, that's my mother's method of problem-solving. I'm not a fan of it, either. I won't let you go overboard."
"Based on what I've seen so far, you seem responsible. In fact, I don't think I've seen you drink at all." A sudden thought struck her. "You do drink, right? I'm not going to have to finish these bottles all by myself? I was the one who suggested –"
Robin shook her head. "I don't drink anymore. Growing up with an alcoholic parent has made me very cautious." She spared a glance down at the bottles. "Homer Simpson was right when he said that alcohol is the cause of, and the solution to, most of life's problems."
They spent the rest of the drive discussing their first drinking experiences. Tess hadn't indulged until her first year of college, when she accidentally ladled a cup of punch from the wrong bowl at a wedding and ended up flustered and confused in front of several adults. She had learned her lesson, however, and never drank more than she could handle during celebrations or social occasions. Robin's experience was earlier, at fifteen, and more typical, having taken place in a friend's basement without similarly amusing results. After a few equally unpleasant experiences, she had decided not to tempt fate.
"I never developed a taste for beer," Robin said as they exited the car, making sure to grab the bottles on their way in. "Is there another room we can wait in while Louph messes with your computer?"
"Sure. We've got several conference rooms. I need places to meet with all the bigwig donors trying to line my pockets, don't I?"
Robin could tell that Tess was being sarcastic, but it did remind her of the reason she had travelled to Cincinnati in the first place. She made a mental note to do some more research on Cal Saunders later, after she made sure Tess would be all right for the evening. She felt guilty for neglecting her real job in favor of finding Tess's blackmailer, even though she knew that the politician needed her help far more than the bureau needed to catch Saunders. He deserved to go to jail if he really was taking bribes, but Tess's threat was more immediate, and the consequences were highly personal.
The two women settled dow
n in a conference room at the other end of the building from the office, and Tess gave Robin a devious smirk as she pulled out her cell phone. "You know what? For the next couple of minutes, I'm turning this off."
"Off?" Robin said, trying to ignore the knot that her stomach had looped itself into under the power of Tess's smile. It was a very attractive smile, and she felt her palms and face heat up. She hadn't known Tess long enough to be sure, but she suspected that the politician rarely, if ever, turned off her cell phone. "Won't that get you in trouble with Brian?"
"Brian can take the stick out of his ass." Robin was surprised by Tess's behavior, but she pulled the bottle of Jack Daniels out of the bag it came in and passed it over. "I'm too lazy to get a cup," Tess continued, further surprising and confusing her. She reached into the bag to take out the bottle opener she had thought to purchase along with her mid-afternoon indulgence and did the honors.
"Easy there, don't drink the entire thing," Robin said as she watched Tess bring the whole bottle to her lips and take a long swig. This was definitely a side of her new friend that she had not been exposed to yet, and she wasn’t sure that she liked it.
"I think I'm allowed to do one stupid thing in my life. Aside from the stupid things I did to end up being blackmailed in the first place, I mean. I never drank much in college, never tried an illegal substance, never went to parties except the boring, fancy kind that I hated... and later, when I was an adult and did pick up girls, I usually just pretended to be drunk. It made communicating easier. Or, well, lack of communicating... After all the years I've spent being responsible and trying to live up to the image everyone expects, I deserve one bottle of Jack." Tess took another decisive drink, and Robin decided not to pester her. She had a feeling that the politician was having a minor breakdown, and if she wanted alcohol to get through it, well, she was an adult, capable of making her own choices. Unfortunately, those choices reminded her of her mother.
Chapter 20
Twenty minutes later, Robin wished she had said something.
At first glance, Tess didn't seem stumbling, falling-down drunk, but a closer inspection revealed that she wasn't sure of her reflexes, even while sitting, and the words coming out of her mouth were definitely a giveaway to the fact that she wasn't sober.
"I hate most of my life, you know? I always wanted to be a politician, even when I was a kid. But somehow, life found a way to make me hate what I love."
Robin was getting the impression that Tess was an introspective, slightly morose drunk instead of a silly, party-friendly drunk. Alcohol was, after all, a depressant. "Here, you've had enough of that," she decided, taking the bottle away from Tess, who was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she didn't protest. Seeing that the bottle was half gone already, Robin set it aside where Tess couldn't reach it. By her own admission, Tess wasn't a big drinker, and since she was slender and inexperienced, Robin had a feeling that she was going to be useless for the rest of the day.
"Can I have your phone?" she asked, taking it from the sad looking, drunk politician's purse and powering it back on. There were several missed calls from Brian, and so she dialed him back. "Hey, this is Robin Hart. Tess met with me for lunch today and something's not sitting well with her. I'm going to take her home, all right?"
On the other end of the connection, Brian paused for a moment, taken aback by the news. Tess hadn't missed work ever since he had joined her campaign. "That's strange," he said, more to himself than to Robin. "I think it would be better if I took her home, though. It might seem –"
"Look," Robin said, deciding to come clean at least a little, "I know you know Tess is gay, and I know you don't want anyone else finding that out. I'm not trying to jump her bones, I'm just looking out for her, and I'm not going to cause you any problems, all right?" She thought about mentioning the fact that she had listened to the blackmailer's phone message, but decided Brian didn't need to know what she knew yet. She didn't want him involved any further in this mess until she had a plan of action in place.
"You'd better not cause me any problems. I don't know why she told you. She should know better."
Robin frowned, insulted by Brian's tone and the implication of his words. "She had her reasons. I'm not going to tell anyone or sell the story to the Sun, all right?"
"Just make sure she's back at work tomorrow," Brian said, hanging up to make sure that he had the last word. Robin turned the phone off again in frustration.
"Samantha thinks I should jump your bones," Tess spoke up, reminding the angry FBI agent that she wasn't alone in the room. "She told me that. She says I need to stop being afraid of what I want."
"Samantha is crazy," Robin grumbled, putting the bottle back in its bag and starting to gather up their things. "I'm going to drive you home so you can sleep this off, and tomorrow, Louph will give us a report on what he found on your hard drive. Then we can set up some software on your phone and figure out who is trying to blackmail you."
Tess stood up, but gripped the side of the table to keep from swaying. "You would hate Samantha. She isn’t – she ... you just wouldn't like her. But she says I should ask you on a date. She calls you my girlfriend because she knows it pisses me off."
Robin knew that Tess would never be saying those things to her if she wasn't drunk, and so she decided to ignore them, as odd as they were. With a little effort, she herded Tess out of the conference room and towards the front entrance. She tossed a casual explanation – "she's not feeling well" – to Mike, the security guard, as she shepherded Tess out the door and into the parking lot. When they got to Robin's car, she buckled Tess into the passenger's seat and headed for the apartment she had only visited once before. Fortunately, she had a good memory and a functional GPS for backup.
Several minutes later, she had successfully guided Tess up the stairs and sat her down on the couch of her living room. The politician was a lot worse off than she had thought. Although she had been silent for most of the ride home, once the door to the apartment was closed, Tess kicked off her heels, leaned back, and spoke towards the ceiling. "I pretended we were on a date when we went out for dessert," she sighed. "I hadn't been on a date in so long... even with Samantha, we never really left my apartment. Actually, I've never been out anywhere with a woman. It always had to be hidden."
For some reason, that admission tugged at Robin's heart. She remembered how difficult and stifling it had been before she came out of the closet. Obviously, sneaking around with sex workers and occasionally seducing faceless, nameless girls at bars had taken a toll on Tess's psyche. Even though Tess was drunk, a question was niggling at the back of Robin's mind, and she had to ask. "How much sexual contact did you have with Samantha, anyway? I'm definitely no expert, but I thought a lot of professional dominants just did... I don't know... dominant stuff. And they didn't include sex so that they could work legally."
"Samantha wasn't a Dominatrix. She was a sex worker that happened to provide BDSM services," Tess said, impressing Robin with her surprisingly clear explanation despite being drunk. "I can't have one and not the other. They're too tied up in each other for me to separate."
Regaining some of her strength, Tess pushed herself up into a straight sitting position again, holding her head briefly when she was struck with a sudden moment of vertigo. When Robin came closer to check on her, she pulled the agent down to sit beside her. "You're too nice to me, Robin. I'm not really a great person."
"What do you mean?" Robin asked, trying not to watch Tess reach beneath her skirt to unclip her stockings and pull them down. Obviously, the blonde was wearing garters, and that mental image was definitely not one Robin needed if she wanted to be of any use to Tess for the rest of the afternoon.
"I'm a hypocrite and a coward," she said, wadding her stockings up in a ball and tossing them to the other side of the couch as she began unbuttoning her dress jacket. Once that was out of the way, she took her hair out of its clip and let it fall, sighing with relief. Left in her blouse and skirt, bareleg
ged and with her hair down, Robin thought that Tess looked even more attractive than she did in full-on work mode.
"I know lots of politicians do this – but do you personally go out and criticize others for not being as 'moral' as you are? Do you bash other people when they don't live the kind of fake, perfect life you try to show the world?"
She thought about it for a moment. "No. I try to talk about my own ideas instead of harping on other people's character fl- character flaws..." The last words of the sentence were slightly slurred, but Robin was still impressed by Tess's retention of her vocabulary despite how drunk she was. She supposed the politician was just a naturally verbose person. "Not that being gay is a character flaw."
"Then you're not a hypocrite."
"But I am a coward." Robin wasn't sure how to respond, but Tess didn't seem to expect an answer. Instead she stared into Robin's eyes with an intensity that was unsettling, but also rather exciting. She pulled herself closer to Robin, making their thighs brush together. The agent felt her heart rate trip along faster. Tess was close, very close, and she couldn't deny that having a beautiful woman – a beautiful woman that she liked – sitting almost on her lap was distracting. "I've always been a coward. I hate it..."
Before Robin realized what was happening, Tess leaned in and brushed their lips together. She blinked, and then her eyes drifted shut for the briefest moment as she tasted the warmth and softness of Tess's lips. After that pure, short moment of bliss, her mind was flooded with all the reasons she definitely shouldn't be doing this. She stopped, pulled away, and opened her eyes again. Tess's eyes were also closed, and she opened them as well, gazing up at Robin with such a pleading, yearning expression that she had to kiss her again. She deliberately pushed all of the reasons for 'no' out of her mind and replaced them with 'yes'.
Their second kiss was deeper, and Tess's teeth sank briefly into her lower lip, coaxing it out of the way with her tongue so that she could taste more of Robin's mouth. She tried to talk against the warm lips seeking more of her, "Tess, I –" Robin stroked the back of Tess's neck with the intention of easing their lips apart so that they could work through what had just happened. Tess was having none of it, and she leaned back in for a third kiss, this one much hungrier and more forceful. Robin had to jerk her lips away, even though it was the last thing she wanted to do. "Tess, stop."
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