The bill was an overloaded ship trying to make port in a shallow harbor, and the clock was ticking on the second continuing resolution that was keeping the government open. Hey, only the American people would be crushed if it didn’t happen—no biggie.
Again and again the reporters tried to get answers from him, and the Majority Leader barked out replies: he refused to discuss the president’s attitude toward the negotiation in detail (“he just wants us to get it done”); no, the Leader didn’t plan to take committee chairmanships away from recalcitrant members (“not at this time, anyhow”); but yes, they would consider another continuing resolution if they couldn’t get the budget done (“but we will”).
Drew thrust his hand into the air, and the senator finally flicked a finger in his direction. He wanted to ask about the human costs of the budget negotiations, but he knew that wasn’t the story Steven wanted. So instead, he said, “We’re hearing some members of the House, the so-called Liberty Caucus, say they won’t vote for a budget until it zeroes out funding for the special prosecutor. In the Senate—”
“I’ll stop you there. As I was saying to this young lady—what’s your name again?” The senator’s question was directed at Allen.
She looked up, her expression serene. “Brynn Allen.”
“Right. As I was telling her, these unsourced quotes you read in the media today, I mean who knows where they come from. Maybe it’s all some over-heated reporter’s fantasies.”
Drew had been prepared for some version of this, so he immediately went for a follow-up. “I’ve personally spoken to three members of the Liberty Caucus who’ve said cutting money from the special prosecutor is necessary if the omnibus is going to get their votes.” The House was generally more supportive of the president and therefore more interested in shutting the investigation down, while more moderate Republican senators wouldn’t mind if the president disappeared tomorrow, and thus they didn’t like this plan.
“If the House decided to eliminate funding for the special prosecutor, would the Senate follow suit?” Drew asked.
“I won’t address hypotheticals like that.”
Then why were they having this press conference? “Sir, given—”
“I’m not answering any more questions from you,” the Majority Leader snapped. “Who’s next? Yeah, go ahead.”
“The war of words over the budget has been getting hotter.” Allen was up now, because she still had more questions after her private audience. “The Minority Leader just released a statement saying his whip count indicates you don’t have the votes. He also called you the weakest Republican Leader since Leverett Saltonstall. Do you have a response?”
“Is that so?” The old bastard smiled—a chilling sight. “I’m surprised he can spell Leverett Saltonstall.”
That was it. That would be the lede in every article written about this press conference, and Allen had gotten it out of him. Drew glared at his recorder.
The next five minutes were uneventful. The Majority Leader successfully evaded every question lobbed at him, and it was over with as little fanfare as it had begun. What a waste of a few hours.
After the senator and his staff flitted off and the press began to leave, Allen gave Drew a sidelong look and then laughed at whatever expression was on his face. “You really need a good cop to pair with your bad cop act.”
Who was this woman? “Is that how you do it?”
“No. I, like a maverick detective, prefer to work alone. I do appreciate you trying to pin him down on the deficit reduction, though. I had a go in his office, and he wasn’t going to talk about it.”
He flipped his notebook closed and put it and his recorder in his bag. Was she trying to throw him a little crumb from her interview? He didn’t want it. “Why didn’t you ask him about the Minority Leader’s quote then too?”
“Because the press release dropped during the scrum.”
That was what he got for not checking his email. “You’d softened him up during your first thing. He wouldn’t have told his joke to anyone else in the room.” He bit that last part off, but he meant it. She might also be spoiled and she definitely had this job because of her mother, but she did it well.
She fluttered her eyelashes. “Are you trying to compliment me? I guess I’ll take it over the stalking.”
“It wasn’t stalking, and besides, I said I was sorry.”
“You didn’t actually.”
The rest of the press had gone, so there was only a Capitol Police officer guarding the door to the Senate floor, an empty podium, Drew, and Allen. Her words echoed off the fancy tiled floor and the vaulted ceiling. This was probably how sources felt when he asked them to give something up they hadn’t offered and didn’t want to.
It felt, it turned out, like shit.
Drew glanced down. Allen had on black dress shoes of some kind, pointy toed ones, and a shiver of…something went through him at the knowledge that under the patent leather, her toe nails were eggplant purple.
Damnit, now he was thinking about the woman’s toes rather than getting past this and back into what he needed to be doing today, starting with an apology.
He looked up into her gray-blue eyes. “I’m sorry I was creeping your Insta and assumed you’d be meeting Deep Throat.”
After a moment, she nodded. “You should be. I did know who you were, at least I knew your name, at The Coffee Bar. I just didn’t recognize you.”
“Well, this is me.”
“I see.”
The moment stretched out between them, quiet and aware. He had any number of regrets over how he’d handled this, including that he’d ever thought she looked like a bug and that the most interesting woman he’d met in months would be happy to crush him under her heel.
Her phone buzzed, though it had been buzzing more or less constantly as they’d talked, but she dug it out and scowled.
He wanted to ask if it was Deep Throat—except they weren’t friends and they weren’t going to be—but based on her expression, it was probably a source, or many sources, or an editor, or a needy boyfriend.
His own email notification sounded, as if to insist that he was also busy and important.
“It’s got to slow down someday, right?” she muttered.
“Or we’ll explode.”
“Maybe that’s why MTL hasn’t been hustling? Trying to conserve your energy?” She offered her quip with a wry smile, though she continued to read her email.
“Gray ladies can still hustle, we’re just a little creaky while we do it.”
“‘Creaky’ is a pretty mild descriptor for your social media game, but hey, now we all get to write explainers on Leverett Saltonstall, so you’re welcome for that.”
The truth was Steven would probably love the clickbait. “Hmm, I don’t think I’m grateful, but he wouldn’t have given me that quote. You did well.” Because he was pissy he hadn’t gotten a private audience, he added, “Or he knows your mom.”
Allen’s head snapped up and her mouth twisted. “Yeah.” As she whipped away, she added something that sounded like “asshole.”
Which he probably was.
3
Frustration made Brynn’s dash out of the Capitol and across the grounds particularly fast. Then, in something of miracle, she caught a cab immediately.
Seething and answering emails kept her busy during the ride over to a restaurant near the Justice Department. Drew was so good looking, so entitled, and therefore so not worth thinking about again—but she’d thought about him with every click of her keyboard all week, hoping he’d read this story or get pissed about that quote.
She’d dug up his stuff too, and she had been annoyed when it had been well sourced and thoughtful. It had made her want to debate the Earned Income Tax Credit with him rather than kick his ass, but she didn’t have time for either. Not today. Not this year.
At Zaytinya, she found Lee at a table in the back, scribbling notes on a memo. As the acting Assistant AG for Legislative Counsel
, Lee provided legal advice to the White House. When the new president had taken over, she’d expected to be replaced within weeks, which was how this crazy relationship had started.
“If you’re about to be ousted,” Brynn had said casually over the phone in late January, “why don’t you tell me what you’re hearing about his immigration plan?”
“I can’t do that,” Lee had said in a tone suggesting she could.
“Tell me where I should be looking, then.”
“Well, Dwight Simon in Legislative Affairs isn’t pleased.”
So Brynn had called Dwight Simon, and he’d told her everything.
Today though, Lee looked like a metal spring twisted into an unfixable knot.
“What’s up with the 911 message?” Brynn took a seat.
Lee flicked her eyes up and then back to her memo. “Something’s coming down the pipe.”
As far as Brynn knew, fifty things were coming down the pipe. The pipe was loaded, jammed: policy changes and budget wish lists and appointments and insults and crises. The President had a tendency to jump from idea to idea haphazardly without sticking with any one thing for very long, and his aides took advantage of the chaos to promote their pet agendas. And the threat of investigation hung over it all like haze above a forest fire.
Brynn had no idea if Lee was referring to something she’d heard whispers about or something else entirely. But she wasn’t, after all, the one who had called this meeting.
“Do you want me to guess?” Brynn asked.
“No, I just wanted you to know.”
“Wanted me to know what?”
This was the point where knowing Lee, really knowing her, didn’t help. Brynn hadn’t meant for their friendship to develop like this, and she wasn’t ever certain where she could push and where she couldn’t. It was why you shouldn’t date coworkers and why friends sometimes made bad lovers: taking people from one context and putting them in another made all the rules squishy.
When Lee didn’t answer, Brynn said, “I realize you feel weird about this.” There wasn’t anyone sitting near them, there was enough ambient noise in the restaurant to hide their conversation, and their families’ friendship gave them good cover, but Brynn still kept her voice low. “I know you never wanted this.”
Lee snorted and kept on editing. “I wanted to work in someone else’s administration entirely.”
So had most of the civil servants in town. “But you have to see you’re doing good.”
“For whom? For you?”
“Sure.” There was no reason to deny Lee had helped Brynn’s career: she had. This wasn’t about Brynn herself, however, which no one seemed to believe. “But more than that, though, you’re doing good for the country.”
“Well, the country needs all the help it can get.”
“Tell me what’s coming.”
Lee didn’t say anything, though. Brynn waved a server over and asked for a glass of water. When it arrived, she took a drink and then pitched back in her chair. She should leave, go find someone who actually wanted to talk to her, but she took another swing at it instead.
“I hear a lot,” Brynn said. “There’s a good chance I already know.”
A sardonic look, and then Lee went back to scratching and scritching all over the page. “You don’t.”
“I never write things solely based on what you tell me, but you know you know more than anyone else.”
Lee’s pen hovered in midair.
In almost all of these conversations, the compliments were when she started to make headway with Lee. “Other people are like gophers. They dig deep—but only on the one thing. You’re like a fox. You’re everywhere.” That was why Brynn pushed when Lee clammed up: Lee was finding these things on purpose. She wanted to pass them on, to get them out.
Lee set her pen down. “I know what you’re doing.”
Neither of them was stupid, nor subtle. “Then don’t make me do it. I didn’t call you and ask for something.”
After that first time, Brynn never had. She called plenty of other people, but not Lee. With Lee she waited, as quiet and patient as a debutante, and she never had to play the wallflower for long. Maybe it was dumb, and it definitely made Brynn depend on one fickle source, but it was worth it to get the truth out.
“Yeah.” Lee leaned her head back against the banquet. The restaurant interior was all white leather, glass, and sleek modern lines. Cool. Understated. Elegant. Like Lee herself.
“You don’t have to call if you don’t want to talk.” Brynn meant it. This relationship was getting to be more trouble than it was worth. “Or we could have lunch, no politics.”
“Neither of us has time for that.”
“Probably not.”
Outside, a fire truck, siren blazing, drove past. Once it was gone, Lee said softly, “The investigation has taken a turn.”
The investigation into the president, presumably. “Uh-huh.”
“I heard from one of the witnesses, specifically someone who’s looking for new lawyers. Shit’s getting real.”
For the next five minutes at least, Lee got over her qualms and spilled the beans.
When she rolled into the Chronicle newsroom later, Brynn’s fingers itched. Maybe she ought to call in Matt to help. Most of her really big pieces had a shared byline, and this one was going to be a doozy.
“Hey! I’m glad I caught you.” Corey jogged over and fell into step alongside her. “I heard some of the interns giggling in the breakroom, and I wanted to know what the fuss was about, and it was you. If you haven’t checked your mentions on Twitter recently, you’ll find Drew Orlov there.”
Brynn set her bag down on her desk with a thump. “Uh-huh.”
“I guess he at’ed you in a piece about some midcentury Republican senator.”
“Leverett Saltonstall?”
“That’s the one. Anyhow, his Tweet went viral.”
With a groan, Brynn pulled up Twitter, and there it was: 3002 notifications. “I’m starting to think our civilization will be buried in our attempts to entertain ourselves.”
“No doubt. Though I hope I’m around to write about it.” Corey gave her shoulder a pat. “Do you need anything?”
“Nope.” Brynn had jotted down all the highlights from her conversation with Lee on her way back to the office. She pulled her notebook out and rapped the cover. “I have a new lead.”
“Ooh, well, I shouldn’t have distracted you with gossip. Happy writing!”
Brynn got out her laptop, opened a doc, and began to reorganize her notes in narrative form, adding questions and annotations where she could.
Every few sentences, though, she glanced at Drew’s Tweet.
Because I know you’re very busy, @ChronicleBrynn, I wrote this superb piece on Leverett Saltonstall. Feel free to RT.
He’d helpfully included the link. The headline was “The Rise and Fall of the Pince-Nez Leader.” In the replies, people took him seriously and bemoaned the lack of knowledge of midcentury New England politicians and insisted Saltonstall didn’t wear pince-nez, or they made fun of the Chronicle, or they commented on how hot Drew was. In fact, Drew seemed to have quite a following, which surprised Brynn not at all.
When she’d finished transcribing and filling in her notes from her conversation with Lee, she opened the Chronicle site, grabbed the link to their Saltonstall explainer, and hit reply.
A bit irreverent, don’t you think? It’s like the Gray Lady doesn’t take history seriously. This one is superior in all the ways.
After she’d checked in with Matt and they’d both made rounds of calls to confirm Lee’s account of the shift in the investigation—
“How did you hear this?” an FBI agent demanded.
“Is it true?” she replied.
Silence.
Right. “What I know about the new investigation is…”
—when Drew responded.
The Gray Lady *is* feeling frisky. He’d attached a GIF from Grey Gardens of Little Edi
e dancing with an American flag. By the time Brynn read it and yelped with laughter, it already had hundreds of retweets.
Watching the ticker flick up in real time, Brynn realized she was flirting, publicly, with an arrogant MTL reporter who she didn’t even like most of the time.
The worst part was she didn’t want to stop. So she responded, It’s odd because I think you’re more like Big Edie.
It’s my affinity for hats, isn’t it?
No, it’s the skirt-cape.
Not all heroes wear capes. This was followed by a series of superhero GIFs, each somehow more endearing and funny than the last.
She took a call from a source, drafted a paragraph, and sent what she had to Matt. “I don’t have time for you,” she whispered to Drew’s latest message.
She closed Twitter and got back to work.
Over the late afternoon, she conferenced with Matt and Grace, chatted with still more sources, and began drafting what they had. Then, while eating a makeshift dinner of crackers, apple chips, and a Coke, she finally reopened Twitter.
7863 notifications.
She knew why this was interesting to her, or at least had been before she’d found out Drew was a covetous jerk: the thunderclap of heat and awareness in her stomach when they locked eyes. Or when she heard him berate the Majority Leader. Or when she read his stuff about the impact of the president’s anti-immigration rhetoric on agricultural workers in rural Virginia.
He was hot, sure. And she was tired, so tired, of the stress and the job. She’d like to sink into him for a few minutes and just be.
He felt the professional exhaustion too…but that was why it was a mistake. Because she couldn’t separate out what was real here, if anything was, from what he wanted. This, they, couldn’t be neutral.
Before she lost her nerve, she found her phone, made sure nothing specific was visible on her desk, and snapped a picture of her dinner. She attached it to her reply to Drew.
Some of us are still working here @WashChronicle. Maybe @MTL_DC ought to try it? She added a winky face emoji, sent it off, and then went back to her research. Her fingertips only tingled the slightest bit.
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