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He was so easy to love. He had a way about him that drew people in. I’d fallen for him the very day we’d met, twelve years earlier when I’d roomed with Jacinta at Stanford.

I’d come home to change before I went to a yoga class and to my surprise, the sexiest man I’d ever seen was sitting on my couch, wearing a Harvard Law T-shirt and watching TV. He didn’t notice me until I’d made some sarcastic comment about an enemy in Stanford territory. The moment our eyes locked, I was a goner.

“Damn. I just thought of something funny,” Tracy said with a laugh, snapping me from my thoughts.

“What’s that?”

“Jacinta Camden is about to get another notch in her candidate collecting belt. First, she enters the race for Senate, then she convinces Veer George to run for governor, and now you’re going to make an official announcement. I wish I were in her shoes. She’s going to get all the credit for influencing you to run.”

“I’m glad my personal and political angst is a competition between you and Jaci,” I muttered as I filled my cup to the brim and took a sip of the piping-hot brew. “Everyone is going to lose their minds when I break the news tonight and tell them why I’m making it official. Shit. It will have to wait until all the guests leave, and that will be close to midnight.”

“It’s the way it works, Samina. Your family’s approval isn’t going to change the course you’re taking. All I can say is enjoy today, and get ready for a roller-coaster ride.”

“Not helping, whatsoever.”

Tracy chuckled. “I’ll call you in the morning. Stop worrying about Devin.”

“That’s easy for you to say. I’m the one who has to inform my husband what we’re planning.”

“That’s marriage,” she said and hung up.

I placed my phone on the counter and took a deep breath.

Oh God. What was I going to do? I had to tell him.

Last night, we’d agreed to talk each step of our lives out. This was our chance to get it right, to fix the mess we’d created of our relationship. Now I’d made the official decision to run without consulting him.

Would he still support me when I was about to do to him the exact thing I was so angry with him for doing to me?

I released a deep breath and rested my face against the hard surface of the kitchen counter.

This was my life now. A game of strategy, a chess match where I had to outmaneuver the sitting king. The second the papers were filed, Senator Anthony Sanders would declare war on me, and he would use nude pictures of me to shame me. Everyone I knew would see them. My family would see them. What was Mommy going to think? Would she blame me as I expected Papa would? I could almost hear Richard telling me to get over it. But Carol didn’t deserve the media spectacle thrown on her.

Oh God, Jacinta. She’d blame herself. I’d have to make sure she understood this time I was going to fight for her and me.

I lifted my head to rest my face in my hands.

I’d better wake Dev and give him the not-so-good news.

“That view of your naked, round ass is priceless. A man always wants to see his sexy wife in her birthday suit first thing in the morning.”

I stood, turning to face a nude Devin, and quickly wiped the tear running down my face.

“Baby, what’s wrong?” The playfulness of his mood disappeared as he approached me.

“Dev, I have something to tell you.”

He stared at me and then ran a thumb along my damp cheek.

“Does it have to do with the pictures or the election?”

“Both,” I answered. “It’s going to make you into a public figure as much as I am.”

He continued to gaze into my eyes before he spoke. “I don’t care. Not right now.”

“This is important. I have to prepare you.”

“I said, I don’t care.” He cupped my face. “You can tell me later. Right now, I have to take care of you. Tell me what you need.”