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CHAPTER ONE
Elizabeth
The storm outside raged, the wind howling like a feral beast, rattling the windows and making my heartbeat thrum wildly against my ribcage. Lightning flashed, lighting up the corners of my darkened office.
A migraine was a vice grip on my temples, squeezing tighter with each clap of thunder. I leaned back in my chair, eyes squeezed shut as I rubbed my forehead in slow, deliberate circles in a futile attempt to dull the pain.
The screen of my computer was blinding to my overly sensitive eyes, piercing into my brain anytime I tried to look at it as the rain pelted rhythmically and relentlessly on the glass behind me.
Every ounce of me wanted to power down and finally head home for the night.
The neon clock at the corner of the screen taunted me. Midnight. The witching hour. Yet another day that passed me by while I spent every waking moment in this office that was steadily starting to feel more like a prison with each passing day.
Was it any wonder the stress had brought on yet another migraine? The third this week alone.
The storm outside and the one inside were fighting for dominance as I reached into my drawer for painkillers, set right there next to my trusty bottle of antacids that I was eating like candy most days.
I downed the pills with a swig of my long-cold coffee, the bitter taste a small price to pay if it would actually ease some of the pain, so I could get back to work.
My desk was a disaster, piles of folders and loose papers evidence of how behind I still was, despite pulling sixteen-hour days.
What can I say?
The reelection campaign wasn’t going well.
Polls were leaning out of our favor ever since a very motivated blue-collar worker from a bad area started her grassroots effort to take down the incumbent.
My boss.
A man who had held his position in the Senate almost as long as I’ve been alive.
Someone who, according to the aforementioned polls, was out of touch with the common man, who was in this for the money and the cushy government benefits, not to actually help the common man.
The thing was, the constituents weren’t even wrong.
That was the hardest part of this job. Running a campaign for a man you didn’t personally even respect, let alone like.
Michael Westmoore was the very definition of a slimy politician. Full of smiles for everyone he shit-talked behind their backs. Making speeches about the plight of the common man while wearing shoes that cost more than the average person made in a month. Preaching the importance of a strong middle class and unions while actively voting against anything that would actually help his people.
He’d also taken up a pretty severe filler addiction lately, on top of one too many facelifts, making his face look pulled too tight and emotionless.
The scandal of the week was him trying to give a moving speech, but his face had been so frozen that he looked like a robot.
The memes, God, the memes.
Hilarious, truly.
But really damning to the campaign.
And, man, the senator had been enraged. The whole office paid for that one. Even if, realistically, the only person to blame was his injectionist.
I was still trying to clean up that mess. Meanwhile the senator was already caught by some random member of the press saying something horrifically misogynistic about the young woman running against him.
If I didn’t need this job so much, I would jump ship and go work for her.
Alas, I’d been here for a while. The pay was good. The benefits… enough to keep me out of complete financial ruin if I found myself in the hospital for any reason.
It was a bad time to try to leave.