Page 3 of Caught By the Chief of Staff

“I won’t,” she calls out from her closet.

She will. Grace always does. She’s too hyper to be able to sit still and let me work my magic.

Grace hustles back into the bathroom and climbs into my chair. I dust her face with soft golds and shimmery pinks as she sits there in her underwear.

“I forgot my bowtie,” the senator says as he tumbles into the bathroom to see Grace in her undies with her hair in rollers and me applying her makeup. “Holy fuck.”

His expletive makes me laugh. He reminds me so much of the man I’ve worked so hard to put out of my mind for the last nine years—the man who every other doesn’t quite measure up to—and not just because they’re friends.

“Jake, this is Cara. Cara, this is Jake.”

“Hi, Cara,” he says, but he never takes his eyes off Grace, which makes me giggle even harder.Ahh, young love.

“Can I see you in the closet for a moment?”

“Absolutely not!” I practically shout, making him jump a little. “If she goes with you, you’re going to fuck her, and then you’ll ruin all my hard work. Fuck her later.”

“You don’t know that,” he says nonchalantly, but I know bullshit when I hear it. “I could be careful.”

“I don’t think so, Senator Chancellor,” I respond with a sweet smile.

“Jake,” he corrects me.

“Jake,” I repeat on a smile. “I’ve had a man look at me like that before. I know the look of a man who is at the end of his patience.”

“Better get that bowtie and run,” Grace says before she busts out laughing too. Grace and I always have fun when we hang out.

“Don’t think there won’t be retribution, Ms. Sanders,” he tells her with a twinkle in his eyes.

“I would expect nothing less, Senator,” Grace flirts.

And then he moves to his closet, and Grace and I wait quietly until he gets the accessory he needs and takes it to the spare room where he’s dressing.

“Holy shit,” I say, fanning myself. “Have fun tonight.”

“You know I can’t stand these things,” she says softly.

“No. I meant after,” I tell her with a look to the doorway where Jake just left. “That man clearly has plans for you.”

“We’ll see.”

When I’m done with her makeup, I carefully unroll each of her curls and brushes them this way and that before pinning one side back with a gold barrette. Grace rolls stockings up her legs, and then I hold her dress out for her to step into then zip her up.

“Here,” I say, handing Grace the deep-pink lipstick I slicked on her lips, and I watch as she drops it into my beaded clutch. “Oh! Your shoes!”

“Right here, Cinderella,” Jake says as he holds them out. She moves to reach for them, but instead, he drops to one knee and takes her foot in his hand and slips the heel on her before setting it back on the ground. He taps her other foot to let her know to lift it to his ministrations.

Jesus, that’s hot.

I’m not gonna lie. I love Grace like a sister, but right now, I am all kinds of jealous.

“Thank you.”

“And this,” he says after he stands and pulls a long velvet box from his coat pocket. He snaps open the top, plucks a gorgeous diamond tennis bracelet from the silk pillow, and chucks the box onto the counter unceremoniously, making Grace smile and me laugh. He’s such a man. Jake wraps the bauble around her wrist and then lets her go. “I saw it and thought of you.”

“I don’t know what to say,” she tells him quietly, but still, I hear it.

“You don’t have to say anything at all.”