Page 47 of Caught By the Chief of Staff

“I never cheated,” he swears. “Not once.”

“I know.” I smile sadly. “I never doubted that. They were of you overseas. Laughing, working out, on patrol. Things like that.”

“I don’t understand.”

“The caller told me that if I didn’t leave you, you would die by friendly fire that night.” I let the words hang in the air, the threat I carried with me all these years, the unspoken words of the burden I have carried that are now shared between us.

“Cara,” he says gently, sadly. Rick knows and understands my sacrifice now.

“Yes.” There are no other words that need to be spoken; we can’t go down this road, because it won’t find our daughter. We’ll come back to this bridge one day, if we get our daughter back. If not… I’m not sure I’ll ever go on.

“Then what happened?” he asks, and I’m thankful for the change in subject.

“I dropped the quart of milk all over the floor of Target,” I admit. “The caller told me to pretend like nothing was wrong. And buy my vitamins. I decided I didn’t need milk, since I would be leaving and you wouldn’t be back for a long time. So I bought the things in my basket and then went back to the apartment. I left those things in the trunk of my car. I went up to the apartment and packed a bag. I didn’t want to take anything else from you than I already was, so I left it all behind. Including my wedding rings.

“And then I sat on the couch as the sun set outside, and I cried and cried. I still wasn’t ready when you called, but I knew what I needed to do. I had to protect you. You couldn’t die because I was too selfish or too scared. So—”

“So you left me.”

“I did,” I answer him honestly for the first time in years. “Left as soon as I hung up the phone, driving all night. I felt restless, like I couldn’t sleep. So I just kept going. And when I finally stopped at a motel to rest, I looked through a phone book, found an attorney with the least sleazy name, and asked him to file for divorce in the morning. And then I cried myself to sleep.”

“And after that?”

“After that, I found a way to live without you, because I had to. I couldn’t lay down and die, because we had a baby on the way, and she needed me. She still needs me.”

“Cara—” he starts, but we’re interrupted. I jump at the intrusion. I was so lost down our sad memory lane.

“What the fuck is going on here?” the intruder roars, making Rick roll his eyes before he turns to me.

“Cara, you know the President and First Lady of the United States.”