Page 16 of Lieutenant

He’d never admit it to me anyway.

Plausible deniability.

Chapter Five

Then

When I was a kid, I learned about partisan politics before I learned myABCs. When I played sports, I was never picked last. Not because I was good, but because I could play the game.

The game of politics.

I gotAseven when I didn’t have the best grades, because I could sweet-talk the teachers and they’d overlook my shortcomings, or give me extra chances to improve my grade.

I learned.

Boy, did I learn.

I knew two things about myself before I reached high school—that I hated my father, and that I would make my own name for myself in this world.

Don’t get me wrong, I loveDaddy, the man who sang me to sleep, who taught me how to fish, who took me camping. Adorehim.

Rarely saw him, though, once he started advancing through the ranks politically. The higher the office he achieved, the less I saw of Daddy.

If I wanted to spend time with my father, that meant I needed to become acquainted with and spend most of my time with Benchley Evans.

It was Benchley Evans, politician and political operator, who I saw most often. The skilled lawyer who taught me everything I know about the game of politics.

Daddy hoped I’d marry a nice guy from his party, settle down, have grandbabies.

Daddy is highly disappointed.

But Benchley Evans is not-so-secretly proud of me for setting myself up to be governor.

Both men despise my husband, Carter. Mostly because, professionally, Carter is everything they aren’t…andeverythingBenchley Evansis, and more.

My father would have much preferred I married Owen. Owen reminds me so much of Daddy.

How little does he know.

Owen owns my heart as much as I own him and his.

They say girls marry their fathers. Except my father is two distinctly different men.

I guess, in a way, that’s exactly what I did.

* * * *

One of my early memories is of going on a particular camping trip with Daddy and some of his friends. I didn’t understand until I was older that many of them were involved in politics in some way, either politicians, or lobbyists, or lawyers who had an interest in political doings, or even county or city employees.

Momma wasn’t into camping, atall, but I loved everything to do with it. I also loved the attention I got from Daddy. He taught me how to take care of myself, how to set up my own tent, how to build and tend a fire—all of that. He’d been an Eagle Scout when he was a boy, and since he didn’t have a son…

Well, he hadme.

There was an older girl, Rebecca Soliz, who frequently went camping with us…until she didn’t. There was a gap of several years before I saw her again, and at some point, she’d had a baby.

Although that was something no one talked about.

Rebecca’s father, Edward Soliz, was one of Daddy’s best friends. Rebecca and I used to share a tent, which I always thought was fun. I was seven, and she seemed so much older than me, even though she was probably thirteen or fourteen, at the time.