Page 65 of The Illusion of Power (Passion and Politics #1)
Every time I call Selene his wife, the word burns its way up my throat, scorching my tongue and my lips on its way out.
She shouldn’t be his wife. She should be mine.
She should be Beck’s. She should be ours.
Though I know it’s not legally possible, the desire still lives in my heart, existing right beside the urge to murder Aubrey for breaking vows I would kill to take, vows I would rather die than break.
He’s frowning now, his over-inflated sense of importance trumping what should be relief that he’s not in the cross hairs of a potential killer. “That doesn’t make sense,” he says, looking at Selene. “I’m the one running for President. She’s just?—”
Beck’s interruption of his sentence begins with a growl he has to work hard to temper into something else.
“She is the person Jacob blames for his father being behind bars. In his mind, this all started the day Aubrey Jr. was killed. Selene’s public grieving was the catalyst for President Warner’s push for real change on the gun control front.
That speech sent a tremor of fear and then outrage through Leland’s organization, and the assassination plot was born. ”
“I grieved my son just as loudly and publicly as Selene did,” Aubrey insists, his hand going to his chest to rest over his heart.
“For the last five years, I’ve kept AJ at the center of my life, career, and this campaign.
If his death has made Selene a target, then I don’t understand why I wouldn’t be one as well. ”
“Great, we’ll be sure to let Jacob Marsh know you’d like him to divide his stalking efforts and murderous intentions evenly,” I spit, my last shred of patience gone.
“Careful, Drake,” Hicks warns while Aubrey flounders for a response. “Mr. Taylor makes a great point. You’ve made a solid case for why Marsh would want to go after Mrs. Taylor, but I haven’t heard a single reason why you’ve ruled out Mr. Taylor as a target.”
Beck jumps in, giving me a second to recover from engaging with this level of stupidity. “Because Jacob wouldn’t see him as a threat,”
Jordan purses her lips. “A future President with the power to do the exact thing his father went to prison to stop from happening isn’t a threat?”
“Yes, because this isn’t about gun control laws,” he replies. “No matter what Jacob tells himself. No matter what lies he’s spouted to his followers to get them to help him with this plan. Deep down, he knows it’s really about revenge.”
“And logically, Selene is the easier target. She’s a Black woman in America, so he can count on her to be deprioritized, dismissed and discounted at every turn,” I add, raising a brow at Hicks to make it clear that everything he did, or didn’t do, in regards to Selene serve to prove that point.
“Mr. Taylor’s whiteness, his growing popularity with conservative white males, and his alignment with Senator Barnes, who is well known for her relationship with the NRA, has insulated him and left Selene out in the cold. ”
My eyes touch her face, then, the softest of visual caresses to let her know she is not alone in this. Aubrey might have built in layers of protection, but she has us. Her expression gives nothing away, but I have to believe she feels the reassurance I’m offering.
Aubrey resents the answers Beck and I just gave him, I can tell by the way the vein in the middle of his forehead throbs. “So, it’s my fault this Marsh kid wants to kill her?”
“Is that what he said, Aubrey?” Selene asks incredulously. “How do you manage to make everything, even someone trying to kill me, about you?”
He opens his mouth to respond. I have no desire to see the two of them arguing because I won’t be able to stop myself, or Beck, from stepping in, so I interject. “There’s one more thing.”
Hicks sighs, sitting back in his chair. “What is it?”
“We have reason to believe that one or more of the agents on this team is providing information to Jacob Marsh.”
Everyone in the room, except for Beck, Selene, and me, starts to look around the room. Disgruntled murmurs and pleas of innocence blend together, growing louder until Hicks stands and slams his fist on the table.
“Now wait a damn minute! You two circumventing an investigation and commandeering a security briefing is one thing, but withholding information about a potentially corrupt agent is something else altogether. This is my fucking team, and I should be the first one to know if anyone even thinks someone under my command is dirty, so I can handle it.”
“That’s not your job, Hicks,” Beck says from his spot near the door of the conference room. His hand rests on the knob, and he pulls it open just as Hicks growls, “Who’s fucking job is it then? Yours?”
“No, it’s mine.”
The words are spoken by a petite Black woman in a perfectly tailored black suit and a blunt bob.
We’ve never met in person, but I recognize her voice from the phone call we had yesterday when she arrived in Detroit.
She strides into the room on sure feet, marching right up to Hicks and extending her hand.
“Althea Lennon, Office of Integrity of Professional Responsibility.”
Anderson, Hicks and Harris all look sick to the stomach, which makes me want to laugh even as Agent Lennon’s presence in this room, and our lives, turns my intestines into a ball of anxiety.
She’s a highly perceptive woman and a decorated investigator who always gets to the bottom of every situation, even those she’s not tasked with resolving.
All of which means, Beck and I will have to be more careful around Selene than ever.
Hicks takes her hand, introducing himself through clenched teeth. She makes her way through the rest of the room, learning everyone’s names before she comes to stand beside me at the front of the room. I step aside, taking up the space at Beck’s side while she takes command of the room.
“I’m not here to disrupt your lives or your work,” she starts, spreading a piercing gaze over everyone in the room.
“I am, however, here to find the answer to a straightforward question: which of you has decided to put hubris and selfish desire above oath and duty? And I will do whatever is necessary to find that answer. If you are the guilty party I seek, you can make all of our lives easier and confess now.”
She pauses, brows raised expectantly. When no one steps forward, she sighs.
“Very well. We’ll start with voluntary interviews. When no one signs up for those, my consultant and I will move on to mandatory interviews. You will be assigned a date and time, and, of course, you have the right to have a lawyer present.”
Once again, the room erupts into murmurs and uneasy conversation. Although I knew Agent Lennon was coming, I feel a bit uneasy as well.
“Did she say consultant?” Beck asks. The question, which is an echo of the one that just formed in my head, is loud enough for her to hear.
“Oh, yes,” she nods, looking to the conference room door and waving someone in. “The Bureau was kind enough to lend me one of their undercover agents. She’s only here for a short while, though. Marsh is starting to trust her, so she can’t be gone long.”
The door opens as I run through all of my conversations with Charlie, trying to remember when, or if, she said anything to me about them having someone inside Jacob’s organization.
When the familiar figure steps into the room, tucking brown strands of a grown-out pixie cut behind her ear, the question changes.
Did Charlie ever say anything to me about being embedded in the Brothers?