Page 10 of Grift

Seconds of stony silence stretch out into eternity.

“Jessica,” he says, finally turning his gaze from the elaborate painting and back to me. “You know that I’ve done everything within my power to protect you.”

My throat starts to close.

“When the tapes first surfaced, I couldn’t believe it.”

Tears sting my eyes and threaten to ruin my makeup, something my mother would never allow. The tapes. Always a vague reference, never anything I’d seen. But the one subject we don’t discuss, because they’ve ruined my life and intermittently threatened to ruin his. It’s been awhile since they’ve come up. Unless they are threatening to do so again.

Oh God.

I don’t speak, because what can I say in the face of his ancient, persistent disappointment.

“Over the past decade, I’ve paid hundreds of thousands – probably millions – to keep them under wraps,” he continues, looking away again at a painting he probably doesn’t even see. “When I think of where I might be if I’d been able to put that money to better use.”

There it is, the familiar unspoken allegation: he’d be in the White House if it wasn’t for me. If it wasn’t for the time and the money they’d spent keeping my name out of the headlines. The stress and the whispered rumors he never let me forget occasionally circulated. I’d never heard them, but he never seems to miss one. Or miss the chance to castigate me about it.

He turns sharply, “I’ve received another threat.”

My hand flies up to my mouth. I’d been so good. So careful. It has been years, literally years, since anyone has breathed a word of those damned recordings. Some part of me, the optimistic part, hoped that the horror might be behind me. Behind us. That I might eventually be able to carve out a different life for myself.

“I’m done protecting you, Jessica,” his voice is cold. “There’s no more money to throw at this problem. You may have destroyed my chance at the White House, but I won’t let you do that to your brother.”

My eldest brother Camden, the younger Kensington in Congress. Unlike me, he’d followed the plan for his life perfectly: Ivy League college, Harvard Law, two years clerking for a federal judge, and he is wrapping up his first term as a representative in the House. My middle brother Jared is a trust fund kid, never moving forward but at least never in trouble. That gives him one-up on me in the family hierarchy.

In other words, Camden is my father’s only hope at a legacy worth anything. Or so he’s said directly on multiple occasions.

My father is talking about stepping aside and endorsing Camden to run in his spot for Senate during the next election. Technically, the Senate seat isn’t a family dynasty. He can’t just hand my brother the position. But with his money, power and reputation? In reality, his endorsement will count for everything, especially if he is heading back into the private sector and can hand out favors in the aftermath. If his supporters share the vision that Camden Kensington could end up in the White House, everything he’s worked for could be a few short years away.

He probably can hand my brother that senate seat if he wants to. The first domino in his grand plan to set up the next phase of his life.

“You’ve taken enough from this family, do you understand?”

He waits, as if he wants me to speak, but when I try he cuts me off.

“I only want the best for you, Jessica. You’re my daughter, after all. And maybe what your mother and I have asked of you, shutting yourself up and hiding from view wasn’t the best choice. Even if it quickly became the only one,” he’s trying to sound kind. But all I hear is the softening before the blow, a tone I’ve heard a thousand times. “No husband. No family. What kind of life is that for a young woman?”

Horror is dawning, as I see the contours of the plan he’s setting up, even if I don’t know the particulars yet.

“Please just tell me, Dad,” my voice is barely above a whisper. I hate that I sound like a terrified child, instead of a grown woman.

He sighs, and sits down on the bench with me, as away far as he can physically get. Geary Kensington isn’t one for physical affection or human touch beyond a “seal the deal” handshake.

He looks me straight in the eye. “James Carney has a copy of the your sex tapes, and he’s going to release them to the media if we don’t comply. He wants you to marry his son. In exchange, he’s agreed to destroy the recordings and fulfill certain other conditions.”

No doubt the certain other conditions are what matter.

But all I hear is the blackmail.

Why would James Carney want a woman like me to marry his son? As if he can read my face, he says, “An alliance between our families would ensure that the Trinity and James’ other projects get continued good favor.”

Marry a Carney? It’s been years since I’ve had more than a casual lunch date. Marrying anyone seems impossible. It’s not that I haven’t longed for a partner at times, or wanted intimacy. Before everything happened in college, I’d had two dreams: to study archeology and get married and have a family. But that’s not what my father’s proposing.

At best, it’s a marriage of convenience. At worst, it’s a sham.

He’s basically selling me off. Trading me to buy an allegedly reformed mafia boss’ silence. Our family secrets stay buried, and in exchange, he gives preferential treatment for whatever barely legal activities Carney is behind these days.

I don’t know much about the Carneys as a whole, but I know that the patriarch has a questionable history. Rumors about some of the things they’ve done to make the casino project happen are bone chilling. Ruthless.

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