Page 55 of Not the Plan

“Isadora? You haven’t said a word. Are you okay?”

“Oh, yeah, sorry.”

“Good thing your computer wasn’t damaged.”

“Yeah.”

“What’s wrong?” He sat next to her.

“I have this stupid working group with these asshole people from the Department of Health at eighta.m.about this supplemental insurance bill Peter’s filed. Have you seen it?”

Karim shook his head.

“It’s—” She slammed her mouth shut. Still in the romantic haze of the previous evening and the time they’d spent in the car, she’d almost forgotten that Karim was a Capulet and on Peter’s side. The bill Senator Luccini had filed would allow some private entities the ability to provide supplemental coverage under single-payer. On its face itseemedinnocuous, but Daniel had doubts. It looked like Peter was setting up a Trojan horse. Daniel wanted the staff at the Department of Health on his side as he tried to dissuade the other senators from supporting it. The absolute last thing Isadora should do wastellKarim what Daniel’s arguments against the bill would be. Even though she was sure Julian and Peter were already trying to guess. She took a deep breath and smiled at him.

“We’re workshopping the bill. We want to get the department’s input just so things flow smoothly.” She felt bad lying, but he was a Capulet; his boss was his boss. “My notes, handouts, and copies of Daniel’s priorities are the pile of disintegrated papers you saw at the wet end of the table. My laptop was being weird last week. One of the IT guys is going to switch it out for me tomorrow afternoon. To be on the safe side, I wrote out most of my presentation. I’d planned to come home, take a hot shower, read through everything, and go to bed. But now…I see that I have several hours of work ahead of me, unless I want to go in there and look completely unprofessional in front of the working group tomorrow.”

“Can your assistant help you? It is Sunday, but maybe?” Karim asked.

“Nah. I’m sure she’d be willing to, but she’s out of town until Tuesday. Plus, this is my baby.”

“What about your legislative director?” he asked.

She checked her watch and sighed. “Good idea, but it would take more time getting her up to speed enough to help restructure than it will if I just do it myself.”

“What about this legislative director?” he asked, pointing at himself.

She smiled and shook her head.

“I know you said you paid attention to what we did with single-payer, but did you follow the minutiae of it?”Please say no, please say no.

“I can’t say that I did,” he said.

“I’ll handle it,” she said.

He gave her a sad shrug. “I’m sorry. I wish I could be more helpful.”

“There’s nothing for you to apologize for. I’ll get it together.” She rested her head on his shoulder.

“Well,” he said. “You have to eat, right?”

“Crap…”

“No, wait. I’ll go get some dinner. And you mentioned handouts and Daniel’s priorities. Do you have those on a USB key? Maybe I can go print some more copies. That way you can focus on rebuilding your notes. Would that help you get ready faster?”

She paused. Could she trust him with the handouts? Relying on others was always a struggle for her. The skitter of her heartbeat and shakiness in her hands made it difficult to just say yes. And then there was the content. Was there anything in there she couldn’t let a Capulet see? She’d had her assistant make the handouts as neutral as possible. She’d just have to trust her work.

“You’d run around and do all that for me?” she asked.

“It would be my pleasure, beautiful.” He kissed her on the cheek. “But first we’ll wait for the maintenance guy to head out.”

“Why?”

“Feeling rather protective of you today. Not leaving you alone with a strange man in your apartment. Even if he seems nice.”

Isadora hid her smile, playing with the hem of her skirt. “Aren’t you sweet?”

He smiled, kissed her on the cheek again, and then hopped off the bed, headed for the door.

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