Page 77 of Kissing Kayley
Stunned, I stared at her. I knew that the president and Ily Bardales had a relationship dynamic where she was in charge, but this was something beyond that.
“Do you love her?” she asked me.
I nodded.
“Do you want to fix this?” she asked.
I nodded again.
She smacked my shoulder with the back of her hand. “Then let’s figure out how you can fix this before it’s too late.” She shook her head as she turned to Jordan. “Why didn’t you tell me what this idiot did?”
He smirked. “Why do you think I insisted on coming with Daddy and the pet today?”
CHAPTER 27
Kayley
It was cold and rainy in DC when my flight landed. I no longer had an official detail so I hadn’t expected it when DCMP officers boarded and escorted me off first, bypassing the jetway to descend a flight of steps through an “employees only” door to the tarmac. There, I was loaded into a large, black SUV which was flanked by DC and airport police.
Five minutes later, we sped through the dark toward the White House.
It felt weird returning here knowing my brother and his family weren’t in residence. I’d asked to stay at Blair House, but Ily Bardales insisted on me bunking with them in the residence.
When the First Lady asks you to do something, especially a force of nature such as Ily, you kinda need to do it. It wasn’t so much a request to visit as it was an FYI, clear my calendar, and show up when told.
Her husband might hold and control the nuclear codes but Ily held and controlledhimby the short and curlies.
I wonder if Vic’s working The Shift?
I viciously snipped that thought off as close to the roots as I could. It’d been over three months since we said goodbye in person…. And frankly, it still stung.
Scratch that—I felt like my soul had been scoured.
Dammit psychologist, analyze thyself.
We still texted, but with decreasing frequency and little more than superficial friends-level exchanges that made me ache more each time I stared at my phone and wished for him to call.
Could I call him? Yes, but if I was always the one calling him, always initiating the contact, that was a sure sign that while our relationship wasn’t quite dead, the coffin certainly was being lowered into the grave.
It didn’t help that Valentine’s Day was rapidly creeping up and I’d be alone.
Again.
What I really needed to do was sack up and officially end things with Vic, move on, find a partner who wasn’t completely married to his job, and release Vic.
The problem was, who would I do that with?
Especially now that I knew I enjoyed kinky shit?
That required a level of trust in someone vastly deeper than just “dating”.
Not to mention I was still unable to randomly “date” like I could before my brother was drop-kicked into the international spotlight. I had no idea if someone was legit or looking to use me for clout or access. Even with an unofficial nod from the former head of my security detail that they’d be happy to run full background checks on potential dates for me, the thought of going through all that left me feeling…
Empty.
Still, I refused to lay all the blame on Vic’s shoulders. If I wanted to, I could take a sabbatical, or find a position teachingclose to DC. Between my CV and my brother’s influence I could probably write my own ticket nearly anywhere.
Problem was, I didn’t like to lean on name-dropping. If that wasn’t a hang-up of mine, I could do exactly that and be close to Vic.
