Stephanie Doyle - One Final Step

She was right: he was used to attractive women. Women more glamorous, more blatantly sexual. On the two days he’d seen her, she had been wearing a dark gray business suit then a black business suit. Both austere, both unassuming. She could have been an FBI agent for all her flash. Still when she was around him, he felt something.

Something instinctual.

Free to pace now that she was gone, he trod back and forth in his plushly carpeted office. He never liked to overdo it in front of people. He only ever allowed himself a few back-and-forths before forcing himself to stay still. Pacing could be construed as a sign of nerves or anxiety, which obviously wasn’t something he wanted to communicate to people. For him it was a bad habit. One he picked up in prison as a way to deal with being confined in a cell. As long as he kept moving he could cope with the tight space. It was when he stopped that he felt like the walls would start to close in on him.

So Madeleine wanted him to take a woman to the charity event. And not just any woman. But a woman he might consider taking to more than a handful of events. A woman he might consider spending enough time with that the media could start using the word relationship.

The idea was laughable. The women were there for a purpose. He knew she thought he was naive at the game they were playing, creating an image, manipulating the press to think what he wanted them to think, but the truth was he was a master craftsman.

At least at creating the bad-boy persona. He knew how to present himself so people would see what he wanted them to see. He didn’t know how to do that and come off as respectable. That’s why he’d reached out to Ben.

Michael knew Madeleine Kane was a member of Ben’s team and he knew about the scandal involving her and the president peripherally. He’d been in Europe at the time and his racing career had started its meteoric rise. An American sex scandal made the news, but in Europe they always thought Americans took sex too seriously so the story was only casually mentioned.

If a man had a mistress, so be it. If the woman chose to be that mistress, her choice. The president was a powerful man. Who wouldn’t want his attention?

Michael tried to reconcile the woman in his office with the star of the scandal. She was so buttoned up. So locked down as if every word she said and every movement she made was carefully considered. How had a woman like that tempted the president?

What the hell was he saying? She only had to look at Michael and he was… He didn’t know what he was. He couldn’t say aroused. Maybe intrigued. Something.

He needed information. Sitting at his desk he called up a search engine and started to type. It wasn’t difficult. Key in Madeleine Kane and President and there were hundreds of pictures, articles and blogs related to the subject.

She wasn’t overplaying the size of the scandal. Looking at the time frame, it had gone on for months. Even after she’d resigned and the First Lady filed for divorce from President Marlin, the press continued to pursue her. Unlike his predecessor, who had once been in the center of a sexual scandal, this president didn’t lie about the affair. He came clean quickly and apologized profusely.

No crime had been committed and as a result no charges of impeachment were filed against him. After several months it died a slow death and he went about the job of running the country. He was not reelected but Michael thought that had more to do with his jobs policy than it did the sex scandal.

Madeleine never reentered the political arena and after a two-year hiatus in media attention, there was a blip of an article announcing her addition to the Tyler Group.

Not a surprise Ben would go after her. He collected great minds like most people collected coins. His group was part think tank, part troubleshooters, all brains. If someone needed a job done and didn’t have the skills or the necessary people on hand to accomplish the task, they contacted Ben.

The Tyler Group was like a brainy version of the A-Team. Selling their specific set of skills for a price.

In Europe, Michael had met Ben while he was still an operative for the CIA. Michael actually liked to think he’d helped him out on a mission, but all he’d really done was act as a carrier pigeon. Still, it was as close to James Bond as he’d ever gotten. For whatever reason, Ben had seen through the image of the hard-drinking, hard-gambling, hard-sexing playboy. As though he’d been wearing special-colored glasses.

At first he had balked at Ben’s request that Michael help him out. Until the idea of doing something right for a good cause settled in his stomach and made him feel…better about himself.

Ben thought he was in Michael’s debt. The reality was the opposite. Meeting Ben and getting to know him helped Michael grow up. Ben wasn’t just some government agent. He was a man who cared deeply about his country and the work he did for it. It had been such a simple chore he’d asked Michael to do. When Michael asked, “Why me?” Ben said it was time for Michael to do something for someone else.

He’d been right. And it had been another step in the path that had eventually helped him to get his life back when it seemed as if prison had taken it all away.

At least part of his life.

Michael finally pushed away from the computer, tired of reading the sordid details of Madeleine’s past. Somehow he doubted the affair was quite as dirty as the press made it out to be. One article mentioned toys, another the president’s need to be dominated, of all things.

He could see Madeleine wielding a whip. He couldn’t imagine her doing something as silly as smacking a man’s bare ass with it.

No, if Madeleine was going to take out a whip she would have a much more useful purpose. Michael smiled as he shut down his computer. After a moment he got up and started pacing again.

Right, then left. Right, then left.

CHAPTER THREE

“HOWAREthings going with the new girl?”

Michael handed down a crescent wrench to Archie. Instantly an image of Madeleine appeared in his mind, but Archie didn’t know anything about Madeleine. No one did.

She was like the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain secretly pulling all the strings. Any consulting was done either by phone or occasionally after hours in his office. Mostly she coached him on answers to questions that might be put to him when a microphone was shoved in his face. And of course she was always plotting ways to get him to those places where the microphones might be.

He’d asked her to visit his home in Grosse Pointe. He thought she could stay in one of his guest rooms, which would be more comfortable than a sterile hotel suite. She’d stiffened and told him in no uncertain terms that there was not a single reason for her to see his personal residence.

No stepping out of bounds for his girl.

Not his girl.

She wasn’t even remotely his girl. Still, he couldn’t stop thinking about her. A condition that was becoming as problematic as it was annoying.

“Which new girl?”

“The one you went to that fancy shindig with. The actress. What’s her name. You know, she was in that movie with that fancy guy.”

“Charlene Merritt. She was in a movie with George Clooney.”

“Yeah, that guy. He’s sharp. No Cary Grant, but then who is today?”

“Really, Archie? You’re that old you remember Cary Grant?”

The dolly slid out from under the car. A small, thin white-haired old man with bifocals squinted up at him. “North by Northwest, Charade, Psycho…now those were real movies.”

“I’m pretty sure Cary Grant wasn’t in Psycho.”

Archie waved him off. “Oh, what do you know.”

Michael pulled out his smartphone to check, but then tucked it away. No reason to upstage the man.