Free True North (Compass series Book 4) by Tamsen Parker Page B

mid-sentence by a commotion out in the hallway and then a slamming open of the conference room door. No embarrassed sneaking in for this staffer. Guy’s got balls, I’ll give him that much.
    But it’s not Jose; it’s not even a dude. Nope, it’s really not. A minty green kick-pleated skirt and a fluster of blonde hair rushes through the door, a pile of notebooks and a laptop clutched to her chest and—
    No way. Freaking no way. I’ve managed to not run into my ex-wife for six years in this city that feels sometimes like a very small town, and here she is, twice within the space of a week. Once at a fetish club and once in the venerated halls of law-making. One guess where I’d rather see her.
    She dumps her things on the table in a way that softens me. She busted her ass to get here. It’s not fair and it’s not rational, but for her I have sympathy whereas for anyone else, I’d want to rip their disrespectful heads off. But Pressly? Makes me want to pull out her chair and give her a glass of water, ask if she’s okay.
    I don’t have to, though, because Rusty’s doing it for me and I find myself more than a little jealous. Especially when she gives him one of those patented Pressly Allwyn smiles, one that infects the whole room.
    “I’m so sorry I’m late. Jose got food poisoning and asked me to fill in. I told him those yogurt parfaits looked suspect, but he didn’t listen. I—”
    She turns a freshly apologetic smile on me, and it suddenly vanishes, as do her words. I can see the ones she wants to say springing from the top of her head as if they were in a cartoon bubble: “What in the fresh hell are you doing here?”
    I struggle to keep the censorious frown on my face. It’s hard with her all agog. I want to smirk and say, “ Fancy seeing you here ,” but that’s not allowed either. Luckily, the senator pipes up before I can say anything stupid.
    Looking back and forth between us, Johnson seems to expect a skirmish to erupt. “Mr. Lewis, I believe you know Pressly Allwyn?”
    She leans forward across the table and offers her hand, which I take, shaking for all I’m worth, trying not to grind my teeth while I reply.
    “I do, indeed, Senator.” In the biblical sense, you asshole. “Ms. Allwyn, a pleasure to see you again.”
    She nods silently and then sits down, arranging her piles and pulling out a notebook to flip to a blank page. She looks up expectantly, only a hint of red blooming on her cheeks. “Let’s get on with this then, shall we? We’ve got some ground to cover.”
    I spend the next thirty minutes laying out my reasons why Johnson should support this bill, why it’s good policy for everyone, never mind for his district. For every counterpoint Johnson or his staff bring up, we’ve got answers because we’re prepared. And at the end of the meeting, Johnson does as I knew he would.
    “We’ll have to consider this carefully. You understand this is a pretty large shift in policy, and as much as I’d like to help the veterans in my district, it’s not something I can shake on right here.”
    Of course it’s not, you stuffed shirt sonofabitch. But I tighten my jaw silently and shake his hand on our way out. He turns back to his private office and I turn toward the door, but before I can get very far, a small hand grips my forearm.
    “I need to talk to you.”
    Her tetchy whisper isn’t how I’d like to hear Pressly talk to me, but it’s better than nothing so I wave Becky and Naeem ahead of me. “I’ll be there in a minute. Head back without me if you’ve got things to do.”
    They look at me with widened eyes, but when I open my mouth to tell them to get the fuck out, they skedaddle before I can speak. And then Pressly and I are alone in the hallway. Not private, by any means, but good enough.
    “You needed something, Ms. Allwyn?” I keep the sneer out of my voice but barely. It’s seething regret, pure and simple. I’m not angry with her.
    “What the fuck are you