So that was the little thing they were calling the Mayor’s Mystery Lover. How cute.
Dennis Lee meant that.
Little thing reminded him of his Martina, with that brown hair and the pale eyes. She wasn’t any bigger than his Martie, either. Younger, by a good ten years, than his daughter. Probably just as unworldly.
But the nerves were what got to Dennis Lee the most. The girl was about to shake apart.
No doubt she wasn’t used to being in the limelight like this.
The girl squared her shoulders and stepped up to the podium. She turned toward the mayor and looked at him.
Turner betrayed exactly how he felt about that girl right then and there. If he loved her that much, the last thing he needed to do was broadcast it to whomever was watching.
Didn’t see Dennis Lee all over his Jenny-girl like that. Fool.
No. Jenny was close to that friend Carl of hers. He would never understand the appeal of that dried stick. Carl Buchanan had always been a sanctimonious ass.
It would do Carl some good to find a pretty lady and take a tumble or two. Or two thousand, make up for the lays he hadn’t gotten in the last forty years. Of course, that would cause his starched white undershorts to explode. Carl wasn’t exactly the type to attract the ladies.
“I…” the girl said, drawing his attention back her way. Pretty girl. No wonder the mayor wanted her. “We have to be reasonable. All of us. For one thing, Turner Barratt didn’t cause the storm. And from the moment it hit, he’s done nothing but try to make it better for everyone he could. I should know. Most of you are aware that he pulled me from the rubble himself. We’d been trapped together. I was in his office, trying to convince him to help us.”
“I just bet you were!” An idiot in the front row called out. Several of his contemporaries laughed.
“Sit down and be quiet, Harley Borlin. I’m not finished talking. And you will listen to what I have to say.”
Dennis Lee snorted. So the little buttercup had some fire in her shorts. Good for her.
“Yes, ma’am! So the mayor’s why you won’t go out with me, Annie?”
More laughs.
“She won’t go out with you because you’re just a stupid pig, Harley!” a young girl called out from across the room.
Typical community meeting on Boethe Street.
Dennis Lee sat there and laughed to himself as the woman in front of the room told them all how wonderful the mayor was, how he was doing his best to help them all.
And that’s when Dennis Lee figured out how to keep the mayor in line the best he could. People were remarkably easy to manipulate, after all.
No doubt it would work again.