ALMOST SIX THOUSAND POSITIONS. Theoretically that was how many jobs could be up for grabs at the changeover from the Cooper administration to Benton control. The first thing Kate did was hire an experienced personnel staffer to manage the sudden wave of job applications that flooded their office. As the number of applications grew, so did the size of the personnel office, eventually topping two hundred people making contacts, checking references, cataloguing, and filtering through the paperwork generated by nearly two hundred thousand job seekers.
But before they could start filling positions, Emily, Kate, and the transition team had to determine which personnel connected with the current administration would stay and which would go. In theory, Emily could replace everyone from ambassadors down to the White House waitstaff, but that sort of explosive housecleaning was unnecessary. In practice, it would be highly detrimental to the smooth running of her new administration.
So she and her staffers had to operate like surgeons, keeping the good, removing anything that looked like trouble. Kate didn’t have it easy. In the days between the election and the inauguration, she caught meals on the fly and slept for only a couple of hours each night. It was the price she paid for doing what few if any campaign managers had ever done —moving immediately from managing a presidential campaign into the role of incoming White House chief of staff. Although it eased any friction between the campaign staff and the transition team, it gave Kate no downtime between critical roles.
Working from their transitional offices, she and Emily put into play the first level of plans that their inner circle had been working on in secret since the convention.
Their initial concern was securing those people who would fill the senior White House staff positions and become President Benton’s key policy advisers. The goal was to identify the designees as early as possible so that their FBI checks and economic disclosure reviews would be completed in time to give them transitional ramp-up time as well. They too had to hire their own staff and needed as much time as possible to do this before taking their official positions.
Emily had strong opinions about who should be among her inner circle of senior advisers. Working with their campaign’s advisers, a dream team of sorts had been assembled on paper shortly after Emily won the party’s nomination. Kept secret, this document became the initial blueprint of the Benton administration, and as the White House chief of staff designee, Kate’s job was to make it happen.
But if coming up with the dream team had been hard, making it a reality appeared to be nearly impossible. Considering they had only eleven weeks to assemble, vet, and flesh out the skeleton of the White House staff and then the cabinet, Kate, Emily, and their growing staff spent their collective energies contacting, negotiating, and sometimes reworking the elements of their plans.
As a result, Thanksgiving was lost in a blur. Kate remembered being slightly annoyed that government offices were closed that Thursday, and it wasn’t until someone brought leftover turkey into the office that she realized how much she had missed the traditional gathering at her family’s house.
While the main personnel office —led by Pria Shangalia, who would eventually head the Office of Presidential Personnel —handled the bulk of the work, as chief of staff, Kate ran a separate personnel unit responsible for coordinating everything necessary to ease over six hundred people into their new positions and prepare them for new responsibilities. Many appointments couldn’t be made until Emily actually took office. Other appointments would have to wait for Senate confirmation before becoming set.
By the time Christmas rolled around, Emily made everyone take a mandatory couple of vacation days, saying that if they didn’t take a break, her first act as President Benton would be to institute a national week of sleep. In any case, they were stymied in their efforts to keep the bureaucratic ball rolling at the same speed since many government agencies were short-staffed around the holidays.
By the time they reached Inauguration Day, most of the positions had been filled, the selectees vetted and ready to pack their boxes and move from their transitional offices to the real thing in the White House after Emily took the oath.
In many cases, within the hour.
Ah yes . . . the inauguration. Kate thought about it with a fair amount of excitement and equal part dread. She looked forward to the traditional pageantry, the official pomp and circumstance which would start that day and continue for four years —eight, if they were lucky. But it was the carnival-like atmosphere that began five days prior to the actual swearing-in ceremony and the four days afterward she wished she could avoid.
She stared at the latest version of the ambitious schedule that the Presidential Inaugural Committee had drawn up. Parties, concerts, official presidential balls (nine of them), unofficial balls, receptions, candlelight dinners, brunches, luncheons, a parade . . .
It made her tired just to read it.
That’s just your fatigue talking, she told herself. It would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience, something she’d never forget and would probably tell much too often in the old folks’ home. Sure, she’d been to her share of Washington parties, even an inauguration ball or two, but she’d never spent much time seeing the behind-the-scenes preparations.
So when the day of the inauguration finally arrived, Kate had already survived five days of events, including three concerts, a half-dozen receptions, and the Black Tie and Boots Ball. As she sat in St. John’s Church, one row behind Emily and Vice President–Elect Burl Bochner and his wife, Melissa, Kate sent up a prayer of thanks for the brief respite.
The next four years working at Emily’s side in the White House would likely be exhausting, exhilarating, and exasperating. But for the moment, Kate drank in the comforting silence of sitting on the far end of the president’s pew in the hushed church, waiting for the rector to take his position.
Kate didn’t have to be Episcopalian to find a sense of comfort in the rector’s words, his admonition to pay attention to the needs of the world around them and how it influenced the legacies of leadership.
“High above us is a steeple, and in that steeple is a very historic bell that still rings to this day. You probably heard it earlier this morning. The bell was installed up there in 1822, only a few months after being forged by John Revere, the son of famed patriot Paul Revere. I guess you might call it a legacy of freedom. As we witness the passing of the presidential torch later today from one administration to the next, I can’t help but think this is an excellent example of the American legacy of freedom in action, a legacy that knows no color, no gender, and no limitations.”
Kate glanced over at Emily, who seemed to listen with rapt attention. A sense of guarded pride grew inside Kate, not for herself, but for her colleague, her employer, her friend. Even though becoming the first female to achieve that lofty position was a singular accolade, Emily hadn’t won the office because she was a woman. She’d won because she had been the best candidate in the field, gender aside.
And Kate was going to do everything in her power to make sure the legacy Emily left behind was one of leadership, compassion, and strength.
Two hours later, at high noon, Emily Rousseau Benton stood on the steps of the Capitol’s west side, her right hand on the Bible and her left held aloft.
“I, Emily Rousseau Benton, do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
There was the slightest of pauses as if she faced either a moment of indecision or she wanted to give more emphasis to her next words.
“So help me, God.”
A shiver slid across Kate’s shoulders. It had been Emily’s sole decision to add the phrase, which wasn’t technically part of the official oath.
Later, as they stood for the first time together in the Oval Office, Emily offered an explanation.
“Why? Because I figured I needed all the help I could get.”
“Seriously,” Kate chided.
Emily ran her hand over the edge of the famous Resolute desk that she’d opted to use as so many presidents had before her. “I knew it meant a lot to you, and therefore, it means a lot to me. Sometimes I don’t see the big picture, and there’s no bigger picture than God, right?”
Kate hugged her friend. “Absolutely right.”
That night, as Kate left the White House, she had her driver —who had introduced himself as Edward —stop outside of the iron fence that separated both Joe Tourist and Joe Terrorist from the White House grounds. She gave the grand old lady of a building a lingering look, containing far more awe than pride. “It’s hard to believe I work there.”
Edward nodded. “Yes, ma’am. I can imagine.”
She’d driven past the building a thousand times, even visited it a half-dozen times or two. But working there . . . she was still trying to wrap her head around that one. After one more look, she said, “Okay. Let’s head home.”
Edward pulled out into traffic, expertly finding a place between a cab and a double-decker tour bus full of people gawking at the sites.
Kate settled back in her seat, rolling the window up. “I guess you hear that a lot about the White House.”
“Yes, ma’am. At the beginning, at least.”
“And later on?”
“Not so much. The newness wears off. But that’s normal.”
Normal. Somehow, she didn’t think she would be able to use the word to describe her life over the next four years. Just today, she stood at the right hand of the most powerful leader in the free world. Later on, she ran a meeting of the newly installed White House senior staff. Some of them she knew personally, like Dozier Marsh; some she knew in passing; a couple she knew only by reputation. No matter whether they were men, women, older, younger, they would funnel their concerns, their programs, their communications through her to reach Emily.
Kate would now be the official gatekeeper to the president. Nothing would get to Emily, no one would step through the door of the Oval Office, without Kate’s knowledge or approval. It wasn’t a position to be taken lightly or more importantly, harshly. Kate had studied her predecessors in the job and intended her version of the position to be one of influence rather than control. She learned long ago that Emily would be receptive to the former and bristle, if not openly rebel, against the latter.
Once Kate reached home, she had a little over an hour to get ready before heading out again. What else would cap off her first day at work better than attending an official ball or two?
She remembered the first presidential ball she’d attended —in the far lesser capacity as assistant to the governor, when Emily held that post in Virginia. It had been crowded and hot, the food disappeared long before she reached any serving table, and once the president finally arrived, he and his wife had danced for exactly one and a half minutes before waving their good-byes and pushing off to the next in a string of patriotically named balls that sounded more like battleships than parties.
Liberty. Constitution.
However, this time, Kate’s party-going experience would be different. She had her selection of balls to attend and decided to go to two of the many —the Constitution Ball, the first one Emily would hit on her circuit, and the Commander in Chief Ball, the last event on Emily’s agenda, an event held exclusively for military personnel. Kate’s brother, Brian, an air force officer, would be her escort only because her sister-in-law, Jill, had broken her foot the week before and didn’t want to negotiate the crowds on crutches.
Ah yes, the sensitive subject of escorts . . .
The White House Protocol Office had approached both Emily and Kate weeks before, concerned at how the president-elect wanted to handle her unattached status when it came to social events such as the inaugural balls. Short of going out and dancing by herself, the president needed a suitable escort since there was no First Gentleman.
Emily and Kate had discussed options and finally settled on asking Emily’s cousin Richard Benton, son of former President William Benton, to be her escort in social settings requiring one. He was a familiar face at such events and, more importantly, had four years of experience under his belt of dealing with press, politics, and protocol. His unattached state was legendary in political circles. He’d been nicknamed a most eligible political bachelor and had even made People’s sexiest men list a time or two.
Duties that would normally fall to the First Lady would be shared by another of Emily’s cousins, Margaret Benton Shaiyne, and by Melissa Bochner, the vice president’s wife. The dichotomy of the two —a stay-at-home mother and a career-oriented mother —meant they would bring an interesting range of experiences to the position.
But in all her haste to see that Emily had the proper support in those key areas, Kate had failed to arrange an escort for herself. That didn’t mean her brother wasn’t a congenial substitute, but it still made it pretty evident that her social life had come to a standstill over the last two years on the campaign trail.
All Kate could do was convince herself that this was simply a work-related function. “It’s not a real party,” she repeated to herself as she climbed into the limousine. When she stepped through the VIP entrance to the main floor of the ballroom, she tried to remind herself one more time, but as she looked out at the crowd of fancy dresses and tuxedos, she found it hard to tell herself otherwise.
A ripple went through the crowd, an unofficial fanfare announcing the arrival of Emily and her security entourage. Kate walked backstage and waited for Emily to appear. As Emily’s campaign manager, it had always been Kate’s self-appointed task to make one last review of Emily’s appearance before she stepped onstage. It was a hard habit to break.
For both of them.
Emily’s slightly pinched features relaxed when she saw Kate. “There you are! How’s the dress look? Is it hanging straight in back?” She turned as if trying to catch a glimpse of herself.
Although Emily had the figure and the bearing to pull off an Academy Award–red carpet–worthy dress, she’d selected something a little more sedate from the spate of designers who offered their wares in hopes the president would give them some high-ranking exposure.
The gown she selected had simple, classic lines that accentuated her athletic figure without flaunting it and a neckline that displayed a tasteful hint of cleavage. The dress from an unheard of but soon-to-be-famous designer named C’Teris was a shade of deep crimson so dark that it verged on black but was livened up by small crystals woven into the fabric. With no precedence as to what a female president should wear to this function —or any other function for that matter —Emily had decided to write the rule book, using her own good taste plus an unerring sense of color combined with the talents of Marjorie Redding, image consultant extraordinaire.
Kate admired the finished product. “You look perfect.” It was no lie. Emily absolutely glowed, looking both commanding yet comfortable.
“Thanks. Wish me luck.”
Kate took her place in the front of the crowd right as four ruffles and flourishes, then “Hail to the Chief” echoed across the enormous room. Emily’s arrival was preceded by an eruption of applause and cheers.
She spoke with her usual combination of elegance and ease, keeping it light. No heavy political speeches here. She offered her thanks and spoke more about the tone of her administration and plans rather than getting into details about the upcoming policy changes.
She quipped, “And now let’s see if my cousin actually remembers anything from the dance lessons we took as kids.” She and Richard took center stage as the orchestra struck up “Some Enchanted Evening.”
Someone tapped Kate on the shoulder and said over the music, “She always could dance.”
Kate turned, stunned to find Nick Beaudry standing next to her, impeccably dressed as always. “What are you doing here?” she mouthed.
He leaned closer so he wouldn’t have to yell over the competing music. “Don’t worry. I didn’t crash the party. Security is too tight to do something like that.” He grinned as he reached into his tuxedo jacket and pulled out an envelope and ticket stub. “I guess by the look on your face you didn’t send this.” He flushed a little as he laughed. “Seems to me I’ve said that to you once before . . . not too long ago.”
Kate ran her finger across the raised letters of the return address —the White House.
“I guess I made another wrong assumption, which leads me to wonder . . .”
They both looked out toward the dance floor, where Emily and Richard twirled in rhythm to the music.
To his credit, Nick watched her with mild interest, betraying more a sense of nostalgia than unrequited feelings. “You don’t think she’s getting sentimental in her old age, do you?”
“Emily?” Kate sputtered.
He made a dismissive gesture. “Scratch that. I guess I forgot who I was talking about.” He stuffed the invitation back into his jacket pocket. “This may be a signal that you need to take a closer look at the Protocol Office. If they can make a mistake like this . . .”
Kate waved away his concern. “Maybe this is just Emily’s way of saying bygones are bygones.”
He looked dubious. “Maybe.”
They watched the lower dance floor begin to fill with couples. Emily and Richard still danced by themselves on a higher dais decorated with a large presidential seal on the stage floor.
Nick held out his hand. “Care to dance?”
If he were anybody else but Emily’s ex-husband, Kate would have seriously considered saying yes. Nick Beaudry had transformed himself into a pleasant, intelligent, and well-mannered man. But beyond political ramifications, beyond social manners, the unofficial girlfriend’s rule book said to never date your best friend’s ex.
“Thanks, but —”
“No thanks,” he supplied with a nod. “I understand. I should have thought before I even offered.” He turned slightly away. “Uh-oh . . . she spotted us.”
Kate looked toward the upper stage and caught Emily’s raised eyebrow expression. In response, Kate lifted one hand to offer her friend a small wave.
Nick glanced at Emily, his expression growing sheepish as he turned away. “I knew this was a mistake. Coming here.”
Kate continued to smile at Emily but spoke to Nick at her side. “You were invited. You have every right to attend.”
He sighed. “I need a drink.”
Sudden alarm filled Kate and she pivoted sharply. “No you don’t.”
His sheepish look faded into something much more reflective but controlled. “No, not drink as in alcohol. I need one of those overpriced sodas. You know —all ice and an ounce or two of Coke for five bucks. American free enterprise at its best. Or worst. Can I get you something?”
“I . . . I’ll go with you.”
His voice grew quiet. “I’m not going to get any booze, Kate. I’m not foolish enough to say those days are behind me —one day at a time, you know —but today? A pricey soft drink or tonic water will do me just fine.”
Kate felt her face flush with embarrassment, but before she could apologize, Chip McWilliamson wedged himself between them. It was obvious that the young man was taking advantage of the ebb and flow of the crowd to expertly cut Nick off. After spending the better part of the last two years being in close proximity to Emily while on the campaign trail, he’d learned how to rescue her from overexcited supporters with a well-placed body block.
Only Kate didn’t need or want any rescue.
“Sorry to interrupt, man,” he called over his shoulder to Nick, whom he’d forced to step back. Then he turned to Kate, winked, and stated in a voice a little too loud for the situation, “Ms. Rosen, the president needs to speak with you immediately.”
Kate glanced over and saw that President Benton, Emily’s uncle, had cut in on his son Richard and was now dancing with his niece.
Two presidents, one former, one current, dancing together. The entire ballroom was lit up with camera strobes. It was obvious that Emily wasn’t waiting to talk to Kate or anyone else at that moment. Nothing in the world would make the woman give up the limelight at the moment.
Kate tried not to look annoyed at Chip but knew she’d probably failed. If her self-appointed Rescue Ranger was going to make up an excuse, he certainly could have done a better job of it and made up something believable.
“Kate, I’ll talk to —” Nick was jostled from behind by a woman, and as a result, he took a step closer to Chip, trying to regain his balance.
Before Kate could turn back to inform her would-be hero that everything was actually fine, Chip continued with his imaginary role, raising his voice. “Maybe you didn’t understand me, but get lost, Beaudry. You’re not wanted here.”
A Secret Service agent, stationed nearby in the crowd, made eye contact with Kate, raising his hand to his ear in order to report the disturbance into his sleeve microphone. She made a small dismissive gesture with her hand to wave off his concern. He lowered his arm, acknowledging her command with a barely perceptible nod of his head. If she needed any real rescue, he would be the person to turn to, not some slightly inebriated soon-to-be semiofficial White House blogger who had the hots for the president.
Nick peered around Kate’s self-appointed liberator who had placed himself between them and mouthed, You need any help? He obviously realized that Chip was no threat to her. When she shook her head, he shot her a small salute and mouthed, Catch you later and then was swallowed up by the crowd.
Chip peered over his shoulder at Nick’s departure, then turned back, smirking in triumph over his apparent success. “Beaudry was the last person I expected to be here. He’s lucky I didn’t have him escorted out.” He puffed up his chest in a classic big-protector-of-small-women way.
Kate motioned for him to come closer, and he leaned down accordingly, probably expecting her undying thanks or, worse, a chaste kiss on the cheek.
The white knight syndrome could be so tiring. . . .
Kate kept her voice low and even. “If you ever pull a stupid stunt like that again, in public or in private, I will have every press credential you possess revoked and you will be banned from covering any and all White House events during this administration. Your official blogging days will be over. Do you understand me?”
He gaped at her and suddenly the twenty-year difference in their ages made him truly seem a generation away. Then he flushed with an unexpected flair of anger. “Now wait a freakin’ minute, I thought —”
She met his ire with her own. “You didn’t think. That’s the problem. If you did stop to think, you would have realized that you do not insert yourself into private conversations, especially ones that show no signs of any discord or uneasiness. You don’t get to run roughshod over any of my discussions simply because you’ve decided Nick Beaudry shouldn’t be here.”
“C’mon, Kate . . .”
Her irritation flash-boiled over into full-blown anger. It was probably a result of the building pressures of the past few weeks and the fact that she’d worked hard to find the right tone for her new position as White House chief of staff. The last thing she expected was to be forced to deal with backsliding among those senior campaign staffers who were being integrated into White House staff.
Perhaps what was really bothering her was that Emily had insisted on finding Chip a position that would put them in daily contact.
And probably nightly contact, if Chip had his wish.
“Let’s get one thing straight, Mr. McWilliamson. We’re no longer on the campaign trail, where we maintained less formal procedures out of convenience. I’m now Ms. Rosen to you, the White House chief of staff. I am your boss. And I will hold conversations with whomever necessary, whenever I deem necessary. If you can no longer control your impulsiveness or your alcohol intake, you will be removed from this event and all others if I deem necessary.”
Although she knew she’d probably regret giving him a little dig, she succumbed to temptation and added, “And just so you know, Mr. Beaudry was invited —” she leveled him with an I-know-more-than-you glare —“by someone in the White House.” She tipped her head toward the dance floor. “Understand?”
The young man’s mouth dropped open. “You mean . . .” He watched Emily on the dance floor. “She and . . . Beaudry? Again?”
The color began to drain from his face, and Kate took a tiny amount of pity on him.
“If I were to speculate —and that’s my privilege, not yours —I’d suspect President Benton may have wanted to make a pointed statement to her ex-husband. You know . . . ‘Look what you gave up’? A little salt in the wound?”
Kate suddenly realized what she’d just done to the love-struck young man herself —found his weakness and exploited it. Realization left a bad taste in her mouth.
“Salt,” he repeated in a flat tone. “Sure.” He straightened. “Yeah.” He was gaining some momentum now. “Giving him a front-row seat and twisting the knife a little.” That seemed to satisfy his more bloodthirsty instincts, and he nodded in approval. “Pretty smart,” he said in admiration, watching Emily as she displayed talents honed at more than one Virginian cotillion in her youth.
Chip tore his attention away from Emily long enough to stutter out a passable apology, and then he slunk away. But now Kate had questions eating at her. What was Emily doing? And more importantly, why? First, she helped Nick and excused that as a bit of quid pro quo. But then she sent him a ticket to an inaugural ball? Maybe Chip had it all wrong. Maybe Emily wasn’t twisting the knife but inviting Nick back into the fold. Now that he was reformed —a model citizen of sorts —was Emily considering him as a possible First Gentleman?