Chapter 17

“You’ve got to save me!”

Daniel pretended to hide behind Peter while looking back over the crowd of guests filling the White House State Dining Room. Men in suits, women in elegant gowns. Daniel, as his best man, wore a very smart dark-gray tux which complimented his own black one. Even among the crowd, Peter could easily spot First Lady Kim-Ly Geneviève Matthews, a shining light in the swirl of the people gathered about her.

“What’s the problem?” he asked without taking his eyes off the vision before him.

“Genny’s sister Jacqi won’t leave me alone. Keeps talking about dragging me back to her woman-cave, whatever that is.”

Peter dragged his eyes away from his wife to inspect Daniel and squinted at him for a moment.

“You’d make a cute couple.”

“You’re not helping,” Daniel snagged two flutes of champagne from a passing waiter and handed one over.

“She knows you’re married, right?”

“Sure, even introduced her to Alice.”

“And…”

Daniel took a deep swallow from the narrow flute. “Alice and Jacqi are negotiating using me on a time-share basis.”

“Tell Jacqi that three months is my best offer. Can’t spare you more than that.”

“I’m not a damned condo.”

“Sorry, buddy, best I can do. I have to go and be Presidential.”

“Meaning you have to go ogle the woman you just married.”

“Hard not to.”

“Especially in that dress.”

Peter didn’t bother to reply as he headed into the crowd.

# # #

“Okay if I interrupt?”

Genny couldn’t take her eyes off Peter as he approached where she stood with Emily and Gram.

Mrs. Genny Matthews. The sound of it was both intensely foreign and equally perfect. It was a statement of who she had become and where she wanted to be. His black tux and white tie gave him an old world elegance.

“No,” Em shook her head. “She’s ours. She’ll be yours the rest of your lives. We get her a while longer.”

Peter slid a hand around Genny’s waist, pulling her tight beside him. He kissed her on the temple and whispered in her ear, “I love you.”

She melted every time he said that.

“Easy there,” Emily teased Genny’s husband. “The night’s still young and she looks too perfect. No mussing her up yet, Sneaker Boy.”

“Sneaker Boy?” It was like a galvanic shock coursing through her body.

“Sure,” Emily nodded toward the man even now threatening to undo Genny’s hair from the elegant coif atop her head. “Tossed him in the Reflecting Pool out on the Washington Mall ages ago. All he could do was whine about his sneakers getting all wet.”

“Wet and muddy,” Peter clarified as if in his own defense. “And she didn’t mention that they were brand new, too.”

“Sneaker Boy?” Genny knew she was repeating herself, but it was really too perfect. It started as a smile, but it turned to a giggle. A high one that she just couldn’t stop. Not until she had laughed until she cried and gotten wet spots all over Peter’s lapel when she hugged him, could she finally speak.

They were all looking at her strangely. Smiles on their faces even though they didn’t know why.

“Gram, you remember the one I told you about, on the computer?”

“Yes. The one who plays such good games.” Her grandmother smiled as if she’d known all along. As if there was no question that the world worked this way.

“Do you want to tell my husband what our shared name means?”

“Well, if you are Sneaker Boy, of course you had to marry Kim-Ly.” Then Gram poked Genny’s new husband in the ribs to emphasize the joke. “Our name means Golden Lion.”

Peter simply looked stunned. “All of those games we played on-line at the Scrabble site, and you are the Golden Lion?”

“It fits her does it not?” Gram suddenly glared at him and he blanched.

“It’s perfect. Just as she is. Perfect.”

Gram nodded as if making sure he understood that last point clearly.

# # #

Peter kept nuzzling Genny’s neck as they danced around the State Dining Room floor. Though it was a warm day in June, it was their first dance as a couple after all, Peter had made them play a Christmas carol.

“It is the wrong carol,” she told him though she didn’t really care. “This is not the first one that we danced to.”

“I couldn’t remember what it was. I could only remember the first time I held you in my arms.”

She kept her head on his shoulder and let him tease her. It had been such a perfect day. They had married where they met, out by the National Christmas Tree, now just a tall spruce awaiting next year’s decorations. It was a huge affair that had drawn an astonishing crowd of well-wishers. A near-death experience had made the President even more popular. In Thailand, a right-wing faction had been stripped of all power, the left using the excuse of the trumped-up attack to perform a major housecleaning of the ranks. Maybe now there was a chance for peace at Preah Vihear.

Tomorrow, she would go to her office in the East Wing. Despite Peter’s offers of a role in the Department of the Interior, she had decided to stay with UNESCO. The Director had created a position specifically for her. World Heritage Convention Ambassador to the U.N. Her mandate, to be an advocate for the Heritage Sites with the hundred-and-ninety three member nations’ Ambassadors.

The First Lady’s office had been converted to a tech center that would let her reach around the world, flying an hour to New York only when essential meetings occurred.

Maybe when Peter retired, they would move to New York or perhaps Paris, so that she could be near the UNESCO headquarters.

For now, she simply let herself float in the arms of the man she loved.

“I’m not sure how much longer I can stand it, until I get you out of that incredible dress.”

She knew exactly how he felt. Peter looked so glorious in his tux.

“Well, Mr. President husband, there is only one way that is going to happen.”

“What? If I deport everyone in the room?”

“No.” She looked up into those dreamy eyes and kissed him as they danced. She could hear the cameras snapping away and simply didn’t care. She was too happy.

“No. The only way the President of the United States will get the First Lady of the United States out of her dress, is if they are standing in the middle of the Oval Office.”

She rested her head back on his shoulder as he groaned quietly.

Yes, a perfect day indeed.