Beauty Queen (8 page)

But what if they do? Rebecca heard herself ask. People feel strongly about it. There are some pretty passionate feelings just here in this room.

Matts eyes narrowed, zeroed in on her as Tom quickly agreed, Youre right, Rebecca. We should at least have a position in case it comes up on the campaign trail. Cant hurt, right?

Now Matt looked as if his head might blow off his shoulders in pieces. Cant hurt, he said tightly, dragging his gaze from Rebecca to Tom, but weve got to focus on the economy. The jobless rate is the highest its been in two decades, the Homeland Security initiative is putting the urban counties into fiscal straits like they havent seen in a century, and minimum wage is not keeping pace with inflation.

Dude, youre so rad! Angie laughed. You really know your stuff!

Yes, youre absolutely right, Matt, Tom agreed, but grinned at Rebecca. And so is Rebecca! You seem to have a sense of whats important around the state I knew I was

right about you. Folks, meet our new campaign strategist!

Campaign strategist? Rebecca let out a little cry of happy surprise at that unexpected announcement it even sounded like a real position! Gilbert said, Cool! But Popinjay blinked at Tom in total, unfettered, disbelief.

Tom, are you sure? she asked, smiling so broadly that her cheeks hurt. Im not really

I am very sure, he said, nodding emphatically. You bring just the right touch of empathy to this crew, he declared.

Was this real? Could Rachel be right about all the cosmic stuff? Rebecca beamed at Tom, did not notice the looks of surprise exchanged between the others at Toms unexpected announcement.

Nor did Tom. He grinned right back at Rebecca and asked, Say, wheres that pizza? Im starving! Rebecca, you like pizza?

Love it! she lied, and as Smarty-Pants glared at her from across the table, she shrugged out of her Chanel jacket and rolled up her sleeves to get down to work.

Campaign strategist?

Matt tossed his briefcase onto one of several overstuffed leather armchairs gracing his law offices, punched his fists to his waist, and glared out the plate glass windows at the shining dome of the state capitol. Campaign strategist .. implying, naturally, that the person knew a little something about campaign strategy. Which she obviously didnt. Strip mining, for Chrissakes!

That little scene yesterday was exactly the sort of shit he couldnt abide, the very thing that made him want to drink himself into a catatonic stupor. If hed had a brain in his head, he would have said not just no, but HELL no! the night Tom and his pals cornered him at Stetsons. He should have known that involvement in this project was going to piss him off royally. And it already had, ten times over. Which was really a pity, because Matt actually liked the work. Honest to God, he did. He found the range of political issues intriguing, the challenges facing the state invigorating. He liked the men and women he had met since signing on. the ones who were affiliated with the

party and liked to joke he had the potential of being the next John Kennedy. The ones who kept whispering words in his ear, like district attorney. He had to admit he sort of liked the sound of that... district attorney.

But Tom, shit. He was beginning to think the man didnt have a stance on any issue that didnt further his personal agenda in some way. Matt had yet to hear him speak or act in a manner that would indicate that he didnt ultimately have his own interests at heart. He hoped he was wrong, and had stood silently by when Tom had hired Gilbert, a grad student with one pair of black jeans, some computer skills, and a dubious background in speechwriting (the son of an old friend and cheap, Tom said). Then Angie, the waitress from Toms favorite Fourth Street haunt who had just graduated from tech school and was going to set up a phone bank for him (also cheap and the added bonus of a nice pair of ta-tas, which was, apparently, the most important consideration for Senator Masters). And when Matt had tried to add people to the team who knew a little something about statewide issues, like Pat, a former state attorney for the education department who knew everything there was to know about education and the goings-on at the capitol, Tom shrugged and said, Shes kind of old, isnt she?

Fortunately, together, they had miraculously formed a decent crew. But Rebecca Lear? The woman who thought she was Gods gift? Disgusted, Matt walked to his desk, fell into his chair, and propped his feet on the corner of his extra-long mahogany desk. He pressed the tips of his fingers together, stared at a painting on his wall of a bunch of cowboys around a chuck wagon.

Actually, the more Matt knew, the more he wondered about his old college buddy. Of course he knew that the state Democratic party was propping him up, big time, along with some hefty contracts to a media consultant and campaign organizers, and most of the time, Tom seemed on target about what he was doing. But then hed do something questionable, like hire a waitress when there were hundreds of techie types in and around Austin, or bring a wacked-out beauty queen around for no apparent purpose.

Matt was still fuming about it. In fact, he couldnt get it off his mind. Not that he couldnt see why a philanderer like Tom would want a woman like Rebecca Lear hanging aroundshe was drop-dead gorgeous, had practically knocked him out of his socks when hed first clapped eyes on her in the park. He would never admit it aloud in a million years, but for a brief moment (before she had opened her mouth and called him cheap), he was amazed that a woman who looked like that was actually about to speak to him.

Yeah, he could definitely understand how Tom would be captivated. He was a married man and had his dalliances from time to time (he was, predictably, the bragging type), and Matt had considered the possibility that this was all about getting laid. But as he recalled Rebeccas curves in that tight white suit and the long shiny black hair and those eyes ( gawd, those eyes!), he was pretty amazed that Tom could even know someone like Rebecca, and she damn sure didnt seem the type to hang out with an old lineman like Tom.

So then what was she doing on his campaign? Okay, so she had a spark about her (although some might call it stubbornly holding on to ridiculous ideasstrip mining, give us all a break! Not to mention that strange, meeting-ending little tirade about abandoned dogs). Still... to place her in the position of campaign strategist? The highest position to be held in this campaign? The very same position he held, a position for which there was only one slot before she came along and Tom created another out of thin air? Bullshit!

That was the reason why Matt had pulled Tom aside. I thought this was a serious strategy session, Tom, he had said. So whats with Miss Texas?

Tom had laughed, cuffed Matt on the arm. Nice ass, huh? When Matt did not respond to that (had Tom ever heard of sexual harassment? If he hadnt, Matt had a few choice case files to show him), Tom sighed. Okay, do you have any idea who her father is? Ever hear of Lear Transport Industries?

Of course he had heard of LTI. A person couldnt live in

Texas without knowing about LTI it was one of the biggest homegrown companies around. But what that had to do with the running of a campaign had gone right over Matts head, and he had demanded, So?

So? So shes got a list of contacts a mile long. She was married to Bud Reynolds you know, the guy with all the car dealerships? We could really cover some ground with her.

Okay. Take her money. Wine her, dine her, and get her to make some calls. But what is she doing here? What does she know about political campaigns?

I guess well find out, wont we? Tom had said cheerfully, and when he saw that did not please Matt, had added congenially, Hey, if it turns out she has shit for brains, well lose her. But it seems worth a little ass-kissing to corner some of the biggest contributors in the state, and let me just go on record here saying that I, for one, wouldnt mind kissing that ass one bit.

Apparently, she was going to stick around. Whatever. Shed probably get tired of it and disappear. And maybe he could just forget it what did he care, anyway? It wasnt like it was his campaign and focus on his most pressing issue at the moment, which was getting prepared for an important hearing on the Kiker case. With a sigh, Matt shoved a hand through his hair, switched on his computer, and punched the intercom, asking Harold to bring him some coffee.

A moment later, as he pulled files out of his briefcase, Harold came striding in, steaming cup of coffee in hand. Here you are, Mr. Parrish. Exactly as you like it. Black.

Thanks, Harold, he said absently.

Harold placed it on a coasterthe little bluebonnet design facing Matt, of course and pushed it carefully toward him. Will there be anything else, Mr. Parrish?

Yeah, you can bring me the Kiker briefs.

Harold wrinkled his nose. Such sordid business, he said as he marched from the room.

Harold couldnt even begin to imagine how sordid. Kelly Kiker was a hard, chain-smoking woman who looked like

shed been rode hard and put up wet too many times to count in her forty-two years. Shed been in and out of the system for most of those years, but she had finally gotten her act together, was living in her fathers trailer, and got a clerical job collecting fees. Kelly Kiker might have made some bad choices in her life, but she wasnt stupid, and she quickly figured out that her boss was siphoning a little extra pocket money for himself from those fees. When she confronted her boss about it, he fired her. Kelly was going to let it go she was used to letting stuff go but the more she thought about it, the more she thought it wasnt right, and went to the trouble to get Matts name from her probation officer (who happened to be another woman he had once dated).

Matt had been doing civil law so long that nothing really surprised him anymore. He had sat through dozens and dozens of divorce hearings where wealthy spouses were willing to spend every dime they had to make sure the other didnt get some worthless trinket. He had represented lost and vulnerable kids, abused by parents and the state. Hed done it all. yet there was still an occasional case that would cross his desk and make him question his decision to become a high-flying lawyer, cases that left him so bewildered that he would literally lie awake at night wondering what the hell had happened to mankind. Where was the good?

Kelly Kiker was definitely one of those cases.

Why Toms campaign had all the feel of being another one of those things to keep him awake at night, he didnt know but it sure made the image of Rebecca Lear that kept flashing by his minds eye all the more irritating.

While Matt was trying to craft a legal argument for getting Kelly Kiker justice (not easy, since she had been fired from plenty of jobs in the past), Rebecca had come back from a Transformations Seminar (Track Four) where she had learned how to self-visualize her alter ego (Visualize success! Visualize your future!). Currently, she was visualizing herself as a campaign strategist, and was trying to figure

out how to surf the Net for any information on strip mining.

Fortunately, she had Jo Lynn to keep Grayson occupied. Jo Lynn was her seventy-year-old neighbor who lived alone just the other side of six acres of blackjack oak, cot-tonwoods, and mesquite trees. She had posted a note on the bulletin board at Sams Corner Grocery in Ruby Falls: Looking for something to do a few hours each week. Rebecca had called her; they had a lovely chat, and Rebecca hired her to watch Grayson a few hours a week.

Grayson had been resistant at first I want Lucy! he had screamed. When Rebecca told him he couldnt have Lucy, he had run into his room and slammed the door shut, crying, Youre MEEEEEEEEEEEEAN, Mommy! But then Jo Lynn had come over with a bucket of homemade ice cream and her pet goat, and Grayson stopped crying for Lucy. She was a spry, practically widowed woman (practically, she said, because her husband, who was in a home for Alzheimers patients, did not know her from Adam) who loved life. She had skin that looked like buttery leather, and laugh lines that seemed to have been hand-tooled onto her face. The sun had yellowed her gray hair, too, which she wore in a girlish ponytail. And oddly, practically everything Jo Lynn wore was tie-dyed which had the effect of conjuring up an image of some horrific laundry accident.

And Jo Lynn loved Grayson, spoiled him rotten, and was doing so this very moment, down at the river.

Which left Rebecca with some time to hone her Internet skills. Heretofore, her forays onto the World Wide Web hadnt been very many. Not that she was completely isolated from it certainly she used it for e-mail like the rest of the world. And she had shopped online from Neiman Marcus (gawd, she missed that store!). But she had never really had to look for anything on the Net, and presently, that was throwing her for a loop.

But she was determined very determinedto find some coherent information about strip mining and politics before tomorrow. Because tomorrow, Tom was having a meeting in his new campaign offices, and shed be damned

if she was going to show up without giving Matt Parrish a little something to think about.

Honestly, she would have bet her entire net worth that she had met all the exasperatingly arrogant men she could possibly meet in a lifetime, but that man had to take the cake. She was determined to find a way to rub that smirk right off his face, and visualized, per Track Four, doing just that with her bare hands, Rambo-style.

If only she could figure out how to find anything on the stupid Internet.

Seated in her big square kitchen, she glanced up over her laptop; saw Jo Lynn marching across the lawn, Grayson and the dogs trailing earnestly behind. They clomped up the back porch steps and into the kitchen; Grayson immediately headed for the refrigerator and a box of juice. Jo Lynn helped him climb onto a stool at the kitchen island before wandering over to where Rebecca was working. She peered over her shoulder at the computer screen. Whatcha doing?

Looking for some information about strip mining and environmental concerns.