Alpha Billionaire Series

CHARLES

The line at the coffee shop was a lot longer than I thought. It snaked out the door and around the corner of the building a few yards. Luckily, Peter had this knack for knowing people, and we were ushered right to the front of the line without waiting. We had to shout our order over the hiss of the espresso machine and the ruckus of loud customers. It wasn't the quaint little small-town café where writers and students brought their laptops to study. It was the big-city coffee chain where baristas had attitude and they wrote your name on the cup to differentiate between orders.

“This place is a madhouse,” I groaned, thinking I was talking to myself, but Peter, perceptive as always, replied to my comment.

“It's always like this, but that's only because they have the best coffee. And precisely why I made friends with the owner, so I don't have to wait in line” Peter's chin jerked upward as he took his coffee from the counter and raised it in the air. A man behind the counter waved and smiled.

After we paid, we weaved our way past the grumpy customers still waiting for their chance to order some of the brew and pushed out onto the sidewalk. The weather was fast approaching the time of year when winter coats came out o the closet and snow clung to the ground. There would be only a few more times when we walked these few blocks fo coffee or lunch before we began calling in orders for delivery. I wasn't quite ready for the grip of cold to clamp down on the city.

“Shit, this is good coffee.” Peter had one hand jammed into his jacket pocket and the other holding his paper cup with its plastic lid and cardboard sleeve to his lips.This belongs © NôvelDra/ma.Org.

I sipped it, sucking it in between my teeth so I didn’t burn my tongue. The hints of blueberry and maple in the breakfast blend reminded me of the toaster waffles my mom used to buy me as a kid.To access the complete chapters for free, visit Jo b ni b.com. Peter was spot-on about this being the best coffee place in DC, and I understoo why he wanted to walk seven blocks to get it. “Okay, so before we get back to the office, I have a few things to tell you. I figured you wouldn't really want the team to know the gory details, so I'm sparing you that, but you need to know.”

Peter slurped his coffee, and I dodged a woman walking her dog, not paying attention to where she was going. In my old neighborhood back home, I was somewhat of a celebrity and people stopped me to get a picture with me. Here, was white noise. There were so many politicians and hopefuls that everyone minded their own business and left me alone. It was nice.

“Not more on the story about Willow I hope.”

“Actually, Charles, there is more. You seemed to live your life pretty clean. You didn't get into trouble. You didn't make waves anywhere, except in good ways. Willow wasn’t so good. She failed a few classes in college, having to take them over. This put her on a few lists that got noticed by Mathers'’s team.”

“So, my opponent knows my wife wasn't a perfect student. Who cares?” The news weighed me down like a wet blanket. No wonder Willow had withdrawn in college. I earned top marks in my classes every semester. She probably felt embarrassed by her struggles and hid them from me. She may have even employed the help of a tutor to get through, which would explain why she pushed me away. She wasn't trying to leave me; she was trying to pass college Frustrated by this new knowledge, I scowled. “If that's the worst that Mathers has on her, I'm not worried.”

“Well, there are three witnesses that will attest to her trying to trade sexual favors with the professor to get her grad up.” Peter's casual recitation of the sleazy way others would take advantage of someone for their own profit knotted my stomach.

“That's not Willow. I don’t believe that for a single second.” The claim was preposterous. Willow might have made some choices based on the pain I caused her, but she'd never have cheated on me like that. Least of all for her grades.

“I'm just telling you how they plan to smear you in the next two weeks.” Peter sighed. “Look, Charles, I can make this one go away, but the evidence against her for the abortion bit is mounting. They've been biding their time and waiting for the best time to play the card. I think they will leak their gossip to the press within the next few days, anc there is nothing I can do to stop it. They're trying to time it just right to push voters away from you right before the election”

“What am I supposed to do? I can’t just come out and ask her about this. If she did something and she kept it from me, it's for good reason. I am not taking a stick to that hornets’ nest.” We came to the corner of a street and stopped waiting on the walk signal. I had all but pushed this from my mind.

I wasn’t against women having abortions. I supported every woman's right to choose what was best for herself. I was just against Willow's choice to abort my baby. And the only thing Peter could think about was the campaign. He didn't see how this was f*****g me up and throwing me off my game. I'd almost botched the debate last week because the press asked me if I had any personal thoughts about the issue.

“Look, the best we can do is prepare our reaction for when they start the smear campaign. You just have to make sure we either keep Willow entirely isolated, not let her know what's being said, or we have to talk to her about it Peter tossed his empty coffee cup into a trash can as we started crossing the street and I sipped my coffee still, barely cool enough to slosh across my tongue.

Having that conversation with Willow was not something I looked forward to, but Peter was, once again, right. When I did have that discussion, it had to be as neutral as possible. She couldn't think for a second that I accused her of aborting my baby, just that gossip was going around about her and that topic. If I let my own emotions show even the slightest bit, they'd come out like wildfire burning everything in their path. And that wouldn't do any good at all.