President Darcy

Aunt Madeline’s lips pressed flat. “Why would you spend hours in the sun for a five-second glimpse of the man when you’ve already waltzed with him?”

It was a good question. An excellent question. A completely reasonable and innocuous explanation probably lurked somewhere, but Elizabeth had no idea where. “Um.” Her mind was blank. “Um.” Elizabeth scrutinized the people closest to them, but nobody was paying the least bit of attention to their conversation. She blew out a breath. “I owe him an apology.”

“The president?” she said faintly. You owe the President of the United States an apology?” Elizabeth nodded miserably. “What the hell for?” Her aunt lowered her voice. “Did you vote for the other guy? Set fire to the Oval Office? Drop the nuclear launch codes down a drain?”

Elizabeth cleared her throat. “I…um…made some…assumptions about him that turned out to be untrue, and said some rather unpleasant things to his face.” Oh Lord. She squeezed her eyes tightly closed, not wanting to think about it, let alone discuss it.

“When was this?” her aunt asked.

“A month ago, on Air Force One.”

Her aunt yelped. “Air Force—!” Elizabeth slapped her hand over the other woman’s mouth.

“Nobody can know,” Elizabeth whispered before removing her hand. “I swore the family to secrecy.”

Aunt Madeline’s eyes sparkled. “You were on Air Force One?” she hissed. “Lizzy, when were you planning to tell me? Deathbed confession?”

Elizabeth bit down a smile. “It was just a fluke. The president offered me a ride back from Paris.”

Uh-oh. Her aunt’s curiosity was provoked. The older woman pushed up her glasses and fixed Elizabeth with a penetrating stare. “Do you have a crush on the president?”

“Of course not,” Elizabeth scoffed. “He’s a jerk! He’s proud and difficult—and he called my family nouveau riche.”

He also wrote this heartbreakingly sincere letter that I’ve read so many times it’s in danger of falling apart. Yeah, maybe I have some feelings for him.

Aunt Madeline regarded Elizabeth over the rim of her glasses. “But you still owe him an apology.”

This was hard to explain. How had her life grown so complicated? Elizabeth sighed. “It’s just that…I’m not—he’s not quite as big a jerk as I thought. I misjudged him, and it’s difficult to contact him without a lot of other people knowing. I thought if he sees me here and I wave and smile, then he’ll know that I’m sorry.”

Aunt Madeline surveyed the crowd. “You could hold up a sign that says ‘I’m sorry.’”

Elizabeth grimaced. “I thought about it, but that might prompt questions I don’t want to answer. Hopefully he’ll get the message just by seeing me.” If he sees me. There were masses of people between her and the driveway.

As if reading Elizabeth’s mind, her aunt observed tartly, “He’ll never see you stuck way back here.”

Elizabeth bowed her head sadly. “I should have arrived earlier, but I didn’t realize how big the crowd would be.” She felt the burn of sudden tears. What if he didn’t see her? What if her plan didn’t work?

Aunt Madeline pursed her lips. “There has to be something we can do about that.”

Alarm set Elizabeth’s insides to quivering. Her aunt could be a force of nature when she got ahold of an idea. “The crowd is packed pretty tightly,” Elizabeth said.

Her aunt’s eyes lit up. Oh no, Madeline Gardiner perceived a challenge. “You leave that to me.” Before Elizabeth could object, a cry went up from the crowd: the front of the motorcade had been spotted.

While everyone’s attention was focused on the road, Aunt Madeline grabbed Elizabeth’s arm and started pushing forward into the crowd. Ruthlessly leaving her husband behind, the five-foot-two, sixty-two-year-old woman shouldered people out of her path. “Excuse me, we need to get closer. Excuse me!” A plump lady gave her aunt a disgruntled look. “My niece has an incurable disease, and it’s always been her dream to see the president in person,” Aunt Madeline explained. The woman’s mouth dropped open as she gestured for them to go in front of her.

“Excuse me! Coming through!” Aunt Madeline barked. “My niece is writing her dissertation on presidential motorcades. She needs a good view.” They received some perplexed expressions, but people gave way. Elizabeth’s face burned. Hopefully nobody would ask the discipline of this supposed dissertation.

They were drawing closer to the front of the crowd as the first car in the motorcade—a local Hamptons police car—turned into the driveway, passing the first rows. The car behind it was an SUV that likely contained Secret Service agents.

Aunt Madeline hadn’t given up. “Excuse us! My niece is the official White House artist and needs to compose a painting for this occasion!” Some people frowned as they gave way, but Elizabeth and her aunt were making progress. She could see the front row and the police officers holding back the crowds.

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; “Coming through!” her aunt yelled. “Woman with an urgent petition who needs to see the president!”

Now they were right behind the front row, but it was packed tightly, everyone shoulder to shoulder. Undaunted, Aunt Madeline gave Elizabeth a hard shove between her shoulder blades, causing her to stumble and push between two people—a tall, tattooed man and a plump middle-aged woman—in the front row. They barely noticed, their attention fixed on an enormous black limousine now turning into the driveway.

The crowd cheered and whistled. People screamed and jumped up and down. Parents held up their children for a look. This was it: the president’s limo. As it pulled closer, Elizabeth squinted her eyes and angled her head, trying to get a glimpse of his face despite the car’s darkened windows.