VIII

"Hey, Carol."

"Hi, CJ." Her assistant moved effortlessly into step beside her as they navigated through the corridor. Carol handed across her notes.

"Did Toby give you the-?"

"It's there."

"Thanks." CJ took a quick, absent gulp of her coffee. It was near-cold; she'd been walking around with it in her hand for an age, but had yet to have a chance to stop and drink it.

Carol glanced at her. "Charlie stopped by your office earlier."

"Yeah?"

"He wanted to know if he could have a few minutes sometime."

CJ looked up briefly from her notes. "Urgent?"

Carol smiled and shrugged. "He didn't say."

"Pencil him in for some time... tomorrow morning? He's gonna be as busy as I am today."

"Okay." Carol didn't need to note it down; her spelling might be wobbly at times, but her memory for events was flawless. When you worked in the White House press office, you had to be able to bring together every throwaway line that had been tossed your way, or you were in trouble.

"Okay." CJ stopped walking, took a moment to compose herself, and handed off the coffee cup to Carol. "I'm good. Let's do this."

Carol nodded, and swung towards the press room. The PA crackled.

"Please take your seats, folks. The briefing is about to begin. Please take your seats..."

CJ tuned it out, and strode up the podium. Calm, cool, confident, controlled. Not giving an inch. Whatever they chose to throw at her, she'd be ready for it.

Ha. When had that ever held true?

Pushing the bloody-minded voice of experience aside, she launched effortlessly into today's prepared spiel.

"Well, hey there, folks, and a hearty good morning to you. As you'll all no doubt recall, it's the Transportation Secretary's birthday today, and I hope you've got your cards in early, because let me tell you, once that guy's fan club get going you won't get a word in edgeways." Blow the unimportant stories off quickly, give them no room to wedge in an impertinent question between the lines.

"Senator Collins has taken the time to clarify his comments after last week's edition of Capital Beat, and Janet will be able to give you a transcript of that on the way out. The British Prime Minister's visit has undergone yet another rescheduling-" she paused to allow the good-natured groans - "after his visit to Taiwan was called off due to the outbreak of a particularly virulent strain of influenza. Not, I should hasten to add, on the part of the British Prime Minister. We can now expect him to drop by in the first week of January - assuming, of course, there are no further delays."

A small wave of gentle snickers. At another time, she would have been content, feeling the rhythm of the room, knowing she was in control. But not with the shadow of the Rogers biography hanging over them. It was a multi-headed beast that could pop up to bite you anytime, and from any direction.

Keep stalling. "The Congressional Budget Office have released the new figures, which show a dip of point three billion below even the most conservative estimates from this time last year. There's a more detailed breakdown which should be circulating around the room before the end of the briefing."

A breath. "Well, that's your targets for today, ladies and gentlemen, all lined up, step right up and take a shot. Any takers? Anyone?"

"CJ."

"Chris."

"Has the president made any official comment on the Michael Rogers biography?"

What a surprise. CJ pointed accusingly. "You, my friend, do not get the kewpie doll." Chris smiled slightly, but refused to relinquish her line of attack.

"CJ, has he made any-?"

"The president has not released any official comment, nor does he intend to. This is not official White House business, and he has no intention for the administration to get bogged down in irrelevancies." Yeah, good luck with that, Mr. President. "Sandy."

"CJ, why were the president's comments on the death of the Cambodian Ambassador released in the form of a written statement instead of a briefing to the White House press corps?"

Oh, why the hell do you think?

"The president felt it was owed to the memory of Nathan Williamson, and out of respect for his grieving widow, not to turn his death into a media circus."

They all knew damn well that if he'd come out in front of them to make a statement, not one single question would have had the slightest connection to Nathan Williamson's murder. She knew them, and they knew themselves. And yet none of the vultures had the grace to look at all chagrined or embarrassed.

"CJ!" She hadn't pointed, but the strident voice that rang out from the rear of the room used volume as a substitute for authority. Expert training kept the grimace of distaste from showing on the surface or permeating her tone.

"Jackie." Jackie Grant. No way in hell this question wasn't going to be about the most graphic, sordid detail of the president's childhood the jackals had been able to dig up.

She was prepared... but when the question came, it was nothing she'd ever thought to anticipate.

"CJ! Does the president have any comment on the internet rumour that he and his brother suffered sexual abuse at the hands of their father?"

And then, something unusual happened.

CJ was silent.

Not the flustered, helpless silence of a rookie press handler in a room out of control. Not the open-mouthed silence of a press secretary who had just been blindsided with the mother of all unexpected questions. A cold, awful, horrible silence.

The clamour of the shouting reporters abruptly died out, and nobody quite dared move. CJ softly pushed up her glasses, straightened her shirt collar. And when she looked up at Jackie Grant, her mild expression was more threatening than any mask of rage.

"Okay," she said dangerously softly. "A, I've never heard anything from anybody that would support that rumour. B, I should think just about the last place on earth you're going to hear accurate information about something so intimately personal is on the internet. And C, if that's anybody's idea of an appropriate question for the White House press room, God help us all." She neatly picked up and folded together her notes. "This briefing is over, and I'd think very carefully about how long you want the rest of your career to last before any of you start shouting my name."

She turned around, and walked with perfect, cast-iron control from the podium.

And nobody made a sound.

Leo's office was filled with a babble of frantic hysteria.

"How did we not-?"

"Where the hell did-?"

"Is there nobody in this room who-?"

"Quiet!" Leo roared above the hubbub. The words of the others gradually stuttered into silence.

Josh looked sick. "Leo, we didn't..."

"We didn't anticipate this," Leo finished for him, spitting out the words as if they left an ugly taste. "How the hell did we not anticipate this? Is this not- this isn't something we should have thought about? How did we not anticipate this?"

CJ had a hand to the side of her head, and looked as pale as if she had a migraine. "Because we didn't want to think about it," she said sickly.

Sam turned solemn eyes to Leo. "Was the president watching the briefing?"

"No, but I don't think we can hide it from him!" Leo exploded.

The standard question right now would have been 'Is there any possibility this is true?'

Nobody asked it. Nobody thought it. There was no possibility it could be true, and none of them were going to let there be any possibility it was true.

Toby looked up, and met Leo's eyes. "He's going to flip out," he said, softly but authoritatively.

"No kidding, Toby!" Leo snapped sharply. It was hard to keep his temper from exploding; the thought that someone could idly unleash such a rumour, casually chatter over the unimaginable as if the truth wasn't bad enough, as if there had to be some way to exaggerate it more, make it bigger-

Toby's voice remained serious and low. "Leo. He's been going crazy not leaping out there to strike the story down when he knows every damn word of it is true." He was silent for a beat. "How, exactly, do you think he's going to react now they've thrown a complete falsehood into the ring?"