Thanks as always to my betas, HarmonyLover and chai4anne

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When they arrived at a small conference room in the Russell campaign's Iowa headquarters, the first thing Josh noticed was that Will was nowhere in sight. The Vice President was there, along with a middle-aged, balding man who looked familiar, but whom he couldn't quite place.

"Where's Will?" Donna asked, echoing his thoughts.

The middle aged man interrupted their conversation, holding out a shoebox. "Cell phones here. This is an off-the-record meeting. Nothing that could be used as a recording device is allowed."

Josh reluctantly handed over his BlackBerry, which he had indeed set to surreptitiously record the meeting. The man looked at it and snorted. "Nice try, Mr. Lyman." After he had collected all the phones, he put the box in a storage closet outside of the conference room.

"Where's Will?" Donna asked again.

"I fired him," Russell claimed.

"What? When? Why?" Donna demanded.

"You brought her here under false pretenses, then," Josh snapped. "She was told Will Bailey was going to be here."

Russell smiled calmly. "She was told my campaign manager was going to be here. This is my new campaign manager, Harold Saunders. An old friend of mine."

So that was why he looked familiar. His name was more famous than his face, but Harold Saunders was a well-known political operative. He'd worked for a number of shady 527 groups in the past, and was notorious for launching brutal, unfounded, but devastatingly effective smear campaigns that had brought down a number of politicians.

"I know who you are." Josh didn't shake Harold's outstretched hand. "So I guess this is the direction your campaign is going, then," he added to Russell.

Russell was unperturbed. "Will Bailey was great. He's a nice guy – maybe too nice for politics, though. I think Harold will give my campaign the…well, the edge it needs."

"That's one way of putting it."

Russell frowned, his face darkening. "Speaking of false pretenses, Josh, what are you doing here? I don't remember inviting you. And trying to record the conversation? Hoping to do some spying for Matt Santos?"

"Mr. Lyman, I think you should wait outside," Harold interjected.

"Not happening."

"You're from an opposing campaign."

"Either I'm in the room, or we call her lawyers and delay the meeting until they get here. Take your pick."

"It's okay, Harold," Russell interjected. "Actually, Josh probably should be in this meeting. There's something I want to talk to him about."

Harold gave the Vice President a quizzical look, but sighed. "Fine." He paused. "Why don't we all have a seat, and the Vice President will explain why he called this meeting."

Harold and Russell sat on one side of a long, rectangular table, and Josh and Donna sat on the other.

"Donna, listen," Russell began. "Thinking about the incident the other night, it seems to me that maybe all of this has been blown out of proportion. You were tired and emotional. You probably didn't mean to push me."

She stared at him stonily, not responding.

"And I've decided I'm willing to tell the prosecutor that. I'll ask him to drop the charges. And I'll tell the media that, too. That it was just a misunderstanding. You're a nice person. I don't want your life ruined over this."

"What's the catch?" Josh demanded.

"No catch," Russell smiled.

"Just this," Harold interjected. "In order to confirm to our own satisfaction that it really was an accident, we'd like Donna to give this statement in front of news cameras. If it's true, of course," he added as he slid a piece of paper over to her.

Donna read the statement silently, Josh doing the same as he leaned over her shoulder.

"Two nights ago, I was very tired, and very upset about a good friend of mine, Josh Lyman, who was missing after having been in the Santos plane crash. I ended up having a heated conversation with the Vice President and said some things I didn't mean. I did not intend to push him or physically hurt him in any way. I feel terribly about the incident, and would like to sincerely apologize to-"

"No way in hell," Donna said sharply.

"Donna-" Josh touched her arm. The thought of her apologizing to Bob Russell made him sick, but if it would mean putting an end to her legal troubles, and even providing her with some political cover as well…

"I'd rather spend the rest of my life in jail than apologize to him," she insisted, a harshness in her voice that surprised him.

"Well, that's your other option," Harold retorted smugly. "Well, okay, probably not life. But an assault on the Vice President? I'd guess you're looking at a few years, at least. You really think you can do that kind of time?"

"I'm offering you an out here, Donna," Russell interjected. "I'd take it if I were you." He took another piece of paper out of a folder. "How this will work is that I'll issue this very gracious statement to the press, accepting your apology, saying that as far as I'm concerned the matter is settled, and calling on the prosecutor to drop the charges." The Vice President handed Donna another piece of paper. She didn't even look at it.

"Maybe she should just file charges against you," Josh snapped in annoyance. "She could, you know. You grabbed her arm. You were trying to stop her from leaving the room. That sounds like false imprisonment to me. You lied to the Secret Service. Ever hear of obstruction of justice?"

"Oh, knock it off," Russell snorted in irritation. "She's not going to do anything to me, and you wouldn't want her to." He gave Josh a meaningful look that Josh didn't quite understand. "You may not want me to be President, but you don't want my career destroyed, either."

"Wanna bet?"

Russell's eyes flashed. "If I go down, President Bartlet goes down with me. I really don't think that's what you want, is it, Josh?"

Josh glared at him. "Using the President as a human shield – I never thought even you would stoop that low."

Russell shrugged. "It's just a simple statement of fact."

"We serve at the pleasure of the President – and the second we become a liability to him, we step aside."

"No, you serve at the pleasure of the President – or at least you did until you went trotting off on your wild and crazy adventure with Matt Santos. The Vice President doesn't serve at the pleasure of anyone but himself."

"He plucked you out of obscurity. He made you Vice President of the United States, and this is how you repay him?"

"From what I understand, I have the Republican Speaker of the House to thank for my nomination, not any of you in the White House."

"You disgust me."

"Well, that just breaks my heart, Josh."

Josh shook his head. "Say what you want about Hoynes, but when he got in trouble, he took himself out of the equation rather than hurt the President."

"And the President wouldn't survive another VP resigning over a scandal. You know that as well as I do."

"Just say you want to spend more time with your grandkids."

Russell met his eyes. "Or what?"

Josh blinked in confusion. What exactly were they talking about here? His comments about Donna pressing charges against the VP had been a reflexive response to the attempt to intimidate her. He hadn't meant it as a serious threat, although if the case were to go to trial those issues would probably come up, and the Vice President knew it.

Russell's voice didn't quite mask an edge of nervousness as he spoke. "Let's just cut to the chase, Josh. If you think you're going to help Matt Santos by telling the media about Donna's meeting that morning, you're wrong. Greg and Christine will say it was just opposition research. The guy was going to be on the ballot. We wouldn't have been doing our jobs if we hadn't tried to find out who he was."

"What?" Josh stared at him, dumbfounded. He glanced at Donna, who had suddenly turned white as a sheet.

"By the time we get through with her, your little girlfriend here will look like a crazy, disloyal ex-employee who no politician will ever trust to have on staff again. And I'll look like a victim. You don't think I can manage to spin it that way? Harold's made a career out of that kind of thing."

"What the hell are you-"

"So yeah. Go tell the press all about her meeting with Peter Burton. I almost hope you do. We'll see who comes out ahead."

"Her meeting with…" Josh's voice trailed off as some of the pieces started to fall into place. He remembered the news report about the Democrats who had supposedly met with Burton, and how Donna had reacted after hearing it. He glanced at her again. She looked stricken.

"She didn't tell you." The realization dawned on Russell. He glanced from Josh to Donna, clearly suddenly afraid he'd made a huge mistake by spilling the beans. "Well, I'm sure she would have gotten around to it eventually."

Harold, who had been staring at Russell with an expression that plainly indicated he hadn't expected the conversation to take this particular turn, recovered and looked at Donna. "Issue the apology. Make this go away. Your life is going to be ruined if you don't."

She got up sharply from the table, shaking visibly. "This meeting is over."

"Donna-" Josh called after her, but she didn't turn around. She stalked out of the room without waiting for him.