"Alice, are you sure that this is all right?" Bella asked for the hundredth time as the town car they were in pulled up to the front of the posh restaurant.
"Of course it's all right," Alice said as she adjusted her gloves. "I've wanted you and Rosalie to meet forever, but she hardly gets out to California these days and you haven't really been out to D.C. much."
The driver had opened the back door to the car and Alice gently nudged Bella out before following her and continuing, "Besides, I'm hoping that she'll be working with us more closely and that my dad and Jasper will be hiring her on as an image consultant."
Bella looked at Alice skeptically. "This isn't a working dinner, is it?"
Alice laughed. "No, not at all. When Rosalie and I get together business is usually the furthest thing from our minds."
Alice had told Bella all about her friend Rosalie Hale. They had first known each other when they were both students at UCLA. Alice had been a double major in business and government and Rosalie had been a public relations major minoring in government. They had taken enough government classes together that they got to know each other and had formed a fast friendship.
After graduation Alice had stayed in California and had started helping a friend run his small fashion house, providing some input into the design as well as serving as his 'muse.' Rosalie had moved to D.C. and had worked at one of the bigger PR firms there till she had started hiring herself out as a consultant.
Entering the restaurant they checked their coats with the hostess before they were led to a table towards the back of the restaurant. Rosalie was already sitting there, sipping at a glass of wine and perusing the menu.
As soon as she saw her, Bella already felt a little intimidated. To say that Rosalie was beautiful was an understatement. Her light blonde hair was falling in soft waves around her shoulders which were encased in a beautiful grey business suit. Her jewelry was understated and she was only wearing a diamond solitaire necklace and diamond earrings. Even her make-up was soft, simple and meant only to enhance her natural features rather than covering anything up. She was the type of woman that wouldn't have been out of place at a big Hollywood event.
As they approached the table, Alice lit up with a smile and called out, "Rosalie!"
Rosalie looked up from her menu and smiled. "Alice!" Setting her wine glass and menu down she stood up and leaned over to hug the much shorter Alice and then she turned to Bella with a bit of a reserved smile, but a smile nonetheless.
"You must be Bella. Alice has told me so much about you." She smiled and politely shook Bella's hand.
"It's very nice to meet you," Bella said with a soft smile in return.
As they moved to sit Alice was smiling brightly. "I'm so glad that we could get together. I've wanted you two to meet for a while now, but all our schedules have been so hectic!"
Rosalie smiled. "Well, you're the one that's been stuck out there in California with all that sunshine." Her voice was almost wistful as she spoke.
Alice laughed. "The grass is always greener! I've wanted to experience the seasons changing for some time. Warm, hot, hotter, and burning to a crisp are no comparison to fall, spring, summer, and winter. Though it does give me the opportunity to work on my tan whenever I want. It helps to hide the blemishes."
"Oh shush!" Rosalie laughed. "Your complexion is flawless and you look good with a tan or without one." She turned to Bella. "Like you. You seem to have the perfect peaches and cream complexion."
Bella blushed brightly and Alice smiled, agreeing with Rosalie. "She does, doesn't she?"
"Um, thank you," Bella replied, obviously embarrassed.
Alice smiled and decided to change subjects. "So what have you been up to, Rosalie?"
"Same old, same old," she said with a smile as she picked up her wine glass again. "I'm putting out some feelers for some new clients now that the midterms are done. The period right afterwards is a bit slow, but that doesn't last and I'm already getting a few inquiries in regards to work for the presidential election in two years."
Bella looked at Rosalie with interest. She knew from what Alice had said and talk she'd heard around the office that Rosalie was at the top of game. She knew what to do to make a candidate look good and appealing to the public. She'd helped several congressmen and a couple of Senators get elected and while she had never worked at a national scale, there was no doubt she would be part of a team in the upcoming presidential election.
Before anything else could be said, the waiter came over and took their drink and food orders. After he was gone Alice continued, "What about your personal life? I tried asking over the phone but you said the conversation could wait till dinner. So spill.'"
What could only be described as a dreamy smile turned up the corners of Rosalie's perfect, cupid bow lips. "Well, if you must know, I have recently started seeing someone."
"I knew it! I knew it!" said Alice with an even bigger grin. "Tell us all about him."
Rosalie proceeded to tell them all about Emmett, a man she had met at a party fundraiser who had been peeking at her from behind a statue of a bear all night before he'd gotten the courage to come up and talk to her. They'd gone out twice and it was obvious that Rosalie seemed to really like him.
"What about you, Bella? Do you have a boyfriend? Are you seeing anyone?" Rosalie asked after thanking the waiter for pouring her another glass of wine after he had poured glasses for Bella and Alice.
Bella shook her head. "No, there just doesn't seem to be time."
"I know how that is," Rosalie said with a bit of a smile. "I'm learning to make time."
"I guess when the right person comes along you just know that you have to," added Alice.
Both Bella and Rosalie knew that Alice was thinking about her relationship with Jasper.
Oddly enough, Bella's mind wandered to the nameless man she'd met the other night.
Before she could ponder more on her strange turn of thought, their salad course had arrived and Alice was pressing Rosalie for more details about Emmett.
It was then that Rosalie revealed that he worked for Senator Volturi.
"No? Really?" said Alice as she wrinkled her nose a bit as if she had suddenly smelled something awful.
Rosalie sighed. "I know. It's his one flaw, but even then, I can't fault him for it. He joined Volturi's staff because he wanted to work with Edward Masen. His parents always praised the Masens."
"I heard that Masen has been working with Senator Volturi for a while," Bella added.
Rosalie nodded. "From what I heard he started working with the Senator not long after leaving law school. Emmett joined the team several years back."
Masen was a well-known name in the world of politics as famous as Kennedy, or Bush. It was a political dynasty that stretched back several generations and hardly anyone could remember a time when a Masen didn't hold a political office in D.C. It had started at the turn of the last century with a Masen being elected to the House out of Illinois. One after another the name Masen became synonymous with political power in Illinois and it all seemed to come to a head when Edward Masen, Sr., the senator from Illinois, had declared his run for president several years back.
When he and his wife had died in a plane crash on their way to a rally in California, that had been the end of the Masen name in the halls of congress…at least for a while. At the time of their deaths, their young son Edward had been a teenager. While the picture of JFK Jr., saluting his father's casket when he was no more than a toddler had touched the heart of a nation because of poignant way in which a son honored his slain father, it was touching because the boy had little awareness of what was going on around him due to his young age. The picture of Edward Jr. standing on the snow covered ground between the caskets of his parents his body hunched over, contorted with grief while he sobbed into his glove covered hands had shown the world the figure of a young man who had lost everything and found himself truly alone. It touched people because while they had suffered the loss of a great leader, the young man in the photograph had lost his family. The picture, obviously taken in a moment of utter despair, had won a Pulitzer.
While Edward tried to keep out of the spotlight, every now and then a story would pop up about him in national news outlets. They called him the surviving prince, the heir apparent to the political dynasty that his family had cultivated for generations. Despite his plea for privacy, stories about his high school graduation, his grades in college, his acceptance into Columbia law school, and his subsequent graduation and admittance to the bar were reported on with regular frequency. Media outlets would speculate now and then when he would pick up the reigns and throw his name onto the ballot. They considered him a sure win if he ran for the Senate in Illinois.
When he decided to accept a position as Senator Volturi's Chief of Staff, he had set off a firestorm. Some political pundits praised him, figuring he was just biding his time and learning the ropes under the senior Senator. Others wondered if this move had been a tragic mistake on Edward's part.
Edward never discussed his personal life with anyone so no one really knew his reasons.
"Well, Edward Masen seems like a good guy…despite who he works for," Alice said, bringing Bella out of her musings about the man in question.
Rosalie nodded. "Emmett calls him his best friend. Seems to me like the two of this have this whole bromance going."
"Well…he could do worse," Alice said with a shrug.
"Yes, Emmett does seem to have very good taste," Rosalie said with a grin and all three women laughed.