Sara never cared for security measures, but since the presidency, she'd learned to overlook the necessary bodyguards that flanked her whenever she so much as crossed the street. Since the shooting, it had only gone downhill. Not because they'd tightened security. You can't pump a balloon fuller than its maximum capacity. Only, Sara was overwhelmingly aware now that the risks she took weren't hers alone. A man had died for her. Because of her.

So when she entered the restaurant, whose dining area had been cleared for her sake, every breach through which a bullet could creep yanked her attention. The bathroom, where a shooter could spring from. The great window.

She took a seat, her exchange with Kellerman still fresh in her mind from this morning. "Who'd you want to leak it to? The New Yorker? The Slate?"

"Manners, Paul," she teased. "We keep leaking to them, people are going to start calling us socialists."

His eyes twinkled. He spared all his energy now, even that required for grinning. "Preferences as to the headlines? 'President Refuses CEO's Generous Offer: Democracy Is Not For Sale?'"

Sara shrugged. Paul was one of these people most efficient when you let them have control. "You're better at this than I am. You decide."

She had worn a dress red as molten rubies. Waiters ushered her in, informed her the man who had made the reservation 'would be a few more minutes', and that was a surprise to Sara. Most people did not keep the president waiting.

A glass of wine waited for her on the table. Red. She did not drink it. The pleasure of refusing to be bribed was one she preferred to enjoy sober.

While waiting, Sara took her phone out and started to work. It wasn't that she was impatient, but that she never had a few minutes in her day to spare. She'd prefer to save them for Michael rather than waiting alone at a restaurant.

The thought of Michael wasn't a safe one.

His fingers, last night, crawling up her thighs. The taste of his tongue in her mouth. The gold shine of his skin under the dim lights.

"Madam President."

Sara looked up, and actually—shamefully—dropped her phone in surprise.

Jacob Ness, CEO of the NRA, stood smiling at her.

Sara couldn't speak for a second.

An abyss yawned open beneath her. Her hands turned to fists on the table.

This is the man who ordered to have me killed.

For a horrible moment, she wasn't the president. She wasn't a civilized human being at all.

That she might lunge at Jacob and sink her nails into his face, right here and now, shimmered on the horizon with very real undertones.

His pleasant smile. His pleasant face. Not Hollywood handsome, but politics handsome. Many newspapers had dubbed him Bachelor of the Year.

"What a great honor it is to meet you. I do apologize for taking you unawares—you will forgive me this little deception, I hope. I could not be sure you'd agree to come, if you knew it was me you were meeting."

Sara did not respond. She was still falling in some place below her own body, below any traces of restraint and civilization.

I'm an animal. This is the Jungle.

Trauma rose up her system in a burning hot flow. Screams. Shattering glass. Waking up in a hospital room, feeling like she had been gutted, and the whole world was watching.

Jacob reached for her hand, and instead of shaking it, pressed it to his lips like some continental gentleman.

The contact of his mouth jolted her out of shock.

She tore from his grasp, raked her chair against the wooden floor before he had a chance to sit opposite her. Damn it. Reporters must be having a blast, snapping pictures that would make for a quite the clickbait front page tomorrow. The head of a company, whom Sara had accused of being a terrorist, kissing her hand. The NRA and the president making friends—or more than friends, everyone in America would think.

How was she going to get out of this? Could she purchase every picture before they hit the internet? God, Kellerman would have their heads on a spike. How had she allowed herself to be in this situation?

That she had been too shocked to draw away from Jacob immediately shoved a pit of guilt down her throat.

Only it hadn't been shock and she knew it.

I froze.

Just like therapists said she would, whenever a reminder of the shooting came back to her.

A nagging voice in her head. Is a woman plagued by PTSD still a good president? Isn't it time you retire, take your bow, Sara—let the adults take care of this.

She stood with as much dignity as she could gather. Even without heels, Jacob Ness did not have an inch on her.

"Touch me again, sir, and I assure you, my bodyguards will shoot you where you are. As to your little deception, as you call it—I do not forgive it. You are very right in assuming I would not have come, knowing who I was meeting. I hope for the both of us this will be our only meeting. I do not like your odds, should you try to impose your presence on me again."

"Madam President," he coaxed. "You are a very powerful woman. I am a very powerful man. Let us not waste time in threats and talk of what we might do against each other. For once—let us consider what we might do together."

He smiled his Bachelor smile.

Sara felt someone had shoved dragon fire down her throat. "No."

He cocked his head to the side. "You haven't listened to my offer yet."

"I don't need to hear it. No, to anything you propose. Whatever you have in mind. As long as the outcome is you and I, meeting under other circumstances than in a court of law. The answer will be no."

Jacob had the gall to look charmed by this. "You are a spectacular woman," he said.

"I beg your pardon?"

He sighed, as if annoyed that groundwork still needed to be laid. "I will speak frankly, Madam President. There is no one around to hear us," he glanced at the bodyguards, circling the restaurant. "No one who will speak a word of what took place tonight. Presidents have tried over the years to measure themselves to my organization. All of them came to realize, in the end, that it was smarter to work as allies. You will not take down the NRA. I think you know this—although I admire your defiance in thinking that you'll try, anyway."

Jesus, Sara thought. Was this what this was about?

She cursed herself—had not come here, ready for a showdown with the NRA.

A fool for thinking in this world, your opponents wait until you're prepared. How many times do you need to hear it?

It's a Jungle out there.

"Every president who was serious about taking us down has sat on the other side of such a conversation," he said.

"All due respect?" she spoke in a glacial tone. "I don't care what you're offering. If you're intent on stopping me from attacking you publicly, and everything you represent, then I suggest you hire a better shooter. That's what it's going to take."

He shook his head, smiling still. "Admirable."

She wished she could spit in his face.

"I'm glad you're giving me an opportunity to set the record straight," he said. "I have no desire to antagonize you. Quite the contrary."

"You called me delusional on Twitter."

"You called me a terrorist."

"Because it's the truth."

He chuckled. "The truth has precious little weight in this day and age. Surely, you know it."

It took effort not to drag her fingernails down her palms. Not to clench fists. Not to betray anger. If she didn't hear Jacob Ness out, now, he would keep trying until he had laid out his proposition to her. Men like him always thought that the question wasn't who could be bought, but for how much.

"All right, Mr. Ness. Name the amount you think I put on my country, my people, and my duty as president. Surprise me."

The grin on his lips turned roguish. "I believe I will."

"But please be quick about it. I take no pleasure in your company."

"I would like you to marry me."

Silence dropped. Though it was undoubtedly the effect he'd been anticipating, Sara could not will words out of her mouth for a while.

Jacob went on looking at her, with that smug, impish look. He probably thought of himself as charming.

"Marry you?"

"Yes."

Sara didn't laugh. She was too shocked, even for that.

"Let me make my case, Madam President. For starters, think of the polls. You are already well-loved by the nation, true. But such an alliance would win over the other side of the country—those who call you an extremist, a socialist. In other words, anti-American."

"If you think for a second I'd contemplate—"

"I believe you act for the good of your country," he interrupted. "Let's consider the outcomes of a 2025 election, Madam President—shall we? Alexander Mahone will be the Republican candidate. You will run for the Democrats, of course. And Theodore Bagwell will run as an independent, representing the Knights."

Sara arched a brow. Jacob couldn't know that.

As if reading her mind, he said, "Do not ask me how I'm able to anticipate this. But the fact is sure—as sure as I stand before you, right now, Bagwell will be your opponent again in 2025."

"Then I'll crush him. As I did in the first race."

"Times have changed since then. People all over the country are calling you a radical. You've changed this country more than a lot of people are comfortable with. A second term would give you time to do even more damage, as some call it."

"I won't listen to such nonsense, Mr. Ness. You're wasting my time, and yours."

She started to walk away.

"Alexander Mahone will lose against Theodore Bagwell."

She stopped in her stride.

It was not Jacob's prophesizing tone that did it. It was the realization that, somewhere deep in her bones—she believed him.

Believed that the next election would really be that insane. Opposing two candidates, more different than this country had ever seen. Candidates whose only common feature was that they wanted to transform America. For better or worse.

Jacob walked around the room, to be in her sight again. "Listen to me, Madam President. Republicans have not all lost their minds. But sensing that the wind is changing, knowing Mahone won't make it to the White House, they will vote for Theodore Bagwell, instead of you. He'll be the lesser evil, so long as you don't soften your image. If you marry me—"

She scoffed. Could not repress it.

He continued, unperturbed, "It will be enough that you can hope to reassure the most tepid voters. It is the only way you can ensure that, come 2025, this country won't be in the hands of that lunatic Theodore Bagwell."

"And you think, to make sure America does not vote itself into hell, I'd be willing to marry a lunatic myself?"

She shook her head. Could not believe this man. She knew the NRA believed itself above the law, but above commonsense?

"My God. You really do think you own everything you touch."

She took a step forward. A smell of shower gel and aftershave hit her nostrils.

"No, Mr. Ness. That's my answer to you. Let me be frank, too. I would not marry you for all the money in the world. I would not marry you at gunpoint. Not that you bothered to propose to me, the last time I was in your shooter's range of fire."

"Ah," he said, like that was a fine point of contention. "I thought we would get to that. I'm glad you're giving me the opportunity to clear that up, Madam President."

As if she'd referred to an embarrassing incident, like he'd merely splashed coffee on her shirt or something.

"I understand, given the clear take you've taken against my organization, that you'd think I'd be determined to stop you." He smiled. "But that's simply a misunderstanding of how the NRA does things. How I do things, Madam President."

She considered him, with his tame smile, disgust pulsing in her throat like a second heartbeat.

"Don't let the image of guns fool you—we might sell guns, but we aren't modern cowboys who go about settling our scores with a revolver. God. D'you know I've never touched a firearm in my life?" he laughed. "I'm a businessman. Not a killer."

"Right."

He cocked his head in concession. An organization with that much money, with its teeth planted so deep into American politics, had blood on its hands. Rivers of it. Or entire oceans.

"Let me rephrase," Jacob said, reading her mind again. "Even if we believed that the country would be better with some individuals taken down—surely, we would not go as far as to commit treason. You are my president."

"I am."

He beamed. "Why would we use weapons of war, when history has proven to us over and over that alliances can always be contrived under the right circumstances?"

"Because you know that going to war against me is the only way you'll stop me."

He shook his head. "Like I said, Madam President. My intention is not to make an enemy of you. It never was. I thought of marriage long before this tragedy happened. If you agree to become my wife, rest assured, our pooled resources will shed the veil twice as fast on the person who planned your assassination. But whoever it was…" he smiled. Genuinely. "It wasn't me."

Sara stood in silence, watching him. Not because his ridiculous proposal warranted a minute's thought. But because during her term as president, she had gotten very good at determining whether someone was lying to her.

Her eyes crisscrossed over Jacob's face, and he let her.

Her blood curdled with the feeling, irrepressible, that he was telling the truth.

If the NRA hadn't orchestrated her assassination—who had?

Jacob must have mistook her thinking for lack of determination, because he pressed. "Think of how you'll soar in popularity polls. A wedding for the whole nation to see—spectacular. Who could stop us if we stood together?"

"Like I said, Mr. Ness. You could ask me this question at gunpoint, and the answer would still be, No. I'd say no to all the men in the world before I said yes to you."

She ignored his detestable smile.

"Thank you for this—enlightening encounter," she went on. "I don't suggest you try to see me again, unless you want to find out how well my bodyguards can use the weapons you flood the streets with."

She passed him on her way to the door.

He said, "If it's your lover you're worried about, you could keep him."

Sara froze. Her heart pumped December rain instead of blood.

"I am not a man of half measures," he admitted. "If I marry you—I won't do it in name only. But I wouldn't presume to tell you who not to see. Michael Scofield—isn't it?"

The drum-drum at her temples was too deafening for thought.

Now she understood what was really going on.

Jacob did not think she would marry him. This was not about him proving himself to be a gallant gentleman, instead of a coldblooded shooter.

Like all things in the Jungle—

This was about power.

No more sophisticated than a man grabbing you in the streets.

This was Jacob's way of taking them back to that primitive form of domination. Of putting her on the menu even as he sat at the table.

"You said you would not marry me at gunpoint," Jacob pointed out. "But I assume that's only if you were in the range of fire. Isn't that right?"

Sara clenched her teeth, hard enough to crack them. When she turned back around, there was not a trace of anger on her face. She didn't ask how he had found out about Michael. That would only admit to how much he'd surprised her.

The only thing to do now was understate the weight of what he had on her.

"I will not sell my country to you, Mr. Ness," she said. Because that was what he meant, of course, when he spoke of marriage. "Not for my own life. Not for Michael's. Not for anyone else's."

He just flashed her that pleasant smile again. "When the election comes, and this country falls into chaos—remember I tried to offer friendship, Madam President."

"It's not friendship you're offering. Don't insult my intelligence."

"If war comes to this country—"

"It has come." She planted her eyes into his. "You and I are not on the same side. And will never be."

He considered her for a moment. "What a pity."

"Don't speak such words, Mr. Ness. I doubt you would know pity if it shot you in the head."

...

END NOTES: I know I've been a long time in updating. Please share your thoughts in the comment section!