For the Love of Gina: The President's Girlfriend by Mallory Monroe Read Free Book Online

walked
out of the door.
    Forbes
glanced back at them too, just as confused as they were, but he swiftly
followed Dutch out.  
    Sam
stared at Jade so intensely that Jade had to ask if she had a problem.   Sam did.   “What the hell is going on here?” she asked her daughter.
    Jade
gave her a sidelong look.   “What is that
supposed to mean?”
    “You’re
fucking him, aren’t you?”
    Jade
smiled.   “You’re sick,” she said.
    Sam
grabbed her daughter and shook her.   “You’re fucking that fool?”   Sam
could hardly believe it.   “Aren’t you?   Aren’t you, Jade?”
    Jade
snatched away from her mother with a bitter snatch.   “Leave me alone!” she said so harshly that
Sam knew it was true.   She knew it like
she knew her name.  
    She
exhaled and shook her head.   Jade getting
better was about as possible as Jade getting a heart.   Neither, Sam concluded, were ever going to
happen in her lifetime.
    Or
anybody else’s.

 
    Once
Dutch and Forbes were out in the hall, Dutch hesitated, as if he was in deep
thought, as his hand still rested on the doorknob.
    “What’s
wrong, sir?” Forbes asked him.
    Dutch
didn’t respond.   He just stood there,
dressed immaculately as usual, Forbes thought, and Forbes suddenly felt as if
he was being treated disrespectfully.   He
was the director of Hammersmith, one of the best psychiatric facilities in the
country.   Dutch Harber, he felt, could at
least give him an explanation.  
    “What’s
wrong, sir?” Forbes finally asked again.
    It
was only then did Dutch look at him.   “I
heard the official version,” he said.   “Now I need to hear the unofficial one.”
    But
Forbes was confused.   “I don’t quite
follow you, sir.”
    “How
does your staff break down?   Are there
assignments based on patient room numbers, or full floor assignments, or what?”
    “Not
at all.    Well, let me back up.   Only for the housekeeping staff do we have
assignments based on patient rooms.   But as
for counselors, it’s based on their diagnoses and whether or not---”
    “Take
me to the men and women responsible for Jade’s section.   In Housekeeping.”
    Forbes
was dumbstruck now.   “Housekeeping, sir?”
    Dutch
nodded.   “Housekeeping.”
    Forbes
still didn’t understand, but it wasn’t as if he had a say in the matter.   “Right this way, sir,” he said.
    Dutch
followed Forbes as he took him downstairs, to Housekeeping, and requested that
the maids and janitors responsible for the fifth floor immediately stop what
they were doing and report downstairs.   Dutch and Forbes sat in the housekeeping supervisor’s tiny office, and
waited.   Within minutes the staff, two
women and one man, all black, arrived.   Including Cindy, the fifth floor maid in charge.
    “You
wanted to see us, sir?” she asked Forbes.
    “Yes,”
Forbes said.   “And you are?”
    “Cindy,
sir.   And that’s Richard.    And that’s Maggie.”
    “Very
good.   Close the door, please.”
    Richard
quickly closed the door.   All three stood
there, with their hands behind their backs, looking as if they were in some
kind of trouble.   Especially when they
saw Dutch sitting there.   They were used
to wealthy people around them.   The
patients all came from wealth.   But a
former president was an entirely different level, even at Hammersmith.
    “I’m sure
you all know President Harber.”
    They
all acknowledged that they did.
    “He
wants to ask you a question or two,” Forbes said, and then turned it over to
Dutch.  
    Dutch,
who was sitting on the front edge of the desk, crossed his legs at the
ankle.   “My daughter, Jade, has a room on
the floor you service.    Correct?”
    “Yes,
sir,” Cindy said for all three.
    “Were
all three of you were working on the fifth floor when my daughter first arrived
here?”
    They
all nodded.   “Yes, sir,” Cindy said.
    “I
want a straight answer from each of you, please,” Dutch requested.   “I want