The long black limousine pulled up slowly, and came to a
stop, in a long line of cars just like it. It was a balmy
evening in early June, and two Marines stepped forward in
practiced unison, as Madeleine Hunter emerged gracefully
from the car in front of the east entrance to the White
House. A brightly lit flag was fluttering in the summer
breeze, and she smiled at one of the Marines as he
saluted. She was tall and thin, in a white evening gown
that draped elegantly from one shoulder. Her hair was dark
and swept up in a neat French twist which showed off her
long neck and single bare shoulder to perfection.
Her skin was creamy, her eyes blue, and she moved with
enormous poise and grace in high-heeled silver sandals.
Her eyes danced as she smiled, and stepped aside as a
photographer flashed her picture. And then another, as her
husband stepped out of the car and took his place beside
her. Jack Hunter was powerfully built, a man of forty-
five, he had made his first fortune in the course of a
career in pro football, invested it brilliantly, and in
time had traded and sold and bought first a radio station,
then added television to it, and by forty owned one of the
major cable networks. Jack Hunter had long since turned
his good fortune into big business. And he was very big
business.
The photographer snapped their photograph again, and then
they swiftly disappeared into the White House. They made a
striking couple, and had for seven years. Madeleine was
thirty-four, and had been twenty-five when he discovered
her in Knoxville. Her drawl had long since disappeared, as
had his. Jack was from Dallas, and he spoke in powerful,
clipped tones that convinced the listener instantlythat he
knew exactly what he was doing. He had dark eyes that
pursued his quarry to all corners of the room, and he had
a way of listening to several conversations at once, while
still managing to seem intent on the person to whom he was
speaking. There were times, people who knew him well said,
when his eyes seemed to bore right through you, and other
times when you felt he was about to caress you. There was
something powerful and almost hypnotizing about him. Just
looking at him, sleekly put together in his dinner jacket
and perfectly starched shirt, his dark hair smoothly
combed, he was someone one wanted to get to know and be
close to.
He had had the same effect on Madeleine when they met,
when she was barely more than a girl in Knoxville. She had
had a Tennessee drawl then, she had come to Knoxville from
Chattanooga. She’d been a receptionist at the television
station where she worked, until a strike forced her into
doing first weather, and then news, on camera. She was
awkward and shy, but so beautiful that the viewers who saw
her sat mesmerized as they stared at her. She looked more
like a model or a movie star, but she had a girl-next-door
quality about her that everyone loved, and a breathtaking
ability to get right to the heart of a story. And Jack was
bowled over when he first saw her. Her words as well as
her eyes were searing.
“What do you do here, pretty girl? Break all the boys’
hearts, I’ll bet,” he’d said to her. She didn’t look a
minute over twenty, though she was nearly five years
older. He had stopped to talk to her when she came off the
air.
“Not likely,” she laughed. He was negotiating to buy the
station. And he had, two months later. And as soon as he
did, he made her co-anchor, and sent her to New York to
teach her first everything she needed to learn about
network news, and then how to do her hair and makeup. And
the effect, when he saw her on the air again, was
impressive. Within months, her career was off and running.
It was Jack who helped extricate her from the nightmare
she had been living, with a husband she’d been married to
since she was seventeen, who had committed every possible
kind of abuse on her. It was no different from what she
had seen happen in Chattanooga as a child, between her
parents. Bobby Joe had been her high school sweetheart,
and they’d been married for eight years when Jack Hunter
bought the cable network in Washington, D.C., and made her
an irresistible offer. He wanted her as his prime-time
anchor, and promised her that if she came, he’d help her
sort her life out, and cover all the most important
stories.
He came to Knoxville himself in a limousine. She met him
at the Greyhound bus station, with one small Samsonite bag
and a look of terror. She got into the car with him
without a sound, and they drove all the way to Washington
together. It took Bobby Joe months to figure out where she
was, and by then she had filed for divorce, with Jack’s
help, and a year later, they were married. She had been
Mrs. Jack Hunter for seven years, and Bobby Joe and his
unthinkable abuse on her were a dim nightmare. She was a
star now. She led a fairy-tale life. She was known and
respected and adored all across the country. And Jack
treated her like a princess. As they walked into the White
House arm in arm, and stood in the reception line, she
looked relaxed and happy. Madeleine Hunter had no worries.
She was married to an important, powerful man, who loved
her, and she knew it. She knew that nothing bad would ever
happen to her again. Jack Hunter wouldn’t let it. She was
safe now.
The President and First Lady shook hands with them in the
East Room, and the President said in an undervoice to Jack
that he wanted to catch a private moment with him later.
Jack nodded, and smiled at him, as Madeleine chatted with
the First Lady. They knew each other well. Maddy had
interviewed her several times, and the Hunters were
invited to the White House often. And as Madeleine drifted
into the room on her husband’s arm, heads turned, people
smiled and nodded, everyone recognized her. It was a long,
long way from Knoxville. She didn’t know where Bobby Joe
was now, and no longer cared. The life she had known with
him seemed entirely unreal now. This was her reality, a
world of power and important people, and she was a bright
star among them.
They mingled with the other guests, and the French
Ambassador chatted with Madeleine amiably and introduced
her to his wife, while Jack moved away to speak to a
Senator who was the head of the Senate Ethics Committee.
There was a matter before them that Jack had been wanting
to discuss with him. Madeleine saw them out of the corner
of her eye, as the Brazilian Ambassador approached her,
with an attractive Congresswoman from Mississippi. It was,
as always, an interesting evening.
Her dinner partners, when they moved into the State Dining
Room, were a Senator from Illinois and a Congressman from
California, both of whom she had met before, and who vied
all evening for her attention. Jack was sitting between
the First Lady and Barbara Walters. It was late in the
evening before he joined his wife again, and they moved
smoothly onto the dance floor.
“How was it?” he asked casually, watching several key
players as he danced with her. Jack rarely lost track of
the people around him, and he usually had an agenda, of
those he wanted to see, and meet, and touch base with
again, either about a story or a matter of business. He
rarely, if ever, missed opportunities, and never simply
spent an evening without some plan to what he was doing.
He had spent a few minutes in a quiet aside with the
President, and then President Armstrong had invited him to
Camp David for lunch that weekend to continue the
conversation. But Jack was concentrating on his wife now.
“So how was Senator Smith? What did he have to say for
himself?”
“The usual. We talked about the new tax bill,” she smiled
at her handsome husband. She was a worldly woman now, of
considerable sophistication and enormous polish. She was,
as Jack liked to say, a creature entirely of his making.
He took full credit for how far she had come, and the
enormous success she enjoyed on his network, and he loved
to tease her about it.
“That sounds pretty sexy,” he said, referring to the tax
bill. The Republicans were having a fit over it, but Jack
thought the Democrats would win this one, particularly
with the President behind them, which he was
squarely. “What about Congressman Wooley?”
“He’s so cute,” she said, smiling up at Jack again, as
always, still a little dazzled by his presence. There was
something about her husband’s looks, his charisma, the
aura that surrounded him, that still impressed her. “He
talked about his dog and his grandchildren. He always
does.” She liked that about him, and he was crazy about
the woman he had been married to for nearly sixty years
now.
“It’s a wonder he still gets elected,” Jack said as the
music ended.
“I think everyone loves him.” The warm heart of the girl
next door from Chattanooga hadn’t left her, despite her
good fortune. She never lost sight of where she’d come
from, and there was still a certain ingenuousness about
her, unlike her husband, who was sharply honed, and on
occasion somewhat abrasive and aggressive. But she liked
talking to people about their kids. She had none of her
own, and Jack had two sons in college in Texas, though he
rarely saw them, but they were fond of Maddy. And despite
his vast success, their mother had few good things to say
about their father, or Maddy. They had been divorced for
fifteen years, and the word she used most often to
describe him was ruthless.
“Ready to call it a night?” Jack asked, as he assessed the
room again, and decided that he had already touched base
with everyone that mattered, and the party was nearly
over. The President and First Lady had just left, and
their guests were free to go now. Jack saw no reason to
stay any longer. And Maddy was happy to go home, she had
to be in the newsroom early the next morning.
They left the party quietly, and their driver was waiting
for them near the door, as they made a graceful exit. And
Maddy settled comfortably into the limousine beside her
husband. It was a long way from Bobby Joe’s old Chevy
truck, the parties they had gone to at the local bar, and
the friends they had visited in trailers. Sometimes she
still had trouble believing that her two very different
lives were part of one lifetime. This was all so
different. She moved in the world of Presidents and Kings
and Queens, politicians and princes and tycoons like her
husband.
“What did you and the President talk about tonight?” she
asked, stifling a yawn. She looked as lovely and as
beautifully put together as she had at the beginning of
the evening. And more than she realized, she was an
incredible asset to her husband. Rather than being
recognized as the man who had invented her, he was seen
now as Madeleine Hunter’s husband, and if he knew it, he
never acknowledged it to Maddy.
“The President and I discussed something very
interesting,” Jack said, looking vague, “I’ll tell you
about it when I’m free to talk about it.”
“When will that be?” she asked with renewed interest. She
was not only his wife, but had become a skilled reporter,
and she loved what she did, the people she worked with,
and the newsroom. She felt as though she had her fingers
on the pulse of the nation.
“I’m not sure yet. I’m having lunch with him on Saturday
at Camp David.”
“It must be important.” But it all was. Anything that
involved the President was potentially a big story.
They drove the short distance to R Street, chatting about
the party. And Jack asked her if she’d seen Bill Alexander.
“Only from a distance. I didn’t realize he was back in
Washington.” He had been in seclusion for the past six
months, after the death of his wife in Colombia the year
before. It had been a terrible story, which Maddy
remembered all too clearly. She had been kidnapped by
terrorists, and Ambassador Alexander had handled the
negotiations himself, awkwardly apparently. After
collecting the ransom, the terrorists had panicked and
killed her. And the Ambassador had resigned shortly after.
“He’s a fool,” Jack said without preamble or pity for
him. “He never should have tried to handle it himself.
Anyone could have predicted that would happen.”
“I don’t suppose he believed that,” Maddy said quietly,
glancing out the window.
And a moment later, they were home, and she and Jack
walked up the stairs as he took his tie off.
“I have to be in the office early tomorrow,” she said, as
he unbuttoned his shirt in their bedroom, and she slipped
her dress off and stood before him in nothing more than
pantyhose and her high-heeled silver sandals. She had a
spectacular body which was never wasted on him, nor had it
been in her previous life, though the two men she had been
married to were extraordinarily different. The one brutal
and unkind and rough with her, indifferent to her
feelings, or cries of pain when he hurt her, the other so
smooth, so careful, so seemingly respectful of her. Bobby
Joe had once broken her arms, and she had broken her leg
when he pushed her down the stairs. That had been right
after she had met Jack, and he had been in a jealous rage
about him. She had sworn to him that she wasn’t involved
with Jack, and she hadn’t been then. He was her employer
and they were just friends, the rest had come later, after
she left Knoxville and moved to Washington to work for him
at his cable network. Within a month of her arrival in
Washington she and Jack had become lovers, but her divorce
was already in the works then.
“Why are you going in early?” Jack asked over his shoulder
as he disappeared into his black marble bathroom. They had
bought the house five years before, from a wealthy Arab
diplomat. There was a full gym and a swimming pool
downstairs, beautiful reception rooms Jack liked to use to
entertain, and all six of the house’s bathrooms were
marble. The house had four bedrooms, a master, and three
guest rooms.
There was no plan to turn any of the guest rooms into a
nursery. Jack had made it very clear to her right from the
beginning that he didn’t want children. He hadn’t enjoyed
the two he had when they were growing up, and he had no
desire to have more, in fact he absolutely forbade it. And
after a brief period of mourning for the babies she would
never have, at Jack’s insistence, Maddy had had her tubes
tied. She thought it was better in some ways, she had had
half a dozen abortions during her years with Bobby Joe,
and she wasn’t even sure anymore if she could have a
normal baby. It seemed easier to give in to Jack’s wishes
and not take any chances. He had given her so much, and
wanted such great things for her, she could see his point
that children would only be an obstacle she’d have to
overcome, and a burden on her career. But there were still
times when she regretted the irreversibility of her
decision. At thirty-four, a lot of her friends were still
having babies, and all she had was Jack now. She wondered
if she’d regret it even more when she grew older and had
no grandchildren, or children of her own. But it was a
small price to pay for the life she shared with Jack
Hunter. And it had been so important to Jack. He had
insisted on it.