Gavin stared at her, the fight draining from his shoulders. He had come to confront a mentor. He had found an enemy.
Rachel laughed—a dry, brittle sound. “Insurance? Gavin, I built you. When you were a nobody state rep with a DUI and a dying campaign, who gave you the playbook? Who wiped the slate clean, not once, not twice, but a dozen times? Those emails aren’t insurance. They’re proof of my loyalty.” rachel steele gavin
Now, Rachel sat in her silent Georgetown kitchen, the city’s lights blurring through rain-streaked windows. The text was from an anonymous number, but she knew the signature: terse, confident, and damning. Gavin had been quiet lately. Too quiet. He’d stopped taking her calls, started hiring his own staff, and last week, he’d voted against a bill she’d personally lobbied him to support. He wasn’t just distancing himself—he was preparing for war. Gavin stared at her, the fight draining from his shoulders
She met him at dawn in a deserted corner of the National Mall, the Lincoln Memorial looming like a stone ghost. Gavin arrived in a dark overcoat, his boyish face hardened by sleepless ambition. Rachel laughed—a dry, brittle sound
“And if I don’t?”
The wind picked up, rattling the bare branches above them. Rachel stepped closer, her heels clicking like metronomes of doom.