Beyond All Dreams (30 page)

Luke's star certainly seemed to be rising on Capitol Hill, and perhaps he no longer had time for the librarian he'd been friendly with during his political exile. But he'd promised her an honest effort to discover what had happened to the
Culpeper
, and he hadn't delivered on that promise yet.

She nudged through the crowd, weaving around the broad-shouldered men as she hurried toward the hall of representatives. She spotted him as he left the chamber.

“Luke!” His step quickened as he headed toward the east wing. She reached out to grab his elbow just before he passed into the private corridor. The guards stepped forward and began pushing her back.

She wouldn't let go. “Luke, what happened to the
Culpeper
?”

“Stop it,” Luke ordered firmly. She couldn't tell if he was speaking to her or to the guards. The guards paused and looked to Luke for instruction. “Let her through,” he said.

The guards stepped back, and Luke directed her down the gold and ivory corridor. His demeanor was baffling . . . he'd never been so cold to her before. How was she supposed to respond to this terse, aloof man?

Luke's back was stiff as she trailed after him, and he stared straight ahead. The halls back here were almost empty. Anna had worked in the Capitol for six years, but had never been in the private wings for elected officials.

At last he opened a door and gestured her inside a dimly lit cloakroom, with rows of coats and hats and scarves dominating the space. An elderly clerk behind the coat-check counter looked up the moment they stepped inside.

“If you don't mind, Jacob,” Luke said, “I need a few minutes of privacy.”

“Certainly, sir.” The man stepped around the counter, exiting the cloakroom and quietly closing the door behind him.

Luke peered down the four rows of coats to be certain they were alone.

“Well?” Anna said. “Were you planning on telling me anything more than the little note you sent the other day?”

“Anna, I'm sorry, but I've been very busy. I tried to get more information about the
Culpeper
, but didn't learn anything different from before.” It was warm in the small room, and Luke tugged on the collar of his shirt, careful to avoid looking at her
in the eyes. He glanced at the coats, the room's single window, anywhere but at her face.

“I don't believe you,” she said.

“It's the truth.”

“Why were you put back on the House Budget Committee? Cornelius Jones hates you.”

He shrugged. “It's just politics, Anna. Stranger things have happened.”

“Yes, like the
Culpeper
's chief petty officer turning up alive and well in Canada.”

A flush stained Luke's cheeks, and he took a step back. “Anna, I didn't want to tell you this, but Admiral Channing was at the meeting the other day, and he said Silas Zanetti had been ordered off the ship for insubordination one week before the hurricane. It was either that or face a court-martial back home.”

“Insubordination? Silas Zanetti was an easygoing man, not a hothead who couldn't follow orders.”

“You were only twelve years old. You didn't really know him. It turned out that being put off the ship was what saved Silas Zanetti's life. The ship sank, Anna.”

Something was wrong. Four months ago, Luke had been stripped of political power and ritually humiliated by Speaker Jones. Now that same archenemy gave Luke his seat back on the House Budget Committee, plus an appointment on a special committee reporting directly to the president?

“What about what the old diplomat said?” she challenged.

“You mean the one who had dinner with Thomas Jefferson? That old diplomat?”

“You're lying to me.”

His eyes turned flinty. “Anna, you don't know what you're talking about.”

“I know that you've despised Cornelius Jones from the moment
you arrived in Washington. Now you're sprinkling rose petals in his path.”

His jaw clenched, and he turned away and began pacing in the cramped cloakroom. “I sent you a note asking for your patience,” he said tightly. “I'm sorry we can't spend more time together, but I'm serving on a demanding committee and I'm asking for a little time. I have important responsibilities to deal with right now, and it would be selfish to get distracted by a romantic relationship. In a few months' time, perhaps that can change. Please try to understand.”

“I understand that you know what happened to the
Culpeper
and are covering it up.”

He stopped pacing and turned to look at her. “Are you ever going to be able to get the
Culpeper
out of your head? I want us to have a future someday, but that's impossible if you keep up with this obsession.”

“I'll never give up until you tell me what you know.”

He closed his eyes, and the way his shoulders sagged made him look twenty years older in the space of a few seconds. He swallowed and gathered a breath. “Anna, it's ancient history. It doesn't matter anymore. Please, just let this go. I've told you what I know and I don't see how we can ever be together if you keep accusing me of lying.”

“But you
are
lying. You sold your soul to get back on that committee, and for what? To lick the boots of Cornelius Jones? Tell me what happened to the
Culpeper.
”

He moved closer, and she instinctively backed up, bumping into a row of coats. “I'm fighting for the most important cause of my life,” he bit out. “If that means cooperating with Cornelius Jones to get things done, that's what I'll do. And I don't have to answer to you about that.” His hands were balled into fists, and he struggled to control his breathing. “I'll ask you again.
Are you going to be able to forget the
Culpeper
and move on with the rest of your life? I need to know.”

“I won't ever forget it. It taught me a lesson about who you really are, and how am I supposed to forget
that
? The man who couldn't become the world's greatest poet decided to crawl to the top by becoming the world's best bootlicker.”

The barb struck home. Luke whirled around and gave the wall a good hard kick.

Anna flinched, but tried to keep her voice steady in response. “Charming, Luke,” she said, her tone dripping with scorn. “The whole nation is safer because such a fine, rational man has won his precious appointment back.”

She retreated closer to the door. She would only flee if he dared to raise a hand to her, for she had quit running from bullies long ago. “Look me in the eyes and tell me the
Culpeper
sank just like the navy said. You can't.”

Luke met her eyes. They were smoldering with anger, and something else she couldn't place. She blinked back tears. The man who swore he would never lie, no matter what the cost, was now a lying bully.

“Anna, your father died in 1882. If you believe nothing else, believe that.”

“You're just saying that so I'll give up. I know that report is wrong and I want it corrected.”

“That will never happen.” His voice lashed out like a whip, and it frightened her. “You have no idea what you're dealing with, and if you don't stop this, they will squash you like a bug beneath their heel. Do you understand me? You need to stop this.”

He brushed past her and out of the cloakroom, but she followed him into the hallway.

“What about my father's letter?” she called.

He froze, then spun to look at her. “What letter?”

She walked to him, maintaining eye contact until she stood only inches away. “My father sent me a letter the week before the hurricane. He was in Cuba. I've still got that letter, and it's proof the navy is lying.”

His jaw tightened. Voices and footsteps from the rotunda echoed down the hallway, yet it seemed as if they were the only two people in the world. “I see,” he finally said.

How could she have let herself get close to a man who could flip on her like this? “I've been alone most of my life because I'm the only person in the world I can rely on. For a few days I deluded myself into thinking you were someone I could believe in. That I could trust you and lean on you, that you would never lie to me. What a mistake I made.”

Luke turned away from her, but the longing that flashed across his face nearly drove the strength from her knees.

“Come with me,” he said.

Anticipation built as she followed him down the corridor toward the rotunda. She prayed he had some reasonable explanation for his behavior and would hold her and tell her how foolish she'd been for doubting him even for a second. The voices from the rotunda grew louder as they approached the main hall, where the guards standing at attention in the doorway looked to Luke for instructions.

“Please escort Miss O'Brien back to the Library of Congress,” he said. “And don't let her back here again.”

Luke was shaking as he walked away from Anna. He hated liars. He hated bullies. And now he was both, and to a woman who deserved only his admiration and protection.

When he'd arrived in Washington, he'd vowed he would al
ways tell the truth, but that was before he'd walked into a private meeting with the highest officials in the nation and learned that things weren't always so simple. That the truth shouldn't always be paraded for the world to see. That some secrets needed to stay safely hidden and consigned to the past.

He'd been richly rewarded for agreeing to keep one of those secrets, just as Anna had accused. Luke would have kept quiet about the
Culpeper
even without the reappointment to the committee, but when it was offered, he took it.

Cornelius Jones waited for him around a corner near the alcove, his face calm. “It had to be done,” Jones said. “Come on, let's go have a smoke.”

Luke followed Speaker Jones into the congressional retiring room, which was packed with men lounging between sessions. Curious eyes scrutinized him and the Speaker as they walked through the double French doors onto a private balcony. Anna wasn't the only person bewildered by the sudden turn in his relationship with the Speaker. Everyone was commenting on the strange alliance, but Luke had no intention of shedding any light on it.

It was chilly on the balcony overlooking the manicured grounds of the Capitol, now crisp and yellow in the bleak February light. Jones reached into his coat pocket for some wrapping papers, a sack of tobacco, and a box of matches.

“Cigarette?” he asked. Luke shook his head. Jones moved to the balustrade to set out the wrapping paper and tap a narrow line of loose tobacco onto the paper.

“I disliked you from the moment you arrived in Washington,” Jones said in a casual voice as he methodically rolled the cigarette with practiced tobacco-stained fingers. “I thought you were hotheaded, arrogant, and stubborn. And an insufferable prude about smoking and drinking.”

Luke said nothing but struck a match as Cornelius leaned forward to accept the light. He took a long pull on the cigarette, then tilted his head to release the smoke into the air.

“Now I believe that hostility was a blessing,” the Speaker continued. “If two men from different sides of the House, total opposites in all things, can come together for a higher cause, perhaps we will be able to persuade others to follow us. It's our only hope.”

Luke nodded, praying this unlikely alliance would work. What an odd twist of fate that the man he'd despised for so many years was now his tightest ally. After agreeing to drop the petty squabbles that separated them, Cornelius Jones was rapidly proving to be a mentor, a friend, and the father Luke had always wished he had.

Luke stepped forward and looked out at the horizon, the Washington Monument rising proudly at the far end of the Mall. While it'd been a privilege to serve in Washington, the truth was he'd run for Congress as an excuse to escape his family troubles at home, not for any noble reason. All that had changed. He now understood his life's mission, and it was more important than political squabbles or personal glory.

Or heaven help him, more important even than Anna O'Brien. Lying to her was a horrible thing to do, but he would take whatever action was necessary to steer his cause through to completion.

And that meant he had to stop Anna from ever learning what really happened to the
Culpeper
.