Dutch and Gina: The Power of Love (36 page)

The door opened again, and instead of the assistant walking back in, a young, somewhat gaunt-looking black male in glasses walked in.
 
When Gina turned to see who it was, she could hardly believe her eyes.
 

She frowned.
 
“Marcus?” she asked, and that name alone prompted LaLa and Jade to look too.
 

“Hello, sis,” Marcus Rance said, his face lit up with the kind of happiness that only hope could allow.

“Is that you, Marcus?” Gina asked, moving toward him, her face still unable to believe that she was seeing what she just knew couldn’t possibly be right in front of her.

“Yes, it’s me,” he said.
 
“You can believe it.
 
I’m still trying to.”

Gina touched first his arms, and then his baby face, and then they embraced warmly.
 
When Gina pulled back, she still appeared to be in shock.
 
“But how could you be here?
 
How could you be free?”

“Governor Feingold granted me a pardon.
 
And they quietly released me in the dead of night, and the president’s people brought me straight here.
 
Just in time for the wedding looks like.”
 

“But I didn’t talk to him.
 
I didn’t convince him. I
  
didn’t. . .”
 
Then Gina smiled, touched her brother on the side of the face.
 
“I’ll be right back,” she said, and took off running.

“I know she’s in shock, but gosh,” Marcus said, grinning.
 
“I didn’t think I’d scare her away.”

“You didn’t scare her,” LaLa said.
 
“You just pleased her.”

“Good,” Marcus said.
 
“Sunshine and light, that’s what I’m after.”
 
Then he extended his hand.
 
“Hello, LaLa.
 
You were with Regina when she visited me at the prison.”

“You remembered,” LaLa said, shaking his hand.
 
“That’s a plus in your favor.”

Marcus smiled.
 
“And this must be?” he said, extending his hand to Jade.

“That’s Jade Bale,” LaLa said.
 
“Your niece.”

Jade smiled.
 
But instead of shaking his hand, she hugged his neck.

Dutch and Crader sat in chairs facing each other.
 
They were in a White House dressing room inside the Residence.
 
Both wore tuxedos, both were leaned forward, both had their legs apart, their expensive Italian shoes sparkling against the bright, sun-filled space. Dutch had his elbows resting on his thighs, his hands clasped underneath his chin.
 
Crader was too nervous to do anything but sit there.

“There’s not much I can say to you, my friend,” Dutch was saying, “except to be good to her.”

Crader nodded.
 
“I will try my level best.”

“Women are wonderful creatures,” Dutch continued.
 
“I adore them.
 
But there are some who never understand boundaries.
 
They will still try to take what isn’t theirs to have.”

Crader nodded.
 
“Don’t I know it.
 
That may be my biggest challenge.”

“There’s no may in it,” Dutch assured him.
 
“It will be your greatest challenge.
 
You love women, just as I do.
 
But you have to say no.”

Crader looked at Dutch.
 
Studied his expression.
 
“You don’t even get tempted, do you?”

Dutch inwardly snorted.
 
“Yes, I do,” he admitted.

“Even now?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“Believe it, Cray.
 
I’m out of town away from my wife quite a bit, just as you’ll be.
 
There’re beautiful women all around me, many of whom are more than willing to get in that bed with me and let me fuck the shit out of them.”

“But you don’t do it?”

“I don’t do it, no.”

“Why?” Crader asked, staring at Dutch as if the answer to this question would answer the riddle of his life.

“Because I think about Gina, and what it would do to her, and I see the stop sign.”

“But those feelings are there?
 
You do want to have sex with those women?”

“Yes, of course.
 
Just because I love Gina doesn’t mean I’m some hermit.
 
I still appreciate women of all shapes and sizes.
 
But Gina’s my girl.
  
I don’t want any of them above her.”

Crader nodded.
 
“I’ve been a womanizer my entire life.
 
But ever since that night I messed up with Liz, I haven’t even thought about being with anybody but LaLa.
 
I’m praying that holds.”

Dutch laughed.
 
“Well, it certainly won’t hold by osmosis.
 
You have got to make it hold,” he said.
 
And just as he said it, Gina came bursting in.

“Well, excuse me, Mrs. Harber,” Crader said, standing up.
 
“I could have been naked up in here.”

“Ugh,” Gina said, “and I would have been sick up in here.”

Crader laughed.
 
“I’ll go and see if I can get a little look at the bride,” he said, leaving.

“Don’t you dare, Crader McKenzie!” Gina yelled, sitting down in the chair he just vacated.

Crader left.

“Marcus is here,” she said breathlessly to Dutch.

“Yes, I’m aware of that.”

“But how could it be?
 
I never spoke to Governor Feingold.
 
I never got a chance to convince him of Marcus’s innocence.”

“But I did,” Dutch said.
 

Gina stared at him.
 
“You spoke to him?”

“Yes.
 
We met at a friend’s home here in DC.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“And you convinced him just like that?”

“I showed him all of the evidence. I explained to him why you and I are convinced that Marcus did not kill those people in that drive-by shooting.
 
I told him that I strongly believed a miscarriage of justice had taken place in the matter, and that he would be on firm moral ground if he were to pardon young Mr. Marcus.”

“And there were no bribes?”

“No bribes, no promise of a position, just the facts.”
 
Then Dutch smiled.
 
“And a little of that presidential bully pulpit,” he added.

“Oh, Dutch,” Gina said, grabbing hold of both his hands.
 
“You did all of that for Marcus?”

“Mainly for you,” he admitted.
 
But he didn’t have to.
 
Gina was already in his arms.

And they carried that affection into the ceremony on the White House lawn.
 
The traditional
Here Comes the Bride
began playing, Marcus, Christian, and Jade, with Little Walt in Jade’s arms, stood, and Dutch began walking Loretta “LaLa” King down the aisle.

LaLa fought tears the entire time.
 
It was just that it felt so ironic to her.
 
She had decided, after so many heartbreaks, that happiness wasn’t meant for her.
 
She had reached the conclusion that she would be alone for the rest of her life, with no prospects worth her time or attention.
 
She even grew content being alone.

But then something happened on the way to her spinsterhood.
 
Crader got his act together.
 
And he stepped up and finally began behaving as the man she deep down had hoped he would become.
 
But she was determined to be cautious. She wasn’t about to go into this marriage with blinders on.
 

She glanced at Dutch as he walked her down the aisle.
 
She spent the night at the White House and he took time out of his busy schedule to come to her room, late last night, sit on the side of her bed, and have a heart-to-heart with her.
 
She expected him to talk about Crader and how Crader wasn’t perfect and how she had to bear with him.
 
But he didn’t.
 
He talked about himself, instead.
 
And how she was wrong to think that his relationship with Gina was a perfect one.

“Far from it,” Dutch had said, sitting there, and LaLa remembered being surprised that he would say that.
 
Intellectually she knew that no marriage was perfect.
 
But if there was ever one that came close, she believed, it was Dutch and Gina’s.

But he said that wasn’t so.

He told her that, just as he still had urges for women, Crader was going to be the same way.
 
“You don’t go from a tail chaser to chastity just like that,” he had said, prompting her to smile.
 
They were men with big appetites, he said, but that they were also men with a love and affection for their women that no appetite could surpass.
 
Just know, Dutch wanted LaLa to know, that Crader was going to work at it and Dutch was going to do everything in his power to see that he did.
 

And that short little conversation went a long way to help ramp down LaLa’s fears.

As they walked past Little Walt, he cried out, “Daddy!” and then “Auntie!” and everybody laughed.
 
And when Dutch surrendered LaLa to Crader, to his brand new vice president, he remained on stage as the best man.
 
And there they stood, LaLa and Crader, and Dutch and Gina, the bride’s matron of honor.
 

“Dearly beloved,” the minister began, and Dutch took Gina’s hand and squeezed it.
 
Because she was his dearly beloved.
 
Through joys and pain, sunshine and rain, Gina remained the one human being he could always rely on for strength and help and understanding.
 
Because they could take it all from him.
 
They could take the power, the riches, the glory of being President of the United States.
 
But he would still mark his life as a richly blessed life.
 
And it wouldn’t be because Dutch had power or riches or glory.
 
It wouldn’t be because Dutch had elegance and beauty and sophistication.
 
It would be because Dutch had Gina.
 
And Gina was, in his eyes, first and last, everything.
 
His
everything.