“Now, how many people know about this? Four, right? Or have you told anyone else, Jase?”

“Not yet.” Jase’s voice is steely.

“But you’re planning to, because that would be the right thing to do, am I right, son?”

“I’m not your son. Yes.”

Crashing the chair back to its upright position, Clay inclines forward, elbows on his knees, hands outspread as if in supplication. “There’s where, with all due respect, I don’t think you’re thinking clearly.”

“Really?” Jase asks acidly. “Where am I confused?”

“By thinking two wrongs will make a right. When you tell other people what happened, Senator Reed will assuredly suffer. She will lose the career she’s dedicated her life to, the one where she serves the people of Connecticut so well. I’m not sure you’ve thought through, though, how much your girlfriend will suffer. If this gets out, she will, as they say, be tarred with the same brush. It’s a pity, but that’s what happens to the children of felons.”

Mom flinches at the word felons but Clay continues, “Are you prepared to live with that? Everywhere Samantha goes, people will be speculating about her morals. Thinking she must not have all that many. That could be a dangerous thing for a young woman. There are men who won’t hesitate to take advantage of that.”

Jase looks down at his hands, which have balled into fists. But on his face there’s pain, and worse—confusion.

“I don’t care about that,” I say. “You’re being ridiculous. What are you even saying—that the whole world will assume I’m a tramp because Mom hit someone with her car? Give me a break. They must have handouts with better lines than that at Cheesy Villain School.”

Jase laughs and puts his arm around me.

Unexpectedly, Clay laughs too. Mom’s impassive.

“In that case, I guess offering you two hush money in unmarked bills isn’t going to fly, huh?” Clay stands up, ambles behind Mom and begins massaging her shoulders. “Fine, then, where do we stand? What’s your next move, Jase?”

“I’m going to tell my family. I’ll let my parents decide what they want to do, once they have all the information.”

“You don’t need to be so defensive. Hey, I’m from the South. I admire a man who stands up for his family. It’s commendable, really. So you’re going to tell your folks, and, if your folks want to call a press conference and announce what they know, you’re fine with that.”

“That’s right.” Jase’s arm tightens around my shoulder.

“And if the accusations don’t bear weight because there are no witnesses and people think your parents are just crackpots out to make a buck, that’s all good with you too?”

Uncertainty returns to Jase’s face. “But…?”

“There’s a witness, and it’s me,” I point out.

Clay tilts his head, looking at me, nods once. “Right. I forgot that you had no problem betraying your mom.”

“That line’s straight out of Cheesy Villain School too,” I tell him.

Mom buries her head in her hands, her shoulders shaking. “There’s no point,” she says. “The Garretts will hear and they’ll do what they’ll do and there’s nothing to be done about it.” She lifts her face, teary, to Clay. “Thank you for trying, though, honey.”

Reaching into his pocket, he pulls out a handkerchief and gently dabs her lashes dry. “Grace, sugar, there’s always a way to play it. Have a little faith. I’ve been in this game a while.”

Mom sniffs, her eyes cast down. Jase and I exchange disbelieving looks. Game?

Clay hooks his thumbs in his pockets, coming around in front of the desk again, starting to pace. “Okay, Grace. What if you call the press conference—with the Garretts. You speak first. Confess everything. This terrible thing happened. You were wracked by guilt, but because your daughter and the Garrett boy were personally involved”—he pauses to smile at us, as if bestowing his blessing—“you kept quiet. You didn’t want to taint your daughter’s first true love. Everyone will identify with that—we all had that—and if we didn’t, we sure wish we had. So you kept quiet for the sake of your daughter, but…” He paces a little more, brow puckered. “… you couldn’t honorably represent the people with something of this magnitude on your conscience. This way’s riskier, but I’ve seen it work. Everybody loves a repentant sinner. You’d have your family there—your daughters standing by their mom. The Garretts, salt-of-the-earth types, the young lovers—”

“Wait just a minute here,” Jase interrupts. “What Sam and I feel about each other isn’t some”—he pauses, searching for words—“marketing tool.”

Clay tosses him an amused smile. “With all due respect, son, everyone’s feelings are a marketing tool. That’s what marketing is all about—hitting people in the gut. Here we have the young lovers, the working family struck with an unexpected crisis—” He stops pacing, grins. “Gracie, I’ve got it. You could also use the moment to introduce some new legislation to help working families. Nothing too radical, just something to say Grace Reed has come through this experience with even more compassion for the people she serves. This all makes perfect sense to me now. We could get Mr. Garrett—the wounded blue-collar man—to say he wouldn’t want Senator Reed’s good work to be destroyed by this.”

I look at Jase. His lips are slightly parted and he’s staring at Clay in fascination. Sort of the way you’d look at a striking cobra.

“Then you could appeal to the people, ask them to call or write or send e-mails directly to your office if they still want you as their senator. We in the business call that the ‘Send in Your Box Tops’ speech. People get all het up and excited because they feel part of the process. Your office gets besieged—you lay low for a few days, then call another conference and humbly thank the citizens of Connecticut for their faith in you and pledge to be worthy of it. It’s a killer moment, and at least fifty percent of the time, it makes you a shoo-in at election time,” he concludes, grinning at Mom triumphantly.

She too is staring at him with her mouth open. “But…” she says.