A smile curled Kellan’s lips. “Consider yourself lucky to be fired. I’ve got to listen to her disapproval for the rest of my life.”
Penelope shook her head and pressed one hand against Kellan’s chest to keep him at a safe distance. “Well, I’m going to be unemployed in three weeks. I have a pretty promising job lined up in Atlanta, but it hinges on a glowing recommendation from your mother.”
“I heard about that. That’s the reason I’m here.”
Penelope frowned. It wasn’t exactly common knowledge. “Who told you?”
“My mother.”
Penelope’s dark eyes grew wide. “You were talking to your mother? About me?” She didn’t even want to think about how that conversation had gone. After Penelope had landed a dream internship at the White House, she’d had to break it off with Kellan, and when a couple years later she’d been hired as Social Secretary, Mrs. Ramsey had acted as though her son had never dated her.
Kellan shrugged. “It certainly beats talking to her about me. Besides, I think she enjoyed it. She gets a thrill from knowing she split us up. She was taunting me about you moving to Atlanta to work at some fancy, private girls’ school. Is that really what you’re going to do?”
He said that like it was the most wretched job in the world. She supposed that for a rich kid who’d gone to a private school, it might be. For her, it was almost as good as the job she had now. But there was a time limit on jobs at the White House, and she’d be a fool to pass up this new opportunity. “Yes. The Jefferson Academy is one of the most highly regarded private schools in the world. Getting a position on the staff there is more impossible than being admitted as a student.”
“You’re going to teach stuck-up little girls which fork to use?”
It was just like him to reduce her hard work to something as trivial as flatware. “Etiquette is what holds polite society together. The parents of those ‘‘stuck-up little girls’ recognize that. It’s a very prestigious position. One that depends on your mother’s letter, so could you please take a step back before someone sees us?”
“No.” He didn’t budge an inch. “You won’t be happy there.”
“What makes you think you know so much about me, Kellan? It’s been a long time since we’ve been anything but casual acquaintances.”
“Exactly. And that ends here. Tonight.”
“Says who? You?” Penelope asked.
“I told you I would come back for you. Didn’t you believe me?”
Kellan had helped Penelope get a job as a White House intern while they were still in college. It was what she had always wanted, but the price of his gift was that they couldn’t see each other while she was interning. He knew it was important to her, though, and had told her he could be patient. That he would wait for her. But when she’d graduated, she’d continued working in the White House full-time as an administrative assistant and worked her way up to her dream job of social secretary. Kellan, meanwhile, had gone off to law school and followed his own path.
“It’s been six years. I thought you would’ve moved on by now.”
“Why? Because I had such a horrible reputation with women before we met?”
Penelope shrugged. “There is that.”
His blue eyes pinned her in place, sending a flush of heat up her throat. “And who have you seen me with since then? No one special. We were great together. I brought you out of your shell and you kept me level. We only split up because you were working for my mother.”
“Right.”
“And in a few weeks, you won’t be.”
“In a few weeks,” she repeated with emphasis. “Not tonight. I still have a job to do. Without a recommendation letter from Mrs. Ramsey, I’m going to end up moving back into my mother’s tiny apartment and begging to teach debutants how to serve a proper tea.”
“That’s ridiculous. You’ve done an amazing job. Everyone knows that.”
“No, Kellan. You know that. Outside of these walls, most people have no idea who I even am. No one stops eating at a State Dinner with the Premier of Japan and wonders who planned such a great party. The President and the First Lady did it. I am a silent force. I need that letter. And she’s certainly not going to write it if she finds you pressed up against me like this.”
Kellan looked down, starting at the pink toes peeping from her heels and letting his eyes slowly travel up the length of her body. “I’m hardly pressed against you. But I’d certainly like to be. That dress…” His voice trailed off and he swallowed hard before he spoke again. “You look great tonight.”
Penelope felt her knees weaken slightly, but she couldn’t fall into his arms the way she wanted to. It was pretty talk, but that’s all it could be. “Thank you,” she said. She could feel her cheeks flush, but she couldn’t break away from his gaze. “But we’ve had this discussion before. Nothing is going to happen between us while I work here.”
Penelope loved the thrill of planning a flawless event, the elegance of a perfectly crafted thank-you note. Etiquette was a lost art she was determined to keep alive. She’d come from practically nothing, and she’d still have nothing without the scholarship to Georgetown. She had fought her way to get where she was. Risking all that to fall into Kellan’s arms was foolish.
“And the clock is ticking down.”
So that was what brought all this on. He saw the end of his father’s administration as a green light between the two of them. She wished she could see it as positively. “Unlike you,” Penelope said, “I’m not looking forward to my time here ending.”
“That’s because you were never in the media spotlight.”
Penelope looked up at the man who’d protected her from the media when the lights had chased her. Dating the first son should’ve landed her name and picture in magazines and newspapers, but he’d shielded her from it all. In the years since, he had grown up, but he still had the same caring heart.
“I was almost caught up in the media storm. If not for you, I—”
“If not for me, you never would’ve been in that position to begin with,” Kellan said.
“But you could’ve let the press splash my name and picture everywhere. And you didn’t.”
Kellan smiled and her insides melted like she was twenty again. “I didn’t want to share you with the world. They would’ve found a way to turn our relationship into another one of my scandals, and you deserved better than that. I didn’t want to ruin us.”
“You couldn’t have ruined us,” she said.
Kellan narrowed his eyes as he listened to her speak. “What happened to that sweet, southern accent I used to love?”
Penelope was grateful for the change in subject. “I’ve been living in D.C. too long, I guess.” The truth was more that she’d deliberately tried to shake her accent. She’d wanted to sound more professional when she started to work at the White House full-time. She didn’t want to be the only Elly May in the office.
Kellan frowned at her. He could see the truth in her eyes. “There was nothing wrong with you the way you were. My Penny was perfect. You didn’t have to change for my mother.”
“I