The Senator's Mistress

Jack's entry into political life was itself a point of frequent nostalgia. For Jack had walked straight in, yes-sir-ee, straight in through the front door of the White House. Before his feet had even had a chance to return to the ground after his short and fateful war, he had been summoned to the White House and offered the position of chief military liaison officer. Largely a political position, it had afforded Jack both prominent military and political presence, a status that he used to full advantage ten years later when he had first sought elected office as a Representative of his home state of North Carolina. Still then very much a local celebrity, and newly wed at thirty-two to Raleigh's well-heeled homecoming queen Grace DeMonde after a whirlwind romance and engagement, Jack had swept triumphantly into office. Although it had been strenuously denied by local party officials that his sudden marriage to such a renowned society lady had been part of a carefully orchestrated election campaign, Jack had in the fullness of time grown to love and to treasure Grace who became his closest and most trusted companion and mother to his fine, handsome sons. Ten joyful years later, at forty-two, he had ascended to the Senate, a move which had been effectively ordained by the retirement of old Joe O'Reilly, his late mentor and life-long friend. People liked Jack. A firm hand shake, a strong look in the eye and an honest tone. People knew where they stood with Jack. He never broke his word, was never late, and above all was unflinching in his loyalty to his friends and the Party. Jack didn't even have a vice, well maybe a spot too much and a drab too often in his whisky glass, and... Jack paused for reflection. The euphoria drained from him over a long sigh. Well... no, Monique wasn't a vice. Plenty of men at his age had lady friends some thirty, even forty years their junior. Well, what the hell, a red-blooded man didn't even reach his prime until fifty! It was only natural, and Grace; well she hadn't really minded, even though she still dearly loved him and was well past the age of satisfying a man. He caught the lump in his throat and tried to swallow it. No, it wasn't infidelity, it wasn't! She had even told him that she'd long known, even after she'd walked in on him with Monique in the office, and afterwards had insisted that she hadn't really minded.