Melanie always arrived before anyone else on the senior staff.“Thanks, Annie,” Melanie said.“Let me see it,” Annie said.“What?” Melanie replied innocently, opening her suit jacket.“Oh, my God, it is amazing - totally worth the splurge. Her assistant, Annie McKay, was already there.“Happy birthday,” she whispered, even though no one else would have heard her if she’d yelled at the top of her lungs. It could be ninety-seven degrees outside, or minus seven, and the climate was always a cool sixty-six degrees inside the West Wing, where she’d be for the next sixteen hours.Melanie climbed the single flight of stairs to her office and walked inside. She wished she’d worn a coat, but she’d stopped dressing for the seasons years ago. Just keep your eyes on the road,” Melanie said.“Yes, ma’am,” Walter said, still smiling.A minute later, he pulled the car as close as possible to the entrance of the West Wing and jumped out to open the door for her.Melanie stepped out of the SUV, holding her Dior bag protectively under her suit jacket so the fresh snow wouldn’t touch the leather. “Your secret is safe with us.”“Shut up, Walter. “And it’s not like she has the CIA or the FBI to turn to if she wants to find out for herself when her chief of staff’s birthday is, so you should be fine, Melanie.” He smirked. I didn’t even remind Char - er, President Kramer that it was today.”“Mmm-hmm,” Walter said, glancing at Melanie in the rearview mirror as he navigated M Street in the snow. “Open it - it’s from both of us,” she said, gesturing at Walter, Melanie’s other agent.“Thanks, Sherry, but my birthday is a classified national security event. She turned around, smiled at Melanie, and handed her an envelope. Snow had been falling since late the night before, and at five-thirty a.m., they would make fresh tracks.“Happy birthday, Ms. She’d resisted full-time Secret Service protection at first, but on mornings like this, she was glad she’d relented. “Morning guys,” she said to her agents as she hopped into the SUV that would take her less than two miles to the White House. “Those look like the eyes of an old woman,” she said to herself before turning out the lights in her Georgetown condo and walking out. She scrunched her nose and leaned in to examine the creases and dark circles that rimmed her eyes.
Melanie’s hair hung in a stylish strawberry-blond bob.
#Bathing suit nicole wallace msnbc full
Five years on a strict no-carbohydrate diet had banished her full cheeks, and the miracle of chemical straightening had finally tamed her red curls. She glanced at her reflection and nodded approvingly. Only a dozen White House staffers were given hard pins. The small, round pin bearing the presidential seal signaled to the United States Secret Service that she was to be granted full access to the president. Gently, she stacked the BlackBerrys, two phones, her ID for the West Wing, an ID and key for the underground command center she’d be evacuated to in case of a terrorist attack, her passes to the Pentagon and the State Department, an ID for the Camp David guard station, a West Wing parking pass, and her wallet and keys inside and closed it.She stopped in front of the hallway mirror to attach her hard pin to the lapel of her black Armani pantsuit. She considered leaving one of them behind but thought better of it. She looked at the three BlackBerrys - one for the classified e-mail system, one for the normal White House e-mail system, and one for her personal Yahoo account. The elegance of the two-thousand-dollar Dior purse would be lost on most of Melanie’s colleagues, but its perfection brought her a surprising amount of happiness.As Melanie pulled the purse out of its protective cloth and removed the paper stuffed inside, she suddenly felt worried that all of her electronics wouldn’t fit into it properly. The second most expensive bag in her closet was a Marc Jacobs she’d purchased on sale years before. Melanie pushed the tissue paper aside and gazed adoringly at the Dior bag she had splurged on for her thirty-seventh birthday.
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