She ignored him. “The thing is, you’re going to have to think very hard about this because a lot of bad stuff will happen if you go with me, and I won’t be able to do anything about it.”

Lucy’s eyes were wide. “What do you mean? How could anything bad happen?”

Nealy rose and walked over to the ottoman at the foot of Lucy’s chair. “I’m a public figure, and that won’t go away, even when I’m no longer First Lady. ” She sat down and took Lucy’s hand, rubbed her slim, cold fingers. “We’ll be connected, so lots of people will be waiting for you to do something wrong.”

Lucy’s throat worked as she swallowed. “I don’t care about that.”

“You’ll care. Believe me. It’s a terrible thing to lose your privacy, and that’s what you’ll be doing. You’ll have Secret Service following you everywhere—when you’re with your friends, the first time you’re on a date, wherever you want to go. You’ll never be able to go anywhere by yourself.”

“You did.”

“This has only been temporary. I knew from the beginning that I’d have to go back to my real life.” She rubbed Lucy’s knuckles. “And it’s not just the big things in your life that will be destroyed; it’s the little things, too. Think about how much you love going to the mall. You won’t be able to do that without causing all kinds of trouble, and pretty soon you’ll realize it’s not worth it. You’re going to miss things like that a lot.”

“I never said I had to go to malls.”

Nealy needed to make her understand exactly what she was walking into. “Wait until you screw up, Luce, because that won’t be just between the two of us. The whole world will know about it.”

Mat took a step closer to the windows, Button limp in his arms, his expression growing more foreboding. He should be her partner in this, not her adversary, and her resentment deepened.

She returned her attention to Lucy. “If you curse in public, or talk too loud, or decide to go back to that awful purple hair, it’s going to end up in the newspapers, and then everybody will starting criticizing you. One day you’ll turn on the television, and some psychologist will be analyzing your personality for all of America.”

“That blows.”

Her words had finally penetrated. “It really does. And it’ll happen, I promise you.”

“Did people say a lot of bad things about you in the newspaper while you were growing up?”

“Not too much.”

“Then why do you think they’ll say them about me?”