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magic cures?” the president croaked.

      “Nary a one, Madam President, other than a hot toddy. A cup of tea, honey, lemon, and cognac. Easy on the tea and heavy on the cognac. Makes you sweat out all the toxins. I don’t usually recommend this, because my patients want to go to the drugstore and pay outrageous sums of money for a bottle of pills.”

      The president nodded. “I’ll give it a shot. When I was a little girl, my mother used to grease our chests with something called Musterole and wrap a warm towel around us. Then she’d string a bag of garlic around our necks. We used to get better right away. At least I think we did.”

      “That’s because you weren’t able to stand the smell, so in spite of everything, you healed yourself. Been there and survived. So, do we understand each other, Marti? Bed rest, liquids, and more bed rest.”

      “Yes, I understand. Thanks, Al.”

      Alfred Montrose looked around as he packed up his medical bag. “Isn’t there some way you could … make this room more … personal?”

      The president sighed. “I’m just temporary, Al. Family pictures, green plants, knickknacks, is that what you mean? What’s the point?”

      “Sometimes the familiar is the best medicine of all. But if this works for you, then that’s all that matters.”

      “When are you going to ask me, Al?”

      Montrose struggled to look nonplussed. “Ask you what?”

      “About my engagement? To Hank Jellicoe? Don’t you want to chastise me for my lousy choices in men? You were never bashful before I moved in here.”

      Montrose removed his glasses and slipped them into his pocket. “I assumed your engagement was off. Even I know there are some things that are too personal and private to talk about. You are the president now, Marti, and I didn’t want to overstep my boundaries. As for Mr. Jellicoe, how could you know what the man was all about? People tend to let us see only the best side of them, tell us what we want to hear. It’s always been that way. We all make poor choices from time to time. They say the trick is to learn from those mistakes.”

      “I guess I didn’t read that part of the rule. My track record with men is beyond lousy. It would appear I don’t learn from my mistakes. I knew there was something wrong, Al. I let it slide. Henry was so … in control… so with the program, I’m still having trouble accepting it all. What do you think I should do with the ring? I’m asking friend to friend.”

      Montrose chuckled. “That’s all above my pay grade. You want an answer, I see. Well, then, I think I’d put it in a box and write on the lid, ‘This belongs to someone I used to know,’ and let it go. One day you’ll know what to do with it. Is it valuable?” he asked curiously.

      The president tried to laugh and ended up coughing. “I suppose it could feed a third-world country for a little while. You know what, Al? I’m not even sure if it’s real. I’m beginning to have my doubts. It looks real, but I’m no authority on diamonds. Just for the hell of it, would you mind getting it appraised for me?”

      “Sure. I can do it when I leave here. I’ll bring it with me tonight when I come back to check on you.”

      “Is that necessary? You coming back to check on me?” the president asked as she rummaged in her night table drawer for the ring she’d wrapped in a wad of tissues. She tossed it to him.

      “No, it’s not necessary, but it’s the way things work around here. If they could, they’d have me babysitting you and reading you bedtime stories. Try and behave yourself, Madam President,” Montrose joked.

      When the door closed behind the doctor, Martine Connor yanked at one of her pillows and started punching it with the little strength she had. Then she started to cry. Eventually, she cried herself to sleep, her dreams filled with her one-of-a-kind memories of Hank Jellicoe. When she woke two hours later, her pillow wet with her tears, she punched at it again and again, then got up and pulled on a ratty robe from her college days. It felt like an old friend as she wrapped herself in it. If there was one thing she needed at that moment, it was an old friend. She slipped her feet into fuzzy-bear slippers and made her way to the kitchen, where she poured herself a glass of apple juice and drank it down in two long gulps. Then she made herself a cup of hot tea and followed the doctor’s order, light on the tea and heavy on the cognac.

      The president reached for a box of tissues as she made her way to the living room, where she stretched out on a chocolate-colored sofa. She gulped at the hot drink and somehow managed to finish it. After she pulled up a bright purple afghan her secretary had given her for Christmas the first year of her presidency, she clicked on the television and proceeded to channel surf as tears rolled down her cheeks. If the world could only see how unpresidential she looked right now.

      The president reached behind her for the pillows and fluffed them up. Within seconds, she was exhausted from the effort. She leaned back into the nest she’d made for herself and closed her watery eyes. Eventually, she dozed off as the twenty-four-hour newscasters felt compelled to drone on and on about nothing because it was a slow news day. As she drifted into a deep sleep, she started to dream, one wild dream after another, until she woke drenched in sweat. She didn’t have to touch her forehead with the underside of her arm, the way her mother used to do when she came down with a bad cold, to know her fever was gone.

      The president wiped at her forehead, face, and neck with a handful of tissues. Maybe she wasn’t going to die after all. She picked up the remote control and clicked until she hit the USA Network to watch a rerun of NCIS. She wished, and not for the first time, that she had someone on her staff like Mark Harmon. She did love Leroy Jethro Gibbs’s wicked smile. She wondered what would happen if she invited the entire cast and crew to the White House for dinner. Maybe she would do just that before the new season started in September. The more she thought about it, the better she liked the idea. And that idea brought another one swimming to the surface.

      The president leaned back into her nest and let her mind race. Her idea was so over the top, so outside the box, she knew she could make it work. And if she couldn’t make it work, she seriously did not belong in her job. She smiled as her mind continued to race one way, then another. Within minutes, she had herself so psyched that she wobbled out to the kitchen to make another toddy. If one had worked so quickly, a second one should be the magic bullet. Maybe she could sweat out more toxins, and by tomorrow, she’d be almost totally recovered. She would definitely have to be at the top of her game to put this particular plan into action.

      Martine dozed and woke, dozed and woke until she woke from a light sleep to see her doctor standing over her. She smiled when he reached down to touch her forehead. Alfred was definitely old school. “I’m feeling much better, and the underside of my arm told me earlier, after the first toddy, actually, that my fever had broken. Would that be your assessment, Alfred?”

      “It would, and you are right on the money, but you aren’t out of the woods, Marti. I’m still confining you to quarters. You can do what you have to do from here.” Ten minutes later, Montrose was done peering down her throat, done with checking her blood pressure and reading her pulse. He listened to her heart and lungs and made some notes. When he was finished, he reached into his pocket and withdrew the bunched-up tissues that held Marti’s engagement ring. He held it out to Marti, who reached for it with a trembling hand.

      “I’m sorry, Marti. The jeweler said it was a high-grade diamonique. He said they’re big sellers on the home shopping networks and that they look more real than a real diamond. The value he put on it is fourteen hundred dollars. I wrapped the jeweler’s report around the ring.”

      Marti made a very unladylike sound and muttered something that made her doctor grin outright.

      It was dark out when Martine woke again. She lay quietly, a little disoriented from her deep sleep. Once again, she was drenched in sweat. She looked around, aware that it was totally dark outside. Inside, the only light in the room came from the television set, which she had put on mute before she fell asleep. She wished, and not for the first

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