" Muy bueno. Gracias. "

Lupe grabbed the brush and hair spray and shut the door behind her. Bode sipped coffee from a mug with an image of his smiling face and Bode Bonner for Governor stenciled on the side and stared out the second-story windows. The stark white, Greek Revival-style Governor's Mansion and grounds occupied an entire city block at the corner of Eleventh and Colorado in downtown Austin, as it had for one hundred and fifty-five years. Sam Houston himself had sat in this office and gazed out those windows, which now offered a prime view of the pink granite State Capitol sitting catty-cornered across Eleventh Street. The Capitol dome glowed in the morning sunlight just as Jim Bob's bald head glowed under the fluorescent office lights. Add in the pasty skin and pockmarked complexion-the man's got a face like a bowl of oatmeal-and James Robert Burnet looked more like a registered sex offender than the ace political strategist for the governor of the great State of Texas. Bode exhaled loudly enough to get his attention.

"What's wrong now?" Jim Bob said.

At first Bode wasn't sure Jim Bob was talking to him. His strategist had an earpiece that looked like a hearing aid on steroids wrapped around his ear, a newspaper in his lap, and an iPhone in his hands. His head was bent over, and his fingers fiddled with the phone like a squirrel with an acorn. Jim Bob texted on his cell phone more than Bode's eighteen-year-old daughter, and he carried on phone conversations while also conversing with Bode, which annoyed the hell out of him. Bode addressed the top of Jim Bob's bare head.