#Chapter 171: The Long Wait

Amelia The campaign suite was packed, the air dry and tense, and it still felt somehow hollow. Lights buzzed overhead, cold and clinical, and screens lined the far wall, pulsing through vote percentages every few minutes like a slow drumbeat. Staff cycled in and out, whispering updates and handing off reports, each more anxious than the last. The press were barred from the suite itself, but their presence buzzed just beyond the double doors, and I could hear them murmuring and could almost feel their cameras even when they weren’t aimed at me. I sat beside Richard at the main table, both of us maintaining a practiced posture of calm. His ankle rested on the opposite knee, one hand loose on the surface of the table, thumb idly tracing the rim of his water glass. I mirrored him as best I could, sitting upright with my hands folded neatly in my lap, though I couldn’t quiet the tapping of my foot under the table or the sick feeling crawling steadily up my chest. The central distric