He Stole My Bill, So I Divorced Him and Outranked His Father novel · Chapter 24 of 24
Chapter 24: The Author Gets the Pen
On the first Thursday in June, the Governor held a bill signing in the Reception Room on the second floor of the Capitol.
I stood at the side door in my green dress, and I could not feel my hands.
The room was full. Cameras lined the back wall, and the chairs stood in rows.
In the third row, on the aisle, sat Emilio's mother in her church dress with her braid pinned up.
Catalina sat beside her in blue, with a lanyard and a legal pad, holding her mother's hand.
The seat where the Senator had once held court belonged to the new committee chair, a mild woman from Amarillo.
Beside her sat a man with a silver mustache and a rodeo buckle, who saw me and took his hat off.
My father sat in the front row in his church suit, with my mother's photograph in his breast pocket.
The Governor came to the podium and tapped the microphone.
"Y'all know I don't like speeches," she said. "I'll keep this one short and honest."
"A year ago a woman stood up in this room and asked a question nobody could answer."
"The Springs Act has kept the water in the ground for twelve months. Today I sign its funding."
She picked up the pen.
"I'm signing it for the Hill Country," she said. "And the pen goes to the woman who wrote every line."
She signed with a long, slow stroke.
Then she held out the pen to me.
It was an ordinary black fountain pen, a little heavy in the hand.
Emilio stood against the wall by the Governor's door, in his gray suit, where he had stood a year ago.
He was not watching the Governor. He was watching me.
I walked to the podium.
"Thank you, Governor," I said. "Last June a man stood here and thanked his wife for her cobbler."
A warm ripple went through the room.
"I make a very good cobbler," I said. "I also wrote this bill. I think a person should be allowed to do both."
The room laughed, and it was a different laugh.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–6 of He Stole My Bill, So I Divorced Him and Outranked His Father are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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