Stalked, ducked, covered, rolled, shot the bad guys. Kept moving.
The mantra, it’s a rhythm. It gets in your heart. Protect POTUS.
Protect POTUS. ”
Her gaze was far away, and Tam had no doubt that for Kip, the memories were close, real and painful.
“I finally got to the limo. Everybody’s down, just the President and the driver. Driver can’t get out—that’s his orders. So it’s up to me when a figure appears out of a side alley. Luck of the draw, I guess. Nine times out of ten it’s a woman with a bomb. I might have fired and I wouldn’t be here. But I got the one time out of ten it was a baby, not a bomb. Didn’t fire—which is fine. But right behind her, a few seconds later, woman with a bomb.”
She was silent long enough that Tam gently supplied, “You didn’t fire?”
“I did—but in a simulator four seconds is a lifetime. Enough time for the dummy to light up twice as having detonated. And when I did finally fire I missed. So that’s your protection.”
Tam didn’t know what she had expected, but that hadn’t been it. “How could I fault you for a women and children first philosophy?”
“I don’t know if it’s because I’m a lesbian and part of me just refuses to believe that women can be so fanatical and venal. It’s not rational, because I know that it might be rare, but it’s real.
Women can do anything. But I froze—and it didn’t help to have my trainer screaming in my ear to ‘blow the bitch away.’ But the Service rightly held it against me.”
195
“So you started over.”
“At the time it was the Service or nothing for me. Then I heard about Sterling Fraud Investigations and...” Again, her smile was rueful. “And here I am.”
“A new life and career built.”
“Not if we get caught tomorrow.” Kip appeared to be studying the faded laminate surface of the table.
There were a lot of things she could have said, but what she might have chosen went out of her head when Kip abruptly scrubbed at her eyes.
“Please.” Her voice broke. She took a deep breath and started again. “Please don’t be the woman with the bomb. Please don’t leave me wishing I’d pulled the trigger the moment I walked into your office.”
“Oh Kip...” Tam slid to one knee next to her, gazing up into her face. Taking one hand between both of hers, she said simply,
“I’m not that person. I promise you.”
Her eyes glittered with unshed tears. “So there you have it.
All my secrets.”
I’ll tell you mine, Tam wanted to say. Kip had put all of her past on one side of the scales. It was time for Tam to match it.
She couldn’t make her mouth move. She had no practice at the subject. Where to start?
A knock at the door was followed by a cheery, “Room service.”
Kip sighed and pulled her hand from Tam’s grasp. “I’ll wait in the bathroom.”
Pressing a washcloth to her eyes, Kip told herself she’d done all she could. The ball was in Tam’s court now. She heard the clatter of the room service cart and had the irrelevant thought that she hoped her only choice in swimsuits wasn’t a butt-floss bikini.
None of which mattered. Gun or not, she was on a case. She 196
had a client who expected results. Utterly convinced Tam wasn’t involved, in spite of no confirmation by the facts, Kip knew her responsibility now was protecting her client. She couldn’t do that if she was weeping over lack of parity in their honesty with each other.
She had felt so naked, and hoped that maybe Tam would share something, anything. It was clear who didn’t trust who. At least she thought so.
Pull yourself together, she thought. I’m sure as hell of no use to anyone if I’m worried about a swimsuit making my butt look like a barn. Personal and professional weren’t supposed to mix. That was why there were rules at SFI about exactly that conflict.
She patted her eyes dry and gave herself a scolding look in the mirror. Imitating her grandfather’s voice, as best as she could recall it, she said, “You’ve got a job to do, little Kipling. Your only choice is how well you do it.”
“All clear,” Tam said from the other side of the door.
“That smells good,” she said as she emerged.
Tam had put the plates on the table and was just transferring a small vase of wildflowers as well. She draped a white napkin over her sleeve. “Your midnight buffet awaits, madam.”
Kip decided to keep the light tone. There wasn’t really anything else to do. “Thank you, garcon.”
The stew turned out to be delicious and heartier than she had anticipated. Spiced chunks of chicken were in a rich gravy, redolent with roasted and fresh peppers. The other ingredients included different tropical taro, a South American sweet potato Kip recognized, and roasted plantain both in the stew and on top, crisped and in slivers. By comparison, the salad, when they traded plates, was pedestrian, but still tasty. They discussed food adventures as they ate. Tam’s experience was much broader than Kip’s, but none of the disclosures came close to the moment when Kip had thought Tam might finally explain the mystery of her childhood.
Calmed by the banality of talking about their meal, Kip wasn’t sure she had a right to know. A couple of kisses didn’t mean 197
anything these days. She had no reason to think Tam knew that kisses weren’t casual to Kip, not in the least. And even if she did, why should something so painful to Tam be any of Kip’s business?
Did Kip’s not knowing interfere with their investigation? Did not knowing keep Kip from doing the job she had to do? If not, it was none of her business.
The dishes empty, Kip said, “We should be at the stores when they open at nine, shouldn’t we? Then back here to check out and take a cab to the port?”
“That seems right,” Tam agreed. She might have been pale, or maybe it was just the lighting. But her air was as professionally distant as Kip’s. “There’s still enough time to get a good night’s sleep.”
A good night’s sleep, right, Kip thought, once she was in the elevator. It didn’t seem likely to her.
198
Chapter FIFteeN
“Are the expenses of being a fugitive tax deductible?”
Kip answered in a matching droll tone. “I don’t see why not.
They are job-related.” The basic Speedo looked just dandy on Tam. Scrumptious even. But Tam looked as if she’d rather be seen in a potato sack. “You can stick with the board shorts and a tank top. Totally acceptable women’s pool gear these days.”
Tam frowned into the full-length mirror. “I think I will. This looked good on you but me... It’s so tight.”
“You obviously didn’t have gym class in a public school in the U.S.”
“You’re right. I went to a boarding school in Connecticut, and swimming was not on the list of activities.” Tam disappeared into the dressing room again.
Kip leaned on the wall next to the door, glad they were alone.
At this hour on a Monday morning, the department store was 199
nearly deserted. She might never shop on weekends again. “Did you sleep okay? You look really tired.”
“Remind me not to have Cuban food at midnight.”
“Oh, I’m sorry it bothered you. I slept like a baby.” She had, too, much to her surprise. As conflicted as she was emotionally, her body seemed not to have a worry in the world. It knew something she didn’t, or it was just besotted and happy to be so. She’d been relaxed until she’d seen Tam in the shorts and a tee they’d bought before leaving Washington. Then her body had been something completely opposite of relaxed, and aside from the worry that she wasn’t worried, the feeling was very...