Radclyffe - Price of Honor

“It seems like I never can,” Blair whispered. “I couldn’t do a damn thing when you were captured.”

Ah, finally. Here it was.

“Sometimes things like Idaho happen,” Cam said. “But street cops are far more likely to be injured in the line of duty than federal agents. When I headed out there, I really thought it was a fact-finding mission only, or I’d have taken backup. What happened was an anomaly.”

“I hate that you’re the one that takes the chances.”

“I don’t know how to be any different. This is my job. I can’t do anything else.”

“I know. I wouldn’t recognize you if you did.” Blair pressed her cheek against Cam’s shoulder. “And most of the time I’m okay. I know how good you are, all of you. But when I see you put yourself in danger, so instinctively, so naturally, it scares me.”

And that was what the anger was all about. Cam understood the fear of losing someone she loved. She cupped the back of Blair’s neck, kissed her again. “I’m not going anywhere. Ever.”

“Promise?” Blair asked, even though she knew no one could promise. Hearing the words still made a difference.

“I promise,” Cam said, because she knew it helped.

*

Viv found her compartment in the press sleeping car and stowed her bag. She was surprised to find the berth outfitted with a small toilet and shower in addition to her bunk. The accommodations were a little more luxurious than she’d anticipated, although the very narrow bed looked as if she might fall out if she rolled over in her sleep. Measuring it with her eyes, she had the sudden image of her and Dusty trying to fit onto it together. The picture came out of nowhere in absolute clear and vibrant Technicolor. She almost laughed at her adolescent reaction, but the heat that spread through her, making her tingle in some very interesting places, was undeniable. And undeniably pleasant. She couldn’t remember a time when she’d had such an intense reaction to a woman. Giving herself a moment to indulge in whimsy, she tried to work out the logistics and decided the only way it would work was if Dusty was on top of her. That thought stoked the flickering embers to an all-out inferno.

Bad idea. She had a story to file on the president’s speech and the subsequent fund-raiser, and she wanted to explore the train and hopefully catch a glimpse of Dusty at work. She wasn’t going to be able to do any of those things if all she could think about was sex. And what was that all about, anyhow?

Sex was not something that usually intruded into her consciousness during the day. She might be remotely aware of someone being attractive, but not to the extent she’d make mental pictures of the two of them romping naked together. And not to the extent that she could feel herself swell and tighten and throb.

Damn it. She wasn’t given to thinking about masturbating in the middle of the day either. The car was suddenly too warm for comfort. She had an hour before they were scheduled to depart, and she needed to take a walk. She slid her recorder from the bag she’d carried that morning into the pocket of her overcoat, grabbed her gloves, and headed back out of the car. Her colleagues filled the aisle, chatting and jostling luggage, and she returned their greetings quickly as she worked her way through to the rear of the car. She stepped onto the short platform between the adjoining cars and paused to button her coat and pull on her gloves. A few minutes of brisk Chicago air would take care of her temperature overload. As the inner door to the sleeper car slid closed, she became aware of someone speaking.

“You know what security is like,” a muffled male voice said. “We might as well be talking about breaching the White House…I’ll try to work something out. When…”

Viv overheard a hundred personal conversations a day, including people making arrangements for secret assignations that were rarely ever really secret, and tuned out the rest as a handful of her colleagues filled the platform. She stepped back to make room.

“What’s it like in there?” Sally Jensen, a super-competitive correspondent from NBC news whose blond hair was perfectly coiffed despite the wind, asked eagerly.

Viv plastered a smile on her face. “Cozy, but I wouldn’t plan on doing much entertaining.”

A chorus of good-natured groans followed. Gary Williams and Brad Cooper gave her friendly nods. The third man she knew only by sight. She thought he was a veteran White House correspondent, although he looked too young for the role. He sidled by her with barely a glance. The door swished closed again, smothering the chatter and leaving her alone in the cold.

Chapter Thirteen

Route 84, a diner outside Mountain Home, Idaho

Jane raised the collar on her dark green canvas coat and turned her face away from the wind. The phone booth was little more than a shell, but it was more private than the one hanging on a wall in the back corner of the diner where she and Hooker had stopped for breakfast. He was still inside, nursing a coffee and doughnut. She’d carried her second cup of coffee outside in a Styrofoam container and sipped it between sentences, trying to keep her face warm and her hands from freezing.

“The best chance we’ll have is for me to get onto the train,” Jane said, “but we can’t count on me getting close. I’ve got other plans.”

When she told him about the explosives, she expected his protests. She knew how formidable the task would be. No matter where the president was, inside the White House, in a vehicle, on a stage, or…on a train, he was the best-guarded man in the world. All the same, people had always been able to get close, and not just before the Secret Service had been charged with protecting him. All it took was ingenuity and the unexpected. It was true that Kennedy had been assassinated by a long-range shot by a marksman, but Reagan was nearly killed by a deranged man who had stepped out of a throng at a rope line as Reagan left a hotel and shot him, along with several others, hoping to impress a movie star. Gerald Ford was assaulted by a knife-wielding woman in a crowd and might have been shot by another if she hadn’t been apprehended before she could get off a round. Only luck had saved him that second time.

Crowds offered excellent cover for an assailant, especially crowds out-of-doors where individuals couldn’t be scanned with metal detectors. And fortunately, Powell had many outdoor events scheduled. But she needed more than to simply kill him. She needed him alive for a while. She knew his scheduled route by heart. She was a little less than 900 miles away from the intersect point. She’d be there well before him. Well before all the roads approaching the train route were closed. And she’d be in Colorado Springs by morning, where Hooker’s contacts would provide her with the weapons she needed.

Robbie didn’t like the plan.

“I’ve got an advantage,” she said. “I’ve got you on the inside.”

“I’ll work on it,” Robbie said unhappily.

He wasn’t afraid for himself, but for her. She understood that. She’d far rather be in danger herself than endanger him, but they were at a point where risk no longer mattered. This time, the plan had to work.

“I’ll call you again according to our schedule. Don’t worry.”

She hung up the phone, hunched her shoulders against the blowing snow that had started an hour before, and pushed through the smudged, grease-streaked door back into the diner. Hooker was where she’d left him, sprawled in a booth with both big, reddened hands curled around a white ceramic mug of steaming coffee. The doughnut was gone. She slid in across from him and drained her cup. “We should go. Storm coming up. You get the tab.”