Birch looked out the window of the West Sitting Hall as he waited for Tate to finish getting ready for their first official date. They’d slept in as long as they could that morning—all the way until five o’clock. Since then, it had been nonstop. Humphrey had had way too much coffee and spent the day running from office to office handing out reports, handling media, and working with Tate on presenting the correct story to the public. The story was of George Stanworth using the media as his own way to push his agenda with no concern or respect for the actual truth. What was interesting was that George and his daughter, Helena, were nowhere to be found to answer for the shitstorm now coming down on his company.

Jason had arrived back home and reported the packages had been delivered successfully and offered his help at any time. Maybe that was why George had disappeared? The numbness in Jason’s voice had reminded Birch of the pain of losing his own wife. That pain never went away. But as he turned to look at Tate walking down the hall toward him, he knew there was enough love in him for them both. He hoped that someday Jason would remember he was still alive. The pain was undoubtedly excruciating. So for now, Jason was doing what he needed to survive the tremendous loss.

“You’re stunning,” Birch told her as she did a little spin in the casual sundress. She looked relaxed even after the ups and downs of the past month.

“I feel great. I’m turning off my phone and going on a date with the man I love. Not only that, we don’t have to hide. The newest popular story running is our love story. The hate and vile filth that had been thrown at me before has now changed to the almost idyllic President and the Press Secretary story.” Tate laughed happily and Birch smiled at her pleasure.

“What’s funny?” he asked, wrapping his arms around her waist and looking at her.

“The irony. Our relationship has been anything but idyllic. But if I get a couple hours to forget about the darkness we are embroiled in, that’s worth smiling.” Tate leaned up and placed her lips on his. Birch closed his eyes, getting lost in a kiss that was turning hotter by the second.

“We better head out for our date now, or we may forget we had plans and end up in bed,” Birch said, pulling away. He wasn’t entirely convinced that would be a bad thing.

“I’m starving!” Tate laughed as she swatted him on the bottom and hurried down the hall. Birch smiled and caught up to her, slipping his hand into hers as they headed down the red-carpeted stairs.

Birch met Abrams and Brock at the bottom of the stairs before they headed to the limo. “As per your request, we have trimmed the detail. We have two cars with us with agents in both. We have two agents at the restaurant now, securing the location and a table for you,” Brock informed him quietly as he opened the door to limo for them.

“Thank you, Brock,” Tate said, placing her hand quickly on his arm and giving it a squeeze.

Birch slid into the back seat next to Tate. They talked of their day. They talked of their worst first dates, and they laughed. For a moment Birch was simply a man nervous about making sure his date went well.

---

Tate looked up at the gold letters on the red sign. The restaurant was small with a few bistro tables set outside. Couples laughed over large dishes of pasta. They stopped and stared as the limo and two SUVs came to a stop outside next to the already parked detail that had secured the restaurant for them.

“Ready?” Birch asked as the people pulled out their cell phones and a man in a marinara-covered apron came hurrying out, his pot belly swaying as he grinned broadly at them.

Abrams opened the door and Birch slid out, holding out his hand for Tate. The owner of Gimiagano’s greeted them as the people at the table asked for pictures.

“Is it okay?” Birch asked.

Tate nodded and Brock handled the diners coming up a few at a time for a picture with them.

“Thank you all, but it’s date night.” He winked to the delight of the patrons gathered outside.

The owner showed them to their romantic table in the back with plenty of privacy. Tate noticed a table of two men nearby and spotted the coms systems. Abrams and Brock took up positions near the front and back doors as the limo pulled up to the back door out of sight from the front street. Two SUVs parked out front as if they were regular diners, even though the engines were still running and agents were inside keeping active watch.

A complimentary bottle of wine was poured as patrons got their last photos in. After hearing the specials from the owner, who was also the head chef, they were finally alone. Birch raised his glass and Tate followed suit. “To many evenings together.”

Tate took a sip of wine and rolled her eyes. “This is so good.”

“I used to eat here all the time when I was a nobody in politics. Stephano imports all his wine from these small family wineries in Italy.”

“Did you always live in Virginia?” Tate asked even though she knew the answer. Hearing the answer firsthand made it sound new.

Birch told her of growing up at the military base, and Tate couldn’t stop smiling.

“Tell me about your brother,” Birch said as Stephano set down a plate of fried calamari and some fresh bread.

Tate grinned as she thought of Tucker. He was her little brother, and while she hated to admit it, he was a good one. “He always pestered me, growing up. He’d spy on my sleepovers.” Tate looked into Birch’s smiling face before a force sent her flying from her chair. Her body slammed against the brick wall as the restaurant filled with clouds of debris and dust.

Tate’s ears were ringing, and she coughed uncontrollably, trying to breathe. Her eyes stung as she groped her way toward the outline of a body. “Birch,” she croaked as she crawled on hands and knees over broken glass and shattered tables.

It seemed far off in the distance, but she began to hear pinging noises. Turning her head, she cringed in pain. The entire front of the small restaurant was gone. Bodies littered the floor where just moments before, diners sat enjoying their meals. There was so much dust in the air it was hard to see out of the windows. But the noise became clear—gunfire.

Tate felt a fear unlike anything else begin to choke her. If she had thought her car accident was bad, this fear completely shut off her ability to think. Escape was all she could think of. Tate pushed her body to crawl faster. The first body was that of Abrams. She shook him, screaming his name. His eyes were open and a shard of glass protruded from his neck.

Tate was about to leave Abrams when the gunfire came to a stop. Glancing to the hole in the front of the building, she saw figures moving toward them from across the street. There was no help coming, she realized dimly. Looking back, she saw Brock limping as he started flinging tables aside. Brock would help her. He would get her to safety out the back door, but he should be with Birch. If Brock was here, then . . . “Birch!” She had wrongly assumed the agents out back already dragged him into the limo.

Brock’s eyes shot up at her and then at the men coming toward them. Tate pushed open Abrams’s jacket and grabbed the gun. She tried to stand, but her leg failed her. Looking down, she saw why. Her leg was broken. She saw the bump of the wrecked bone. Tate bit down on the grip of the gun and crawled, dragging her broken leg toward Brock.

Stephano’s body lay writhing on the floor. “Stay still, help is on the way,” she said as she stopped. Then she saw him.

“Brock!” Tate pointed to the body partially hidden by Stephano’s body.

Brock didn’t look at her, but instead fired off a shot. A man fell to the floor and then Brock ran toward her.

“Stephano, you have to move. You can do it. Please,” Tate was crying as she shoved at his side.

Brock stopped and fired another shot before bending over and flipping a table up to provide some cover. “I don’t have contact with the limo. I don’t know if the driver is still there or if he’s under attack,” Brock said into his intercoms being relayed to headquarters.

Tate continued to use all her strength to push Stephano as he groaned unconsciously. His eyes were closed and there was blood dripping from his ears. Brock fired again and bent down. “Push!” he yelled.

Stephano rolled off Birch, and Tate scrambled to feel for a pulse. Brock fired again in rapid succession from his spot behind the table. Bullets flew around them now as Tate almost collapsed in relief when she felt the flutter of an uneven pulse.

“He’s alive!”

Brock conveyed the facts into his coms as four men stepped through the blown-out front of the building. “Can he walk?”

“He’s unconscious.” Tate shook Birch and got a groan out of him. “Birch, you have to wake up. Birch!”

Sirens sounded in the distance. Tate looked up at Brock, his face set in stone as he aimed at the first wave of men and fired. Tate looked to the back door. Could she drag Birch outside? Tate screamed as a man kicked in the back door, answering her question for her.

Brock turned to look and fired, missing the man, before the four men at the front sprayed them with gunfire. Brock ducked and Tate covered Birch with her body as she picked up Abrams’s gun and fired. It hit his chest, but he didn’t stop. She fired again, this time at his head and the man at the back door fell down, dead.

She began to turn in order to tell Brock to aim for the head when she felt her face splashed with something warm. She wiped it from her eyes, and when she looked at her hands they were red. “Brock?”

Tate didn’t have to look up to find him. Brock’s body lay a foot from her knees and part of his head was missing. Tate choked back a helpless cry and with resolve reached for the gun in his hand.

The only chance they stood to survive was her own will to live and two guns. Tate pulled the table closer to cover herself and Birch before lying flat on the ground and crawling to the edge of the table. She took a deep breath like she did during target competition and cleared her mind. She ignored the sounds of sirens. She couldn’t count on them. She ignored Brock’s body and the blood pooling around his head inches from her. She ignored the warmth and stickiness of that blood on her bare arm as she laid herself into firing position.

Tate saw the targets, and she fired. Four rapid shots as if she were in competition. Two hit dead center as they fell dead, their heads blasted apart. The other two dove for cover as Tate slid back behind the table and military-crawled to the other side.

“Behind you,” Birch gasped, his breathing unsteady.

In surprise, Tate spun around only to feel a bullet rip through her shoulder. She screamed, the gun in her right hand falling to the ground. The man lowered his gun at Birch, and Tate raised her left hand. She fired Brock’s gun over and over. The man staggered back as she hit him in the vest, readjusted her aim and shot him in the eye. His body slammed against the back wall leaving a red mark on the wall as he slid down.

She rummaged through Brock’s pockets until she found another clip. She slid it into the gun and held it awkwardly with her left hand. “Birch, hang in there, please. Help is coming.”

“I love you,” Birch gasped between heavy breaths. He fought to breathe as Tate leaned down and placed trembling lips to his.

“I love you too.”

Then Tate did the hardest thing she’d ever done. She turned her back on Birch as his eyes slid closed. Sounds of sirens, helicopters, and men yelling surrounded her, but there were still two men inside the restaurant as federal agents and police began to surround the building. Tate knew without a doubt the two remaining men wouldn’t give up without a fight.

She sat up on her knees, the pain from her broken lower leg sending a wave of dizziness through her, and scanned the area through the sight of her gun. There, at the corner of the bar the muzzle of a gun stuck out. Tate pushed everything aside as she focused on that gun. It moved slowly as the man decided to lean out. With her arms propped on the edge of the table, her knees shaking from pain and her left hand holding her injured arm steady, she pulled the trigger. She didn’t wait for the best shot. She just took the shot. The shot she knew would kill him if it hit, and she knew it would. She saw the gun drop to the ground and knew she’d hit her target.

“Police! Drop your weapon!” came the command from behind her. But Tate just shook her head. There was still one more person left unaccounted for.

Tate felt them surrounding her from behind. She saw the officers and agents storm the front. “Watch out!” she screamed, but it was too late. The last gunman opened fire. An agent fell as a hailstorm of gunfire aimed at a person she couldn’t see erupted. Then all was quiet.

“It’s the president!” Tate heard someone gasp behind her. “We need an ambulance ASAP!”

Tate finally dropped the gun. Her body collapsed. Her legs gave out as she fell to Birch’s side.

“Are you Tate Carlisle?” an officer asked. He seemed fuzzy as the world tilted. She blinked back the shadows as she fumbled to find Birch’s hand. When she clasped his hand, she looked back up. “Yes, but you need to get Birch to a hospital now.”

“I believe we need to get you there too. That was a hell of a shot, Miss Carlisle.”

She didn’t care. She looked down at Birch as EMTs rushed inside. Tate was pulled away, and she screamed in pain. She didn’t hear the officer apologize. She only watched in absolute horror as the EMTs began CPR on Birch’s lifeless body.

In minutes, they had him strapped to a spinal board as six men carried him quickly from the restaurant. “I have to go with him,” she yelled as other EMTs now flooded in to help the injured.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t allow that. You need to come with us.” Tate looked up at the unidentified agent. He didn’t offer an explanation and the officer was happy to hand her off.

“No,” she said with as much power as she could. “I’m Tate Carlisle, the press secretary for the president, and I will not go with anyone I don’t know. Please call Humphrey Orville, the chief of staff, for me.”

“You’re coming with me, ma’am,” he said through gritted teeth. The officer now looked curiously between them.

“No!” Tate yelled. “I will not come with you, and I demand you contact Humphrey Orville, the chief of staff.”

The man grabbed for her and the young officer, no more than twenty-two years old, pulled his gun as the EMTs froze in their progression toward her. “I’m sorry, sir, but I’ll need to see some identification.”

“I’ll have you fired for this. I’m CIA.” He flipped open his badge and the young man wilted.

“I don’t give a shit who you are. I’m not going with you.” There was something wrong here. The man was only looking at her. He wasn’t allowing EMTs to see her, and with her broken leg and a bullet wound, he’d have to carry her screaming out of here.

There was a commotion outside as cars scrambled back to clear a space in the street. Tate had never felt such relief as when she looked out and saw Crew Dixon, pilot of Marine One and member of their secret group, landing a military helicopter. Crew glanced around, his eyes locking on hers, and then to the man in front of her. Crew leapt from the helicopter, and the man lunged for her. Crew ran, Tate screamed, and the young officer fired.