It was six p.m. and the sky was still bright when Dane emerged freshly shaved from the bathroom—the only one in the small house—to find Andrews and Goodley still hard at work, sitting at the dining table in front of their laptops tapping away.

Sassy was in the guest room, but Dane had reminded her that when he and Shana left, her assignment was to stick with the two agents and not let them out of her sight while they were in the house.

Andrews took his attention from his keyboard and stood. Dane noticed that the process of straightening was not fluid or quick. The agent couldn’t be ten years older than him. Dane didn’t appreciate the insight that getting up from a chair as if he were the squeaky Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz might be in his near future.

“Let’s talk first. I know you don’t like this, or us.” Andrews spread his arm to encompass Goodley. The younger man grunted and scowled at the screen, but didn’t take his attention away from it.

“So?”

“We’re relying on you.”

Andrews let that sit without explanation. Dane read his mind, or tried to. He could outwait the man, but they were scheduled to meet Acer. Shana sauntered from the hall and met him, looping her arm through his. She smelled like an impossible combination of angel and devil, or it could have been his wishful thinking. The effect would have been dizzying if he hadn’t had his guard up.

Dane noticed that Andrews’s guard hadn’t been up if the sudden dilation of his pupils was any indication. She was dressed to kill—someone—way past the dress code for the Lucky Parrot. Her slinky black dress with the missing back and short hemline was one of his favorites.

“Get to the point, Andrews. And quit eying my wife—”

“You’re married?”

Dane heard Andrews’s disbelief and felt rather than saw the singe from Shana’s shock. His blood heated but he kept his cool. He’d never been such an idiot before.

“Not yet.” Shana moved in closer. “You’re jumping the gun, darling.” She sounded part cat, part woman the way she purred, like she was channeling some siren from a sixties cold war spy movie. He’d have to start monitoring what she watched on late-night TV.

More importantly, he needed to monitor himself and get back to that detached professional persona that kept him alive all these years.

“Get to the point,” Dane repeated without taking his eyes off Andrews. He remained undistracted on the outside, managing to prevent himself from staring at his almost-wife. Later he’d analyze why he’d needed to prematurely claim Shana as his wife. Or more likely she’d analyze the hell out of the episode for him. For now, he could tell she enjoyed it, could feel the vibration of energy sizzling off her.

“The point is,” Andrews said, his lips hardly moving as if he were a ventriloquist—an angry ventriloquist. “That if you want to go out, you need to be in touch at all times and say nothing to anyone. That includes Captain Lynch, the Gables, and any other friends you might have.”

“Might have? We have plenty of friends,” Dane said. Purposely missing the point, he refused to react to the crack about the Gables. Dane had known they’d been followed.

“Don’t be a wiseass. We’ll be watching you. Because as I’ve said, we don’t trust you. Maybe you should keep that in mind.” Andrews went back to his laptop at the dining table.

Dane knew when he’d said “watching” he’d also meant “listening,” but couldn’t say it because strictly speaking it would be against the law in Massachusetts to listen to someone covertly without their permission.

They’d managed to evade the listening devices out on the Gables’ yacht, but that was no long-term solution to the private communications problem they were developing. Dane hoped Acer had the problem under control in the basement of the Lucky Parrot. His assignment had been to construct a surveillance-proof space, an NSA-spy-free zone where they could meet and talk, using it as a base of their own counter-surveillance operations.

Acer had been game. When wasn’t he? If his old special ops team member thought Dane was paranoid out of his mind, he didn’t show any sign. So far Shana was going along.

“Let’s go, darling.” He took Shana’s hand and led her out the door after calling Sassy up from downstairs.

Dane didn’t bother trying to evade the car he noticed following them starting three blocks from their house, presumably Secret Service. He turned the radio up and opened the window then, before he had a chance to pull her to him, Shana leaned in and put her face close to his. He took a deep breath of her scent and let the intoxication of her cloak him.

“We’ll head to the basement first before we eat.”

“You don’t think they’ll notice?”

“Make it look like you’re going in to the ladies’ room and slip through the basement door instead.”

“You think Acer’s set up and waiting for us?”

“We’re in a shitload of trouble if he isn’t.”

“I love your optimism.” She kissed him on the side of his mouth while he drove. He knew if the Secret Service men could somehow see inside their car they’d guess at the intimate conversation. He knew the loud radio and open window didn’t fool them. But it didn’t tell them what was going on either.

When they walked in the back door of the Lucky Parrot, Dane hid his surprise. He counted no fewer than three tables occupied by various feds. No one he knew. He and Shana both managed to slip down through the door off the back hallway that led to the basement stairs. Shana went to flick on the light switch and Dane slapped his hand over hers, stopping her.

“No light. One of the feds out there may have noticed us and may try following. I don’t want to leave a trail.” He whispered this next to her ear as he nudged her forward with his body, holding her so she wouldn’t fall as he felt along the wall with his other hand.

She was smart enough not to speak and nimble enough to climb down the stairs in the dark without incident. By the time they got to the bottom, his eyes had adjusted somewhat to the darkness and they encountered a small open space showing two doors.

He touched the knob of the one on the right, but rapped lightly in Morse code, spelling out his name. This was his all-purpose communication with Acer and all his ex-special-ops team members to announce his arrival lest he got knocked on the head or worse when he opened the door.

As he entered he shoved Shana through ahead of him. Just in time to avoid being seen by whoever had opened the door to the stairwell above. He nodded at Acer and signaled for them all to remain silent. Locking the door behind him, he flicked the lights off. And waited.

Damn if these feds weren’t determined to keep him in their sights. They were better than he’d given them credit for. Or maybe it was that he couldn’t afford the luxury of time and planning to better evade them.

That was all about to change once his friend Acer was up and running this basement web-hacking and general spy support shop. In the meantime, they all listened to the deceptively light footsteps of someone on the stairs. Dane kept his breathing even when the doorknob rattled.

At the same time as the knob rattled, another set of steps could be heard stomping down the stairs, sure and fast this time and without concern for noise. Then Dane listened just on the other side of the door to the voices outside, loud and clear.

“Hey, what are you doing down here? This is off limits to customers.” The unmistakable voice of the Lucky Parrot owner, Tom Jones.

“I was looking for the men’s room. I saw someone else come down here—” The voice was unrecognizable, lower, barely audible, but unintimidated.

“Let’s get back u-stairs, bud. Anyone else belongs down here and you don’t.” There was a pause for a couple of beats. He felt Shana’s breath fan his neck, felt her press against him, the tickle of her hair against his cheek. Dane hadn’t realized how tense he’d been until his shoulders unclenched a notch with her closeness.

Then they heard two sets of footsteps going back up the stairs and when the door closed at the top with a loud thud, courtesy of Tom, Dane took a deep breath and slipped an arm around Shana.

“Glad that showdown was avoided,” Shana said.

“For now,” he said.

“I’ll need to take precautions then,” Acer said. “I don’t want to be a sitting duck here if they decide to come back when Tom isn’t around. Or if they get a warrant.”

“Or if they just come back at night. We’re not sure how closely these guys are playing by the rules.” Dane already knew in his own mind that they weren’t, at least not the two Secret Service agents they were dealing with. Andrews and Goodley were already crossing lines by barging into his house and insisting they have access to Dane’s equipment.

Dane hoped to hell that didn’t include the arsenal of weapons he had stashed in the basement. But why would the Secret Service need his other equipment?

No reason unless they’re outside the lines and need a fall guy.

“So what’s Acer supposed to do?” Shana didn’t look alarmed exactly, but Dane would definitely describe the slight downturn of her mouth and the tension around her eyes—not quite a squint—as dismayed.

“Same as I always do,” Acer said. “I go into Alice in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass mode.”

She paused and didn’t bother asking for the explanation, unless he counted the way she put her hands on her hips and stared at Acer like a school principal. Dane didn’t bother saying a word. He knew Acer would spell it out for her.

“I’ll need some supplies.” Acer eyed him.

“I’ll arrange delivery before dawn. I have a kit. It’s a bit dusty, but it should work.” He assessed the size of the room. Two- by-four studs, wood paneling, some hydraulics, and presto.

“What the hell are you two talking about?”

Acer smiled. “We build the room out to look like something it’s not. We’ll have some storage behind the walls for my equipment and my favorite feature, a secret door.”

“I don’t think there’s enough space for a secret room for your work space behind the walls, Acerman,” Dane said.

“I know. And we’ll have to hope they don’t take too much notice of the setup. It won’t be polished.” He looked up at the ceiling. “We’ll need to put in a drop ceiling or they’ll trace the plumbing and electricity to its source behind the walls.”

Shana stood shaking her head. Dane said nothing. Finally, she took her fists off her hips and faced him.

“You were in clandestine operations, like the CIA?” It was an accusation.

“Far more clandestine than the CIA,” Acer scoffed. “The less you know, the better.”

“What did you think special ops was about?” Dane stared back at her, resisting his urge to throw his hands on his hips or to throw his arms around her and hug her in.

“I… don’t know.” She waved a hand. More military I guess.”

He nodded. “Plenty of that too. We did whatever we needed to do. From the basic aim and shoot to elaborate set ups.”

He watched the rise and fall of her breasts as she took a deep breath.

“How are you going to get your kit from the basement?”

He smiled. “It’s not in the basement. It’s in storage. I’ll have Ronnie make a special delivery. It should fit in the van he uses to deliver food for the Shark’s Table.”

“Have him stay and help me build it out. Have Tom help too.”

Dane nodded.

“This is going to cost a pretty penny,” Shana said.

“Would you rather stay and help with the build-out yourself?”

“Not on your life. I’ll be back at the shack with you, keeping an eye on our friends.”

“Speaking of whom, we need to get out of here.”

He slipped his arm around her and they walked to the corner of the small basement room to an alcove where there was a stairway leading to an exterior bulkhead.

He turned to Acer. “Make sure you hide this.”

Acer saluted them. “Make sure you send me down some food.”

Dane let Shana go through the bulkhead first. It opened up to a fenced-in area with a dumpster. The fence was closed all the way around and padlocked. That must make it tough for the garbage men Dane thought, apropos of nothing.

He lifted Shana up and she launched herself over like a gymnast doing a vault move. He was going to need to use the dumpster to get himself up and over, but he managed to do it without making a mess of himself. They would go around the front door and go inside and eat dinner now.

He landed on his feet and watched his girl straightening her elegant black dress. Without a word, he brushed some grime from the fence off her backside, letting his hand linger.

“Even the fence conspires to allow you a feel on a night when we need to be all business.”

“Don’t worry about me. I’m focused exactly where I need to be.” He looked around the parking lot. A couple of young women laughed as they closed their car doors and headed to the restaurant.

“Front or back door?”

“Let’s go around front. We’ll follow the girls in. Less conspicuous.”

He put an arm around her waist and pulled her into his side, the way he always did, the way he always would for the rest of his life, and they walked.

She laughed, head up and gazing at the stars as if this were a glorious night for a date and they were any normal romantic couple. His shoulder blades tightened because it wasn’t a romantic date, as much as he wanted it to be a night without danger. They would have their nights. Sometime. But this wasn’t one of them.

They walked in the front door and found the place packed. Dane shouldn’t have been surprised to see almost as many tourists as regulars.

He definitely wasn’t surprised to see federal agents still mixed in with the crowd, presumably regular Secret Service men and women doing their jobs. They were the plainclothes versions, the kind not trying to hide who they were, the kind purposely advertising their presence, shouting that they were on island to protect the President and that anyone who wanted to do him harm had fair warning. They were the deterrents, the expected official police presence.

Dane and Shana were seated at their table after only a two-minute wait at the bar—only enough time to get their drinks because they were given preferential treatment. All the wait staff treated Dane and Shana as if they were part owners. In truth, Dane felt more like a behind-the-scenes consultant and took pride in the fact that the place had flourished since he’d taken an interest in it after his first mission with Shana.

“We have to go back down. After Acer has a chance to set up and get us something.”

“Tonight?”

“We have twenty to thirty-two hours and counting before the shit hits the fan. I figure that’s how long it’ll take for Andrews’s boss to order us to throw Sassy and Ronnie out on the street. Then—”

“How can they do that? How can they force the issue?”

“At gunpoint.”

“I thought this was a free country.”

“Except when the President’s visiting town and there’s a viable threat against him, then all bets are off. Civil rights get caught up in the national security net.”

“What do you make of our assignment to observe the crowd at the airport when Air Force One lands?”

“It’s a setup of some kind. They don’t need us for observation.”

“Maybe they need us for a distraction?”

“I’d buy that. But for who and how?”

She picked up her drink and took a long sip.

“We need Acer to come through for us with something. Fast.” Dane didn’t look toward the back hall and stairway, but he surreptitiously watched everyone who went that way to go to the restrooms.

“How about if we divide and conquer?” She dangled the glass between two fingers, holding the stem. She was drinking a martini, slightly dangerous for her. They’d ordered dinner but it hadn’t arrived. They could leave now and not come back, but he knew they should stay to keep up the charade. Plus, they needed to eat.

“Have another roll.” He moved the basket in front of her. He didn’t want to separate from her, not even for a half hour.

“I could take a drive down the street to the pie shop and go in, pretend I’m picking up some things for Sassy while you go down stairs. If we both go out the back, you can sneak in through the bulkhead—”

“Stop. No way.”

“They’ll follow me and leave you alone.”

“There’s no guarantee of that. You recognize the pair who followed us to the Gables’ in here?”

“Sure.” She lifted her drink in the direction of a table at three o’clock.

He nodded. “That’s them.” He lifted his own drink to his mouth, but only took a deep drag of the scent of the Glenlivet 18-year Speyside single malt. He’d talked Tom into stocking it for him. The Lucky Parrot proprietor had grumbled and called him nasty inventive names, but he stowed a bottle with a Dane-only sticker on it under the unused old-fashioned cash register. Jones had never done away with the relic for aesthetics though the staff used computerized gadgets these days for taking orders and taking payments.

“Shana, there’s no advantage to us splitting up. I mean—” He stopped then because he didn’t know what he meant. He shook his muddled head.

“I know what you mean.” She shrugged.

He couldn’t believe he’d lost his cool, couldn’t believe he’d uttered a flustered word, had a moment of awkwardness. That never happened. Not even when he’d been an adolescent. When everyone around him had been awkward, he’d been cool and collected. Distant. He’d been distant from his emotions. It had been easy to be cool then.

Now he enjoyed an excruciatingly close relationship with his emotions. They were front and center and interfering on a regular basis with his cool. With his ability to function. Whenever he was with Shana, whenever it was about Shana. It was always about Shana now. Damn.

He closed his eyes for a couple of blinks and collected himself, gave himself a stern warning. This was no time to act like a lovesick adolescent. He tightened every muscle in his body against the intrusion of emotions.

“We need to go downstairs now—before our dinner gets here—and sell it as a private assignation. We can’t wait until after dinner because if we don’t show up at the Jeep directly after leaving they’ll come looking for us.”

She agreed without trepidation or even irritation, “They’ll be waiting since they’re following us.” She looked at him with a loving smile. He steeled against it. Besides, he knew it was part of the act. The slight tilt of her head told him she got it.

“I like the idea of an assignation,” she murmured, holding him with a dreamy look. She stood, clutching her purse with one hand. “I’ll meet you there.” She winked and trailed her other hand seductively along his jaw.

Anyone who was watching would understand why he’d abandon his dinner and follow her from the room.