When they came up from the basement, Dane and Shana entered the dining room of the Lucky Parrot separately, as if they’d come from the restrooms, and went to their clamshell-shaped booth to finish dinner. Dane slid in beside his wife-to be with more relish than he’d ever dreamed.

“Secret Service at ten o’clock.”

“I see him. He’s partnered with a woman. Why couldn’t they have used those two for—”

Dane kissed Shana before she said another word. He had no idea how sophisticated their surveillance equipment might be, but they’d been warned by Acer to plan for a complete eavesdropping blanket of the area until he could interfere with it. He whispered in Shana’s ear, a nice side effect of the need for clandestine behavior.

“Let’s sell the idea that we were out for a quick romantic interlude.”

She gave a low quiet laugh, elegant and seductive. He pressed his lips on the white column of her neck, sucking on the impossibly tender skin. If he didn’t cut it out, everyone in the room would be sold on his need to get a room, including him.

They managed to finish dinner under the watchful gaze of any number of agents, Secret Service and otherwise. All they spoke about were their plans to make love back at the shack. Dane hoped he’d caused more than a little discomfort to whoever might be listening—or better yet, he hoped he stirred some jealous lust with his detailed plans about what he wanted to do to his lover. At least he’d made Shana blush—but that was only because she knew they were listening.

They returned to the shack later than they should have, later than Dane knew Andrews wanted them to. Collecting himself, reining in his desire to do nothing more than fall into bed with the love of his life to prove over and over again how much he loved and worshiped every cell of her body, he let out a deep rough breath. The amorous intentions he had telecasted during dinner had not been an act at all.

Shana straightened, her soft warmth evaporating as she moved from his side to open the Jeep door and get out.

“Where have you been?” Andrews met Dane at the door.

He pushed past him, escorting Shana through into the kitchen, careful to shield her from him in the tight space of the kitchen entry.

“Gee, Dad, I didn’t know we were past curfew.”

Goodley was waiting for him, apparently waiting for his chance to pounce on the first wiseass remark Dane made. He fronted Dane and grabbed him by the collar. Dane’s heart roared in his ears, but he didn’t lose his cool, in fact the adrenaline kicked him into a deadly dangerous calm as his eyes swept over Goodley’s hands on his shirt and then met Andrews’s hot red face.

Shana had recognized the signs and jumped to Dane’s side, placing a hand on his arm.

“Hands off, Goodley.” He left the threat unspoken of what would happen if he didn’t. Goodley loosened his grip but left his hands where they were as if he wanted to be ready for evasive tactics were Dane to make a move.

“I’ve had enough of your smart-ass attitude, Blaise. This is more important than you. We’re dealing with the President’s life here and you’d better damn well cooperate or you’ll find yourself in—”

“Enough, Thaddeus.” Andrews had let him vent but, sticking to his good cop role, didn’t let him go too far. Just far enough to try and scare Dane.

Thaddeus let go of his shirt and stepped back, swiping his brow as if he’d worked up a sweat. In fact, he had.

“We were out to dinner at the Lucky Parrot, to answer your question.” Dane spoke calmly. “But you already knew that since you had us followed and there were at least five agents eating dinner at our favorite restaurant.”

“I told you we were following you,” Andrews said. Dane sensed a touch of defensiveness. “That’s why we know you disappeared in the middle of dinner. Where did you go?”

“None of your goddamn business.”

“Everything you do for the duration of this assignment is my business, Blaise.” Andrews drew himself up and an edge crept into his voice. He was beginning to blur the roles of good versus bad cop.

Dane smiled. He was getting somewhere. He had them on edge, nervous and depending on him—and Shana. He slipped a glance at her. She was inscrutable, hands fisted at her sides and at the ready. The thing was, Andrews and Goodley had forgotten that they didn’t really need Dane and Shana. Now the contest to gain control had overridden the mission, the end game. They’d gotten distracted from keeping their eyes on the prize.

Dane had them exactly where he wanted them.

“What’s this about?” He spoke as if he hadn’t a care.

“I don’t want you messing this up, you goddamn—”

“Messing what up, Liam?”

“Who have you talked to? Who did you tell about this?” Andrews stepped closer, his anger simmering to the surface and about to boil over. He’d crossed over from good cop to bad now, but the problem was, Dane doubted that Thaddeus Goodley was going to cross over from bad cop to good cop to cover for him. Dane saw Shana tense and shift toward Andrews, saw that Andrews hadn’t noticed her.

Once again, a man was making a big mistake not accounting for the Shana factor, not sensing her as a threat, not taking her seriously enough. And not merely her physical presence, but her tactical presence. She was often the smartest person in the room. Next to him. Sometimes smarter than him too. Maybe most of the time.

“Tell about what? It’s not like you’ve told us much. The Governor already knew about it.”

“You’re lying. You told him. How else would he know?”

“Now you’re fishing. Don’t insult me.” Dane took a breath and pushed his fingers through his hair. He was weary of this game, tired. He decided to play that angle since it was real.

“Look, Liam. I don’t care if you don’t trust me. Because I—we don’t trust you either. So we’re even. Shana and I will go to the airport tomorrow and play your little game where we pretend to be innocent tourists and talk to whoever you want us to talk to, pretending to try and identify your assassins.” He paused then and held Andrews eyes for a beat. Then he reached out for Shana and she came to his side.

“Because we know it’s a game. We know you’re setting us up. You’re using us to flush out the assassins.”

“What the hell are you talking about? Who have you talked to?” Andrews shouted the question with a tinge of desperation in his words.

Shana scoffed like only she knew how. “As if that’s the most important thing here? To know how we found out that you’re using us? Rather than the fact that you are using us?”

“We’re not admitting to that,” Goodley said.

Andrews swore under his breath and turned away from Dane.

“We’re not admitting to that,” Goodley repeated louder, more insistently, as if that would matter.

“You want us to appear like a pair of assassins casing the security operation, doing our research, identifying the players.”

Andrews stilled, his expression flicked from caught-in-the act to blank. Goodley’s hostility went to surprise and then if Dane wasn’t mistaken, a shade of fear around the edges. And Dane was hardly ever mistaken about reading faces.

“Maybe . . .” Shana said, “they want us to pose as assassins, to confuse or distract the real assassins.” She gave Andrews a wide-eyed look.

“No, darling. That couldn’t be. That might be dangerous. The real assassins might come after us if they thought we were competing assassins.”

“Enough. What the hell kind of game do you think you’re playing here?” Andrews face reddened like he had a bad case of hives and his mouth flattened like a dried prune.

“We’re trying to play your game,” Shana said. “It’s been tough to come up to speed on our own, with you playing hide and seek with all the most fun details, but we’ve given it our sporting best—how’d we do?”

Andrews simmered in silence. Goodley’s mouth was open and if Dane wasn’t mistaken, a shadow of respect slipped through his mean mask of horror. Anger formed like a quick, yet predictable storm, but Goodley didn’t have a chance to speak.

“How about if we start over and discuss tomorrow morning’s assignment?” Dane spoke in a deceptively reasonable voice, but he knew they recognized the knife edge underneath.