Adam leaned back in his chair in the Roosevelt Room, ignoring the bickering breaking out across from him. Presiding over the monthly cabinet meeting was like leading a platoon of ego-driven middle-schoolers. They all fought on the same team, yet each member of Adam’s cabinet had distinct priorities.
Every item on the agenda was of world-shaking importance, yet Adam felt like his role was merely to settle disputes between the different departments. Earlier he’d thought he’d have to hold back the education secretary when she learned there was no more money allocated in the federal budget for her favorite project, and his Veterans Affairs secretary was barking orders at everyone at the table as if they were the soldiers he’d led in battle.
Today’s agenda included a discussion about the situation in Bhotaan. Adam twisted the secretary of state’s arm when she balked at sending an envoy to the capital, remembering his conversation with Tenzin. He couldn’t send in the army, but he could damn sure see to it that the dictator knew just what the United States’ position was on burning at stake.
Finally, he called the meeting to an end and everyone filed out of the Cabinet Room, picking up their cell phones from the basket by the door where they’d been left with sticky notes to label the owners.
Adam walked back along the Colonnade with Conner Forrest, who often played the role of the grownup in the room. “I think we settled that. Good cop, bad cop works well with this bunch.”
Connor nodded. “It works with my children, too. And Rebecca loves it when I cuff her wearing my policeman’s uniform.”
“Hey, keep your kinky sex life to yourself. Some of us aren’t so lucky.”
“I imagine there are any number of women who’d be happy to have kinky sex with you, sir.”
“Unfortunately none of them have passed their security clearance.”
“I have a friend,” Connor replied helpfully. “She works on Wall Street, but she’d probably go for some bondage. As long as you’re done by the opening bell.”
Adam gave him a look. “You’re starting to sound like Lyndon.”
Connor lifted a questioning eyebrow. “I didn’t realize LBJ was into bondage.”
“Oh, you’d be surprised what former residents of this place were into,” Adam told him with a smirk.
“I guess the staff talk.”
“Something like that.”
Adam loosened his tie as they passed the Rose Garden. “Cut the kinky talk; I have a meeting with my daughter’s head babysitter over lunch.”
“I thought you’d decided against getting a nanny for Katie.”
“Security detail. Babysitters with guns.” Adam grinned. “Not even you can afford a nanny with a license to kill.”
A Marine opened the door to the Oval Office and Adam walked through the doorway of the most powerful office in the world. He put thoughts of Ellie handcuffed to his bed out of his mind. Or tried to, anyway, but the image of her brown curls splayed over his pillow wouldn’t quite subside.
An usher met Ellie at the door to the residence and escorted her to where the president waited in the small upstairs dining room, one of the rooms normally used for family occasions. He was on the phone, but he looked up when she entered and quickly ended his call.
She half-turned toward the fireplace. “Don’t let me disturb you. I can wait. I took the afternoon off to do paperwork back at headquarters.”
“It was just the national security adviser. We’re tracking some Russian nuclear material that’s gone missing and he has a lead.”
“Well, that’s good to hear—but isn’t that classified?”
“Probably.” He closed a folder with a sigh. “You’ll likely hear it on the six o’clock news anyway. We’ve strategically leaked it. John thinks it will force the Russians into cooperating if we let them know we already know the probable suspect. Even though we don’t.”
“Ah. You’re bluffing.”
He shrugged, then pulled a seat out for her. He looked tired, like he’d not been getting much sleep. Ellie figured the man had plenty to keep him up at night, including an adolescent daughter whose scowl could give the Russians a reason to restart the Cold War.
He sat across from her and smiled, and suddenly he didn’t look so tired anymore. The smile creased around his hazel eyes, and Ellie caught her breath: This was what the networks’ cameras ate up, when he’d first appeared on the political scene. This was what the pundits called charisma. This was what had news magazines with his image on them selling like Justin Bieber albums to preteens.
The steward served them salad, and Ellie concentrated on her plate. She had no business thinking about POTUS in that way. She could remember all those years ago when he’d been hailed as a hero, a Medal of Honor winner for conspicuous gallantry, above and beyond the call of duty. Above and beyond what most people could fathom.
She wished she could ask him about that—about the time he’d held off dozens of enemy soldiers as they closed in on the abandoned shed where his wounded comrades were waiting to be medevacked.
But his mind was on clear and present dangers, not a jungle war that had happened two decades ago.
Ice clinked as he picked up a glass of water the steward had just filled. “I’ve taken your advice, tried to spend more time with Katie. I even asked her about her social life.”
“Oh?” Ellie wasn’t sure where this was headed. As far as she could tell, Katie had no social life.
“She tells me she has a few friends. One—is it Jennifer? Jenelle?” He looked at her for a prompt. But Ellie could only give him a blank stare.
“Jennifer? I don’t think so. There’s a Jacqui she sometimes talks to in the library—”
“Ah. That must have been it.”
Ellie narrowed her gaze. “You’re bluffing again. Katie hasn’t told you about her social life. She didn’t mention Jacqui, or anyone else, did she?”
The tiny smile tilting up one corner of his mouth was a giveaway.
“She blew you off!” Ellie laughed.
“I’ve asked her if she wants to invite a friend over to the residence, maybe for a sleepover, like she used to back in Chicago. But she just ignores the question. Surely she must have some friends.”
Ellie eyed him over a forkful of radicchio, wondering if she should tell him the truth. Katie talked to no one if she could avoid it. She spent library hour at a table by herself, her lunch break hunched over a plate of food she only picked at, and after school she hurried out to the waiting car as if chased by small arms fire.
The kid was desperately lonely. Some kids were natural loners. Introverts were nothing new to high school hallways. But Ellie had studied the psychology of loners—a necessity in her line of work. Katie didn’t fit the profile. She was just having a hard time making friends.
But did her father need to know this? Did this come under the heading of protectee secrets that she must keep?
Ellie hesitated. Adam Dybik wasn’t looking to come down on his daughter for sneaking a drink, or snatching a cigarette on the playground. He was concerned, and rightly so.
The steward served plates of bay scallops covered with lemon butter, then left the room. Ellie gazed across the table. “Katie’s having difficulty fitting in. For one thing, she’s much more intelligent than many of her classmates.”
“She’s always been smart. It was never a problem before.”
“She attended school in suburbia before. These kids at this school—they have street smarts, but they’re not coming home to parents who discuss the latest NPR segment. Many of them are from single-parent homes—”
Too late she realized her mistake.
Adam gave her a sharp look. “Is that so?” He speared a scallop a little more forcefully than the perfectly cooked mollusk called for.
Ellie swallowed. “Yes, I know, so is Katie. But her home is—” She looked around, at the Jackson Pollock painting hanging above the fireplace, at the gold striped wallpaper, at the silver candelabras glowing on the mantle. “Not your typical single-parent environment. Most of the kids in her school have never heard of Jackson Pollock.”
“It’s borrowed from the National Gallery—”
“Whose director was a visitor here two months ago.”
“Katie wouldn’t even look at him during the meal. Except to tell him Picasso was a talentless hack.”
Ellie winced. “She wants to shock you.”
“And she’s accomplished that. On more than one occasion. I was hoping we could get beyond that phase of teenage rebellion and on to something more constructive.”
Ellie took a sip of her ice water. “Such as?”
Suddenly a man who’d single-handedly held an enemy platoon at bay had the look of a man in way over his head. “I don’t have a clue. What’s a normal father-daughter relationship supposed to involve?”
“If you’re asking me for advice…”
“I am. As a friend, not as the head of her detail.” His face broke into a scowl. “There are no federal guidelines issued for father-daughter relationships, it turns out.”
Ellie smiled. “Maybe you’re overthinking this. Have you tried just being yourself? I mean, you’re not exactly an ogre.”
“Tell that to Congress.” Then he sighed. “I don’t know what to do. I try talking to her, helping her with homework—not that she needs any help. I ask her about her school day and you’d think I was pumping her for classified information.”
He set down his fork. “Tell me—you’re a woman.” That smile again, the one Justin Bieber would envy. “You have a father. How are these father-daughter things supposed to work?”
Ellie slid her tongue against a piece of radicchio stuck in her teeth. She didn’t want to tell him her own relationship with her father wasn’t particularly healthy, so she focused on Katie. “Katie’s pretty creative when it comes to getting under your skin. You have to give her extra points for that.”
“Yeah, the blue hair was particularly creative. And the asthma attack? That was off the scale.”
Ellie shoved a grape tomato to the side of her plate. This was way outside the scope of her duties. There had never been a class at Rowley on advising parents of protectees on how to negotiate the teenage years. Hostage negotiations, yes. She’d participated in a wargaming exercise with the FBI once.
In fact…that gave her an idea.
“Why don’t you schedule a visit to Rowley? We’ve got great bike trails—other presidents have enjoyed them. And while you’re there we could set up an entertaining demonstration on law enforcement techniques. They’ll be training the EDT dogs this weekend.”
“EDT?”
“Explosive Detection Team. We use them for sniffing incendiary devices.” Ellie put down her fork. “I can set it up with your scheduler—it’ll be a great chance for you and Katie to bond. If she likes bike riding, we’ve got bikes you can use.” In a safe environment, surrounded by agents. Agents who would spot any hint of the attraction she was beginning to feel, the very out-of-line attraction.
But it would be gone by then. She was sure of it.
“She used to like bike riding. I’d even go with her, on weekends when I wasn’t working. But that was when we lived in suburbia, and she didn’t need to have a dozen agents accompany her wherever she went.”
“We can lay off the close protection at Rowley. You guys can just enjoy the ride. Get some fresh air. There’s even a firing range there. We all have to qualify every three months.”
He sighed. “Sounds like a blast.” He tossed his napkin, embossed with the White House emblem, to the table. “There was a time when we didn’t have to clear the streets of all human life forms just to ride our bikes.”
“It comes with the job these days. That’s why a lot of qualified people won’t even consider running for president.”
“There are days when I wish I hadn’t considered it myself. Lots of days.” He gazed at her with a rueful expression. “No one thought I’d win anyway. They had their money on the candidate in a coma.”
“Instead they elected you. A fully conscious man with a squeaky clean past. Well, except for those parking tickets you racked up in Chicago. We know about those, you know.”
“As long as the media doesn’t find out about the jaywalking charges.”
He gave her another grin, the one that would’ve melted her socks, if she’d been wearing any. Why did the father of her protectee have to be so damn handsome, anyway? They didn’t cover this predicament in agent school, either: What to do when your protectee’s father makes you want to rip off your panties.
“So I’ll tell my scheduler to pencil in Rowley for the weekend. We’ve both got bikes—unless there’s some rule about presidential vehicles that extends to the two-wheeled ones.”
“No, but we’ll want to inspect it. Your detail will see that it’s safe.”
“Right, just in case any terrorist tries to take out the brakes.”
“Unfortunately, terrorists have much more potent weapons.”
The steward came in, with plates of chocolate cake. He set them down and placed dessert forks exactly three inches from each plate, then exited the room as quietly as he’d come in.
Ellie gave the cake a wary glance. “I don’t think I can eat that. And still remain upright.”
“Surely you’re not on a diet.” The president’s gaze slid over her, and for a second she thought Adam Dybik was flirting with her.
But no. This president wasn’t known as a flirt. He worked too hard, everyone said, to spare the time for dating.
Or maybe he’d just never got over his wife leaving.
That thought depressed her, so she forked a piece of chocolate cake before answering him. “No, no diet. But I usually don’t eat dessert. At lunch, anyway. Personal rule.”
“I see.” He gave her a rueful glance. “I gave up smoking and hard liquor. I’m not about to give up chocolate.”
Ellie savored the taste of the cake in her mouth. “Mmmm. I don’t blame you. This is really good.”
“It’s better than sex.”
Her fork clattered on her plate. “What?”
He smiled again, the one that crinkled his eyes. “That’s the name of it, according to the chef, when he told me the menu. Said it was a recipe from the last administration, won a White House cooking contest. And caused a mini scandal.”
“Oh.” She took another bite, swallowed, and considered. “Well, maybe.”
He gave the slice on his plate a measuring look, pretended to judge. “I don’t think so. But it’s been awhile, so I could be missing a nuance or two.”
This was definitely not where this conversation should be heading, but Ellie’s impish side seemed to have kidnapped her tongue. Because her tongue was now licking the frosting off her fork as if it belonged to a high-class D.C. hooker.
“Mmm hmm,” she agreed. “Definitely better than sex. Especially with that last guy, who thought his abs were molded at the Greek god factory.”
“Factory abs. I’ve heard about that place.”
She giggled. “Yes, they advertise on infomercials. ‘For $29.99, you too can get the abs of Zeus. Plus, for a limited time only, we’ll throw in the biceps of Neptune if you act now.’”
Adam said, a little too casually, “So you dumped him? The guy with the Greek abs?”
“Oh, yeah. He unfortunately had the head of a Greek statue as well. Thick as a vein of marble.”
Why didn’t the steward come in, stop her runaway tongue? She glanced at the doorway. Nope, no rescue there. She was on her own, divulging the secrets of her sex life to the president, with no chance of rescue.
But he didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he seemed to be listening intently, as if she were revealing the locations of that missing nuclear material. The stuff destined for a dirty bomb.
“I see.”
“He was an agent. Reassigned, before you came on board.” Damn. Now her chocolate-fueled tongue had just admitted she hadn’t had sex in almost a year.
He crossed his legs, leaned back, and looked at her over the remains of dessert. “I’m beginning to think Katie’s not the only one with a—deficit in her social life.”
Ellie fingered the stem on her water goblet, pretending to examine the pattern in the crystal. “There hasn’t been time.”
“You don’t get time off?”
“Yes, but…it’s a big investment to…it takes a lot of time to—” She shrugged. “You know, going out, to bars, or wherever eligible single guys are.”
“I know what you mean. I tried to go to a bar the other night and there was a situation in Beijing. Some sort of power struggle they wanted to brief me on.”
“At least you get to blame the Chinese.”
He gave her a wry smile. “Yes, a superpower with nuclear warheads is always a handy scapegoat. I blamed the Russians when I couldn’t snag a date for the G20.”
She laughed. “You’re the busiest man in the world, and here I am complaining about not having time to cruise bars.”
He nodded soberly. “Thank God we have chocolate.”
She laughed again, surprised to discover she was having more fun discussing the finer points of chocolate cake with POTUS than with her last date. “Dating is definitely overrated. Or else this is really great cake.”
Her eyes met his, and damn it, there was that smile again. The one that shouldn’t be so sexy, but was about a nine on the heatometer. She felt her face flush.
She’d have to examine this strange urge she had to confide in Adam Dybik. But not when he was looking at her as if she were a slice of chocolate cake he wanted to devour.
The steward came back, wheeling a trolley with two carafes. “Some coffee, sir?”
Adam nodded. “I’ve got another meeting with my treasury secretary this afternoon. I have to be on my toes, otherwise I’ll end up agreeing to raise taxes.”
“I’ve met him,” Ellie said. “He seems nice.”
“He’s mellowed since he got married and had three kids. Back in the day, he was known as the toughest bastard on Wall Street. We met at Harvard, but it wasn’t until he helped me bust some crooks at the Chicago Board of Trade that we became friends.”
“I was on his security detail for a while, before I got reassigned to Katie.”
“He’s the one who convinced me to take on this gig.” Adam waved a finger in the air. “He told me the international financial markets were about to collapse due to the instability of the political situation.”
Ellie declined coffee, glancing at her watch. “I should go. I want to finish that paperwork, then head to the school in time to ride home with Katie.”
Adam drained the coffee, then set the delicate cup on the saucer. “Same time next week? And we’ll definitely schedule that trip to Rowley. I’d love to see those dogs at work.”
“Sure. But no more bluffing. I’m on to you now,” she told him, scooting her chair back.
He stood, smiling at her over the floral centerpiece. “Let’s just hope the Russians aren’t.”