Evyn murmured and shifted above her, easing her leg between Wes’s thighs. Her pelvis rocked into Wes’s and the tight knot of need between Wes’s thighs grew. She’d come hard the night before—the first time when Evyn had taken her with her mouth, then more slowly as Evyn had stroked her, and now she was ready again. Cupping Evyn’s ass in her palm, she guided Evyn’s leg to the place she needed her.

“I like waking up with you,” Evyn whispered, her lips against Wes’s throat. She kissed her way up and tugged lightly on her earlobe.

The tiny points of pain sent pleasure streaking down Wes’s spine. She raised her hips so her clitoris rubbed against Evyn’s thigh. “I like sleeping with you. I like waking up with you. I like everything about being with you.”

Evyn chuckled. “Handy, that, because I plan on being around a lot.”

“I think I’ll need you around a lot.”

Evyn propped herself up on her forearms, the first rays of morning light breaking over her face. Her eyes were blue-gray in the dusky dawn. “We haven’t talked about the future.”

Wes cradled Evyn’s face, scooped her fingers through her hair, kissed her. “I want one.”

“So do I.” Evyn kissed her, exploring, teasing, tasting. She slid deeper, claiming. “I want you. Just you. I know always sounds like a line, but I mean it.”

Wes’s concentration faltered—gave way under the sensation of Evyn’s mouth and hands. She pressed harder against Evyn’s thigh, climbing faster. Too fast. Gasping, she pulled away. “I’m going to come soon.”

“Mmm—then don’t stop.”

“I want—I need—to say this first. I love you. I’ve never wanted anyone else and I never will. Always sounds like the beginning.”

Evyn shuddered. “I never even wanted tomorrow with anyone before. Now I want every single one of yours to be mine.”

“They will be.” Wes’s muscles clenched and she rode the plume of pleasure higher. “I’m sorry, I can’t…I’m coming for you.”

“Yes. For me.” Evyn scored her teeth down Wes’s neck, biting gently. “Yes,” she breathed against Wes’s skin, hearing the startled cry as Wes’s control unraveled. Her clitoris twitched, pulsed, thickened. She needed to come but she held back. She needed Wes more. “Mine. All mine. Come for me.”

Wes cried out, body shattering with pleasure. She crushed her face to Evyn’s neck. “Yours. Yes.”

Pushing up on one arm, Evyn fumbled for Wes’s hand with the other. She pressed Wes’s fingers between her legs. “Touch me. I need to come for you.”

Wes stroked her, slid lower, pressed inside, and Evyn exploded in her hand. “I love you,” Wes whispered. “No chances today, Evyn. I can’t lose you.”

Evyn sighed and stretched, trailing her fingers down Wes’s back—sated, supremely content. “You won’t lose me, I promise. I’m here for the long term.”

Wes kissed her, choosing to believe for a little while longer they could control the future.

*

Hooker opened the minifridge tucked in the corner of his motel room and removed a small plain cardboard box the size of a ballpoint pen case. The clear plastic vial with the screw top was nestled inside, surrounded by a Styrofoam cut-out. A half-inch of milky white fluid filled the end of the tube—at least it had when he’d checked it when he’d accepted it from the woman in Georgia. He hadn’t looked at it again. He didn’t want to look at it, he didn’t want to touch it. He wasn’t superstitious, but he didn’t ride around with a loaded gun and the safety off pointed at his chest, either. If all he’d been told was true, whatever was in the tube was ten kinds of deadly dangerous. He couldn’t hand it off soon enough.

He placed the small, narrow box in a white plastic cooler along with a couple of cans of beer and a burrito from the minimart where he’d gassed up the rental car he’d used to drive north the night before. Russo had pushed the timetable forward, and haste was never a good idea, but Russo lived by the polls. If the numbers showed Powell gaining in popularity, that was all that mattered to Russo—after all, he wasn’t taking any risks. Hooker didn’t concern himself with politics—politicians came and went as frequently as the weather shifted, and he’d never seen that whoever held power changed things very much. Money was the only true power, and Russo had plenty of that. He’d follow Russo’s lead as long as the money held up.

He packed his travel bag and meticulously wiped down everything he’d touched in the motel room, which hadn’t been much. He’d just arrived the night before after dark in another rental car that he’d procured with one of his aliases. He’d eaten at a fast-food place across the highway from the motel and slept in his clothes. He’d shower at his next stop. Satisfied that he hadn’t left anything of himself behind, he grabbed his bag and the cooler, left his room key on the rickety table by the door, and walked out just as the sun came up. He couldn’t finish this job fast enough. In five hours, he’d be at the airport headed home for Christmas Eve.

*

Jennifer stepped out of the shower and wrapped a fluffy white bath sheet around her chest. It fell to her thighs, chasing away the slight chill in the bathroom. The temperature had dropped again, and the old town house let in a little of the night air through hidden cracks and crevices. A small price to pay for its historic beauty, except on mornings like these. She hurried into her bedroom, drying herself as she went, and dressed hastily in a navy suit, white shirt, and low dark heels. She didn’t plan to stay very long in the diner and doubted the man, Tom, would want to linger, either. Twenty minutes, really, ought to be enough for two people whose only connection was a common friend to share a cup of coffee, make small talk, and go their separate ways. She’d timed the meeting so she’d finish up and arrive at the clinic at shift change, when she’d slide her lunch bag into the staff refrigerator just as she did every morning. Only today, the bag would be a little fuller. Her stomach trembled when she thought about the next step.

She wasn’t frightened, she was excited. Proud to be the one to ultimately carry out the mission. Her family would be proud that she had fulfilled her destiny—that she’d learned her lessons well and had struck a blow for true freedom and independence. If she was very lucky and everything went according to plan, she might even survive. But if she didn’t, she would die knowing she’d made a difference. And after all, that’s what she’d been born for.

Chapter Thirty-two

Wes sat in the van beside Block and two Secret Service agents she didn’t know, watching the monitor from a camera trained on the front of Eva’s Diner. She’d been watching patrons come and go since 0600. Two other video feeds—from cameras above the restroom hallway in the rear and over the kitchen door behind the counter—revealed the interior. A directional audio receiver that Block could reposition remotely from his control panel had been secured to an overhead light fixture. The place was small—a long, narrow room with eight booths against the plate glass front windows and a dozen black-vinyl-topped stools in front of the counter. At zero-seven twenty, almost every space was occupied.

Roberts had advised the diner owner who’d arrived to open the place at 0530 that the team, from an unnamed federal agency, needed surveillance to document unspecified criminal activity. The owner, a bottle-blonde of indeterminate age, was thrilled by the whole thing and a very good actress. She worked the counter and never once glanced at the cameras—or at the undercover agents posing as patrons.

Wes couldn’t see Evyn, who was posted inside the kitchen with a view through the circular window on the swinging door. In order to protect the civilians, the plan was to record the exchange on video and apprehend both Jennifer and her contact outside the building in a safe zone. Wes’s job was to receive the virus and supervise its transport to a secure lab. The second part of her assignment—the part she hoped she would not have to carry out—was to limit civilian exposure in the event the virus was released and oversee the treatment of any individuals who were exposed.

The other agents inside the diner posed as a businessman reading a newspaper at the far end of the counter opposite the rear exit and a young couple having breakfast at a booth just inside the front door. They blended in with the morning business crowd and neighborhood diners, and Wes doubted even someone looking for it would pick up their constant survey of anyone coming in the door.

“Here comes the subject,” Block murmured, and Wes swiveled on her stool to get a view of his monitor. Jennifer Pattee, a large black leather bag over one shoulder, walked briskly up to the diner door and inside. The kitchen feed picked her up as she walked a few feet down the aisle and then slowed as if searching for someone she planned to meet. With a sudden smile, she hurried on and sat down across from a single man in a Redskins cap drinking coffee in a booth. Wes had looked at him a half dozen times and noted nothing out of the ordinary—mid-thirties, possibly older, rugged outdoor type in a flannel shirt with faint dark stubble along his jaw. He half rose as Jennifer sat, and Block adjusted the audio receiver for maximum reception.

“Hi,” Jennifer said as she settled across from the man. “You must be Tom.”

“And you’re Jennifer. Ellie’s told me so much about you.”

“She hasn’t told me nearly enough about you,” Jennifer said. “It’s great to finally meet you. I’m sorry you won’t be able to stay longer in the city. I could play tour guide.”

He smiled, sipped his coffee, and said nothing while a waitress approached. Jennifer asked for coffee and a plain croissant.

“Maybe next time I’m through,” he said.

“That would be great.” Jennifer picked at the pastry, although she didn’t appear nervous. She glanced at her watch several times while her contact passed on a refill on his coffee and watched the door as other customers came and went.

“Excuse me,” he said, fishing his cell phone from his pocket. “I’m expecting a message.”

“Please—go ahead,” Jennifer said quickly.

He checked the readout and grimaced. “I’m so sorry, a business message from a client overseas. They’re available now and I have to get back to them. It may take a while. I hate to have gotten you all the way out here only to run out on you.”

“That’s okay—if you can get free for lunch or dinner in the next day or so, you have my number. If not, maybe I’ll see you the next time I visit Ellie.”

“Absolutely.” He started to rise and paused. “Oh, I almost forgot…” He reached into a backpack beside him and drew out a small narrow box. “Ellie asked me to give you this. A Christmas present. She said she didn’t get her shopping done in time to mail it to you.”

Laughing, Jennifer slid the small box into her oversized bag. “That sounds like her. Thanks for bringing it along.”

“No problem. Well—I should go.”

“All right. Hopefully we’ll meet again sometime soon.”

He held her gaze a moment. “I hope so too. Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas,” Jennifer said softly.

*

Roberts’s voice came over the COM. “Team one, subject is on his way out. Take him at the corner…Go.”

Wes watched as two men closed in from either side and a woman stepped from a parked SUV into his path, forcing him to slow. The subject’s expression went from surprised to wary, and he quickly scanned up and down the street as if considering his chances of escaping. Within seconds, the two male agents each grabbed an arm and the trio pushed him forward into the back of the idling SUV. The agents followed him in, and the vehicle sped away. The whole thing was over in less than a minute.

Wes scanned all the monitors for Evyn and didn’t see her anywhere. Her mouth went dry but her pulse stayed steady. She glanced at the masks and hazmat suits stacked by the van door. Evyn knew her job, and she knew hers. No matter what happened out there, she’d find Evyn.

Inside the diner, Jennifer searched through the large shoulder bag and came out with bills that she laid on the table next to her uneaten croissant and nearly full cup of coffee. Wes wondered if she’d transferred the stolen sample to another container inside the bag. Any unnecessary handling risked rupturing the seal on the tube or, even worse, breakage.

“Showtime,” Block muttered as Jennifer stood and pulled on her topcoat, slipped the strap of her black leather bag securely onto her shoulder, and strode directly toward the front door. The next second, she stepped out into the morning.

*

“Go,” Roberts said over the COM.

Evyn pushed away from the side of the diner and strode around the corner to the front. Jennifer was thirty feet away, one hand in the pocket of her coat, the other on top of her bag.