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Without another word, he wrapped his arm around my waist and lifted me off my feet, hauling me back into the kitchen. He grabbed his gun that was lying on the counter (the first time I’d noticed it since he’d arrived, but then again, I was busy) and put a finger up to his lips.

  I rolled my eyes.

  Did he really think he needed to tell me to be quiet?

  He leaned down and spoke low in my ear. “Stay with me.”

  Wait a minute. Was he going up there? Shouldn’t we be getting the hell out?

  I grabbed hold of his hand and gave it a hard tug. He turned back, holding the gun at his side. I pointed to the door, motioning for us to use it.

  He shook his head and held up the gun.

  My eyes widened. Was he crazy?

  A thump echoed from upstairs, and Spencer started to move. I could only rush after him, unwilling to leave him here alone.

  The noise continued as we slowly went up the steps. Spencer kept his finger on the trigger and moved with purpose, using his body as a shield for mine. Whoever was up here seemed to be shut in the small third bedroom at the end of the hall.

  I kept all of Jack’s toys in there. Sort of like a playroom. Of course, Jack only ever dragged his toys out of there and into one of our bedrooms or downstairs, so maybe it was more of a storage room.

  And now it was harboring a criminal.

  As soon as we cleared the top step, both of us stood in the hall, staring at the door I never closed. Suddenly, the sound of high-pitched laughter rang out. I jumped, nearly having a freaking heart attack as this creepy-crawly feeling skittered over my nerves.

  Hahahahah. Heehehehehe.

  The sound echoed through the quiet house.

  I knew it was one of Jack’s toys, but it still scared the shit out of me. I felt my arms shaking and tried to ignore it.

  The laughter stopped.

  Spencer motioned toward the door and for me to stay where I was. I wrapped my arms around my middle as he crept toward the door, gun drawn and muscles bunched.

  He reached out to turn the handle.

  I held my breath.

  The metal of the round doorknob rattled in his hand as Spencer tried to open the door. He glanced at me with raised eyebrows. I shook my head. I never locked that door. Why would I?

  Another thump and more laughter went off from inside.

  Hahahahah. Heehehehehe.

  I was so throwing that toy in the trash later.

  I had one of those key things that opened all the doors in this house. It was like a piece of straight metal with a handle on the end that one could insert into the lock and pop it out to open the door.

  I rushed into my room and pulled open my top dresser drawer. After a second of fishing around, my hand closed around it and I rushed back into the hallway and held it up.

  Spencer nodded and held up his hand. I tossed it to him and he snatched it out of the air.

  Keeping hold of his gun, he moved forward to pop the lock.

  This odd feeling, like being watched or of something not being right, came over me. I turned to stare back into my room.

  Something was off…

  I walked back into the room, staring at everything, trying to understand exactly what felt wrong.

  A dark figure came out of nowhere, appearing soundlessly behind me. I didn’t have time to react, to do anything at all. He slapped a hand with a rag over my face and jabbed me in the kidney with his fist.

  I hunched over in pain as he dragged me backward into my closet.

  Out in the hall, I heard the lock pop and Spencer burst into the other room.

  A man wearing a black ski mask and dark clothing shoved me against the wall, pinning me by the throat. The rag he held over my face and mouth was doused in some kind of chemical, and it smelled incredibly sweet.

  “This is your last warning, bitch,” the intruder growled. “If he’s not dead by the night of the dignitary dinner, then you will be.”

  My brain became fuzzy, overruling the intense fear in my body. I couldn’t struggle. I couldn’t fight back. All my air supply was cut off, my lungs were seizing, and the pain in my throat radiated over my entire body.

  Yet, I felt somehow detached.

  Unfocused.

  Far away.

  “You understand?” the man growled, tightening his grip.

  From somewhere far away, I heard a cat hiss and meow.

  I didn’t have a cat.

  A gun went off.

  The man holding me chuckled. Then he shoved his face so close to mine that I wanted to recoil, but I was unable. His breath was hot on my ear when he whispered, “That new man of yours is a real pussy hater. Better be careful.”

  He pulled the rag and his violent grip away. I sagged to the floor, falling into a heap among my hanging dresses and shirts.

  Spencer yelled my name, and I heard a scuffle and commotion.

  Another shot was fired.

  Glass shattered.

  The lights went out.

  17

  “Why won’t she wake up?”

  The urgent tone of the deep voice intruded upon the darkness claiming me. It was unbelievably thick, and I began to panic that I wouldn’t be able to get free.

  “He used chloroform on her. You know that shit knocks people out,” another voice replied.

  “He was right under my fucking nose,” he growled. “He fucking got her, and I was standing right here.”

  “This isn’t your fault, Waller.”

  “I’m going to fucking kill him,” he swore.

  I wanted to call out to Spencer, to tell him I was okay. The pure rage and fear in his voice cut through the darkness and attached itself around me. Every word he spoke towed me further to the surface.

  “Do I need to remove you from this investigation?” the man responded. “I can put you on another detail until this is over.”

  I felt the deadly calm radiate around the room. “Try,” Spence growled. “I won’t listen.”

  “You would risk your entire career for this perp?” the man asked. I think it was Walsh.

  “Not for him,” Spencer rebuked. “For her.”

  I tried to force my eyelids open. I wanted to shout that I was here, and I didn’t want him sacrificing anything for me.

  “Are you in love with her?” Walsh asked, his voice quiet.

  Everything inside me stilled. I stopped struggling against the sludge holding me under. The only thing I could focus on was that question and the answer Spencer would give.

  Seconds ticked by.

  “Fuck,” he swore. The pure emotion behind his favorite word speared me. I felt him move closer, felt him staring down at me. “She totally snuck up on me,” he whispered.

  And just like that, I shoved through the heaviness. I wanted so badly to look into Spencer’s amber gaze.

  He loved me.

  I blinked my eyes open. It took long moments to focus, and when I finally did, all I saw was Spence. His face was drawn. His hair was a wreck, and his jaw was unshaven. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and I realized it was because I was wearing it. All he had on was a pair of jeans, and he was looking across the room.

  Walsh sighed heavily. “I can’t say I’m surprised. You spend more time in the kitchen than any agent should.”

  “Hey,” Spencer said, his voice growing hard. “I do my job.”

  “Yes, you do. And you’re good at it.”

  “If you take me off this case, I’ll go rogue.” Spencer warned.

  My voice scraped from my sore throat. “No.”

  He was right there instantly, bending over me, his eyes filled with concern. “Elle?”

  I smiled groggily. “Hey…”

  He let out a string of inappropriate cuss words and then dropped on the edge of the bed, making my body slide against his hip when the mattress dipped. “How are you feeling?”

  “Kind of fuzzy,” I said.

  His hands brushed at my hair, sweeping it back from my face. “It’ll wear off.”
r />   I nodded. “Jack?”

  “He’s fine, darlin’.”

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “We were hoping you could tell us,” Walsh said from across the room.

  I frowned.

  “Take your time,” Spencer said.

  I moved to sit up and he wrapped his arm beneath me and helped. We were in my bedroom, at my house. I glanced around as the fog lifted from my brain.

  I remembered the man in the house…

  The window was still open and the pane above the bottom one was shattered. I remembered the sound of the gun going off.

  I gasped and grabbed Spencer’s arm. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” He assured me.

  “The man that was here…” My eyes went to the closet, and everything that happened came back to me.

  Crap. I wasn’t wearing any pants.

  I looked down, totally mortified. Blankets covered me to my waist. I breathed a sigh of relief and looked at Spencer. He winked.

  Heat suffused me as I remembered what Spencer and I were doing before the man broke in again.

  “Elle, what happened?” Walsh asked, stepping closer to the bed.

  “Did you call the police?” I worried, not wanting any of this to hit the news. It would only anger whoever was behind this more.

  “Of course not. The Secret Service is handling this for now,” Walsh replied.

  Spencer remained tightlipped, his jaw tight. I had the overwhelming urge to smooth my hand over his rough jaw and take away some of the edge from within his eyes. Our audience kept my hand in my lap.

  I realized Walsh knew there was something between us, but he’d been privy to enough of our private moments for one night.

  “Did I hear a cat?” I asked, distracting myself from thoughts of Spence.

  “There was a cat in the room,” Spencer said. “He locked it in there.”

  “Why on Earth would he do that?” I wondered.

  “To distract me,” Spencer muttered. “To get you alone.”

  “Spence,” I said softly, reaching for his hand. I hated seeing him beat himself up this way.

  He stood, gently rebuffing my hand, and paced the carpet.

  “I heard gunshots.” I remembered.

  “I fired at the cat. It leapt at me and I just reacted.”

  “Did you kill it?” I worried.

  He stopped pacing and looked at me. “You’re worried about a cat?”

  “It’s a helpless animal.”

  Walsh and Spencer looked at me like I was insane.

  I don’t see what the big deal was. I mean, geez, a girl needed to know if a cat was shot and killed in her house.

  “Well?” I demanded, not backing down from their looks.

  “No, the cat’s fine,” Spencer muttered.

  “And the window?” I asked, glancing at the shattered panes.

  “I shot those out, too,” Spencer muttered.

  “It’s not like you to miss a shot.” Walsh grunted.

  Spencer stiffened. “I wasn’t looking at him. I was looking for Elle when I fired.”

  “So he got away?”

  “Yes,” Spencer growled. Then he came to my side. “I’m sorry. If I’d have shot him, this would be over.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said.

  “He dragged you in the closet,” Walsh said. “Did he speak to you?”

  I nodded, my hand going up to my throat where the flesh felt swollen and sore. The fear of being pinned against the wall, of the life being choked out of me as I tried to suck in air only to get mouthfuls of chloroform instead, washed over me.

  “You need to back off,” Spencer growled, straightening to face Walsh.

  Walsh’s face grew dark, and I hurried to speak before the two men began to argue.

  “It’s fine. I need to tell you so we can figure out what to do next. The clock is ticking.”

  That got their attention.

  “Did he threaten you?” Spencer asked murderously.

  “No. We had tea,” I snapped.

  Then I sighed, guilt pummeling me. “I’m sorry.” I sighed. “I’m just…”

  “I know, baby,” Spencer said softly, sitting down beside me again. “It’s okay.”

  Walsh groaned.

  “He dragged me in the closet.” I began, fingering my bruised neck again. “And pinned me to the wall. My mouth was covered with that stuff so I couldn’t call out, and it was so…. sickly sweet that it made me drowsy almost instantly.”

  “Go on,” Walsh instructed.

  “He told me if the president wasn’t dead by the night of the dignitary’s dinner, then he was going to kill me because I was of no use to him.”

  “Fuck,” Spencer spat and jumped off the bed.

  I really was going to have to speak to him about his foul mouth if he was going to be spending time with Jack.

  That’s when I knew.

  I knew I wasn’t going to be able to resist him. I wasn’t going to be able to hold him at arm’s length forever. As much as I didn’t want a relationship with a man… I wanted Spencer more.

  Even my subconscious was filled with thoughts of him and my son together.

  “Elle?” Walsh said, drawing me out of my thoughts. “What else did he say?”

  I glanced at Spencer, my cheeks heating. “Nothing important,” I muttered.

  “Everything is important,” Walsh snapped.

  Spencer stiffened.

  “It’s okay,” I said. “After Spencer’s gun went off, he said, ‘That new man of yours is a real pussy hater. Better be careful.’”

  “He’s a fucking comedian,” Spencer growled.

  “What else?” Walsh pressed.

  I shook my head. “That’s all. We were only in there a moment. I think he was afraid Spencer would catch him.”

  “He should be,” Spence muttered.

  “He just threatened me, gave me a deadline, and then left.”

  Walsh and Spencer exchanged a long look. It was filled with meaning.

  “It’s an inside job,” Spencer said.

  Walsh nodded. “Yep.”

  “What!” I gasped, springing forward. Pain in my lower back made me wince and kept me from getting up. “How could you possibly know that?”

  “He knows the White House is having a dignitary’s dinner. That stuff doesn’t make the news. The White House has too many events to be reported on. It has to be someone who has access to the calendar of events, someone on the inside.”

  “And now he knows you aren’t here alone, Elle,” Walsh said. “If he works at the White House, then I have no doubt he knows it’s Spencer you are with.”

  “How could he know that?” I asked.

  Walsh gave me a knowing look. “Everyone knows about you and Waller. We saw it coming months ago.”

  So everyone knew but me?

  I thought of something else. “So if he knows about me and Spencer, then… he probably knows that I told him?”

  “Maybe not,” Spencer said. “He told you to be wary of me. Maybe he was trying to drive a wedge between us, keep you separated and alone.”

  “Like I would listen to a man who was trying to strangle me,” I muttered.

  My comment caused Spencer to stiffen and his jaw muscles to lock down. Probably not the best choice of words.

  Good going, Elle.

  “I think we should assume he thinks she told,” Walsh said.

  Panic assaulted me. I jumped up from the bed, swaying a little on my feet. “But what about Jack!” I demanded. “If he thinks I told, then he’s going to go after my son!”

  “He won’t be able to find him,” Spencer said, taking me by the shoulders and staring into my eyes. “Jack is safe.”

  I latched onto Spencer’s face, trying to calm the brutal freak-out ripping through my insides. “Then he’s going to kill me.”

  Spencer’s fingers dug into my skin. “No. He won’t.”

  “He already said he would. He said to kil
l the president by the night of the dinner or he would kill me.”

  Spencer jerked away from me, pacing the room again. Then he stopped mid-stride, his announcement shocking.

  “Then I guess we’re going to kill the president.”

  18

  You could have heard a pin drop.

  The silence filled the room, pressing in on all of us as we sat there and stared at Spencer.

  Did he just suggest we kill the president of the United States?

  Maybe he was overly tired.

  Maybe he was too stressed out.

  “You’ve lost your ever-lovin’ mind!” Walsh roared, making me jump and disrupting the quiet.

  Well, there was that.

  But I wasn’t about to jump on the bandwagon that Spencer had gone cuckoo. It wasn’t possible. I needed him around too much.

  “It’s the perfect plan,” Spencer said. His tone of voice suggested he could be talking about something as mundane as the weather.

  I blinked.

  “Once he’s dead, the people behind this will get sloppy. We’ll be able to catch them.”

  “And he won’t come after me or Jack,” I said.

  Spencer’s eyes cut to me and then away. I noted the hard set of his jaw before he forcefully relaxed it.

  What did I say?

  “There’s just one problem with your plan, Waller,” Walsh said. “I’ll see you in jail before I let you off the commander in chief.”

  Spencer grunted. “Seriously? Give me some credit.”

  Walsh and I looked at each other.

  “We aren’t actually going to kill him, just make it look like we did.” Spencer turned thoughtful. “It’s the perfect excuse to get him out of harm’s way anyway. We can send him into hiding.”

  “Do you know the kind of mass hysteria that will invite? The other countries who hate us will see it as a golden opportunity to strike,” Walsh said, grim.

  I felt all the hope leave my body. He was right. It couldn’t work.

  “Not if we played it right.”

  “What’s the plan, Waller?” Walsh said. “Spit it out already! I haven’t got all damn night.”

  “Put her back in the kitchen.”

  “This isn’t about cookies,” Walsh snapped.

  “Let her get back to her daily routine at work. We kept this quiet at the White House. No one knew but a very limited few that she was at the center of a threat to the president. So she goes back to work. Business as usual. Whoever is on the inside will see it. They will be appeased. They will think she’s going to do it.”