“Do you want to eat now, or later?”

  “Now,” she told him with a grin. “And later.”

  As she watched Adam strip off his clothes, Maggie thought she’d melt from the sizzling combination of hot water and spiraling desire and disappear down the shower drain in a rivulet of need. From a snow cave to a 747, she thought. From under the ground to a mile above it. From an attack beside a frozen lake to a ring of fire beside a deserted shack. Out of all the missions she’d ever been on, she knew this one would always remain vividly emblazoned in her mind.

  And when Adam stepped inside and closed the shower door behind him, Maggie knew the expression in his eyes would always—always!—remain imprinted in her heart.

  Water streamed over his broad shoulders and down his chest as he buried his hands in her wet hair. Tilting her face to his, he smiled down at her.

  “I love you, Chameleon. In all your guises. But I love you in this one most.”

  His use of her code name gave Maggie a little dart of pleasure, then one of pain. Her personal relationship with Adam was so inextricably bound to her professional one. Yet she knew in her heart that couldn’t continue. They’d stepped through the barriers that separated them, and there was no stepping back. Not now. Not ever.

  “I love you, too,” she whispered, sliding her palms up the planes of his water-slick chest. “In all your guises. Special envoy. Director. Code name Thunder. Plain ol’ Adam Ridgeway. But I love you in this one the most.”

  She wrapped her arms around his neck and brought his mouth down to hers. He tasted of warm, rich brandy. Of smoky fire. Of Adam.

  Rising up on her toes, she brought her body into his. She managed to contain her startled gasp when her bruised tummy connected with his, but he didn’t miss the tiny, involuntary flinch. Sliding his hands down the curve of her waist, he grasped her hips gently and pushed her away.

  She murmured an inarticulate protest.

  Guiding her gently, he rotated her slick body until she faced the wall. “Like this, my darling,” he whispered in her ear. “Like this. I don’t want to hurt you.”

  Maggie discovered that “this” wasn’t bad, after all. In fact, she thought on a gasp of pure pleasure, “this” was wonderful. Adam’s broad chest felt solid and strong and sleek against her back. The way he reached around to mold her breasts with both hands sent waves of sensation washing through her. The touch of her bare bottom against his belly was even more electrifying. Hard and rampant and fully erect, he pressed against her.

  Bracing her palms on the shower tiles, Maggie arched her back. Her head twisted, and he bent to take her mouth. While his tongue and hers met in a slow, sensual dance, his hands played with her nipples. With each tug and twist, fire streaked from Maggie’s breasts to her belly. With each nip of his teeth against her lower lip, she felt the sting of need in her loins.

  When his hands left her breasts to brush with a feather-light touch down her middle, her pelvis arched to meet them. Her head fell back against his shoulder as he parted her folds and opened her to his touch and the pelting of the pulsing water. Maggie gasped at the exquisite sensation.

  “Adam! I don’t think— I can’t hold— Oh!”

  “Don’t think,” he growled in her ear. “Don’t hold back. Let me love you, Maggie. Let me feed your soul, as you feed mine.”

  When her soul had been fed, twice, and Adam’s at least once, they decided it was time to feed their bodies. While he used one of the fluffy towels monogrammed with the vice president’s seal to dry himself, Maggie pulled on a thick, sinfully soft terry robe.

  Plopping herself down on a vanity stool, she treated herself to a spectacular view of Adam’s lean flanks and tight white buns as she towel-dried her hair.

  “Mmm… Nice.” Her fingers curled into the towel. “Maybe that steak could wait a few more minutes.”

  “The steak might, but Radizwell probably won’t. I left him sniffing around the office. If we don’t get back in there, he’s liable to—”

  “Adam!” Sheer panic sliced through Maggie. Throwing the towel aside, she jumped off the stool. “You didn’t leave that animal in the same room with my steak, did you?”

  The terry-cloth robe flapped against her legs as she rushed through the paneled bedroom and threw open the door to the office.

  “I’m going to shoot him!”

  Hands on hips, Maggie glared at the shaggy creature stretched out contentedly beside the litter of dishes he’d pushed off the table onto the floor, all of which were licked clean. Sublimely indifferent to her anger, Radizwell raised his head, thumped his tail at Adam a couple of times, then yawned and laid his head back down.

  “I’ll shoot him!” Maggie snarled again. “I’ll skin him. I’ll—”

  “Strange,” Adam murmured. “McGowan said Taylor threatened to do the same.”

  “It’s not strange,” Maggie fumed. “It’s natural. It’s possible. It’s very likely, in fact, that someone will do so in the very near future. Why Taylor would keep this obnoxious, smelly, greedy beast is beyond me.”

  “Probably for the same reasons you keep a bug-eyed reptile with a yard-long tongue.”

  “Terence,” Maggie pronounced with lofty dignity, “has class.”

  Adam laughed and lifted her in his arms. Taking care not to bump her stomach, he carried her to the wide leather sofa at the far end of the office.

  “It’s not funny,” she muttered. “That…that Hungarian ate my steak!”

  “My steak, remember? Don’t pout, Maggie. I’ll order another one. I seem to have worked up quite an appetite.”

  The head steward delivered Adam’s second dinner some time later.

  By then, Maggie had retreated once more to the bedroom to finish dressing. She couldn’t bear the thought of strapping the body shield on over her sore stomach again, and she left it on the dressing stool.

  To her surprise, the pantsuit Lillian had laid out fit perfectly even without the tight corset. A size eight, no less! She smoothed her hands over trim hips covered in a soft, pale yellow wool and admired her silhouette in the mirror. Biting her lip, Maggie debated whether she should forgo her half of Adam’s second steak, after all.

  Nah! Not this time!

  She flipped off the lights, casting a last look over her shoulder at her reflection in the mirror.

  Maybe next time, though.

  They had just polished off their meal when Cowboy rapped on the door. Poking his sun-streaked blond head inside the office, Nate Sloan gave them a lazy grin.

  “You two finished chowin’ down yet?”

  “We’re finished,” Adam replied.

  “About time!”

  Nate strolled into the office with his graceful, long-legged gait. Radizwell lifted his head lazily, issued a halfhearted growl, then thumped it back down again. A juicy steak appeared to have the same mellowing effect on his temperament as it did on hers, Maggie thought in amusement.

  “Jaguar’s been trying to raise you for the last half hour,” Cowboy said casually. “Forget to put your transceiver back on, Chief?”

  Adam glanced down at his wrist, which was bare except for its dusting of dark hair. “Apparently.”

  Maggie remembered last seeing the thin gold watch tossed on the bathroom carpet, along with Adam’s clothes.

  “Jaguar said he could wait, so I decided not to interrupt your…meal.”

  “I’ll go get the transceiver,” Adam said, unperturbed.

  Maggie, on the other hand, wavered between a grin and a ridiculous blush at Nate’s knowing look. She struggled with both while he sprawled with his customary loose-limbed ease in the leather chair opposite her and regarded her with a twinkle in his hazel eyes.

  “We were all taking bets on which way this mission would go, you know.”

  “Is that right?”

  “We figured you and the chief would find a way to patch up your differences or come back ready to use each other for target practice on the firing range. Looks like you did some patchin’.”

  Maggie tucked her legs under her and rested her hand on her ankle. The glint of gold on her ring finger caught her eye. She smiled, realizing that she and Adam would have their forever, after all.

  “I’m not sure I’d call it patching,” she said, her smile easing into the grin she’d struggled against the moment before. “And we still have a few significant differences to work out. But we will work them out, one way or another.”

  Nate’s eyes gleamed. “He’s a good man, Maggie. One of the best.”

  “The best,” she replied.

  “Hellfire, woman, it took you long enough to recognize that fact.”

  “I recognized it a long time ago. I just wasn’t ready to do anything about it.”

  “Why not?”

  Her smile slipped a bit, but she answered easily enough. “He’s my boss, Nate. He’s had to maintain a distance, an objectivity, just as I’ve had to keep my personal feelings separate from my professional ones.”

  “And now?”

  “Now? Now I couldn’t separate them if I tried.”

  “So what are you going to do about it?”

  She hesitated, not quite ready to put into words the decision she’d come to in the shower, but Nate already knew the answer to his question.

  “You’re going to leave OMEGA.”

  Maggie nodded. “I have to. Wherever our relationship goes, I have to leave OMEGA. Neither one of us can operate the way we have been. Not anymore.”

  “Adam might have something to say about that.”

  A gleam of laughter crept into Maggie’s eyes. “I’m sure he will. He usually has a long list of items to discuss with me when I return from a mission.”

  She stretched, feeling immeasurably relieved now that she’d taken the first step.

  “There’s nothing to discuss about this particular matter, though. You know Adam’s needed more at OMEGA than I am. He has the president’s ear. He moves in the kind of circles necessary to carry off his double role as special envoy and director of OMEGA. He’s the best man for his job. The only man.”

  “So what will you do?”

  “I don’t know.” She glanced around the wood-paneled compartment. “Maybe I’ll run for office. I could get used to traveling like this. And there are a few issues I’d like to tackle.”

  “Such as?”

  “Such as the distribution by gender of toilets in public places.”

  Nate gave her a look of blank astonishment. “Come again?”

  “You don’t think all those long lines outside women’s rest rooms are a violation of the First Amendment? Or whichever amendment guarantees us life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?”

  “Maggie, darlin’, I can’t say I’ve ever given women’s rest rooms much thought.”

  “Neither has anyone else,” she said sweetly. “That’s going to change.”

  Nate was still chuckling when Adam came back into the office a few moments later. His blue eyes gleamed with a suppressed excitement that didn’t fool Maggie for an instant. For once, Adam Ridgeway’s cool control had slipped.

  “What?” she asked, sitting up. “What is it?”

  “I just talked to Jaguar. We’ve got it, Maggie. We’ve got the ‘why.’”

  “We do?”

  She scrambled out of the leather chair.

  Detouring around a half acre of prone sheepdog, she joined Adam at the vice president’s desk. Her eyes widened as she scanned the notes he’d scribbled during his conversation with Jaguar.

  “Adam! You were right! First Bank is managing James Elliot’s blind trust during his term as secretary of the treasury. That might be the connection.”

  “They’re managing more than a blind trust. Elliot has several accounts with them.” Adam smiled grimly. “Accounts he failed to disclose during his background investigation and his Senate confirmation hearing. Accounts that received large electronic deposits from offshore banks.”

  “Good grief! Drug dollars?”

  “It’s possible, and very likely. We’ll have to dig deeper for absolute proof. The mere fact that he failed to disclose the accounts will cost him his office, however.”

  Maggie shook her head. “But what does all this have to do with me? I don’t have any involvement with First Bank. Why did he go to such desperate—?”

  She broke off, her eyes widening. “Luis Esteban! Those phone calls I made for him, hinting at high-level government interest in First Bank! My God, Elliot must gotten wind of the calls and thought I was on to something.”

  “He thought a nameless, faceless special agent with the code name Chameleon was on to something. He had to flush her out. One way or another.”

  Chapter 16

  “We’re here to see the president. I believe he’s expecting us.”

  The White House usher looked a little startled at Adam’s cool announcement. A dubious expression flitted across his face as he took in the gaggle of people ranged behind the special envoy.

  Maggie couldn’t blame the poor man. They constituted a pretty intimidating crew.

  After flying through the night, Air Force Two had landed at Andrews Air Force Base just as a weak January sun washed D.C. in a gray dawn. The entire entourage had piled out of the plane and driven straight into the city. Adam couldn’t have shaken any one of them if he tried.

  Maggie, of course, wanted to be in on the kill.

  Cowboy had come along for backup.

  Denise Kowalski refused to abandon her post.

  Hank McGowan wanted to make sure Taylor was all right.

  Lillian insisted that the vice president, who was flying in from Camp David, would need her help to get ready for the news conference scheduled in less than a half hour to announce the historic treaty.

  And no one could separate Radizwell from Adam without losing a hand or an arm in the process.

  When faced with his newly appointed shadow, Adam had shrugged and stated calmly that the animal had taken down two of Maggie’s attackers. He was as much a part of the team as any of them.

  The usher swallowed as he looked the group over once more. “You’re here to see the president, sir? All of you?”

  “All of us.”

  Radizwell didn’t seem to care for this unnecessary delay. He curled one black gum and issued a warning that made the man’s face pale visibly.

  “If you’ll accompany me, sir.”

  With a measured pace, the usher led the small band through the corridor that connected the White House proper with the semidetached west wing. He stopped before a set of tall wooden doors, one gloved hand on the latch, and gave the uncombed, aromatic sheepdog another doubtful glance.

  “All of us,” Adam repeated firmly.

  “Yes, sir.”

  The receptionist rose at their entrance. Giving Radizwell a wide berth, she took their coats and supplied them with coffee. Maggie had just taken a sip of delicious mocha laced with dark chocolate when the double doors opened once more. The vice president strode in, followed by the stony-faced senior agent with the half-chewed ear—Buck Evans.

  “Adam! You’re back!”

  Taylor Grant strode across the patterned carpet, hands outstretched. Her broad smile encompassed the entire group, but her first greeting was for the special envoy.

  “Buck briefed me on the attacks. Are you all right?”

  Adam bent to brush a kiss across her cheek. “We’re fine. Congratulations on the treaty, Madam Vice President. No one but you could have pulled it off. You’re going to make history this morning.”

  She could handle this, Maggie told herself, swallowing a gulp of coffee that suddenly tasted like sludge. She could handle the sight of Adam’s dark head bent over Taylor’s sleek, beautiful one. She could handle it, but she didn’t have to like it.

  Beside her, Hank McGowan stiffened imperceptibly. Maggie caught the slight movement and darted him a quick look. His battered features showed no emotion, but below the rolled-up sleeve of McGowan’s blue work shirt Maggie saw the snarling bear tattooed on his forearm twitch.

  She wasn’t the only one who caught the tiny ripple of movement. Across the room, Denise Kowalski’s brown eyes narrowed as she glanced from McGowan to the vice president.

  Her lips twisting, Taylor released Adam’s hands. “I understand you’re going to make history yourself this morning. You…and Chameleon.”

  She turned to Maggie, and a small shock of surprise widened her eyes when she looked at her alter ego fully for the first time.

  Maggie’s involuntary diet and rather strenuous activities during the past week had altered her face as subtly as her body. Her cheeks had small hollows under their prominent bones…like Taylor’s. Her generous mouth had thinned a fraction…like Taylor’s. She was far closer to a perfect double now than when she’d embarked on this masquerade.

  The vice president quickly mastered her surprise and gave Maggie a sympathetic smile. “I understand I wasn’t the target, after all. It was you all the time.”

  “We think so.”

  “Perhaps we should have reversed our roles. Instead of pouring out my most intimate secrets to a stranger, I could’ve spent a couple of weeks in the mountains with Adam, acting as your double.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Taylor blinked at the drawled response, and Maggie saw that her message had been received. No one, not even the vice president of the United States, was going to be spending any weeks with Adam Ridgeway. In the mountains or anywhere else.

  Except Maggie.

  Smiling, she took a sip of her mocha coffee while Taylor greeted the rest of the entourage. She gave Lillian a quick hug, then gasped aloud.

  “Radizwell!”

  Maggie swung around to see the sheepdog calmly lowering his leg. Having marked his territory to his satisfaction on the delicate hand-painted eighteenth-century wallpaper, he moved on to explore the rest of the office.

  Taylor’s violet eyes squeezed shut. “I’m going to skin that animal,” she said through gritted teeth. “I’m going to skin him and tan him and use him as a throw rug.”