State Secrets. Linda Lael Miller

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      1

      The tall man ran one hand through his dark hair and shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Despite the heavy woolen overcoat he wore, he was still cold. Swift indigo eyes scanned the first page of the dossier. “So what, Walt?” David Goddard bit out, frowning. “She’s the president-elect’s third cousin. Since when do third cousins qualify for Secret Service protection?”

      Walt Zigman made a contemptuous, impatient sound. Apparently, this assignment wasn’t exactly dear to his crusty old heart. “It isn’t protection, Goddard,” he snarled. “Remember that. This is a surveillance project.”

      David sat back in his chair, drawing his right ankle up to rest on his left knee. “Surveillance,” he muttered, suppressing an unprofessional urge to fling the file on Holly Llewellyn back into the mess that littered Walt’s desk. “That isn’t our—”

      “I know, Goddard,” Walt interrupted, falling into his own chair and reaching into one ink-stained shirt pocket for a match to light the cigar stub that was always in his mouth. “I know. I tried to give this thing to the Bureau. I even tried the CIA. But they both threw it right back in my lap. Anything connected with the president or his family is our bailiwick—according to them.”

      David breathed a swearword. He was tired and he could still feel the bite of the crisp November wind outside. He wanted to get out of Washington and have Thanksgiving dinner in Arlington with his sister, Chris, and her family. He wanted to spoil her kids and lounge in front of her fireplace. “Okay, Walt. So Ms. Llewellyn is our problem. Why am I the lucky one?”

      Walt chortled. “Born under the right star, I guess. Come on, Goddard, how bad can it be? You spend a few weeks—maybe a few months—in Spokane. You get the lady to like you. And you make damned sure she’s really what she claims to be, and not a courier for that brother of hers.”

      David had the beginnings of a headache. He opened the dossier again, skimming the rundown on Holly Llewellyn. Twenty-seven years old. Blond. Blue-eyed. Five feet, seven inches tall. A one hundred twenty-three pound pain. “What makes you think she’s running secrets? It says here she writes cookbooks.”

      “Middle Eastern cookbooks,” David’s supervisor imparted with dramatic import.

      David’s mouth twisted into a wry grin. “That alone should convict her,” he mocked.

      “Dammit, Goddard, keep your sparkling wit to yourself. Can’t you see that we’ve got the makings of a scandal here that would make Watergate seem insignificant?”

      “A scandal?”

      “Yes! How would it look if the new president’s cousin turned out to be a traitor? Isn’t it bad enough that her brother sold out? She could be cut from the same cloth!”

      David sighed. “That’s unlikely, Walt. It says here that she’s written a book about Scandinavian meatballs. Good God, maybe she’s spying for the Swedes!”

      “Stow it.”

      “Or the Danes. You’ve got to watch those Danes, crafty little devils, one and all.”

      “Goddard!”

      “She wrote Fun With Tacos, too, I see,” David pressed on dryly. “Do you think she’s working for the Mexicans? Holy guacamole, Batman—do you suppose they’re planning to rush up here and take back Texas?”

      Walt was leaning into the desk, his meaty hands braced against the edge, his cigar stub bobbing up and down in outrage. “I’m glad you think this situation is funny, Goddard, but it just so happens that the next president of the United States doesn’t agree with you! This little lady happens to have a bona fide, card-carrying traitor for a brother!”

      David flipped through the rest of the dossier, not so hastily this time. His headache was worse. “Craig Llewellyn,” he muttered.

      “You remember him, don’t you, Goddard?” Walt gibed, going to stand at the barred window of his dingy little office.

      Remember? David remembered, all right—how could he help it? Craig Llewellyn’s defection had never made the national news, by some miracle, but every federal agent in the country knew the sordid story. “Being Llewellyn’s sister doesn’t make the lady a security risk, Walt,” he pointed out quietly.

      “Maybe not. If she wasn’t related to our next president, I wouldn’t be worried. If she hadn’t just spent two months in Iran, I wouldn’t be worried. As it is, I’m damned worried.”

      “You’d think the opposition would have caught on to this before the election…” David speculated, thinking of the outgoing president and the no-holds-barred campaign he had conducted.

      “They didn’t,” Walt broke in. “I’ll expect your first report early next week.”

      “Right.” David stood up and stretched. Every muscle in his long frame ached with residual cold. “Is this operation covert, by the way, or do I just knock on Ms. Llewellyn’s door and flash my identification?”

      Clearly, Walt Zigman had a headache, too. “That was a stupid question, Goddard. You’ve been on White House Detail too damned long. Spent too much time walking the first lady’s dog. Of course it’s covert!”

      David shrugged, feeling weary. Maybe Walt was right; maybe he was getting soft. Instead of thinking about this case on every level, a part of him was anticipating a day at Chris’s place. The kids would be watching the Macy’s parade on TV. The smell of roasting turkey would be everywhere….

      He reached for the dossier. “Can I take this?”

      Walt waved impatiently. “Yeah, yeah, that’s your copy.”

      David tucked the file under one arm. He supposed it was the forthcoming holiday that was distracting him, stirring up bittersweet memories and half-formed hopes, making him feel far older than his thirty-four years. He tried to imagine Marleen, his ex-wife, roasting turkey or settling a band of freckle-faced rug rats in front of the tube to watch a Thanksgiving parade and couldn’t. “You having dinner here, Walt?” he asked, his hand on the doorknob. “Tomorrow, I mean?”

      Zigman grinned around his cigar stub. “Nope. Going to New York to see my daughter. Happy Thanksgiving, Goddard.”

      David laughed, though he had a bereft feeling inside. He thought of Marleen studying chimpanzees in Borneo and wondered if she remembered that she’d once wanted to raise an entirely different kind of monkey. “I’ll call you on Monday.”

      “Right.”

      David stepped out into the wide, familiar hallway, with its lighted paintings and expensively shabby carpeting. In front of the Oval Office, two agents guarded the heavy double doors. He nodded and they nodded back, their faces solemn.

      Downstairs, David left the White House by a side door, then strode through the snow-dusted parking lot to his car. At one of the high wrought-iron gates, he showed his ID, even though he was going out, not in, even though he knew the young Marines on duty, knew their wives and their kids and their collar sizes.

      Again he felt lonely. Even quietly desperate. As the White House gate clanked shut behind him, he turned up the car radio in a belated effort to cover the sound.

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