"If I don't have that environmental report on Ms. Irwin's desk by morning, it'll be my head," she quipped to the guard at the security checkpoint.

He was a new guy. She hadn't seen him before. Average size. Crooked teeth.

She noticed his teeth in particular because of the way he grinned at her. It was more of a leer. Either manning security at the White House was lonelier than she thought, or the guy was. .h.i.tting on her. It was hard to tell because if he was making a pa.s.s at her, he wasn't very good at it.

The security guard laughed a little too loud at her quip, and when she glanced back while turning a corner, he was still looking at her, still leering.

Now that she was in her office, she focused on the task at hand. She searched her desk for her copy of the environmental report. It was the key to her plan. Earlier in the day Margaret had instructed her to deliver a copy of the report-which outlined the long-range impact of offsh.o.r.e oil drilling on California's coastline-to Ms. Irwin for the president. Just as she was walking out the door, Margaret had called her back. Chief of Staff Ingraham was screaming for follow-up phone calls to the Hill regarding a vote on an upcoming minimum wage bill. Working the phones was Christina's strength.

She didn't know who Margaret had sent to deliver the report, but if anyone were to ask her, Christina could say in all good conscience that she'd been instructed to deliver the report and at the last minute got sidetracked, so it was either come early to work in the morning and deliver the report or do it tonight.

"There you are," she said, spying the report buried under a landslide of fiscal graphs.

"Found it, did you?"

The voice startled her, nearly sending her heart through the ceiling. She swung around to see the guard with crooked teeth. He leaned casually against the doorjamb, his thumbs hooked in his belt. "Would hate to see you lose that pretty head," he said, making a guttural sound while dragging a thumb across his neck execution style.

Charming, Christina thought.

"I'll walk you down," he said.

Smiling as sweetly as she could, Christina said, "Oh, that won't be necessary. I'm sure you have more important things to do."

"Not at all. I'm making my rounds. It's on the way."

"Oh . . . well, in that case."

She clutched the report to her chest with both arms and exited the room. He barely gave her room to get by him. He smelled her hair as she pa.s.sed under his nose.

They strolled casually down the hallway. She had to figure out a way to get rid of him.

He began narrating his life story without asking if she wanted to hear it. He'd been raised in the Bronx, his first job out of high school was as a New York cop. After taking a bullet to the leg during a grocery store holdup, he landed a job in security at the governor's office. Then, when a buddy got hired at the White House, he thought, "Why not? It'll impress the ladies."

He'd been divorced two years following a four-year marriage to a Georgia Peach-his words. Their marriage didn't last "because Southern girls are stuck on themselves and don't get city boys."

Christina wondered what the Georgia Peach would say to her ex's version of the breakup.

"You're not a Southern girl, are you?" he asked.

"As a matter of fact I am," she said brightly.

His face fell.

Christina was delighted. "Born and raised in Texas," she boasted.

"Texas?" he cried. "Texas? That's not Southern!"

"It most certainly is!" Christina said, thickening her Southern accent.

"Nah. Texas is Texas, and from what I've heard, Texas girls-mmmm doggie-are in a cla.s.s all by themselves. They're nothing like them prissy Georgia or Alabama girls. Texas girls know how to keep their cowboys smilin', if you know what I mean."

They were fast approaching Ms. Irwin's office. Christina was running out of time. After his last remark, she could think of nothing she'd rather do than slap him, call him a pig, and report him for s.e.xual hara.s.sment, but if she did that it would involve reports and Margaret would find out she'd been here and this was supposed to be a covert operation.

The problem remained, how to get rid of him? If he stood in the doorway and waited while she dropped off the report, she wouldn't be able to snoop around.

They reached the doorway to Ms. Irwin's office. She turned to him. "Thank you for walking me, Officer . . ."

"Kowalski," the security officer said. "Didn't I tell you that already? Bruno Kowalski."

"Bruno . . . of course," she said.

"Actually, it's Eugene. Bruno's a nickname. I don't tell just anyone my real name, you know. Only special people. You have to promise you won't spread it around."

"Your secret is safe with me, Officer Kowalski."

"Bruno."

"Yes . . . Bruno."

He flashed his crooked teeth. "Don't mention it, Christine." His grin widened. "Surprised I knew your first name? I didn't need to look at your badge. I memorized it when you came through security. I don't always memorize pretty girls' names, but something told me you were special and I just might want to use it again sometime soon. Guess I was right, right?"

Christina did her best to keep smiling. "Well . . . again . . . thank you, Bruno. It was nice meeting you." She extended her hand.

Take the hint, take the hint, please take the hint, Christina pleaded silently.

"Oh, I don't mind waitin' for you," Kowalski said. "I'll wait right here and when you're done I'll walk you back."

His radio crackled.

"Kowalski, are you still in the john?"

With surprising speed, Kowalski snapped up the radio. Turning down the volume, he turned his back on her and spoke in a hushed tone, but not so low Christina couldn't hear.

"I'm making my rounds," he said.

"Your rounds aren't for another half hour! You told me you were going to the john. Get back here ASAP!"

"But Sarge-"

"ASAP Kowalski!"

"They need me back at check-in," he said to Christina. "Seems like I have to do everything around here. Stop by on your way out, maybe we can arrange our own personal hoedown at a bar. I get off work in a couple of hours." He winked at her and made a checking sound that, if Christina were a horse, was the equivalent of giddyup.

As Officer Kowalski sauntered back down the hallway alone, Christina checked her watch, noting that she had thirty minutes to fill before exiting the building, while Officer Kowalski was making his rounds.

When the hallway was clear, Christina stepped tentatively inside the outer office, known by everyone in the building as Ms. Irwin's office.

She was relieved not to find anyone-she might not be the only one working late. Without turning on the lights, she took a quick look around.

Just inside the door to the right was an aide's desk. The person who sat here was the keeper of the office gate. At any given time, up to five secretaries worked in this office. To get to any of them, you had to get past Stewart, Ms. Irwin's aide.

Farther inside the room, five desks sat at right angles along the far wall, evenly s.p.a.ced. Behind them, the wall was lined with metal cabinets of various sizes; some file cabinets, others drawer cabinets for large, flat items, such as maps. The desk closest to the door to the Oval Office was the desk of Ms. Irwin.

"Might as well start at the top and work my way down," Christina mumbled to herself.

She rounded Stewart's desk. She jumped back with a gasp when she saw a pair of bare feet sticking out from behind Ms. Irwin's desk.

This was a problem. Christina's well-thought-out plan had not factored bare feet into them.

Bare feet. In a dark office. Late at night outside the Oval Office. No matter how you spun it, that couldn't be good.

They were male feet, from the size and shape of them. Whoever they belonged to was reclined on the floor behind Ms. Irwin's desk. Whether the feet were attached to a living person or a dead person, she couldn't tell. They hadn't moved.

Should she call out for help?

The thought of Bruno running to her rescue was enough to make her think twice about that course of action. So far she wasn't in any danger, was she?

She could use a phone on the desk and dial security. But that might wake the feet up . . . if that were possible. If she was going to call for help, what would she say? She knew nothing of the condition of the person who belonged to these feet. She should at least look first, shouldn't she? What if the person needed medical attention?

Her curiosity got the best of her. She took a tentative step forward. Then another. And another. As she drew closer, feet gave way to legs. The legs were wearing pale blue pajama bottoms.

Christina wished she'd turned on the lights, but if she went to do that now, she knew she'd keep going out the door and down the hallway. Since she was already this close, she'd look first, then run.

Two more steps and she saw hands, lying lifeless on each side of the body. Another step and instead of seeing a chest she saw a stack of papers bundled with rubber bands sitting on a chest.

Two more steps and she saw . . .

"Mr. President!"

At the sound of her voice, the president stirred. His eyes blinked open. With effort they focused on her. "Miss Kraft," he said. "I've been expecting you."

Christina knelt beside him. He lay slumped against the wall in his pajamas. No robe. In this position and in this wardrobe there was nothing presidential about him. He looked old, vulnerable, human. His hair was mussed. His face drawn. But the thing that seemed strangest to Christina, the thing that bothered her most, was that he was barefooted. It just seemed obscene to her to see the most powerful man in the world in bare feet.

"Are you hurt, sir? Can I call someone?"

The president took a deep breath and pulled himself up into a sitting position, his back against the wall. The stack of papers tumbled onto his legs. He appeared groggy, disoriented. He looked around and seemed surprised to find himself on the floor. Grinning sheepishly, he said, "I was aiming for Ms. Irwin's chair. Guess my aim was off a bit."

"Mr. President, stay right there. I'm going to call-"

"Miss Kraft, wait," he said. He patted the bundle on his legs. "This is what you're looking for. The proofs to Grant's ma.n.u.script."

Christina stared at him dumbly. How could the president know what she was looking for? How could he be expecting her when less than an hour ago she didn't even know she would be here?

He took another deep breath and blinked his eyes. They were clearer, but he still looked at her as though he was trying to look through the haze of a migraine the size of Texas. "My question to you, Miss Kraft, is why? Why do you want the proofs to a book that has already been published?"

For a moment, the briefest of moments, Christina considered lying to him, using her cover story, telling him she wasn't here for Grant's proofs, she was here to deliver the environmental report he needed in the morning.

"We think there may be something in them that falsely implicates Grant in a plot, sir. We're attempting to determine who's behind it."

"We . . . you and Grant?"

"Yes, sir."

"What kind of plot?" the president asked.

Christina couldn't bring herself to tell him. Instead, she fished in her pocket and produced the scratch-pad page with the cartoon mice linked by a smudged trail of hearts. She handed it to him.

The president pulled a pair of eyegla.s.ses from the front pocket of his pajamas and wrestled them on. He read the note aloud. " 'When he is suspended between earth and heaven I will kill the president.' " He removed his gla.s.ses. "Grant wrote this?"

"No, sir," Christina said with conviction. "The message is comprised of thirteen words that appear codelike in your biography. One word in each chapter."

"The published book?"

"Yes, sir."

The president cursed. "But these words are not found in Grant's original ma.n.u.script?"

"No, sir."

He looked to the stack of pages on his legs. "Of course, the proofs. The changes were made in the proofs."

The president seemed in complete control of his faculties now and content to continue with this matter on the floor. He handed the scratch-pad page back to Christina.

"One word at a time," he said to her, unbundling the proof pages.

He flipped pages. Christina was unclear as to whether she was to read the words one at a time to him, or if he would . . .

"Chapter one . . . When," he said.

"Yes, sir."

"Chapter two . . . second word . . . he . . ."

The president continued through all thirteen chapters.

". . . is . . . suspended . . . between . . . earth . . . and . . . heaven . . . I . . . will . . . kill . . . the . . . president."

When he was finished he cursed again.

Whose handwriting is he reading? Christina wondered. He's obviously surprised by the changes. And what happens now? Do I just ask for them? Or will he take care of it?

"Where do we go from here, Miss Kraft?" the president asked. Before she could answer, he erupted, "But why Grant? That's what doesn't make sense. Why Grant? Doc Palmer, maybe. But Grant?"

Christina said, "Sir, if I may ask-"

With a suddenness that startled her, the president grabbed her by the arm. He pulled her close, nearly pulling her on top of him. "I like your Mr. Austin," he said in a whisper. "And I want you to a.s.sure him I had nothing to do with this . . . nothing! Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir."