Looking up from the table, Cade set the b.u.t.t of his cue stick on the floor, regarded her thoughtfully for a moment, then asked, "Would it be too much to hope for that you're referring to my room as your sanctuary?"

With a small shake of her head, Mandi smiled slightly as she said, "No, Ed.

It wouldn't be too much to hope for." She sipped her beer and quietly added, "But it might be all you could hope for."

"Uh, huh. Does that mean I'd have to behave myself or that you'd have your way with me and then discard me like a used paper towel in the morning?"

Laughing, Mandi said, "No, it just means that... Well..." she hesitated further, then gestured at the pool table and said, "See if you can figure it out in the meantime. I'll understand if you're reluctant later."

After a moment of studying her, Cade nodded and lined up on the nine ball.

Seven shots later, only the eight remained and it wasn't too far from a pocket.

Cade called the pocket and sank the ball with a sigh of deliberately unconcealed relief.

Laughing, Mandi said, "Oh, good game, sir."

"Coming from you, that's a heavy compliment, milady." He sipped his beer and asked, "Back to what you said about being 'reluctant later'. You're gorgeous and I enjoy being with you, so I'm having trouble with the idea that I might be reluctant."

Nibbling her lip, Mandi regarded Cade for a moment, then looked around, apparently to be sure n.o.body else could hear.

In a low tone, she said, "You might find s.e.x with me... ah... well, it could be somewhat... ah... unsatisfying."

Matching her soft, confidential tone, Cade stated, "You're trying to say that I couldn't get in, aren't you?"

Reddening slightly, Mandi nodded.

Cade shrugged. "Oh, well. There are other ways to please a woman."

Peering at Cade as if to determine the truth of his words, Mandi asked, "That wouldn't bother you?"

With a small smile, Cade sipped his beer again and softly said, "It wouldn't bother me anywhere near as much as knowing I missed an opportunity to taste a woman like you intimately." After a brief pause, he grinningly added the respectful afterthought, "Ma'am."

Again eyeing him as if to decide whether he'd told the truth, Mandi sipped her beer and laid her stick across the pool table. Picking up the menu from the small table, Cade looked it over and opted for another burger basket rather than some of the other items available, most of which seemed to contain pasta.

"Would you like anything?" he asked, showing Mandi the menu. "I'm getting the burger basket."

Mandi scanned the menu and said, "Same for me," as she reached into her purse for quarters she hadn't expected to need.

"I'm buying," said Cade, waving the menu.

"Thanks," said Mandi, "But I'm looking for quarters. I lost the last game, remember?"

Looking startled, Cade exclaimed, "Oh, yeah! So you did! Wowsers! Thanks for reminding me!"

"Just treasure the moment," said Mandi drily. "It may not happen again.

Ever."

"Oh, yes'm!" said Cade with a nod and a tiny salute. "As you say, ma'am.

Treasuring it now, ma'am. Back in a minute."

As he headed for the bar, Cade heard Mandi mutter, "Smarta.s.s," then she called, "Extra mustard, okay?"

Chapter Twelve

Allowing a little extra time to get back to the hotel and fight the crowd in the auditorium, Cade suggested that he and Mandi head back at eleven-fifteen.

"Besides," he added, "I've only won one game tonight. That's wearing rather heavily on me, you know."

"Poor baby," said Mandi, snapping in her last two b.a.l.l.s and the eight. "If it's any consolation, n.o.body else has won against me in something like six months."

"Well, in that case, I guess I'm all consoled now, ma'am."

Mandi chuckled and racked her stick, then picked up her purse and sipped the last of her c.o.ke.

On the way to the front door, she stopped, took a look around the bar, sighed, and said, "This may have been my last night of real anonymity, Ed."

Cade leaned to kiss her cheek and said, "Doubtful. Like I said, there are lots of beautiful blondes. Just try to blend in."

With a ladylike grunt and a roll of her eyes, Mandi led the way to the sidewalk. Enroute to the hotel, Cade called room 423 to make sure John and Phyllis Morey were in place.

By eleven-thirty they'd found standing room near the front of the auditorium and a nervous -- almost frantic -- Paul Money had spotted them from his position near the stage.

He edged through the crowd to them and asked, "Is everything ready?"

"Yup," said Cade, "Mandi will go change and wait for my call. I'll stay here and wait for your fifteen-minute warning. As soon as I make that call to her, I'll take some of your people and we'll rope off her route from door to door.

You'll station people in here to make sure the doors stay clear. Exactly fifteen minutes from your signal, she'll walk in with the car."

Paul nodded, although he was apparently still not fully convinced that things would be that simple or go smoothly.

"Paul, relax," said Cade.

With a sharp glance, Paul snapped, "I can't relax!"

Shrugging, Cade said, "Okay. Won't help any, though."

Mandi chuckled and said, "Later, people," and slipped out the doors to the corridor. Paul returned to the backstage area.

The last scheduled show ended at ten to midnight. Paul gave the signal -- a small wave and a nod -- and Cade called room 423, where Mandi waited with John, then he took the rope team to set up the walkway.

"We've never done this before," said one of them. "Why the h.e.l.l are we roping off the hall?"

"You'll see," said Cade. "Keep the walkway clear, and that's a dead-serious order, people. You don't even have to be nice about it; just tell 'em to get the h.e.l.l off to one side."

"Excuse me, but just who the h.e.l.l are you?" asked a woman. "I don't think I like your tone."

Glancing at her, Cade said, "We don't have time to discuss this, lady, so get with it or get lost. If you stick around, you'll see why it's important to keep the walkway clear."

As soon as the ropes were in place, Cade tagged four of the bigger guys with the task of keeping the lane clear and told the woman who'd balked to stand by at the driveway doors. She glared at his crisp order to stand by, but said nothing and went to the doors. Cade sent another guy to wait by the auditorium doors.

At five minutes until showtime Cade saw three people with WNN tags and camera gear cross the lobby toward the auditorium at a dead run.

Cade whistled sharply and yelled, "WNN! Get over here and set up! You have about two minutes!"

The guy in charge of the little group came to talk to Cade.

"We were told..."

"She'll be coming in those doors," interrupted Cade, pointing at the street entrance. "You can buzz around her, but don't get in her way. She'll be carrying a Crown Victoria like the one that blew up today."

The brunette woman in the WNN group exclaimed, "She's bringing a car into the hotel?!"

"Yeah, so stay clear of things. Now you've got one minute."

Walking to the street entrance, Cade looked up in time to see Mandi land with the car at the bottom of the ramp. A few others saw her land, as well, and a.s.sorted sounds of amazement came from the bisected crowd.

Mandi headed quickly for the doors. Cade and the balky woman pulled them open wide and held them as Mandi very carefully carried the Crown Victoria on her shoulders through the doorway and into the hotel.

Once she was inside, the astonished crowd stood watching her pa.s.s as if she carried an armed nuclear weapon, but Cade shouted, "Keep 'em back! Back!" on general principles.

WNN's two camera guys circled Mandi and the car like a pair of wolves, panning every inch of the scene as she marched toward the auditorium with the Crown Vic. The woman with the microphone settled for walking alongside Mandi at a distance as she spoke softly into the mike. She sounded as if she was reporting a golf tournament at first, then her voice became somewhat louder as she got over her own astonishment.

At the other end of the roped-off path the auditorium doors had swung open at the same time as the street doors. Some of the con volunteers there were busy keeping the rubbernecking crowd clear of the doors, but as Mandi approached, the people shrank back from the entranceway.

After carefully easing the sedan through the auditorium doors, Mandi lifted herself and the car into the air and flew toward the stage, but didn't land there.

Paul had felt it necessary to make sure they knew the stage couldn't handle the weight of the car. As Mandi settled to hover about a foot above the stage, he paled slightly and prayed that she'd remember not to touch down.

Grabbing the mike from the stand a few feet in front of Mandi, Paul cleared his throat and said in an odd tone of somber astonishment, "Ladies and gentlemen... this is Mandi Steele!" His voice firmed up and he very clearly and in a strong tone repeated, "Mandi Steele!"

The crowd gasped and there were a few shouts, but not because of Paul's introduction. Mandi had shifted the car from her shoulders upward and was now holding it by its frame at arm's length above her head.

With a pause as he glanced back at her, Paul continued speaking by reading from a prepared note, detailing her accomplishment of the day by which she saved downtown Atlanta from a similar Crown Victoria packed with explosives.

WNN's camera guys continued circling Mandi at the extreme edges of the stage as the woman with the mike bit her lip and dared herself to step forward to speak with a smiling woman who was holding a car rock-steady over her head and who wasn't touching the stage.

To the woman with the mike, Mandi quietly said, "Catch me outside when I put the car down."

The woman nodded and stepped back as Mandi flipped the car onto its nose and grabbed the front axle, then flipped it completely end over end and caught it at the same point.

Some people in the front rows screamed and a couple of them fainted. Cade was amused to see that one of the fainters was the Klingon woman from Brooklyn.

"Paul," said Mandi. "It's time to say hi."

Paul nodded and approached her with his microphone.

"Hi, everybody," said Mandi. "I decided to go public after those pictures of me appeared on the news. DragonCon seemed like a perfect place for someone like me to do that."

There were some chuckles and some barks of laughter from the crowd as Mandi held still for the cameras. After a few moments she lowered the car to one shoulder. Paul dropped the mike at her feet and ducked almost convulsively away.

"Aww, I scared him," Mandi said with a grin. "Sorry, Paul. My bad. People, I have to take this car back out to the parking lot now. Since this is the end of the show, you're all welcome to follow me outside."

Mandi flew toward the doors and people made way for her without having to be told. The WNN newsies hurried to catch up and failed because Mandi didn't bother walking to the street doors.

She lay flat in the air beneath the car and flew it through the doorway, over the heads of those now within her roped-off pathway, and out the street doors to the parking ramp.

Once she was in position and hovering a couple of feet above the ramp, Mandi simply shrugged the car upward a few inches and zipped out from under it before it could begin falling to the ground.

The Crown Vic landed almost perfectly on all four of its tires at once, bounced heavily, and shuddered to stillness. People came to wonderingly touch it as if to see if it was a real car.

Pinching the fabric of her bodysuit at each shoulder, Mandi gave it a couple of ear-splitting snaps that seemed to obliterate the two big, dark smudges on her back.

"Kewl," said Cade. "Talk about stainproof..."

She then took off her cape and gave it a rolling snap that left a faint cloud of undercarriage residue in the air.

As she put it back on, Cade opened the front pa.s.senger door to retrieve the damp towel in the plastic bag, then used the towel to wipe smudges off the skin of Mandi's arms and shoulders as the WNN people approached.

"Messy, messy," whispered Cade. "You need a bath, lady. Do you always get this dirty when you play with cars?"

Mandi snickered as she held up a forearm smudge for Cade's attention. He used the opportunity to check her makeup as he buffed her arm clean. No damage.

Prosthetics in place.

"Makeup's fine," whispered Cade. "You know, those fake teeth are kinda s.e.xy."

Glancing sharply at him, Mandi started to say, "They aren't..." then said, "Watch it, smarta.s.s."

"Oh, yes'm. Watching it now. In fact, there's a spot on the back of your right leg. Hold still another minute."

Kneeling behind her, he folded the towel to a clean spot and rubbed the smudge from Mandi's calf. As he stood up, he saw the brunette newswoman eyeing him sharply, curiously.

Patting Mandi's shoulder, Cade whispered, "There you go. All clean, milady.

Go gettum," and stepped back a pace as he re-bagged the towel.