Every primal mating instinct demanded haste and nothing less than total possession. In a matter of seconds, he was pulling her T-shirt over her head. The bra must have been built in, because her breasts were left bare. He cupped them in his hands, reshaping them reflexively, rubbing his lips against her nipple until it beaded, then sucking it deep into his mouth.

She fumbled with the buttons on his fly and then her hand was claiming him, her fingers tightly squeezing, massaging their way up until her thumb was at the tip, pressing- "Jesus." Gasping with pleasure, he ground his forehead against the wall behind her shoulder in an effort not to come. "Wait, wait."

The fabric of her skirt was as light as air against his hands as he slid them beneath it. He worked his fingers under a wedge of lace. She was soft and warm and wet. He quickly rid her of the underpants so he could luxuriate in the femaleness, the snug, silky, wonderful feel of her.

She pressed down hard on his exploring fingers, moaned his name, whispered, "More."

He lifted her up to straddle his thighs and thrust into her, fully, completely, and without caution. He would have paused then to apologize for his lack of restraint, would have rested there deep inside her, giving them both time to adjust, to breathe.

But she rocked against him and searched for his mouth with hers, whimpering a litany of words that signaled her own urgency.

He fucked her. He gave, took, told her with every stroke what he hadn't been able to convey with words, communicated what he'd felt from the moment he saw her enter the courtroom, and knew, in that instant, that he'd been blessed and doomed in the same heartbeat.

He changed the angle and the tempo to favor her. She clutched handfuls of his hair and squeezed his hips with her thighs. And when her orgasm pulsed around him, he came and came and came.

After half a minute, he regrettably disengaged. Weakly, she slid down the wall to sit on the floor. He lowered himself beside her and gathered her against him. She pressed her open mouth against his throat and murmured his name. She slid her hand inside his shirt and pressed her palm against his heart. The gesture moved him more than a spoken endearment and felt even more intimate than the hard-core sex.

It was time for him to go.

He moved away from her and pulled her skirt down over her bare thighs. He passed her the discarded T-shirt, then stood up and buttoned his jeans. She remained huddled there, looking up at him with perplexity, modestly clutching the T-shirt to her chest. "What are you doing?"

"Leaving."

"Why?"

The dismay behind her voice was almost his undoing. "This shouldn't have happened, Amelia."

"What are you saying?"

"What I've said before. I can't have you."

"You just did."

"You know what I mean."

Her swallow was loud in the silence. "I know you want me."

"Only with every fucking breath."

"Then why are you doing this?"

He backed away from her, moving toward the door into the living room, which would lead him out and away from her. "Because you had one selfish bastard who damn near ruined your life. I won't be the second one."

Chapter 26.

Dawson pulled open the door to Headly's hospital room and looked in. The patient was propped up in bed. His chin sprouted a salt-and-pepper beard, and he had bed head, but his color was better. Eva was holding a cup of coffee as he sipped it through a straw. Then he angled his head back and, making a terrible face, complained of it being as "cold as a wedge."

"Be glad you can swallow," she said. "And breathe without a ventilator. If the bullet had affected other vertebrae-"

"I know, I know," he said crossly.

"You're getting meaner," Dawson said as he came in. "A positive sign."

Eva greeted him cheerfully. Headly less so. After an exchange of pleasantries-"How did you sleep?" and so forth-Headly got to the matter of Flora's grave. "I talked to Knutz a few minutes ago. Nothing to report yet. Getting lights in there last night would have been a logistical nightmare, so the team didn't start the exhumation until this morning."

"How long do you think before you hear something?"

"Hard to predict. Until they start excavating, they don't know what they'll find. It's slow-going because they have to be careful not to compromise or destroy evidence. Ascertaining how she died, whether it was of disease or something else, will depend largely on how long she's been buried."

The subject matter apparently distressed Eva. She tried to foist a carton of apple juice on Headly, who reacted as though she'd offered him a cup of hemlock. She returned the carton to his tray, then wheeled the trolley away from his bed. A wheel caught on the tangle of tubes on the floor at his bedside.

Dawson motioned toward it. "Is anybody monitoring what goes where?"

"I hope to God somebody is," Headly groused. "So they don't pump something out that's supposed to be pumped in, or vice versa."

Eva freed the wheel and moved the trolley away from the machines, monitors, and IV paraphernalia. Then she sat down on the edge of the bed and motioned Dawson toward the chair.

"Thanks, but I'm fine standing."

"You're fine?" Headly said. "You're twitching like a man with a rash in his crack."

It was true. He was as restless as he'd been all night. He'd known sleep would be out of the question, but when he returned to his hotel, he'd laid down and had at least tried to rest his weary body.

But within minutes he was up again, moving around his hotel room without aim or purpose except to outdistance his memory of Amelia's disillusionment and the pain he had caused her when he left. He was doing her a favor, but it had entailed humiliating her, and he couldn't stand that.

Headly broke into his disturbing thoughts. "Cough it up. What's the matter?"

Eva laid her hand on her husband's arm, a silent command for him to can it. To Dawson, she said, "You were on your way to see Amelia when you left here yesterday."

"Um-huh."

"How is she holding up?"

"Okay. Ambivalent about Jeremy. She wanted to know everything, but dreaded hearing it all."

"You told her everything?"

"Yes."

"About her father?"

"That was the toughest."

"How'd she take it?"

"Just as I expected. A meltdown over how he'd been tortured. But grateful to have it confirmed that he hadn't taken his own life."

Sadly, Eva said, "Lord, that poor young woman has been put through so much."

Like he wasn't aware of that. Like he wasn't being a goddamn Sir Galahad to spare her from being put through more. He didn't say that, just made a motion with his shoulders to show that he agreed: Amelia had suffered some serious shit.

After giving him time to elaborate, which he didn't do, Eva got up and began straightening things in the room-the stack of fresh towels that an orderly had left near the sink, a bouquet of flowers sent from Headly's office in DC, a sheaf of hospital insurance forms. None of these things needed her attention. She was trying to pretend that she wasn't about to pry, that this was a casual and spontaneous conversation.

Of course Dawson knew better.

"How were the little boys?" she asked.

"Good. Oblivious about their dad. For now. Which is as it should be." In spite of his dark mood, a smile hiked up one corner of his mouth. "I had to give them a lesson in biology." He related the anecdote. Eva and Headly laughed.

"After dinner, Amelia let them make their own sundaes, which were disgusting because they dribbled on everything she set out, including blackberry jam. They made a mess, but I think it was important to her to let them have a good time last night. Considering yesterday's...event."

The three were quiet for a moment, then Eva ventured to ask, "Did you explain to her why you went to such lengths to go after Carl and Jeremy?"

"We talked about it some."

They looked at him, expecting more, but he didn't expound.

Eva pressed on, her misty, wistful expression straight out of a greeting-card commercial. "Amelia is an excellent mother."

Dawson cleared his throat. "She is."

"And she's such a sweet-natured person. It was kind of her to stay here with me through that terrible first night."

"Sure was."

"We talked like old friends, not like two women who'd just met."

"Hmm."

"She told me that the boys continually ask about school, because they're aware that it starts next week. She doesn't know how to tell them that they might not be going back when the other children do. They want a house with a yard so they can have a dog."

"I know all this, Eva."

Bickering with Headly was a normal part of their repartee. But he'd never had a cross word with Eva. Taken aback by his testiness, she lapsed into silence. But now that his anger over the situation had been given an opening, it burst of out him.

"I know their circumstances, and they stink, but I can't fix them. It would be wrong of me to try. My intrusion would only make their situation worse."

"Amelia wouldn't see your involvement as intrusion."

"How do you know?"

"You make her head spin." He registered surprise. Seeing it, she added, "She told me so. In confidence. Which I just broke."

His heart levitated, then sank. "That's nice to hear, but it doesn't make a difference. The situation is-"

"Subject to change soon."

Headly's mumble arrested Dawson's angry pacing. "Why do you say that?"

Headly looked over at Eva. "Maybe I will have some of that juice, but with ice. Would you please get me some from the machine down the hall?"

She folded her arms over her middle. "Hell, no. I'm staying put. I want to hear why you said that, too."

Headly scowled, but she didn't budge or show any signs of relenting. Headly sighed and looked at Dawson. "Neither of us is getting any younger."

"Meaning you and Carl?"

He nodded. "Always before, when he felt us closing in-even if we weren't-he hightailed it. He's jumped states in a matter of days."

"You think old age has slowed him down?"

"In a manner of speaking. He always had this ragtag bunch of outlaws to aid and abet him. Gun dealers, drug dealers, or petty crooks who were hero worshipers, disciples of his twisted dogma. All willing to do his bidding. Most have either been caught and are serving long sentences, or they've been killed by one of their ilk, or simply died off. By the way, they found the guy who owns the boat."

"The CandyCane?"

"He's living in the Keys. But barely. Stage-four lung cancer. He'll die in captivity, but even knowing that, he wouldn't give up any information about Carl." He stared down at his right hand where it lay on his chest and wiggled the fingers experimentally.

Dawson noticed. "The doctor was right."

Headly sneered. "Just to prove how smart he is, last night he stuck a needle, which I'm sure is used to stitch saddles, into my thumb. Hurt like bloody hell."

Eva rolled her eyes. "It was a prick with a straight pin. He howled a profanity that could be heard back in DC. But he's only trying to get off the subject until you two are alone, and I'm not going to let him. Continue, Gary."

He looked at her with exasperation. "Point is, Carl's run out of admirers. Even Jeremy's gone. Carl Wingert is passe, of another era, history that few even know about. He wanted to live in infamy like Bonnie and Clyde, Oswald, Jim Jones, David Koresh. He never achieved those heights. He knows he's a has-been, and that'll eat at him."

"What do you think he'll do?" Dawson asked.

"Stage a spectacular exit for himself. He's got little to lose now except for his inflated self-esteem. He won't care if he doesn't survive, so long as he leaves the rest of us with a lasting impression." He paused. "Knutz has already alerted Homeland Security."

"Excuse me, sir. Can I help you?"

The nurse was young and pretty and eager to be of assistance to such a decrepit older gentleman. Her scrubs were purple. A UGA bulldog snarled from the patch affixed to her breast pocket.

Carl adjusted his baseball cap, as though conscious of his hairlessness, when actually he was tugging down the bill of the cap in order to conceal his face from Dawson Scott, who was at the end of the hallway, talking to an attractive middle-aged woman. Carl assumed she was Headly's wife.

He'd come to scout out the hospital, commit to memory how it was laid out, note where the fire alarms and emergency exits were, plan how he was going to get to Headly and finish their feud once and for all.

Lo and behold, the moment he stepped off the elevator on this floor, the first person he spotted was Dawson Scott. He'd been about to duck back into the elevator and get the hell out of there, but in a millisecond he changed his mind.