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  The big man walked away to allow Lizzie to speak privately with her caller. He wasn’t sure, but he rather thought Lizzie would confide in him unless it was a client’s privileged conversation. He jammed his hands in his pockets as he paced around his living room, then into the den, which was lined with books and a huge 106-inch television set mounted on the wall. His enormous custom-crafted rocking chair, which matched the one in his office, beckoned him. He tried to remember how many times he’d slept the night through in that very chair. He finally gave up when he realized that more often than not it was where he slept. His day lady was forever chiding him for not sleeping in his bed.

  Cosmo watched the digital numbers change on his watch. Whoever Lizzie was talking to was either very verbose, or he or she was trying to convince Lizzie of something. He wondered whether, if they ever got married, Lizzie would still answer calls in the middle of the night. If they ever got married. Why hadn’t his thought been, when we get married?

  Cosmo closed his eyes. First he had to ask Elizabeth to marry him. He admitted to himself that he was afraid to pop the question for fear Elizabeth had had second thoughts and would say no, she just wanted to keep the relationship the way it was. Fear was such a terrible thing.

  In the next room, Lizzie paced, too, as she listened. “No, Martine. I can’t give up my life to help you. No. Why would you even think I would consider much less accept your offer to be your White House counsel? You can’t buy me; you could pay me my weight in diamonds, and I would still tell you no. Do I have to remind you that you made the decision to live in that fishbowl? I just helped you achieve your goal because I believed in you, and you’re my friend. I owe you nothing more.” Lizzie listened, her eyes growing wide with shock. “No, Martine, you can’t do that! I know you’re desperate, but you cannot infringe on my life. I will not allow you to do that.” She listened again. This time her jaw set into hard lines and her blue eyes sparked with anger. “Don’t ever threaten me, Martine. If you do, you’ll regret it. I don’t give a good goddamn about your Secret Service or the FBI or the CIA or the IRS or any of those other stupid alphabet-soup organizations. I know people who will chop those people up and spit them out. I’m going to hang up now, Martine, before either one of us says something even stupider than what has already been said.” Lizzie snapped the phone shut and ran into the living room, where Cosmo was waiting for her.

  “If your phone rings, do not answer it! The president of the United States is going to be calling you to ask if you want to be White House counsel. Oh, my God, Cosmo, you don’t want that job, do you?”

  “Whoa! Whoa!” Cosmo said as he struggled out of the rocker. “Were you just talking to the president of the United States? Why in the world would I want a job like that?”

  “Yes, that’s who I was talking to, and she’s going to call you. The only time she can call is the middle of the night.”

  The words were no sooner out of Lizzie’s mouth than Cosmo’s phone rang. He pulled it out of his shirt pocket and looked at the unknown name and unknown number that showed on the screen.

  “She’ll leave a message if you don’t answer,” Lizzie hissed.

  “Elizabeth, I do not have to return her call. I do not have to answer this phone either. It’s that simple.”

  “She damn well threatened me. I won’t tolerate that, Cosmo. Did you hear me? The president of these United States threatened me! Me! We’re friends. I helped her get into office. I cannot believe she threatened me. She did. With the Secret Service, the IRS, and all those other crazy ABC organizations. I hung up on her! I did, Cosmo, I hung up on the president of the United States! I can’t believe I did that.” All the while she babbled on, Cosmo’s phone kept ringing. It finally stopped.

  Cosmo laughed. “Do you want me to throw away the phone? I will.” Without waiting for Lizzie to respond, he walked over to the fireplace and tossed the cell phone into the flames. He was grinning from ear to ear at Lizzie’s horrified expression. “Just for the record, I did not vote for Martine Connor.”

  Lizzie burst out laughing as she threw herself into Cosmo’s arms. “I love you, do you know that? When are we going to get married?”

  Stunned beyond belief, Cosmo blinked. Then he laughed until the house shook. “How about right now? I know a twenty-four-hour chapel.” He held his breath waiting for Lizzie’s response.

  Lizzie’s smile lit the room. “Hey, I’m ready. Put your shoes on, and let’s go.”

  Cosmo blinked. “This isn’t very romantic, Elizabeth. I wanted to ask you myself. I rehearsed, in front of the mirror, for hours, and I had it down pat. And then I chickened out because I convinced myself you would say no.”

  “I know.” Lizzie giggled. “That’s why I asked you. So, are we doing it or not?”

  Cosmo held out first one foot, then the other. “See! I have my shoes on. Should we stop for some flowers? I have the ring. You said a plain gold band. I got a plain gold band. Do ya want to see it?”

  “Well, yeah, Cosmo. On second thought, no, not until you slip it on my finger. Will that work for you?”

  “It absolutely works for me, Elizabeth. It absolutely does.”

  “Then what are we waiting for?” Lizzie asked, linking her arm with his. “I can’t wait to become Mrs. Cosmo Cricket.”

  Cosmo thought he was going to black out. In the whole of his life, he’d never been this happy. “They give you a video,” he said.

  “No kidding! Can you order extras? I want to send one to everyone I know so all my friends can see how happy I am.”

  Cosmo walked straight into the front door.

  Lizzie laughed so hard she doubled over. “Come along, my darling. I don’t want you killing yourself before I get to say ‘I do.’”

  Cosmo walked out to his car in a daze. He didn’t say a word when Lizzie said she would drive.

  “Last chance to back out,” Lizzie said as she slid behind the wheel.

  “You must be kidding!”

  Lizzie laughed all the way back to town.

  Annie woke with a start. Groggy and hungover, she groaned loud enough to wake Myra, who had been sleeping propped up against the refrigerator. “Oh, my God!” she wailed.

  “Myra, it’s five thirty! Quick, we have to clean up this mess and get breakfast ready. I knew we should have cleaned it up last night. My head is killing me. And, we smell to high heaven. You drank all that whiskey?”

  Myra pushed her glasses higher on her nose to peer at the empty bottle lying on the floor. “I think I had a little help. All right, all right! I have an idea. Just wrap the tablecloth around everything and dump it all outside the door. Load the dishwasher with the pots and pans, splash some water on your face and we’re good to go. It will work, Annie, if you move your ass like right now. I’ll make breakfast!”

  “You can’t cook, Myra. I’ll do the cooking, you do the cleanup. Hurry!”

  Between the two women, they soon had the dining room back to normal, the dishwasher humming, bacon on the grill, and toast ready to pop. Also, a bowl of frothy yellow foam was standing ready, the sideboard held a pitcher of juice, and the coffee urn was working at full capacity.

  “What did we resolve last night?” Myra shouted.

  “Not a damn thing,” Annie shouted back. “I don’t think we should do that again for a long time. My head feels like it’s going to fly right off my shoulders. How do you feel, Myra?”

  “Sick and sorry I listened to you, that’s how I feel. It snowed again during the night. Looks like maybe another six inches,” Myra said, peering out the dining room window. “We’re snowed in again. Did anyone call us during the night? I can guarantee the girls didn’t have their phones turned on. We really should check the phones,” Myra said fretfully.

  “Forget that we business, Myra. As you can see, I’m rather busy here.” Spatula in hand, Annie slid the pile of bacon from the grill onto a serving platter. She waited another minute, then added the sausage patties Bert Navarro loved.

  Myra
made her way back to the kitchen, the encrypted phones in her hand. “Oh, oh! Maggie called five times. Lizzie called three times. I’m leaving them turned off until breakfast is over, and we have our heads on straight. God, Annie, how do people drink like that day after day? I hope we didn’t rot out our livers.”

  “Myra, shut up! Look, we got drunk, we’re paying for it this morning. We are never going to do it again, so just shut up. Whatever Maggie and Lizzie were calling about can wait. It’s now five minutes to six. Try to look alive even if you don’t feel like it. And, remember this, we are of an age where we do not have to explain ourselves to anyone.”

  Myra fingered her pearls with one hand as she tried to smooth down her wiry curls with the other. She shrugged. Sometimes Annie made perfect sense. Other times she was halfway to the moon.

  “My dear, you are absolutely right,” Myra said, placing a hand on Annie’s shoulder.

  “If I hurt your feelings, I’m sorry. This just hasn’t been a good time for me lately. I promise to do better. It is what it is. I’m going to build up the fire unless there’s something else you need me to do.”

  “I got it covered. Tend to the fire while I carry all this over to the sideboard. I think I hear the girls! We pulled it off, my dear. Age and determination wins out every time.”

  Myra smiled to herself as she tossed a huge log onto the dying embers. Flames shot up the chimney as the log caught and blazed to life. She returned to the kitchen to wash her hands before she joined Annie in the dining room.

  The early dawn chased away the dark, velvety shadows of the night as the girls crossed the compound, the men behind them, to the main dining room for the early breakfast they’d all been ordered to attend.

  The mountain was quiet with a blanket of over five new inches of snow that had fallen during the night. They grumbled among themselves but only because they’d all wanted to sleep in that morning.

  On the porch they stomped the snow off their boots, then slid out of them and set them aside once they were indoors.

  The blazing fire along with the aromas of fresh-brewed coffee and fried bacon put them all in a good mood as they lined up at the sideboard to fill their plates. No one made a comment about Myra and Annie looking less than fresh or that they were wearing the same clothes they’d worn the night before.

  The conversation was light, bantering, as they talked of the snow and the spring that was slow in arriving.

  Myra nibbled on dry toast and sipped at her coffee. She murmured something vague about going on a diet. Annie, on the other hand, gobbled down her own breakfast and went back for seconds. She kept up a running dialogue about planting marigolds that were guaranteed to give triple the amount of blooms if sulfur was added to the potting soil. No one was interested enough to comment.

  Yoko and Isabelle cleared the table the moment everyone placed their napkins on it, the signal that the social aspect of the gathering was at an end per Charles’s previous instructions. Old habits were hard to break.

  “I only have forty minutes before I have to head down the mountain,” Bert said as he inched his chair closer to the table. “Having said that, let me bring you up-to-date on what I know personally. I was called to the White House seven times in as many days. The new administration at the moment is in total chaos. I had two closed-door meetings with the president, and may I say she serves a good cup of coffee. She’s haggard, she’s a nervous wreck and admitted it to me. Half of her appointees are probably going to be resigning, and if they haven’t done so yet, their resignations are ready to be handed in. That old devil sex has reared its ugly head once again. Martine Connor wants the FBI, me in particular, to find the woman who enticed her people—that’s how she put it to me, ‘the woman who enticed my people’—and arrest her. She wants this all done quietly. The only problem is that the other side of the aisle has already gotten wind of it. If that is the case, I have no idea why they aren’t exploiting it. The president gave me a list half a mile long of the men in her administration who participated in, as she put it, ‘nefarious doings.’ She really thinks we can keep it quiet and cover it up. I told her it was impossible but that I would do my best. Personally, I couldn’t believe how naïve she is.

  “When I was leaving, I stopped for a moment to speak with her secretary, and she jokingly said it would be nice if the Vigilantes showed up to pull some magic rabbits out of a few hats. The chief of staff, who was on the list, turned a little green but pretended to agree. It’s not good. I’m on my way to Vegas and will check in with you sometime this evening after I get briefed by the Vegas office.”

  “Lizzie is in Las Vegas. Her trip is purely personal,” Annie said. “But I’m sure if you need her for anything, she’ll be glad to help out. She volunteered to meet with us via webcam, but we postponed that because of your late arrival.”

  “So what is this meeting all about?” Nikki asked.

  The women seated around the table looked at one another. As one, they shrugged.

  “I think we’re waiting to hear from Maggie,” Myra said. “She’s going to be faxing us a list of names. Until we get that, there’s nothing any of us can do. Exxxccceeppt,” she said, drawing out the word as long as she could, “figuring out what and how we’re going to deal with those names. And, I do not think we should concern ourselves with Martine’s promise of a pardon or allow that to influence whatever decisions we make. We can always deal with Martine Connor on our own terms when the time is right.”

  “Myra’s right,” Jack said as he repeated everything Maggie and Lizzie had said at their early-morning meeting the previous day.

  “Yah, Myra!” Kathryn said. “That means I agree.”

  The others nodded to show they, too, agreed.

  Annie’s eyes sparkled. “I look forward to this…adventure. Until we have more information, you’re all dismissed. I do believe the shovels are on the porch, and the snowblower is gassed and ready to be put to use. The dogs need a good run. Myra and I will prepare lunch, and we’ll all meet again and work on our plan after lunch, providing Maggie or Lizzie gets us the information we need.”

  The women clustered around Bert, who was putting on his jacket. It was Kathryn who walked him out to the cable car that would take him to the bottom of the mountain and out of their lives for a little while. The others dispersed to do Annie’s bidding. They talked in low tones that didn’t carry back to where the two older women were standing.

  “I don’t think any of them noticed that we aren’t…up to par,” Annie said.

  “If you think that, then you’re a fool, Annie. They’re all sharp as tacks, and they noticed our…attire and whatever else they noticed. Only good manners prevented them from mentioning that they know.”

  “You always manage to rain on my parade, Myra,” Annie said cheerfully. “I am now going to take a shower, change my clothes, and I might even put on some makeup and perfume. You can do what you want, or you can sit in the corner and play with your pearls. After which I am going to check with Avery Snowden to see if he’s answered any of the e-mails I sent him. Then, and only then, am I going to call Maggie and Lizzie. Do you have anything to say, dear?”

  There were a hundred things Myra thought she could say at that particular moment, but she opted just to smile sweetly, and say, “I’ll be along in a minute.”

  Alone, Myra walked over to the fireplace to poke at the log she’d tossed in earlier. It was burned half-through. Oak was such a hard wood and Charles had been adamant about using only oak when building a fire. Charles had been adamant about so many things. She dropped to her knees and added several smaller logs and poked them about so they would burn evenly. The heat of the fire burned her eyes, and tears rolled down her wrinkled cheeks. She swiped at them angrily. She turned when she felt a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Annie!”

  “Myra, you have to let it go and accept whatever happens. Anger and hatred are such wasted emotions. I’m the living proof, Myra. So are you. I made a promise to myself to never allow
myself to go to that awful emotional place ever again. I know you made that promise to yourself, too, but then you broke that promise. The girls need you, Myra. I need you. Harry, Jack, all the others, they need you, too. You’ve always been our rock. You can’t crumble now. I want you to pull up your socks and get with the program here. I don’t want you to pretend either. I want you to give it your all. Your all, Myra, I won’t accept anything less.”

  Myra reached out her hand to Annie, who pulled her to her feet. Myra laughed. “Leave it up to you to pull me up short. I’m glad I never pushed you off that mountain back in Spain. I’m okay, Annie. I have my bad moments from time to time. Unfortunately, you always seem to be there when I’m having one of them. I mean it. I am okay, and I’m on board one hundred percent. You can all count on me. Now, let’s go take those showers and come back here to prepare lunch. I think we should make a huge pot of hot chocolate, too. After we check our e-mails.”

  Arm in arm, the two women bundled up and headed for the main building. They watched, indulgent smiles on their faces, as the youngsters shoveled and threw snowballs that Murphy and Grady tried to retrieve, only to find the snow crumbled to nothingness once they got the balls in their mouths.

  “Wouldn’t it be nice to be that young again, Annie?” Myra asked.

  “Only if we knew then what we know now.” Annie laughed.

  “You do have a point, my friend. You really do.” Myra smiled as she led the way up the steps and into the Big House. “There’s a lot to be said for old age but at the moment I can’t think of what it is. What’s more, I hope I never remember what it is.”

  “You rock, Myra!”

  Chapter 7

  Maggie Spritzer gnawed on a nail that was already chewed to the nub. Chewing her nails was what Maggie considered her only fault. Other than her nail biting, she thought of herself as perfect. Perfect with one teeny-tiny flaw worked for her.