LITMIR.BIZ

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her, but if I could crawl in and move some of the looser pieces out of the way—”

      “No way I’m letting you go under there,” Harlan said.

      “Now you’ve done it,” Lila murmured.

      “Letting me?” Stacy stared at him as if she couldn’t believe what she’d just heard. “Not your call, Mr. McClain. If there’s even a chance there’s a secondary explosive device—”

      “There probably isn’t.”

      “But if there is, and someone timed it to go off when it would do the most damage, the governor needs to be out from under there now.” Stacy moved away, peering through the remains of the dais—no doubt in search of the best place to enter the maze of rubble. Harlan didn’t know whether she was as crazy as a loon or incredibly brave.

      “If I go in here and crawl through that narrow breach over there, I can reach the debris blocking the governor from behind,” she said, sparing him a quick look.

      He bit back his opinion that she was nuts to even try going into that mess, taking a look at what she was proposing instead. She was right about one thing—the path she’d pointed out definitely appeared to be the best angle of attack, and nobody any bigger than Stacy would be able to navigate the tight space.

      But the plan was as risky as hell.

      “Stacy, you don’t need to take foolish chances here,” Lila called, drawing her aide’s attention back to her. “They’ll get to me sooner or later,” the governor added with a wry smile. “One of the perks of the job, you know.”

      Stacy bent down by the opening to make eye contact with the governor. “Waiting could be dangerous, Lila. We need to get you out of there.”

      “Think about Zachary, honey.”

      For a second, Stacy’s face seemed to melt, her dark eyes liquid and soft, making Harlan wonder who the hell Zachary was. Then her shoulders squared, her chin jutted forward and she met Harlan’s curious gaze.

      “I can do this. The structure isn’t going to get any more stable if we wait, and I probably have more close-quarters rescue training than any of these first responders.”

      Before Harlan could respond, an emergency medical technician rounded the corner and spotted them. His eyes widened as he caught sight of the governor buried under the debris, and he squatted next to Stacy.

      “I’m not badly hurt, I don’t believe,” Lila said in a firm, strong voice that seemed to relieve the EMT. “I’m just stuck.”

      “I have a plan to get to her,” Stacy said. She told the EMT what she had in mind.

      Harlan hoped the man would tell her she’d lost her mind—maybe she’d listen to him. But the EMT nodded. “That’ll probably work, as long as you don’t dislodge anything supporting the pile. I can get you a hard hat and some protective gear—”

      “I’ll take the hat, but the gear will be too bulky to let me get through there.”

      “Be right back.” The EMT hurried away.

      “I thought he was going to tell you to stay out of his way and let him do his job,” Harlan murmured.

      “He knows me. I gave a cave extraction seminar for the Austin Fire Department a couple of months ago.”

      Harlan shook his head. “Who are you?”

      Stacy shot him a faint smile. “I’m the daughter of an Ozark Mountain search and rescue coordinator. I was helping pull people out of caves before I started high school.”

      “You’re sure you want to do this?” Harlan asked.

      “Yes.” Stacy looked scared but determined. “And we’d better get to it, fast,” she added, her gaze sliding past him.

      Harlan turned, following her gaze to find a convoy of news vehicles approaching the capitol grounds.

      “Get your game face on,” Stacy muttered. “We’re about to be TV stars.” She spotted the EMT returning with a hard hat and hurried to meet him, clearly eager to get to work.

      Harlan dragged his attention away from her to watch the approach of the news crews. This whole mess was about to get a thousand times messier.

      Right now, he thought, I’d rather be in Iraq.

      You can do this, Stacy. It’s just like a cave.

      If a cave were made of twisted steel poles and splintered slabs of wood, that was. And if she were really executing a cave rescue, the hard hat on her head would have a carbide lamp attached, enabling her to see more than three or four feet ahead of her. Instead, it just pinched the scrape on her temple that the EMT had patched up for her before she entered the remains of the dais.

      “You okay in there?” Harlan McClain’s gravelly drawl sounded as if he were standing a quarter mile away, even though she’d crawled no more than a few yards into the debris field.

      “So far,” she called back, wincing as her palm pressed down onto something sharp—a piece of metal, she saw, bent out of shape and unrecognizable.

      Of course, those adjectives could describe almost everything that lay in crumpled heaps around her. If she hadn’t seen the dais in all its bunting-draped glory beforehand, she’d never have recognized what it was in the aftermath of the bomb.

      Carefully moving aside several twisted pieces of metal frame blocking her path forward, she called out to Lila. “Still hanging in there with me, Governor?”

      “You bet, sugar!”

      Stacy smiled. “I’m about ten yards from your position, Governor. You just get ready for your close-up.”

      “Damn, I left my lipstick in my other purse.”

      Atta girl, Stacy thought. That’s the woman who’s going to be the next President of the United States.

      Carefully, she carved a twisting path for herself through the debris, keeping a mental map in her head. Forward about four yards, then left another three. That should put her in reach of the large chunk of tangled metal pinning Lila in position. If she could clear enough of that mess to free the governor to move around, she could get her out to safety.

      “I need a little more line,” she called to the EMT holding the safety rope biting into her waist. The line slackened and she moved gingerly forward. Finally, she spotted the governor’s wavy blond hair, now ashy from the dust and debris caused by the bomb’s destruction.

      “I see you, Governor.”

      “I’m a mess, aren’t I?”

      Stacy chuckled. “Never.” She edged around a pole that leaned at a precarious angle, barely holding up a large piece of the stage that could crash down on top of them at any moment. She cleared the hazard and took a sharp left as planned.

      Then she froze.

      Strapped to the large chunk of steel that formed the obstacle between her and the governor, an electronic device blinked ominously, its smooth facade attached by colorful wires to what looked like pumpkin-colored bricks.

      “Governor, don’t move. Not one inch.”

      “What is it?” Lila asked.

      Stacy spotted movement outside the fallen dais, jeans-clad legs moving toward the governor’s position. Harlan McClain’s rugged face came into view as he hunkered down to get a better look at what was happening. His dark eyes met hers. “Is something wrong?”

      Stacy licked her lips. By now, she knew, there must be scores of reporters outside. Whatever she said next could create chaos if she let her rising panic show.

      Lowering her voice, keeping the tone as calm as possible, she said, “I think there’s a second explosive device. And it looks big. You need to start clearing the area. Now. But try not to start a

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