the solemn strains of the “Wedding March” drifting above the crowded pews.
All the guests were watching her and she knew what they were thinking—little Lena McKinney was finally getting married…after all this time! Her tomboy years were behind her, and now she was a woman. From beneath her lacy veil she smiled with silent satisfaction, then all at once, the realization hit her.
Other than the veil, she wore nothing. She was completely naked.
A wave of humiliation swamped her as she dropped her bouquet and tried to cover herself. Her actions were pointless, though. Everyone had already seen. Everyone already knew.
With a startled exclamation, Lena woke up and pushed herself out of the tangled sheets of her bed. She glanced at the clock on the nightstand, her heart still pounding from the dream—5:00 a.m. What in the hell was she doing? She had to get up in another hour, and now she’d never go back to sleep. She never did after the dream.
She collapsed against her pillows, muttering a curse then immediately chastising herself. Her poor mother was probably turning over in her grave. That’s what came from eating, breathing and drinking your work, Lena thought guiltily. She was starting to sound like the testosterone-charged cops she worked with 24/7.
No excuse, her mother’s ghost said with a hopeless sigh. You’re supposed to be a lady, try acting like one for a change.
Lena stared at the stained ceiling above her bed. At least her mother hadn’t been alive to see the Disaster, which was how Lena always thought of the aborted wedding.
The beautiful sanctuary, the silken gown, the wonderful music…every detail coordinated down to her bouquet of white freesias and apricot roses. They’d waited for as long as they could, her father holding her hand in the tiny room off the narthex, then they’d sent out Bering, the eldest of her four brothers. He’d explained as much as possible, and the guests had gone home. Lena had been worried, then incredulous, both emotions finally exploding into a bitter anger the next day when Andres had shown up and given her his lame excuses.
Get a grip, she told herself furiously. It was past history. Dead and gone. Andres had moved on and so had she. Stationed in Miami, he was climbing the ladder at the Justice Department, going up so fast he was nothing but a blur. She hadn’t been standing still, either. In charge of the Emerald Coast SWAT team, Lena held a position of authority and power, too. Two cells of topflight officers worked under her command.
Moaning with disgust over the dream and at herself for having it, Lena sat up and put her feet on the floor. A front had blown in last night and the stained concrete was cold and hard, the icy feeling instantly traveling up her legs. The scene outside the uncovered windows added to the chill, a gray and stormy Floridian sea churning on the beach only a hundred yards away. Above the waves, the October sky looked just as forbidding. Dark, heavy clouds hovered over the horizon, their swirling depths promising rain later.
One of the panes of glass rattled loudly, and propelled by the sound, Lena turned to go to the kitchen. The pipes sang, the shingles leaked, and half the time the heater refused to work. She didn’t care. She had memories of her mother here, and of good summers, laughing and chasing her brothers over the dunes. Her father had tried to buy her a condo last summer in the new high-rise going up off Inlet Beach. The units were “only” three hundred thousand, he’d said. A bargain at preconstruction rates. She’d turned him down, and he’d gotten angry, not understanding.
In the kitchen, she flipped on the television set, reaching for the door of the refrigerator at the same time. Bleary-eyed, she grabbed the last diet cola and a boiled egg left over from a few days before. The breakfast of champions. Her planned stop at the grocery store yesterday had been put on hold, as a lot of her plans were, when the team had gotten a late-afternoon call-out. The situation had dragged on forever, and they hadn’t cleaned up the mess until after two that morning. But that’s what SWAT team work was like. You stayed until the end, no matter how long it took to come.
No one had been hurt, though. That was always her goal: everyone gets out alive.
She popped open the cold drink, then took a long swallow before beginning to peel the egg, dropping the bits of shell into the sink. “Everyone gets out alive,” she repeated out loud. “Hostages, victims…even jilted brides.”
The ringing phone startled her and Lena fumbled with the egg. She caught it right before it slid into the disposal, then grabbed the receiver. “McKinney here.”
Sarah Greenberg’s soft voice sounded, and Lena relaxed the muscles she’d tightened automatically on hearing the phone. Sarah was the SWAT team’s information officer, and her calls didn’t usually signify an emergency. “Sarah! You’re calling awfully early. What’s up? Everything okay?”
“We’re fine,” the young woman answered.
Lena sipped her cola. “Did Beck tell you about last night?” A former negotiator, Beck Winters had left the SWAT team a while back but Lena had promised him a desk job and he’d returned.
Before Sarah could answer, Lena launched into an explanation. “Panama City Beach had a warrant they were trying to serve. It went downhill fast, but—” She realized suddenly that Sarah had gone silent. Usually the young cop had plenty to contribute but for some reason, she hadn’t said a word. Lena frowned. “Sarah?”
A pause—this one lasting long enough to make Lena really nervous—then Sarah spoke. “We got a fax this morning ordering a special dignitary detail for next week. I thought you might want to know about it right away so you could…um…prepare for it.”
“I’ll be in the office in an hour,” Lena said slowly. “It couldn’t wait until then?”
“I thought you might want to know about this one before you got here…so you wouldn’t be surprised.”
Lena waited a minute, but Sarah said nothing more and finally Lena spoke again, this time somewhat impatiently. “Well, are you going to tell me or do I have to guess?”
“It’s for the guy from Justice in Miami.” Sarah sounded almost shaky. “You know, the one they’re sending to open the new office? There’ve been death threats called in. They think an attempt might be made on his life.”
She should have known, Lena told herself later. She should have seen it coming. But it was only after Sarah said “Miami” that Lena’s mind kicked into gear. “No…oh, no…Shit…”
“I’m sorry, Lena. But it’s Andres Casimiro. He’s coming to Destin and he needs protection.”
“IS THIS THE FULL REPORT?” Andres raised his gaze to Carmen San Vicente, his assistant. They were in the director’s private jet, fifteen thousand feet above the Florida Panhandle. Andres hadn’t taken the time to look out the window and see the turquoise waters beneath him, but he’d buzzed the captain a moment before and asked for the ETA. The man had said ten minutes and Andres had felt his gut respond accordingly. Now he was glaring at Carmen and she had no idea she wasn’t responsible for his expression. He was thinking of the same thing he’d been thinking of for the past week—every day, every hour, every minute—since he’d known he was coming back to Destin.
Lena.
Carmen answered, but Andres’s mind had already gone elsewhere. He hadn’t spoken to Lena since the night he’d returned to Destin following Mateo’s death. The meeting had been disastrous, of course. He’d told her what he could—that a special mission had come up, that he’d had
