I tried to kick my heel into my captor’s shin. Then I felt a pinch in my neck.

And then everything went black.

CHAPTER 55

I woke with no feeling in my wrists and a throbbing at my temples. At first, all I could see were my own feet, bound at the ankles with transparent zip ties. My shoes had been removed.

So had my clothes.

That realization shocked me into full and unforgiving consciousness. I was wearing some kind of loose cotton shift. The knowledge that someone must have removed my clothes—that while I’d been unconscious, hands had undressed me—made me shiver violently.

Nausea racked my body. I lurched forward, as far as the ties that bound me to the metal chair would let me. My hair fell into my face and my stomach emptied itself onto the concrete floor. Unable to even wipe the back of my hand across my mouth, I coughed.

Floor, I thought, fighting to pay attention to the details and using them to ground me in the here and now. Concrete floor.

I was inside. The expanse was large—possibly a basement of some kind. No windows. There was a collection of electrical wires at one side. The space was dimly lit, but even that dim light made my head pound harder.

The orderly drugged me. I remembered the pinch at my neck, the darkness that followed. Maybe the headache was a side effect, but that raised the question: A side effect of what?

What had the man injected into me?

Poison? I tried not to think about the likelihood that Judge Pierce hadn’t died of an aneurysm. I tried not to think about the fact that someone had poisoned Justice Marquette.

Not just someone, I thought. I tried to summon up an image of the orderly, but I couldn’t. I hadn’t been paying attention. Dark hair. Tall. That was it. All I’d seen. All I knew.

I struggled against the ties, jerking my body to one side, then the other as hard as I could. All that achieved was knocking my chair over sideways. My head hit the ground. Hard.

I have to get out of here. Knowing that didn’t make it achievable, any more than trying to picture the orderly helped me summon up his face. He’s going to kill me. He knows what I know. He’s going to kill me.

Ivy had sent me out of DC, but she hadn’t sent me far enough.

Focus. My cheek rested against the cold ground. Think. I knew, on some level, that planning wouldn’t do me any good—but what other choice did I have?

Bodie said we were looking for someone with military training. I couldn’t think about the future. I couldn’t think about what might or might not happen to me in this basement. So I thought about the man who’d brought me here. Had there been something familiar about him?

Think, Tess.

I thought about everything I knew—about Pierce and Vivvie’s father and the reporter who’d gotten his throat slashed.

The tip came from inside the West Wing, and that’s all I’m going to say.

Inside the West Wing. Military training.

How many people were on the president’s staff? How many of them were there at the gala the night Theo Marquette was poisoned?

How many of them had William Keyes invited to Camp David?

The president was there. My mind defaulted to that. I couldn’t get it to stop. The president was there. The president was there.

But the president of the United States hadn’t slammed those blankets over my mouth. The president of the United States hadn’t slipped a needle into my neck and knocked me unconscious.

The president was there.

The tip came from inside the West Wing.

We’re looking for someone with military training.

I remembered, suddenly, the conversation I’d had with Ivy about the Camp David picture. She hadn’t just told me that she’d been there that weekend. She hadn’t just hinted that there were other people there.

She’d asked me if I’d thought about who was standing just out of frame.

The president was there. This time, the thought took on different meaning in my mind. The president was there, at Camp David. The president was there at the gala.

“Who was standing just out of frame?” I said the words into the concrete, my muscles screaming in objection to the angle at which my body was held. I translated the question, ignoring the pain.

Who was standing just a few feet away from the president?

Who went with him—to Camp David, to the gala? Who works inside the West Wing because the president works inside the West Wing?

Who had I overlooked?

Who specialized in fading into the background?

I heard the footsteps coming behind me. I renewed my struggles, but it did no good. I wasn’t going anywhere—and the steps were getting closer.

I make it a point to learn names. Bodie’s voice was clear in my ears as my captor stepped into view.

Who went where the president went? Who had the training to kill?

The Secret Service agent knelt down next to me and examined my wounds. “Look what you’ve done.”

CHAPTER 56

Damien Kostas. I’d met him for the first time on Ivy’s front porch. He’d approached me at the state dinner. After Henry and I had talked to the reporter, we’d tried drawing out the killer. Kostas had approached me, and I hadn’t even noticed.

Just like it hadn’t occurred to me that the president of the United States never went anywhere alone.

Nimble fingers probed the side of my head. I winced. Kostas brushed my hair out of my face, then in one smooth motion, he righted my chair. “You should be more careful,” he told me.

Seriously?

My brain-to-mouth filter failed me entirely. “Seriously? You brought me here to kill me, and you think I should be more careful?”

He straightened, assuming his full height. “Whether or not I brought you here to kill you remains to be seen.”

I wanted to grasp at even the smallest possibility that I might get out of this alive, but I’d seen his face. I knew who he was. “I’m supposed to believe you might just let me go?” I said, my stomach roiling and my throat closing around the words as I choked them out.

My captor was silent. He had a naturally serious expression, uncompromising and weighty. I remembered how little luck I’d had getting him to respond to me that day on Ivy’s front porch.

“What do you want?” I asked, knowing the question was probably futile.

He made no move to reply, walking over to a bag at the side of the room. He removed a towel and unfolded it. Then his hand disappeared back into the bag, and he set a collection of needles on the towel, one by one.