And how would this be bad?

"He sure looks more than three years older than Josh," she said.

"Ranger training is hell."

"Been there, done that?" she asked.

"I know some of them."

"The, um, balls-out warriors?"

"Yeah." In addition to being trained by them, he'd debriefed a lot of special forces types, but that was just one more on the long list of things he wasn't supposed to talk about, because the men weren't supposed to have been in the places Dan had been. And vice versa.

He watched Carly looking at the photo and tried not to think about how good it would feel to have her mouth all over him.

"Why are you frowning?" he asked after a few moments. Anything to get her talking instead of him fantasizing about stripping her naked and diving in.

"I'm trying to see the future Governor Quintrell in that rawboned baboon pouring beer over his primate buddy. The eyes are right but the chin looks off. Must be the stubble. He's got quite a crop of it. Josh's eyeteeth are just like the Senator's-that slight overlap that is more a sexy come-on than a flaw. He must have had them straightened later."

"Or else had his mouth redone entirely when he hit forty," Dan said. "A lot of politicians do. In America, bad teeth are equated with poverty and moral turpitude." He took the magnifying glass and studied the photo. "You've got a good eye, Carolina May. That chin isn't as impressive as Josh's is today. Gotta love implants and plastic surgeons."

"At least he let his hair go gray. A lot of them don't."

"Them?"

"Anyone, man or woman, who spends time in front of cameras."

"Gray is distinguished, haven't you heard?" Dan said, smiling slightly.

"Tell that to an anchorman who has someone thirty years younger leaving footprints up his spine. You, of course, would be exempt."

He glanced at her. "I would?"

"Yes. You're going to be like your mother, dark except for one extraordinary silver streak over your left temple."

"I already have the streak."

"If five hairs make up a streak, sure."

"I have more than that."

She pretended to count the gray hairs above his left temple and gasped. "Omigod. Seven! You're definitely headed for the downhill slide into Viagra-land."

Dan was tempted to stand up and show Carly just how wrong she was about the sex pill but didn't. People were still moving around the storage area above them. At any moment a reporter could come down to the basement to research past newspaper articles. Dan didn't want Carly embarrassed or inhibited when they made love, biting her lip when she wanted to groan or scream.

Overhead, someone dragged the tarp aside, lifted the door, and called down. "Dan? You in there?"

Go away, Gus. "C'mon down, Gus."

"How long have you been down there?"

Too long. Not long enough. "Since breakfast. Why?" Dan said.

"Then you haven't heard the news."

"What news?"

Gus appeared on the bottom step. "Sylvia Quintrell finally died."

Chapter 33

NEW HAMPSHIRE

NOON, THURSDAY

GOVERNOR JOSH QUINTRELL SHIFTED ON THE METAL FOLDING CHAIR. HIS expression was engaged, interested. Behind the facade, he devoutly wished he was anywhere but in a gently shabby hall full of veterans of foreign wars trying to digest the indigestible, and reminiscing about wars nobody else gave a damn about anymore. Josh would use his service record and purple hearts to reassure voters, especially veterans, but did he talk about it every chance he had? Hell, no. He'd rather dye his hair pink and wear a tutu. Ninety-seven percent of the people in the dining hall hadn't been shot at, hadn't been tortured, hadn't killed; the three percent who had didn't want to talk about it.

The chicken salad lunch was truly incredible. They should pass out medals for eating it.

I'm going to get a doggie bag for my campaign manager, Josh thought as he clapped mightily for a speech that had left most of the hall comatose. Why should he miss all the fun he signed me up for?

His cell phone vibrated against his waist. He glanced at the call window, saw that it didn't list a number, and went to the message function. No voice message, just text. He punched in commands and wondered what had been so urgent that it had to break in to his campaign time.

Words scrolled across the tiny window: THE SENATOR HAD SECRETS WORTH KILLING TO KEEP. STOP INVESTIGATING CHARITIES.

Josh thought about it.

He thought about it some more. As the second speaker was talking about our brave boys overseas he decided to stop investigating charities on the ranch end.

Then he'd light a fire under the New York accountant's ass and wait to see what crawled out from under the rocks.

Chapter 34

QUINTRELL RANCH

THURSDAY EVENING

THANKS TO BAD WEATHER IN NEW HAMPSHIRE, THE GOVERNOR'S PLANE HAD BEEN late landing in Santa Fe. Sylvia Quintrell's memorial service would be delayed until the governor's helicopter arrived.

Carly didn't mind. Over Dan's protests, she'd driven out early in her newly cleaned and shod SUV, eager to interview Winifred on various subjects, including the possibility of the Senator's illegal offspring. Dan had followed her in his own truck. The extra hour delay before the memorial service had given Carly more time to talk with Winifred-and to prepare herself for another poet-mangling effort by the good minister, who was hovering in the hallway near Winifred's suite like a car salesman looking for a live customer. Dr. Sands hovered with him. He hadn't wanted Winifred to exert herself talking.

Winifred had told him to get out.

Silently Dan handed Carly another photograph for Winifred to look at. The box of plastic sleeves and forms that the airline had misplaced had been waiting at the ranch when he and Carly arrived for the service. While she talked with Winifred, he put various photos and documents between sheets of the clear protective plastic.

Winifred coughed. The sound was husky and dry, shallow, like her breathing. Dan had heard unhealthy noises like that in places where war or plain governmental incompetence kept antibiotics from reaching hospitals and villages. He wasn't a medic, but he really didn't like the sound of her breathing. He knew pneumonia was most dangerous when the chest was tight, not when the lungs loosened.

"Are you sure you should be talking, Miss Winifred?" he asked gently.

She ignored him and peered through reading glasses at the photograph Carly was holding out. Normally Winifred wouldn't have needed-or admitted that she needed-glasses, but she was too tired to struggle tonight.

"Andrew," she said. "Grammar school."

Carly filled in a label, peeled it from its backing, and stuck it to the plastic sleeve. Dan handed Winifred another sleeved photo.

"Victoria. After Pearl Harbor. She was seven."

Carly entered the data and labeled the photo.

"Victoria. On D-Day. Polio. Killed her before-she was ten."

"You need to rest," Carly said quickly.

"I need-to die," Winifred said.

Grimly Carly sorted through the pictures she'd selected for positive ID by Winifred. She'd hoped to find some of Josh and Liza after they were ten, but so far she'd come up empty. All the school and professional photos were of Andrew and Victoria. Family snapshots had stopped after Victoria died. The closest thing to group photos Carly had found after 1944 were the yearly political barbecues. Often as not, neither Sylvia nor the children attended-or if they did, there weren't any photographs to prove it.

The Quintrells weren't what Carly would call a close family. No surprise there.

When the photographs ran out, there was a list of names. "These are the Senator's possible children," Carly said in a low voice. "That is, these children were born to women within ten months of a probable liaison with the Senator. None of the birth certificates list the Senator as a father. Often they list another man, but you asked me to ignore that, correct?"