“A hide?”

“An explosive-impregnated package.”

“Is it dangerous?”

Dusty shook her head. “There’s nothing to arm or trigger the explosives. It’s the odor we care about. Atlas detects bombs by scent. He’s incredibly good at recognizing just about any kind of explosive.”

“Right. He alerts to the scent cone, isn’t that it?”

Dusty gave her a long look. “That’s right. Not many people actually know that.”

“I did a little reading before I came,” Viv said. “And my family’s in dogs. My mother raises and trains Labs, mostly for service but a couple go to handlers for law enforcement. Usually search and rescue, cadaver, sometimes protection.”

“Really? Labs?”

“Uh-huh.”

“They’re good dogs. A little distractible.”

Viv laughed at the understatement. “Oh my God, don’t you know it.”

“That’s why they’re not the best dogs for bomb detection.”

“How old was Atlas when you got him?”

“The pups are separated from their mothers earlier than normal so they bond with the human from a really early age. After I worked with some of the graduate dogs for a while, I got to choose my own for training. He was three weeks old.”

“He’s been with you his whole life.”

Dusty leaned down and unclipped Atlas’s lead. He panted softly, his ears perked and his eyes bright.

“Atlas, find it.” Dusty pointed at a bus twenty-five yards away, and he tore off like a missile fired from a fighter plane.

“Yeah, his whole life,” Dusty murmured as she trotted after him.

Viv ran to keep up, cursing the heels on her suede boots. She hadn’t anticipated anything quite so strenuous. She clutched her recorder in one hand and kept her coat closed at her throat with the other. The wind bit through the wool as if it was sheer cotton. Dusty, hatless with her jacket partially unzipped, appeared impervious, her gaze riveted on the dog. She slowed and Viv pulled up beside her, trying not to gasp. A few more weekly sessions at the gym seemed in order.

Atlas trotted along beside the bus, halting occasionally to hunker down and crawl partway underneath, then backing out and resuming his methodical foot-by-foot search along the carriage.

“What’s he doing?” Viv fumbled her camera out and got a picture of Atlas sniffing along the wheel well with Dusty a few feet away, her hands on her hips, her face in profile, staring into the wind in utter concentration. They were both beautiful animals.

Dusty glanced over. “Checking the exterior, the undercarriage, the wheel wells, the body, the places where someone could plant a charge. He’ll finish inside if he doesn’t find anything outside.”

“Will he?”

Dusty grinned and that breathtaking transformation happened again. She went from remote and cool and icily striking to warm and sexy. Viv stared as Dusty tilted her head much as Atlas had done earlier, studying her in return.

Viv’s face heated against the cold wind, and she hoped Dusty would write off the flush in her cheeks to the weather and not her embarrassment at being caught staring.

“There,” Dusty murmured, her focus back on Atlas again. “That’s a good boy.”

Atlas sat and woofed once, his head extended and his nose pointing to the grille at the front of the bus.

“Different breeds, different dogs, will alert in different ways,” Dusty said as she strode toward Atlas. “Once he alerts, he sits, his focus on the find.”

“How often does he miss?”

Dusty grunted. “Never.”

“And that’s what you’ll be doing during the president’s trip? Atlas will be checking the train?”

“Atlas will be checking everything.”

Chapter Four

Hooker slid onto the stool next to the county sheriff’s deputy and motioned to the bartender to refill the deputy’s beer. Early afternoon, the place was almost empty, the lights turned down low and the windows too grimy for much of the low, flat winter light to penetrate. The deputy, wearing two days’ worth of beard, mud-caked boots, and a sweat-stained, rumpled uniform, glanced at Hooker and grunted in greeting. The man was Hooker’s best source inside the local law-enforcement network, and he’d been combing through the wreckage of the militia compound just like every other LEO in that part of Idaho for the better part of a week. Hooker wanted to know what they’d found and, even more importantly, what they suspected, without giving away his stake in the game.

“Sounds like you’ve been pretty busy up there,” Hooker said.

The ruddy-faced middle-aged man, his salt-and-pepper hair cut close, his heavy straining belly showing his fondness for brew, grunted again. “Fucking waste of time.”

“Puts you boys in a tight spot. I don’t imagine anybody’s too eager to start arresting their neighbors.”

“No point to it,” the deputy said. “No way to prove who was up there that night, no way to prove they were even doing anything illegal, unless you can tie those illegal guns directly to them. Which we can’t.”

“I heard the bikers were the gun connection.”

“Looks like it, and that’s their style.”

“What about the Renegades? Are you picking up any of them?” Hooker sipped the beer the bartender put in front of him. It was a little too early in the day, but he made a show of it.

“The ones who could ride away, did. That left us with the dead and a dozen wounded. The ones in the hospital swear they don’t know anything about any guns and were innocent bystanders.”

“What happened to the guns?”

“They’re locked up in evidence. The ATF will try to track them, but they won’t get anywhere.”

“So the whole thing is pretty much going to die down.”

“The feds are pretty interested in finding out who was backing the buy, but since there’s no money to trace and no one’s talking, things will probably end up dead-ended.”

“Huh,” Hooker said. Someone had the money, someone who’d been in the compound that night. His boss wasn’t happy about losing their donors’ money, although they’d known the risks when they’d manipulated the bikers and the militia into believing each was double-crossing the other. All the same, losing a quarter of a million dollars wasn’t something to write off easily. “Maybe the militia was fronting the buy and one of them made off with it.”

“Most likely.” The deputy drained his beer and Hooker signaled for the bartender to fill him up. “Wherever it went, it’s gone, and I don’t think anyone’s gonna be looking too hard.”

“How’d the feds get pulled into it so quick?”

“Some big shot from back east poking around is what I heard.” The deputy scoffed. “Like they don’t have real enemies to be going after, they have to come looking at Americans.”

“They sure managed to find the place quick.”

“Probably the firefight between the bikers and the militia brought down the heat.”

Hooker wasn’t so sure. He’d never been to the compound, but he knew how well hidden it was. Graves always arranged a meet somewhere on neutral ground, and he couldn’t see Graves letting the bikers anywhere near the place. But the Renegades had shown up in force, and the feds had found the location in record time too. To him, that spelled inside information. But then, maybe someone in the militia got cold feet and tipped off the feds. Every group had its traitors. At least nothing was coming back on the senator, and that meant his job was secure for the time being.

“Yeah, you’re probably right—bunch of hotheads on both sides. Waste of time.” He left a ten on the bar, slapped the deputy on the back, and waved to the bartender on his way out. He was halfway across the street to his truck when his cell phone rang. He waited until he was inside the cab to grab it.

“Yeah?” he said, turning on the engine to get some heat going.

“I still have the money,” a woman said. “Unfortunately, I don’t have any guns.”

Hooker straightened, trying to place the voice. Youngish, maybe the slightest bit of a Midwest accent. “I understand things didn’t go well at the exchange.”

“Is that what you call murder?”

“Sorry. I know you took some losses.”

“That’s done now,” she said with a chilling absence of emotion. “I still have business to finish.”

“What, you still want to try for guns?”

“There’s no point to that, not without the soldiers to use them.”

“What exactly are you talking about then?”

“You didn’t give us the money because you support our cause. People like you want something. I want to know what General Graves promised in exchange for the money.”

“I’m just a middleman.”

“Then I suggest you find out from the man on top. If you can’t, I’ll take the money somewhere else to someone who can help me.”

“Wait a minute—”

He swore as the line went dead. The senator was not going to be happy.

*

Blair nodded to the uniformed officer at the south gate of the White House, crossed to the mansion, and called Lucinda Washburn, her father’s chief of staff. Lucinda guarded her father’s time with an iron fist, and even Blair had to check with her before getting in to see him. She understood. Besides, Luce never kept her waiting unless he was really, truly busy.

“Hi, Luce. Is he free?”

“For about two hours. Have you had lunch?”

“Uh—no.”

“Neither has he. I’ll have something sent over. He’s in the library.”

“Thanks.”

“Make sure you eat.”

Blair laughed. “Roger that.”

Lucinda disconnected and Blair walked to the library, nodding to the agent and military aide outside the closed door. She knocked and entered. Her father sat in a red-cushioned, wing-backed chair in front of the fireplace, reading a thick file. His shoes were parked beside the chair, his sock-clad feet up on a hassock.