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budge. “You’re not doing me a favor. You’re answering the call of duty.”
    Ethan almost burst out laughing, but saw she was deadly serious and kept his amusement to himself. What did she know about duty? She was a special assistant to the president on matters of national security. All of her experience was academic. Poe had plucked her out of a Washington think tank. She wasn’t any older than Ethan was, probably younger.
    How in hell had Ham gotten himself mixed up with her?
    Ethan grimaced. Never mind Ham. How had he gotten himself mixed up with Mia O’Farrell? One day he was chasing an assassin, falling into rivers, talking the marshals out of arresting him. The next day—well, a week later—he was shuttled off to listen to Dr. O’Farrell suggest a fresh new way to get himself killed.
    â€œHow did you know I could ID Ham Carhill?” he asked her.
    She paled, then glanced around as if someone might be listening in the bushes. “Please. Not here.”
    â€œNow you see why I wanted to go inside—”
    â€œYour family and the Carhills are neighbors in Texas.” She spoke briskly, keeping her voice low and obviously thinking that answered his question.
    â€œWe’re hardly in spitting distance of each other. There are a lot of miles between us. The Carhills are ultraprivate.” Ethan paused, watching her for a reaction, but there was none. “Someone tipped you off. Who?”
    â€œIrrelevant. You have your orders—”
    â€œIt’s a voluntary mission.”
    â€œIt doesn’t have to be.” She didn’t go on, but he could see she wanted to—she wanted to remind him that President Poe was his commander in chief, and although this whole crazy operation had ended up within the chain of command, she had Poe’s ear, the president’s trust. That she, in other words, was calling the shots. “Don’t you leave for Colombia again tonight?”
    She hadn’t wanted him to leave Bogotá. She’d passed him the information on the American ex-con with a vendetta against a blond, female marshal. It was all she had. No name, no location. O’Farrell agreed that the marshal in question was probably Juliet Longstreet, but saw no reason to alert her—no reason for Ethan to be the one to question her about the ex-con. Ethan disagreed and flew to New York without O’Farrell’s blessing.
    â€œWhen I was in Colombia last week,” he said, “I heard talk about psycho mercenaries operating there, guys who tout themselves as being on the side of so-called truth and justice but prefer to be unencumbered by the rules themselves. They don’t answer to a chain of command.”
    She sighed. “Yes. I know the type.”
    â€œI ran across a nasty little vigilante network in Afghanistan a few years ago. They’d set up their own interrogation room and prison on the outskirts of Kabul, claimed they were working for the Pentagon—it was all bullshit. They were a rogue outfit, running the war on terror the way they thought it should be run.”
    Mia was trying to pin her brooch back on her jacket, an awkward process with her keys in one hand. Without looking at him, she said, “I don’t see what these mercenaries have to do with your mission. Or me.”
    â€œThey don’t trust the federal government. As far as they’re concerned, they’re true patriots, but they don’t recognize most federal authority.”
    â€œWhat difference does that make? If they violate the law, they’re subject to arrest, just like anyone else. Their beliefs are irrelevant.” She snapped the brooch into place and looked back up at him, her cheeks rosy. “You should take yourself out for a good dinner. Don’t you have any friends in Washington?”
    His last meal. He almost smiled, but any humor disappeared, and what he saw in front of him was an intelligent, capable woman who