The morning anchor on Channel 5 resumed his report on a firebomb going off in Pakistan. Maggie rubbed her eyes when suddenly all hell broke loose on the screen in front of her. The anchor turned the screen over to the reporter at the White House, who was shouting about ninja forces invading the grounds of the White House.

Maggie's eyes popped wide when she saw black-clad masked figures leaping and pirouetting as smoke clouds sprang up everywhere. Bedlam ensued as Secret Service agents appeared out of nowhere, guns drawn. The ninjas covered from head to toe in black garb, continued their high-flying antics as more smoke enveloped the area. Maggie heard curses and shouts the network wasn't able to drown out. More agents appeared as more smoke clouds erupted.

Maggie flinched when she saw Bert and the director flat on the ground, gray smoke circling overhead. She knew she wasn't imagining things as she saw the look of stunned surprise on Navarro's face when one of the black-clad ninjas leaned down to say something to him. When a giant cloud of smoke sailed upward, guards, agents, and pedestrians, as well as all traffic, came to a screeching halt. Car horns blasted the morning as shrieks and shouts permeated the air.

When the smoke cleared, the ninjas were gone, and the Secret Service agents were obviously chasing their tails all over the place. Even to Maggie's eyes they looked foolish. Her nerves twanging, she continued to stare at the screen until she saw Joe Espinosa talking to one of the agents.

Sightseers hoping to see themselves on the noon news could be heard shouting about which way the ninjas had traveled. They seemed to be saying, "Straight up in the air, then they disintegrated into a fine mist." She almost fell off her chair when she heard one of the agents ask Espinosa if that was all true and did he see it the same way.

With a straight face, Espinosa said, "That's how it looked to me. They went up in a cloud of smoke and disintegrated."

Nine blocks away, Jack Emery stared at the screen and muttered, "You can't make up this shit. No way, no how."

Chapter 4

By the noon hour Maggie had her headline for the Post, complete with pictures. She giggled as she approved the bold black letters. NINJAS ATTACK FBI! The pictures made her laugh out loud. Espinosa came through.

She looked up at the reporter, who was standing in the doorway, and paid him the supreme compliment: "I couldn't have done it better myself, Joe. If you hurry, you can catch Emery. He should be leaving the courthouse in"—she looked up at the wall clock—"precisely ten minutes."

Espinosa was gone before she could blink.