Vice President Cooper, Magnus Lattimore, Admiral Wright, LeMar Stoddard, Lily Sexton, and of course Alison—were any of them someone Gabe could truly rely upon? Probably not. Certainly not in the way he could rely upon The Chief.

Gabe sat at his desk, biding time by shuffling papers, wondering if it was worth contacting Alison to arrange a repeat trip to Ferendelli's brown-stone. No, he decided, not with her, anyway. She was far too eager to learn about the president's health—at least that was the way it appeared to him. It would be terrific, absolutely wonderful, if he was wrong about her. She had never been far from his thoughts since the drive back to her place from Ferendelli's.

During the president's asthma attack, she had functioned with quickness, medical knowledge, and, except for a brief moment when she seemed oddly distracted, composure. Cinnie had the same qualities. Alison seemed to be telling the truth about her role as an undercover agent for the Secret Service, but she might have been forced to improvise after her quick thinking saved his life—or at least seemed to have saved his life. If the shooting wasn't something she had orchestrated, she needed an immediate explanation for why she had been following him from the White House in the early morning hours. If it weren't true, the undercover assignment story was brilliant. But brilliant improvisation or not, it would still have been a lie.

Then there was the matter of the missing tubes of blood. How would Alison explain that? Could anyone but she possibly have been responsible?

Another hour passed. Gabe's brain felt as if it were being squeezed in a vise. His headache—tension, he felt certain—failed to respond to some Tylenol, but still the codeine remained in the drawer. I never took a drug that I didn't have a pain for, he had once heard a recovering addict say at an AA meeting.

I never took a drug that I didn't have a pain for.

It had been a long, long while since he last went to a recovery meeting, Gabe thought now. A couple of years at least. Maybe it was time he started going again. The AA program taught not only how to stay away from a drink or a drug for a day but also how to do the right thing when it came to making difficult decisions. Maybe it was time. Why in the hell had he stopped going in the first place?