“Wrap up the contract and keep it on ice. I’ll sneak off to Colorado the first chance I get. That’s a promise.”

“Have you told Congresswoman Smith about her father yet?”

“Truthfully, I haven’t had the guts.”

“A nagging doubt you could be wrong?”

“That’s part of it.”

A vacant expression clouded Abe Steiger’s face. “Jesus, what a mess.” He downed the double martini in one throw and then stared at the glass sadly.

The waitress returned with menus and they ordered. Steiger absently watched her backside as she swayed into the kitchen. “Instead of sitting here, beating out my brains over an old mystery nobody cares about, I should be concentrating on getting back to California and the wife and kids.”

“How many?”

“Kids? Eight, all told. Five boys and three girls.”

110 VIXEN 03p>

“You must be Catholic.”

Steiger smiled. “With a name like Abraham Levi Steiger? You’ve got to be kidding.”

“By the way, you neglected to mention how the brass explained away Vixen 03’s flight plan.”

“General O’Keefe found the original. It didn’t jibe with our analysis of the one from the wreck.”

Pitt pondered a moment and then asked, “Do you have a Xerox copy I might borrow?”

“Of the flight plan?” \

“Just the sixth page.” •

“Outside, locked in the trunk of my car. Why?”

“A shot in the dark,” Pitt said. “I have this friend over at FBI who can’t resist a good crossword puzzle.”

“Must you really leave tonight?” Loren asked Pitt.

“I’m expected at a morning meeting to discuss salvage operations,” he said from the bathroom, where he was loading his shaving kit.

“Damn,” she said, pouting. “I might as well have an affair with a traveling salesman.”

He entered the bedroom. “Come now, to you I’m nothing but a current toy.”

“That’snot so.” She flung her arms around him. “Next to Phil Sawyer, you’re my very favorite person.”

Pitt looked at her. “Since when have you been seeing the President’s press secretary?”

“When the stud is away, Loren will play.”

“But good God! Phil Sawyer. He wears white shirts and talks like a thesaurus.”

“He asked me to marry him.”

“I may vomit.”

She held him tightly. “Pease, no sarcasm tonight.”

“I regret I can’t be more of an adoring lover to you, but I’m too damned selfish to commit myself. I’m not capable of giving the one hundred percent a woman like you needs.”

“I’ll settle for any percentage I can get.”

He leaned down and kissed her on the throat. “You’d make Phil Sawyer a rotten wife.”

Salvage 111p>

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