Reviews:

"Complications here go beyond the usual hurdles and make the romance more touching for being hard won.  And if the main action--Laura and Jake must combat terrorists amassing anthrax in the Florida Everglades--seems farfetched, just read The New York Times." -- Publishers Weekly

"With her impressively realistic portrayal of the jeopardy faced by Special Ops members, dynamic author Vicki Hinze guarantees her readers an edge-of-their-seat thrill ride.  You want intrigue, danger, and romance?  Ms. Hinze proves she can supply them!" -- Romantic Times

"Hinze slides into the major leagues with this novel.  Shades of Gray has it all:  adventure, romance, intrigue, and danger.  Impossible to put down."
-- Under the Covers

"Readers will have no doubts about Shades of Gray being a first class military romance leaded with non-stop action, plenty of intrigue, and a great romance.  Hinze demonstrates that she is the Chief of Staff of the military romance sub-genre."
-- Painted Rock

"Vicki Hinze's new book, Shades of Gray, is a wonderful combination of romance, family drama, and out-and-out thriller.  Her characters are wonderful and vivid, the plot engrossing, and the setting is utterly fascinating.  A terrific read."
-- Anne Stuart, best-selling author

"A great story line that easily could sell as a romance or an action-thriller.  Hinze is clearly one of the leaders of military romances that emphasizes action, suspense, and romance.  A winner for fans of romantic suspense."
-- Affaire de Coeur

"Hinze does an exemplary job of weaving a terrorist tale full of romantic suspense and compassion.  Many twists and turns with the storyline coming full circle after some interesting surprises.  A great book from a terrific author." -- Reviewer, Sunny Adcock

"A roller coaster ride of suspense and terror.  Hinze may just have initiated a new genre.  A page turner from beginning to end." -- Site101

"A high-tech, romantic thriller.  Suspense at its best!   This book accurately delves into the world of Special Ops and the men and women who lay their lives on the line for our country anytime, anywhere.  If you like Tom Clancy, Nelson DeMille, or Tami Hoag, you'll love Hinze's Shades of Gray." -- Lorna Tedder, author of Access

"Hinze takes the reader on a very exciting, suspenseful ride.   Splendid!"
-- Bell, Book and Candle

"Shades of Gray is an exciting, suspenseful drama that will keep readers on the edge of their seats.  Hinze has created an adventure filled with twists, turns, betrayal and romance leaving readers clamoring for more.  Do not miss this brilliantly crafted story."
-- CompuServe Reviews

"Shades is very fast-paced, filled with the kind of intrigue and plot twists that make for a great action movie...a great read if you're a fan of Clancy-type novels and movies.  A perfect combination of the two [intrigue and romance]." -- The Middlesex News (MA)

"A first class military romance... The crisp story line is driven forward at a frenzy pace by a brilliantly developed set of secondary characters." -- BookBrowser Review

"High tension, riveting action, and characters of extraordinary integrity and self-control make Shades of Gray informative and entertaining." -- Amazon.com Review

"An edge-of-your-seat thrill ride."  -- BarnesandNoble.com

"...suspense is paramount, the stakes high, the bad guys truly bad, and the main characters inseparable from their work for the American military.   Hinze writes with convincing authenticity about the complex military world of exact rules, rigid discipline, constant preparedness, and covert missions, a world in which men and women and their families, make tremendous sacrifices to protect their country.   In Jake and Laura, Hinze creates two people of exceptional honor and self-control whose struggle to resist the pull of love goes down in glorious defeat."
-- Ellen Edwards, Amazon.com Article Excerpt

"...takes us behind the scenes on missions of danger and national prominence.   Creating two unforgettable characters of strength, integrity and honor, Ms. Hinze quickly captures our attention and our hearts.  Keeps the pages turning and the pulse pounding.  Shades of Gray has it all." -- New and Previously Owned Books, Reviewer

"Skillfully combines an action thriller with an engaging family story.  Hinze is a gifted writer with an engaging style reminiscent of Karen Robards." -- Gothic Journal

"An exhilarating, fast-paced, edge-of-your-seat story filled with love, honor, and betrayal.  Smooth as silk.  This book will keep you reading long into the morning.  Definitely a keeper!" -- Romance Communications

"Hinze explodes onto the scene as an author of top-notch military romantic fiction.  Fans of Anne Stuart, Tami Hoag, and Iris Johansen will be thrilled to discover the talent of Vicki Hinze.  Fasten your seatbelt for a wild and wonderful ride."
-- Romance and Women's Fiction Exchange

"Twists and turns abound.  A crazy ex-wife, a terrorist group, and the rigid discipline off the military all come together to make this book a real page-turner."
-- WCRG on America Online

"Hinze leaves the reader hanging with each word.  This book is impossible to put down..." -- Word Museum

"A Roller Coaster Reader!  Shades of Gray has it all--breathtaking suspense, heartstopping romance, and fabulous characters.  Hinze is a master at crafting a book you simply cannot put down!  Watch for this book to hit the NYT Bestseller List and for Hinze to join the superstars." -- Delia Parr, Author of Sunrise

Awards & Honors:

Top Pick Award, Romantic Times

Reviewer's Choice Award Nominee,

Best Contemporary Suspense Novel of the Year, Romantic Times

Chapter Excerpt:

© 2006 Vicki Hinze

Chapter One

The banging on the apartment door threatened to knock it off its hinges.

Laura Taylor sat straight up in bed, her heart in her throat. She tossed back the covers, bumping the novel she'd fallen asleep reading to the floor. Fear clawed at her stomach.

Bury it, Taylor. She recalled the drill by rote. Bury it. Intruders seldom knock.

But that didn't mean whoever was pounding on her door in the dead of night was friendly and, in her position, assuming that it did could be lethal. Amateur intruders seldom knock but, at times, professionals do. It could be a diversionary tactic.

Someone could already be inside.

Slinging on a robe, she grabbed the canister of pepper gas she kept in the drawer beside her bed, resenting that break-ins happened even in military communities like Fairhope, California. But they did happen. One had happened, to her.

She crossed her bedroom, her every nerve on alert. The hammering at the door mirrored the jackhammering of her heart, and her throat turned ash-dry. Hugging her back to the wall, she slid against its gritty surface, inched down the narrow hallway, broadening her focus, scanning for any shift or movement in the darkness, seeking sensations of any cool August night air drafting in through broken glass, an open window or door.

She stumbled over her shoes. Banged her hip against the edge of the kitchen bar. Pain shot through her side, and she swallowed a curse because she always left her damn shoes there, and she knew it. Allowing herself to get careless, her skills to get rusty, was a good way to wake up dead.

Steadying herself, she moved on through, skirted around the wicker-and-glass dinette into the adjoining living room, then on to the front door.

It was at times like this one, and during the break-in, when she felt most grateful she'd had survival school training during her active duty days as Captain Laura Taylor, Air Force Intelligence Officer and Communications Research Specialist. Despite the sweat trickling down between her breasts and the fine hairs on her nape standing on end, whoever tried coming in on her wouldn't find a docile woman waiting to become a victim. She had the Air Force to thank for that, even as she acknowledged her covert work for it could have prompted this midnight visit.

"Laura?" A man called out, rapped against the wood again. "Laura, it's me--Jake."

"Jake." Relief washed through Laura, and then evaporated.

She and Jake Logan had been friends for a decade, but the only time he ever had come over in the middle of the night had been when his ex-wife, Madeline, had done something god-awful--usually to their son, Timmy.

One kind of fear replaced another, and squeezed at her chest. Laura twisted the cold dead-bolt, heard it click, and then opened the door. "What's wrong?"

Bitterness seeping from his every pore, Jake slumped against the frame, looking like six foot-two of defeated thirty-four-year-old man, his jet-black hair wind-tossed, his strong face, all angles and planes, outraged and ravaged. "She's suing me for custody of Timmy."

Madeline. Again. Laura nearly cried. Jake had tried everything to make his marriage to Madeline work, but she'd opted to continue downing Scotch. He'd spent years trying to get her sober but, finally, she'd committed the unpardonable sin: endangering their son, Timmy. And after that, the craziest in a long string of her crazy stunts, he'd issued her an ultimatum: dry out in a rehab center, or he'd sue for divorce. She'd opted to drink. Now she'd dried out--for the moment; unfortunately, her dry spells never lasted long--and she was suing him for custody of Timmy.

The injustice stung. Deeply. It wasn't fair or right. Madeline had dragged Timmy through enough hell. More than enough. And, God knew, Jake had been tried by her fire twice as often as his son. When would their aggravation with this woman end ?

Laura opened the door wider, and motioned him inside. "Have you talked to your lawyer?" Gregory Radon was a great attorney. Surely he could put a quick stop to this insanity.

"I've talked to him. And then I tried to find Madeline." Jake came in and, as tense as strung wire, he paced between the sofa and wicker dinette table, dragging his hand through his black hair at his temple. "No luck. She's pulled a disappearing act."

It was probably a good thing for them both that she had, and he hadn't found her. Laura clicked on a lamp, set the canister of pepper gas on the coffee table, then relaxed back in a chair beside the sofa and waited for him to vent enough so that they could talk this through. She hated seeing him upset. Not only because she literally owed him her life and they'd been best friends for years, but because she loved Timmy as much as Jake loved his son.

"The upshot is that Lady Justice isn't just blind," he said, stopping at the edge of the light, pooling on the mint-green carpet. "She's needs a reality check."

A prickle of irritation at that remark slithered up Laura's back. But she knew this wasn't Jake talking so much as his anger and frustration, and so she let the comments slide, and straightened a sprawled stack of magazines on the coffee table. Modern Family looked comfortable there, beside Popular Science.

"Because my job is risky and I'm away a lot, I provide a ‘less than stable growth-environment' for my son. In other words, it's a toss up," he muttered, a warranted amount of anger riddling his tone. "My odds of retaining custody of Timmy are about equal to Madeline's odds of getting custody of him."

Shock, stark and deep, surged through Laura. "But she's a drunk," she said, too surprised to pause and state that bald truth diplomatically.

"Sad commentary, isn't it?" Jake looked down at her, letting her see his weariness of fighting Madeline in his eyes. "I'm a Special Operations officer in the United States Air Force and, because I risk my neck so often for my country, I've got the same odds as an alcoholic of keeping custody of my son."

It was a sad commentary. An infuriating one, too. "So what did Radon say you can do about it?" If Jake said "nothing," she swore she'd spit nails.

He rapped the back of a chair in his pacing, then stopped in front of her. "According to the good attorney, I could ‘greatly enhance' my odds of winning a custody battle by getting married."

"Oh, God." Anything, but that. Anything, but that.

"My feelings exactly." Jake nodded. "He says a wife would be there when I can't be, giving Timmy ‘a higher probability' of having a more stable home life with me." Jake let out a grunt that clearly depicted his thoughts on that recommendation.

After the hellish years he had spent married to Madeline, that suggestion and comment had to sting. Sting? Hell, it had to scorch. They'd had any and everything but peace and stability.

Agitated, she shifted on her chair, swept her auburn hair back from her face. Her thoughts raced. Jake married again? And Madeline gaining custody of Timmy? Just the thought of either soured Laura's stomach.

She couldn't let this happen. Not to Jake or to Timmy. She knew how much pain it would cause them, especially Timmy. How could she not know? She had grown up as an only child in New Orleans without much of a family. Her parents had loved each other to distraction; so much so, they'd had little love left over for their daughter. Laura had never belonged. She had been alone, an outsider, and she had never forgotten how much that had hurt. She'd sworn to herself that one day, she would have children of her own and things would be different. But, thanks to a ruptured ovarian cyst, and a non-functioning ovary, she'd had to watch that dream die.

And then Timmy had been born and, from the moment she had first seen him, just minutes after his birth, she had considered him her surrogate son.

No, she couldn't let this happen. Not to him. The anger and guilt of not preventing it from happening would eat her alive. Resolve hardened in her chest. She'd be damned before she would risk Timmy being raised by a neglectful alcoholic who loved Scotch more than her son. He would not feel like an outsider.

As a resolution occurred to Laura, she said it aloud, having no idea what kind of reaction to expect. "You could marry me."

Jake stared at her for a long moment, his soft gray eyes shining with gratitude, then hardening with determination. He plopped down on the sofa and buried his face in his hands. A minute elapsed, then two. Finally, he leaned forward and propped his elbows on his knees. "You've been the best friend a man could ask for, but you've done so much for us already. I can't ask you to marry me, too."

"You didn't ask." Laura shifted over to sit across from him in her favorite chair. The beige velour snagged her silk robe, exposing her thigh. She tugged it closed, then smoothed it over her kneecap. "I offered."

Thinking it over, he vacillated between the pros and cons, his expression shifting half a dozen times. "No." He sighed, as if he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders, rolled the copy of Popular Science into a tube, and then smacked it against his open palm. "No, you can't."

The more Laura considered it, the more sense it made. And the more reasonable it seemed. "Why not?"

"Why not?" His tone turned incredulous.

"Yes. Why not?" Laura narrowed her gaze in warning. "We know what kind of antics Madeline's capable of, Jake. We've got to do whatever it takes to protect him from her."

"I have to do whatever it takes," he corrected, dropping the magazine back onto the coffee table. It landed with a firm thunk. "Look, I'm grateful for everything you do for Timmy and me. Trying to figure out how to deal with him most of the time . . . well, I'd always be floundering without you, and I know it."

"Then doesn't it make sense that we do this?"

"No, it doesn't," he insisted, forking both hands through his hair. "It's exactly why we shouldn't." Jake leaned back, put on his most serious I-mean-it look. "When Madeline got pregnant and her father insisted she abort, you helped me to accept what I had to do for Timmy's sake. You helped me through that nightmare of a marriage, and the even worse divorce."

"Of course. Friends do that kind of thing for friends, Jake."

"You've done more, and we both know it. You've always helped me with Timmy. Hell, you've been more of a mother to him than Madeline ever thought about being. But I can't have you marrying me for him, Laura. I won't. Even for a best friend, that's just . . . too much."

"Do I have any choice in the matter?" It was her life. And it should damn well be her decision. The man would protect her to death, if she let him.

"Don't get your hackles up." Jake let his gaze roll toward the ceiling, then focused back on her. "I just think that you deserve a life with a man you know is going to be there for you when you need him. I work missions with survival odds between two and ten percent. That's not going to change."

She resisted a compelling urge to sigh and just announce that they were going to do this, and to tack-on an "and that's final." But it was too soon. Jake had to vent and to discuss this some more to see the big picture and to draw the same conclusion she had seen and drawn. "I was in Special Ops. I know what goes on there."

"Then I shouldn't have to remind you that when one mission is over, there's another one waiting in the wings."

Did he think she had forgotten? How could anyone forget a job that determines their whole lifestyle? One drilled into them until they live, breathe, and eat it? No one forgets it. Ever. "Listen, all of this is just smoke. And smoke doesn't change facts. You need a wife."

"The last thing I need is a wife." He grunted, slicing his hand down the thigh of his black slacks. "Even a damn divorce hasn't given me peace from the one I had."

How could Laura dispute that truth? "You need a mother for Timmy," she rephrased. "I can be that, if I'm your wife."

"And what do you get?" he asked, then answered himself. "Nothing."

"I get a son." Only she knew how much that would mean to her.

Jake's broad shoulders slumped, telling her he had more than an inkling of the importance of that to her, and his voice softened. "I can't be a husband again, Laura. I won't." He rubbed at his forehead, clearly irritated and unsure what to do with all his frustration. "Don't you understand? We'd have no future."

"Of course, I understand." She stiffened, and persisted. "But to keep Timmy, you need a wife. I know there isn't anyone special in your life, so that leaves me."

"Why in hell would you marry a man with a son and no future? You, of all people, should have better sense." He laced his fingers atop his head and closed his eyes, as if silently cursing, or praying.

When he reopened them, he glared at her. "It's highly likely I'll never live to see thirty-five, and we both know it. Think about that. And think about yourself, not just Timmy. Are you forgetting who you are?"

"No. But I think you might be."

Agitated and obviously bent on reminding her anyway, from his perspective, Jake began pacing again, hanging in the shadows just beyond the lamplight. "Look, you went into the military to do high-tech, communications research and you became an expert--a captain in Intel who could pick her pet projects and her terms, and you did it. Yet all of that still wasn't enough for you."

She'd loved her work in the Special Ops intelligence community, and she still loved her research. But it hadn't been enough, which was exactly why marrying him made sense. "I haven't forgotten, Jake." Nor had she forgotten Madeline's part in why she was no longer in the military. That, however, Laura had sworn to herself she'd never tell Jake.

He'd said the last thing he needed was a wife, but it wasn't. It was more guilt, which is exactly what he'd feel if she told him about Madeline's antics affecting her and her career.

He stopped near the table, and glared over the slope of his shoulder back at her. "Damn it, you know you hated the constant danger of working Intel. You hated not knowing where you'd be tomorrow or next week, never mind next year."

"Yes, I did. Enough to get out of the Air Force to get away from it."

"You hated having no idea what mission you'd be on, or where you'd be performing it, and you walked out--as much as anyone can walk out of Intel--to get yourself a personal life."

Was he going to laundry list her whole life here? "All of that is true, but--"

"Then why are you telling me you're willing to give up a personal life and put yourself right in the middle of all of the things you hated again?"

"Because I am willing." Laura looked him right in the eye. "And that's exactly what I'm telling you." She lifted a hand, palm upward. "I'm willing."

He dragged a hand through his hair, spiking it. "You're forgetting about Madeline. As much as I wish she would, she isn't going to go away." A grimace flattened his generous mouth to a tight slash. "If I've accepted nothing else in the two years since the divorce, I've accepted that she'll be a thorn in my side until the day I die. You can't be willing to accept that, too."

"Yes, I can," Laura said without hesitating, then leaned forward in her chair, a little amused by the disbelief in his tone. "Listen, you're right about all of this. But you're forgetting the one reason that makes all of it insignificant."

He lifted his hands, and the button on his left shirt-cuff winked in the lamplight. "What the hell could make all of this insignificant?"

"Timmy." Her throat sandpaper dry, Laura dredged up her courage and then spoke from the heart, something she had rarely let herself do with anyone, including Jake. "I'd do it for Timmy," she said. "I love him, Jake."

The skepticism in his expression wilted, and the hard lines in his face softened. "I know you love him, but we're talking marriage here. This isn't a day at the park in San Francisco, or a week in the Sierras playing in the snow. You'd be sacrificing your shot at a happy, normal life with a real marriage."

She bristled, and her tone went flat. "I'm aware of the difference."

"I didn't mean to insult you." His exasperation escaped on a sigh. "Ah, hell, Laura, you know what I mean."

"Yes, I do. I got out of the Air Force because I wanted to put down roots in a quiet and peaceful life. But, in case you haven't noticed, my friend, it's been four years since I took off my captain's bars, and my roots and the rest of me are still single."

Unable to sit and speak this frankly, she stood up and moved behind the stuffed chair, then grasped the back of it in a knuckle-tingling grip, wondering why in heaven she smelled lemons. Despising them, she knew for a fact there was nothing in her apartment that even resembled the scent. "You know how much I wanted children. You also know my biological clock didn't get a shot at ticking before it shut down. I'll never have children myself, but I have had Timmy. In my heart, he's my son, Jake, and he always has been. And right now, my son needs me."

Jake stared at her, a little surprised but even more awed. Laura had let him glimpse inside her on occasion, but never like this. And in her expression, determined and yet vulnerable, he realized the truth. Her suggestion to marry him truly had nothing to do with him. It had to do with what was best for Timmy.

Relieved by that, Jake moved out from the shadows on the floor into the lamplight and plucked at the nubby fabric on the back of the sofa. He considered her proposal from that perspective and, in the end, he decided she made a lot of sense. But they had to be perfectly clear on the terms of this agreement. He didn't dare to not be crystal clear.

"You're right," he said. "I do need a mother for Timmy. But I don't need a wife." His gray eyes turned steely. "If we should do this, as egotistical as it sounds, I would have to know you'd never make the mistake of falling in love with me. Not ever." The skin between his brows furrowed. "My mortality rating is bad at best. We have no future. You can never forget that, and you can never take the chance of loving me."

They had been friends for over a decade. Did he think this was a newsflash? "I know."

His frown deepened, and his voice grew even more stern. "I won't love you. And I won't forget it--not for a second. I can't forget it, and I can't handle any guilt or regret or the worry of wondering that you might. I won't worry, and I won't regret, Laura. And even five or ten years from now, I won't tolerate recriminations or reprisals being tossed into my face because of the way things are. I'm telling you now exactly how things will always be. I've got to know you understand that, and it 's okay with you. Otherwise, I can't do what I have to do."

The job. Duty first. How well she remembered the drill. And as warnings went, this one wasn't so bad. She'd heard worse from him, and those had worked out amicably. "Quit ranting and listen to me, okay?" When he stopped at the other side of the coffee table and stuffed his fist into his pocket, she went on. "I don't love you, Jake. I'm not in love with you, and I can't fathom, even in my wildest imagination, ever being in love with you. So none of that is a problem."

That blunt disclosure had the logical man fighting the male ego in Jake, and he suspected Laura knew it. What looked suspiciously like a smile tugged at her lips. A muscle in his jaw twitched.

"You'll have your home and your life, and I'll have mine," she said in a tone so calm and reasonable it set his teeth on edge. "We'll just do what we've always done: work together for whatever is in Timmy's best interest. The only difference is we'll be married."

"So you accept that's all our relationship can ever be?" Jake asked, still unconvinced. How could she be satisfied, settling for so little for herself? He had to be missing something she hadn't considered. "I'm serious about all this. We'll never be emotionally close. We'll never be a real couple, or anymore of a family than we are now."

"We certainly won't," she firmly insisted. "But we will be married, and that'll ‘greatly enhance' your odds of keeping custody of Timmy. That's what matters most to me."

Jake stared at her in disbelief. "Why?"

Laura accepted it. He wasn't going to relent. Not until he felt satisfied, and to give him satisfaction, she had to bare even more truths. Ones she preferred not to think about much less to discuss. Still, this was for Timmy. She would do it, but she'd be damned if she could look Jake in the eye when she did. She focused on the placket of his gray corduroy shirt. "I was a vulnerable child." Saying that out loud, even after all these years, still rattled her. "I didn't like it. And I won't have a child I consider my son vulnerable. Not if I can stop it."

He dipped his chin, stayed silent a long moment. Obviously her disclosure about being vulnerable had taken him by surprise. Or maybe it hadn't, and he didn't want her to know that he had surmised that truth a long time ago.

He lifted his chin to look at her. "We'd be taking a shot, but it could be for nothing. Madeline could win the custody suit, anyway."

"Highly doubtful," Laura countered. "I'm clean, with strong credentials and no history that could hurt him. Dr. Laura Taylor, formerly Captain Laura Taylor, will round out your superiority nicely, I would say." Lord, how she wished she felt as confident about that as she had sounded.

Surprise flickered through his eyes. "You're even willing to flaunt your titles on this?"

Hating pretentious titles, she blanched. But for Timmy? Anything. Even that. "Yes."

Jake's lip curled, hinting at a crooked smile. "You really are sure about this."

Finally, he was coming around. How could she not be sure? "To keep Timmy away from Madeline, I'd marry the devil himself. You can be ruthless, friend, but you're far less daunting than the devil."

Laura had thought this through. And Jake supposed he could understand why she would find settling for him acceptable. Even without a future, she wanted to feel connected to someone outside herself, to Timmy. And from living through Jake's marriage to Madeline along with him, Laura knew the hell a traditional marriage involved. Not loving him and being Timmy's step-mother, when she already considered herself his mother, was emotionally safe. "Can you tell me straight out you know and accept that the only reason I'm marrying you is to keep Madeline away from Timmy?"

"I know and accept it," Laura said without reservation, then issued a warning of her own. "And I want to know you accept that Timmy is the only reason I would marry you."

"Of course." He shrugged. "Why else?"

The man had no idea of his appeal. Which is probably why they been able to be friends and keep their relationship purely platonic.

It took a lot more discussion--actually, until dawn was breaking outside--but finally, Laura settled his fears and the worry cleared from Jake's face.

"Okay," he said, rubbing his lower lip between his forefinger and thumb. "Okay, let's do it."

"Okay." Laura stood up, feeling buoyant. It wasn't the traditional proposal or acceptance, and theirs wouldn't be anything like a traditional marriage. But it would serve the purpose and hopefully put a damper on Madeline's plan to bring more turmoil into Timmy's life. A sacrifice for both Laura and Jake, but one that--please, God!--would spare Timmy.

That possibility alone made any sacrifice worth the price they had to pay.

 

Two weeks later, in a Lake Tahoe chapel, Laura Taylor put on an antique-white lace dress, held a bouquet of pale yellow roses and baby's breath, and became Jake Logan's wife.

It never occurred to her or Jake to exchange wedding rings, and the justice of the peace had to remind Jake to kiss his bride.

Two weeks and three days after the wedding, Madeline went on another drinking binge, and dropped the custody suit.

That news came to Laura via Jake, who met her for lunch at The Golden Dragon, a tiny Chinese restaurant they frequented, to tell her, and to suggest they have their marriage annulled.

Awash in relief over the dropping of the suit, Laura considered the annulment for nearly two minutes before deciding against it. "No," she said, watching a brunette waitress who was as thin as a rail scurry from table to table, refilling glasses from a frosty pitcher of iced-tea. "No annulment."

About to take a bite of spicy-smelling lo mein, Jake paused, his fork mid-air. "No?"

"No," Laura insisted, removing a smelly lemon wedge from the saucer of her hot tea and dumping it into an ashtray. "What if something should happen to you? Considering the job, we know it's a strong possibility."

He put his fork down. "Custody of Timmy would automatically revert to Madeline."

"Exactly." Laura leaned closer, across the red-clothed table, then dropped her voice to a whisper to avoid being overheard by the two women lunching at the next table. "I know that's eaten at you inside for a long time--worrying about that happening. It's worried me, too. And now we have the opportunity to do something about it. I think, rather than get an annulment, we need to pursue a step-parent adoption."

Jake opposed. Strongly. "No, you've sacrificed enough for us already."

While other diners came, ate, and departed, he went on to reiterate every logical reason in the book why she shouldn't want to do this, informed her that Madeline would never give her consent, and then reiterated some more, in case Laura had missed anything the first time he'd said it.

When he paused for breath, Laura interjected, "But she's an alcoholic, Jake."

"True, but she's one with substantial credentials. She spent years in the Intelligence community as an assistant to Colonel James, and that will strengthen her custody odds."

"Even if she was only there because of her father?" Of course, Colonel James had hired her. Her father, Sean Drake, was a well-respected CIA legend and offending him was paramount to offending God. James was far too slick to offend God.

"It doesn't matter," Jake insisted. "She was there. That's what shows up on paper."

Laura groused, fidgeted on her red-vinyl seat. "But everyone knows she was an airhead and a drunk, Jake. Even her boss knew it."

"She got Excellent ratings on every employee review."

"Okay," Laura conceded. "So to stay in Sean Drake's good graces, Colonel James covered for her. But, over the years, she's pulled a respectable succession of crazy stunts. They can be verified and testified to, and that would have to strengthen our case."

Jake mulled that over and, after Laura swallowed her last bite of sesame chicken, she interrupted his ponderings to remind him of the bottom line. "We have to do everything possible to never leave Timmy vulnerable to her," Laura insisted. "We have to, Jake, because otherwise only God knows the damage she could do."

Timmy could not be an outsider.