more upscale and civilized. Nevertheless, interspersed with the trendy restaurants and boutiques, the gay bars and sex clubs still flourished. For the next hour, Blair browsed the bookstores and bars with Stark shadowing her at a respectable distance. They didnt speak.
The first few bars they stopped in were relatively bright, airy places that catered to an upscale clientele. They stayed awhile in each, while Blair sipped a glass of wine or seltzer and pensively watched the couples or soon-to-be lovers dancing.
It seemed pretty uneventful and Stark began to relax. Big mistake.
Around midnight, Blair halted in front of a nondescript establishment that bore a simple hand-lettered, board sign-'Skins'. From the look of the men and occasional woman entering, it was a leather bar.
Blair glanced at Stark. 'You want to wait outside?'
'I'll come in, thanks,' Stark replied, as if she had any particular choice in the matter.
As soon as they entered, Blair said, 'See you in a bit.' And promptly disappeared.
One look around the dark smoky club and Stark's stomach dropped. Visibility was zero, the music was loud, and sex was in the air. At the far end of the single square room, a small dance floor was crowded with bodies in various stages of undress writhing to a heavy metal beat. The unadorned bar along one wall was three-deep in people jostling to get their drinks. Stark judged that unless she stayed physically attached to Egret, she wouldn't be of much use as security. And staying attached to her was neither advisable nor possible. Deciding she had no good alternatives, Stark moved deeper into the room to look for a vantage point along the wall opposite the bar from where she could watch the entrance and still have some view into the darker recesses of the rear. It was the best she could manage. When she finally staked out a two foot square spot that would do, she radioed her location to Mac and the agents in the car. Macs blistering response did not help her nerves.
Blair insinuated her way through the bodies and eventually reached the bar. A few minutes later, beer in hand, she made her way to a rear corner where she could get her back against the wall and have a view of the dance floor. The crowd was almost all male, most of the men shirtless in threadbare jeans or tight leather pants that displayed what they had come there to offer. Here and there she saw a woman, dressed in denim or leather, too, and usually wearing a tight tank top like her own that displayed toned muscles and untethered breasts. It was a bar like dozens of other bars that she had been in, heavy with the scent of booze and sex and something dangerous. It was no different than it had ever been, and yet it was completely different.
The first woman to approach her was a heavily muscled dark-skinned woman with close-cut hair and a row of silver studs in her left ear. Her sleeveless black T-shirt fit her so seamlessly that she might have been naked. Sweat glistened on the expanse of chest left bare by the deep V in the neck, and her skin-tight leather pants outlined every sinew in her powerful thighs.
'Dance?'
Blair smiled and shook her head. 'No, thanks.'
Clearly surprised, the other woman cocked her head and ran her eyes slowly up and down Blair's body, lingering on her breasts before meeting her eyes again. 'That's not the message youre sending.'
'Sorry, not tonight.'
'You just here to tease?'
Again Blair shook her head, still smiling. 'No.' She shrugged. 'I'm just here to pass the time.'
'Suit yourself, but you don't know what you're missing.'
As the woman turned to walk away, Blair flashed on Cam's face.Oh yes, I do.
Over the next hour as she finished her beer and had another, she refused several more invitations to dance and, in one case, a less subtle offer to share a few moments of bodily contact in the alley behind the bar. She was watching a particularly handsome male couple dancing when she felt a hand close over her shoulder from behind. She didnt stiffen or react in any way, but she shifted her balance until she was centered and slowly set her bottle down on the ledge near her elbow. Turning her head only slightly, she said, 'You need to move your hand or lose it. Right now.'
A body pressed close against her in the crowd, a crotch moved against her ass, and fingers stroked down along her bare arm. Lips brushed her ear.
Just as she was preparing to grasp the intruding wrist and twist away, a voice murmured in her ear.
'I'd give anything I have to be-'
Blair spun around, her arms coming up and around Cam's shoulders as she pushed her lover against the wall and kissed her, all in one swift motion.
It didnt matter to her a bit that shed been vacillating between worry and anger all night, wondering where Cam was, wondering why she hadnt called, wondering how she was ever going to be able to control the terrible ache she felt when they were apart. What mattered was that at the sound of Cams voice and the touch of her hand, every single thing in her life made sense. Every cell came alive, every breath felt sharper, every thought clearer. Urgently, hungrily, she molded her body to Cams, her blood running hot and fast just from the feel of her skin.
Finally, breathing heavily, Blair leaned back, her thighs and pelvis still glued to Cam's. The hard press of the agents inside-pants holster registered against her leg and suddenly she was reminded of where they were and what she had just done. Breathlessly, she whispered, 'Jesus, Cam-Stark is in here somewhere.'
'No, she isn't. I sent her out when I came in. I assured her I'd be able to provide close protection.'
Even in the hazy light, Blair saw Cam's electric grin. She saw something else as well. Cam looked gaunt, circles under her eyes marred her handsome face and the tightness in her jaw belied the strain that she couldn't hide.
'Cam, you look beat. Did you get any sleep at all?'
'I slept on the plane.'
'How do you feel?'
'Rough', Can admitted, because she knew she wouldnt be able to hide it for long. Shehad slept on the flight, and that had helped. The headache persisted. The neurologist whod seen her in the Emergency Room, the one whod wanted to admit her after the explosion four nights before, had warned her that it might be with her for a while. It seemed a little better, though, and her stomach was more settled. 'Nothing a few days away from DC wont cure'.
'Why didn't you call metell me you were coming?'
'Sorry. I drove right to the airport from Treasury. I always have an emergency bag in my trunk, and I just grabbed that and caught the first plane out.'
Blair knew that kind of behavior was unusual for Cam. 'Was it that bad back there?'
'About like I expected.'
Blair nodded, knowing there was more, but for the moment, all she really wanted to do was hold her. 'Look, let's get out of here. We can...'
Suddenly she remembered the car somewhere outside filled with Secret Service agents. In the past if shed wanted to be alone with a woman she'd met in a bar, she'd use the back door and disappear for a few hours. But this was different; this wasn't just any woman-this was the superior of the agents waiting outside. 'Fuck, whatcan we do? I need to be alone with you. Just for a little while.'
'Let's go to the beach.'
'What?'
Cam took her hand. 'Trust me.'
Chapter Eight
They caught a cab on the corner of Castro and Market, and while Blair directed the driver, Cam radioed instructions for the agents in the surveillance vehicle to follow them. When the cab pulled to the curb at the end of Polk across from the bay, they paid and climbed out.
'I'll just be a second,' Cam said as she and Blair walked back toward the Suburban that sat idling behind their cab. When she leaned down to the open driver's side window of the Suburban, Hernandez looked up. 'Two of you stay with the carwhoever's on swing shift is relieved.'
'Yes, ma'am.'
'Keep your eye on foot traffic on the beach.'
'Roger.'
