“Mr. Bellemere.” The suit said the name with reverence and a little shock. As he stuck out his hand, a smile erased the stoic gatekeeper’s expression. “It is a pleasure to meet you.” He pumped Sam’s hand and then signaled for the museum guard to open the door. “I’ll walk you back.”
“Thank you.”
“It is a pleasure,” the suit repeated. “I’m Brady Cortland. Has Madison mentioned me? I’ve been on her planning team for this exhibition and reception from the start.”
“Not that I recall,” Sam said. Why did this guy think Madison shared any details about her work? When the man’s face fell, he knew he had to say something. “But I’m terrible with names.”
“No problem,” Brady said. “Everyone who knows anything has heard how your work consumes you. Give me Mandarin any day over a computer language.”
“You and Madison must have worked night and day on this event,” Sam guessed.
“Yes!” Brady’s smile reappeared. “It took most of the office at one point or another. This exhibit was a logistical nightmare,” he said conspiratorially, “but so worth it in the long run.” He paused outside a door marked Security. “I need to get back to my post. Madison will be relieved you’re here. If you can sort out this mess, you’ll be the most popular spouse in the State Department.”
Sam was sure he’d misheard the man, but when he stepped inside the room, the question faded to the back of his mind. Here, surrounded by technology and the low murmurs of voices, he was instantly at home. Monitors showed views of the museum inside and out. Panels of status displays offered rows and blocks of colors and the soft click and clack of keyboards in action created his favorite background music. This tech-filled room was a world he understood.
Madison’s gaze collided with his immediately. As she crossed the room, her face was the epitome of calm with not a single sign of the tension he’d heard on his voice mail and in the unhappy tenor of her emails. She was a vision in a black sleeveless dress that poured over her curves, slits high at each leg allowing her to move with the dancer’s grace he remembered from school.
“You came,” she said. Her lips, painted a deep red, curved into a warm smile. Her soft green eyes, framed with long black eyelashes, drifted over him head to toe and back up again. She’d pulled her blond hair back from her face. “Dressed for the occasion too.” She leaned back and studied him and he wondered what she saw.
“I would’ve been here earlier if my phone hadn’t been turned off.” Her eyebrows arched. “Rush’s orders for social events,” he explained.
He soaked up every detail of her. They hadn’t seen each other in person since their ten-year high-school reunion, another event Rush had forced him to attend. Madison had been the only bright light that evening. He remembered her in a softer dress, her hair in loose waves around her shoulders. Tonight, the sleek dress and hair created the illusion of a blond version of perfect Far Eastern elegance. As if being shy wasn’t bad enough, her lithe dancer’s body left him tongue-tied. He knew it would be polite to offer her a compliment. If only he could trust his mouth to deliver the words in the proper, flattering order. The years of exercises in composure and confidence in social settings were lost in the ether of his brain. He was terrified of saying something wrong in front of so many people. These were her coworkers and he wouldn’t compound her current trouble with some embarrassing blunder.
Apparently understanding his discomfiture, she leaned close and feathered a kiss near his cheek. “Thank you for coming.” When she took his hand, her tight grasp was his only clue to her distress. “Did we pull you away from something important?”
“No. I’d finished my part for the evening.”
Her hand slid over his arm as she guided him to a workstation. “My apologies for being simultaneously vague and persistent,” she began in that perfect, unaccented voice. “I wasn’t comfortable putting the details in an email. As this evening approached, we had the typical threats against the dignitaries from China and the exhibit that opens tonight with this gala reception. I chalked it up to normal background noise until the museum system was breached a few hours ago. Whoever is behind this has disrupted display settings and the electronic locks on the centerpiece of this exhibit. The consensus is if those settings can be reset, he can do more damage at will to any part of the museum.”
“Sounds about right,” Sam said. “Is the primary concern preventing a theft?”
“On that we all disagree. I find the threat of a theft low.” She gave a quick shake of her head. “I can’t rule it out, of course. The head of the Chinese consulate has added his men to the security team. If theft is the goal, a hacker messing with the display through the computer has made their task additionally difficult. I’m more concerned with what’s going on in here.” She circled her finger at the nearest monitor.
Her voice rolled over him as easily as surf kissing sand before it slid back to the ocean. He could listen to her for hours, a strange revelation for a man who preferred working either in near-silence or to the pounding beat of heavy metal music. Bending forward, he reached up to bump his glasses and hit his nose, forgetting he’d worn contacts. Hoping she hadn’t noticed, he examined several screenshots of coding. “You caught this?” he asked, impressed.
She laughed. “No.” She rolled her hand, inviting two younger people into the conversation. “Carli and Devon noticed some increasing negative chatter directly tied to the event this evening. The primary person in the chat room had too many specifics of the agenda tonight for it to be random. The FBI has been running down the source, which left Carli and Devon to try and amuse the hacker until you could get here. Pardon me,” she said. “Carli and Devon, this is Sam Bellemere.”
“O-M-G.” Carli clapped a hand over her mouth. Her blue eyes were huge behind her glasses. “I cannot believe you married Sam Bellemere. You’re the—”
“Mastermind of Gray Box,” Devon said, finishing her sentence. “We’re huge fans,” he gushed.
They both tried to shake his hand simultaneously and Sam laughed it off. Though he’d never be completely comfortable in the spotlight, their overwhelming greeting gave him a pleasant distraction from another mention of marriage. Marrying Madison—or any woman—wasn’t something he considered forgettable.
Reflexively he looked at her hand and caught the wedding set on her left ring finger. It was timeless and elegant, much like the woman wearing it. The classic beauty of the wedding set contrasted with the larger ruby ring on her right hand that accented the sleek lines of her dress. So he hadn’t misheard the suit with the tablet. Madison had listed him as her husband?
“Was Rush your best man?” Carli asked.
“If we could stay on point,” Madison interjected coolly.
Happily, Sam thought. Whatever her reasons for calling him her husband, he trusted she’d tell him later. He wouldn’t embarrass her with questions now, in front of people who clearly respected her. “What do you need?” He reached for the mouse and scrolled through the screenshots Carli and Devon had captured.
“I need to know the white jade cup and the museum as a whole are secure and will stay secure. This exhibit is a huge honor for the US and a big show of trust from China. Any perceived trouble could undo months of negotiations.” She waved over another man. “If you’d coordinate with Special Agent Spalding, I need to circulate with the guests for a few minutes.”
“Sure.” He pulled out a chair and sat down. Within a few keystrokes, he was into the museum system and feeling his way around. He’d much rather be here than out there with her among a crowd of strangers.
While Spalding brought him up to speed, Sam felt Carli and Devon watching every keystroke as he looked for how the hacker had wormed this code into the display controls.
The code caught his full attention and everything around him faded into the background. He was always happier