More Than Gold (Capitol Chronicles Book 3)

by Shirley Hailstock

  She was dutifully impressed but didn't say anything. She wondered why they were here and for her. She assumed Jacob would accompany her back to Washington and from there she'd be sent to her new home with a new identity. Then she remembered Hart Lewiston and her relationship to him. Were they here because her father would probably be the next president? Or would he? She and Jack had been out of touch with news reports. What was the pressing saying about Hart's revelation?

  She shook hands with them both and sat down. Jack set a cup of coffee in front of her and took the seat next to hers. Morgan wanted to take his hand. She needed something to hold onto, but she only watched as Jack tore a sugar packet open and dumped the contents into his own cup of hot liquid. Then as usual, he stuffed the top into the bottom and dropped them on the polished table. Morgan lifted her cup and sipped. She was suddenly extremely hungry.

  She tried to concentrate on food. When was the last time she ate? What time was it? But she couldn't. She could only think that there were too many people in this room. Maybe it had to do with Hart Lewiston. He was political and the top men in the agencies were here to stay on his good side. If he was elected president they would work for him. It wouldn't hurt to make sure his daughter received their attention.

  She stole another glance at Jack.

  "Jacob." She sought out the only man, other than Jack, she could put her trust in. The silence had gone on too long. "What happens to me now?''

  Her question garnered more quiet and looks passed between the men in the room. Morgan's ears turned red hot. She took Jack's hand under the table.

  "We hadn't planned to get into any details," Jacob said. "You and Jack have been through a lot. You're probably hungry and tired."

  "I want to know," she said before he could go on.

  "That is not an easy question, Ms. Kirkwood," the white-haired director of the FBI answered. "Your father. . .complicates things."

  "My father?"

  "Hart Lewiston."

  "I know who you mean. What does he have to do with this?"

  The director sighed. "The world has changed since his announcement. By right, you deserve the protection of the secret service. There's some jurisdictional wrangling going on. In the meantime, we are charged with your security.

  "It's not like we can put the daughter of the possible next president in the program."

  Anger flashed through Morgan. It was irrational. She didn't want to go into the program. It would mean leaving Jack. She wanted to be with him. She wanted to spend her life with him. Yet that survival instinct inside her had been loosened. She wanted to live. She'd been dead all these years and she didn't want her life to return to that existence. Going into the program would close a cell door on her, return her to the place she did not want to be. Yet the words in her heart broke forth of their own volition.

  "I don't believe the decision is his."

  ***

  Jack woke up in a safe house in northern Virginia. He'd been asleep for almost twelve hours and his head ached from too much sleep. It had felt good to lie on a soft pillow, pale green sheets that smelled like flowers and a soft comforter that made him yearn for Morgan. He'd spent a lot of his life in places where beds weren't an option and other places where the ground was preferable. His assignments didn't often call for scented sheets and mattresses.

  He wasn't sure if he didn't want one of those places now. As long as he could keep Morgan with him. Yesterday Jacob had ended the meeting shortly after it began. Morgan was in no condition to endure a long debate, he'd said. He'd been partially right. Jack and Morgan both needed rest. Now that they were in protective custody, they could afford to wait another twenty-four hours to straighten out the details. Jack wanted the reprieve. Another day with Morgan. He wanted another night with her too, but by the time they'd flown to Washington and then been transported to this place, Morgan was worn out. She'd never admit it, but after what they'd been through in the last few weeks, he was amazed she could still stand on her own two feet.

  Morgan was in the next room. He wondered if she was awake. Leaving the bed, he pulled on clean pants. Clothes had been sent to him. The sizes were perfect and they were stiff with newness. Asking where they came from would be useless. He just pulled them on.

  Outside, the lawn was long. The property, dotted with weeping willow trees that swayed in the soft breeze, was huge. He could see a paddock in the distance. The smell of horses wafted on the air with the scent of freshly cut grass.

  Jack poked his head around the door adjoining his room to Morgan's. He'd left her there after their arrival. He'd wanted to stay with her, hold her, but they needed sleep more than they needed each other. She'd fallen asleep as soon as she got out of the shower. Jack had retired to his room and done the same.

  ***

  Morgan sat in the middle of the bed, her knees up, her hands hugging them, her face turned toward the windows. The room was modern, complemented with furniture that was low and had straight lines. One wall was all windows. Morgan had opened the curtains and light filtered in. After sleeping in caves and vehicles covered with branches, he understood her insistence that they leave the curtains open last night.

  She wore a pink nightgown. Her hair was pushed back from her face, reminding Jack of the morning he'd seen her swimming in the mountain lake. She appeared to be watching the horses.

  "In," he said. He approached the bed.

  "In," she answered. She didn't smile. She'd been deep in thought. "Did you sleep well?"

  "No," he told her. She smiled then and he knew she understood his meaning. They'd been together constantly for the past few weeks. Sleeping without her had only happened because he was exhausted. If he'd stayed with her neither of them would have slept and they both knew it.

  Jack sat on the covers. She reached for him. He came closer to her, immediately taking the soft hand, noticing the cuts and bruises that marred her arm, souvenirs of their ordeal. The marks would fade in time, but the sight of them cut through his gut like a rusty knife.

  Morgan leaned forward. Her arms went around him. Jack folded her into his embrace and squeezed her close. She smelled of the soap and shampoo she'd used the night before. He inhaled deeply. She was warm and soft and he wanted nothing more than to hold onto her forever.

  "Do you know anything?" she asked softly.

  "Nothing that you don't know." He kissed her neck. "Only that Hart Lewiston is pulling out all the stops to find out where you are." Morgan pulled back and looked at Jack. "How do you feel about him?"

  "I haven't really had time to think much about him."

  She looked confused. "There is so much to think about. He's a senator. He's going to be president. He's from a different life. And I'm a grown woman. It might have been different if I were twelve and on the streets. Then I'd have given anything for a warm bed." 1 She smoothed her hand over the pink sheets. “Now, I could only be a liability to him and. . .”

  “And you?” Jack prompted.

  She frowned in an expression that said she had many problems and none with a solution. Hart Lewiston was only one of them. Jack understood. He had his own unsolvable complications.

  “He’s going to be the next president,” Jack continued. “His announcement about you caused a dip in the polls, but he’ll recover. His father is a Supreme Court justice. He’s popular, a national hero.” Jack tipped her face up to look into her eyes. “That makes you a very important person.”

  “I don’t feel very important,” she said. “Just scared.”

  Jack was scared too. He didn’t know if she could see it in his eyes, but he didn’t try to disguise it this time. He wanted her to see him, see into his soul and know everything he thought and felt. He pulled her forward and kissed her. He couldn’t not kiss her. He was scared of being without her again. Terrified. He knew what it was like to carry around a love so heavy that it was painful to push it aside and do other things, and he knew what it was like to run out of time. They were nearly out of it.

&n
bsp; Emotion streaked through him like a lightning rod and he kissed her deeply. He held her close, feeling her softness, imprinting her lines on him, slipping his hands over the satiny feel of her nightgown, rubbing the backs of his hands over her breasts, swallowing the soft breath of surprise that escaped her throat when his touch reached one of her erogenous zones.

  Jack felt himself grow hard. He wanted her. Centuries must have passed since he’d last held her. And this could be the final time. He knew he shouldn’t. He knew it wasn’t fair to either of them. They should talk, but he couldn’t help himself. Pushing her down among all the pink folds of the bedcovers, he kissed her shoulders, her collarbones, listened for her short intake of breath that had become familiar when they made love. He loved her, would always love her. He kissed her again, long and deep, his hands buried deep in the richness of her hair. He couldn’t believe the way she made him feel. Did other people feel like this? How could he ever have thought he was alive before he met her? How was he to survive without her with him? She wasn’t his other half. With them there were no halves, no quarters, no parts at all. There was only a whole. Together they were one solitary unit, one entity, one intensely burning flame that burst into being whenever they came together, one single form of energy, packed densely as if the bonding between them was now and forever.

  Moving one tiny scrape of fabric no wider than half an inch, Jack kissed the skin he uncovered. He repeated the action on her other shoulder. Morgan’s arms slipped down Jack’s. He felt her fingers trail over his skin. Jack pulled her up and released the straps from the prison of her arms. The gown pooled at her waist, baring her breasts. Jack groaned when he saw the clear, smooth skin that covered her from neck to waist.

  Lowering his head, he kissed one puckered nipple and was rewarded by her catch of breath and the arms that clutched his head, holding him to her. Her nipple pebbled in his mouth. He listened to her pleasure-moans, the sound driving him on.

  She was so smooth, so soft. He wanted to know every inch of her, touch her, taste her. He wanted to learn her secrets, explore her caverns, and, once learned, return for a second pass. He wanted to make that pass every day, include it in his daily routine, look forward to waking in the morning and finding her with him.

  Jack eased back and slipped the gown down legs as long as Pennsylvania Avenue. He felt himself pressing harder against the denim of his jeans with each inch of leg exposed under the pink covering. He wanted to be inside her.

  Pulling the zipper on his own pants, he rid himself of them and joined her on the bed.

  “I don’t think I’m going to be able to live without you,” he whispered in her ear. His hands slipped under her, taking her hips and lifting her up to meet his entry. He closed his eyes, clenching his teeth, clamping down on the pleasure that ran through him as he pushed himself into her. Waves of pleasure splashed through him as he filled her, going deeper and deeper with each thrust, driving himself into her until he thought he would explode. Morgan moaned his name in his ear. She kissed him, kissed him all over, holding him with her hands and then her legs. She circled him with those unending legs. Jack had to have died and gone to heaven.

  Jack nearly shouted. He couldn't hold on. He couldn't hold anything back. He let her know through his body that he loved her, with each thrust that he worshiped her, with each kiss that as much as he might try, he could never forget her. He'd wasted so much time, precious time. They'd spent a lifetime apart and they'd lived a lifetime in the past two weeks.

  Jack knew he was going to die here, today, in a moment. Morgan was finally going to kill him. He couldn't stop himself. He no longer had the strength. Morgan had him clutched to her and he never wanted her to let go. He felt his release. The wave built in him, overwhelming him with the force of pleasure so strong that it would drive him to death. He willingly went, followed Morgan, jumped with her, rode with her, carried her. He was power and she was powerful.

  Flipping her over, Jack traded places. She took control immediately, although neither of them really had any. They were spurred on by forces beyond their control, beyond explanation. Magic, voodoo, poltergeist, Jack didn't know which and didn't care. He only knew that it happened with Morgan and Morgan only. She was the catalyst, the fireworks display, the woman of his dreams, the woman he wanted to go to forever with. He'd never wanted to marry. Never thought of it fitting into his career, but with her, it was constantly on his mind.

  He buried his face in her shoulder, muffling her name, as their bodies joined and rejoined. He burned for her and the burning consumed him, seared them into one bright, white-hot light. Everything and nothing mattered to Jack, except the passion that flowed between them. He heard the primal sounds that must have defined the first couple. They were his, mingled with hers. Together they pushed and pulled, circled the world and came back to the beginning. Heat surrounded them, hot and white, erupting in wild thunder, scorching their very souls.

  Bewitched by this she-devil, enflamed by a world without control, Jack felt the sparks of irresistible dynamite that exploded the two of them in mutual climax.

  Morgan collapsed on his chest. His breathing was raspy, labored, hard, as was hers. He dragged air into his lungs, riding the wave of pure sensation that tore through him. His arms tightened around her. He repeated her name over and over, whispering it in her ear, running his hands over her lithe body, over her incredibly long legs and over hips that were made for the contour of his palms.

  He didn't know if he could ever describe what she did to him, how she made him feel or even if they could repeat this impossibly wonderful love that happened between them. He knew without a doubt that he loved her, that he'd given her everything he had to give.

  Even his headache was gone.

  ***

  The horses fascinated her. Morgan had never seen a horse up close. She never knew she liked them. She'd seen the mounted police in Central Park in New York. And she'd seen horses pulling hansom cabs during a short trip to Chicago, but none of those horses were as beautiful as the ones running on the other side of the track. Morgan propped her arms on the slatted fence and watched. They moved with sureness, confidence, defying gravity as they danced in the morning sun.

  "Do you ride?"

  Morgan turned toward the voice. Jacob Winston stood next to her at the fence. She hadn't heard him approach. Her concentration had been on the horses.

  "I've never been on a horse," she told him.

  "Would you like to go for a ride?"

  "I don't think so." She shook her head.

  "You can go anytime you wish. Just let them know." He glanced toward the stables.

  "I will," Morgan smiled, knowing she wouldn't. "I want to thank you."

  "For what?"

  He put his foot on the bottom rung of the fence. Morgan turned back to watch the majesty as horse and rider played with the wind and the sun in the distant field.

  "For getting me out of that room yesterday."

  He smiled. Morgan liked him. She'd liked his voice on the other end of the phone and the way he hadn't argued with her when she called and told him she needed information. He sounded concerned for her safety then and she knew now that he did care about her. Why, she didn't understand. They didn't know each other, yet he didn't look at her as if she'd gotten herself into this predicament and it was his job to get her out. She glanced at the ring on his third finger. He was married. His wife must be a very lucky woman.

  "You needed time. Running for your life is hard work." She laughed then, realizing she hadn't laughed in weeks. "The Clarksburg location receives requests for more than fifty thousand fingerprint matches a day. It was built for that purpose, but it's not set up for meetings that needed the kind of security yours would."

  "Are we about to have that meeting now?"

  "Not out here. I came to give you a message."

  "A message?"

  Morgan's hands tightened on the fence. Was he about to tell her Jack was gone?

  "Hart Lewiston wa
nts to see you."

  "I can't." She bowed her head, leaning it on the rough splintered wood, relieved that it wasn't about Jack.

  "There's a strong possibility that when you leave here you'll be going into permanent protective custody. It might be your only chance to talk to him."

  "I'm not ready."

  Morgan had seen Hart's face on television. He'd looked at her from every newspaper from Missouri to Washington, D.C. She'd heard his voice, knew his smile. She'd watched him speak, knew the way he stood for the camera with his wife holding onto his arm and smiling. She knew everything about his appearance, yet he was a stranger.

  Morgan had carried him, scooped him up and put him in a kangaroo pouch, and like a trapeze artist, flown through the air with him. Yet she wasn't prepared to face the living individual.

  How was she supposed to act? What did a grown woman say when she met her father for the first time? Should she joke? Should she be humble? Aggressive? Angry? Should she tell him she didn't need him after her mother died and she didn't need him now? She was used to surviving on her own. She could tell him she was onto his scheme, that she understood his motives. That she knew he only wanted to use her as a pawn in the Hart Lewiston political election machine.

  "Just start with hello and see where it takes you," Jacob brought her back to the present.