Prologue

      “Yes... We have a renegade.”

      There was silence after the reluctant admission. In the solitary darkness of his Spartan office Simon McKinzie braced the telephone between shoulder and jaw. His face was wooden, one fisted hand rested on his knee, the other clenched a crumpled message. A message delivered by special courier, intended for his eyes only. With his back to a window that commanded an impressive view of Washington by night, his bleak stare looked blindly at a barren wall.

      As he listened to the pedantic lecture of a power hungry bureaucrat wielding what the foolish creature perceived as his own special bit of authority, only the creak and groan of the chair warned of the veiled tensing of Simon’s formidable body. In what could have been misconstrued as a languid gesture, a massive hand lifted from his knee, blunt, square-nailed fingers captured the receiver in a bearlike grip. No hint of change flickered over his features, but deep in his hooded eyes seethed cold, barely leashed rage.

      “Of course I know it’s an explosive situation.” The damning scrap of paper drifted to the floor as he snarled into the receiver in response to a repetitive statement of the obvious. “He’s my man. I know better than anyone what he’s capable of.”

      Reining in his anger Simon leaned forward, eyes like lasers now, scanned his office. Once, twice, then once more, his gaze lingered here, there, probing his memory of his sweep of critical niches. With a curt nod, pleased with his last discovery, he picked up the lighter that occupied a place of honor on his desk. As the voice at the other end of the line droned on, he flicked a broad thumb over it and a flame danced and swayed in the invisible currents of climate control. A small light in the darkness of his soul.

      “I have admitted we have a renegade.” Heavy shoulders taut, a frown wrinkling his forehead beneath a closely cropped silver mane, his words were dangerously spaced as he looked into the calming center of the flame. “Where and why is our concern and no other’s. The Watch takes care of its own.”

      Distaste supplanting anger in his hooded eyes, Simon listened again. A calculated stratagem more than respect for the speaker’s political authority. The covert organization for special investigations had been instigated by a past president. The monumental task of making the dream of fail-safe protection above the vagaries of politics a viable reality had been given to Simon. Through sheer willpower and stubborn dedication he made it reality, he made it viable. Without him it could not have existed. He was the organization, and the organization was his.

      In twenty years that had not changed. The rigid rules and guidelines were set down by Simon. The extraordinary men who lived and worked by them were chosen by Simon. The assignments were accepted by Simon. The Black Watch was still his.

      Simon McKinzie was a powerful man. There were those among his acquaintance who thought too powerful. Those who coveted and those who feared the ungoverned control. Such acquaintances had no concept of the true man. The man of honor and truth, without personal ambition, whose loyalty to his men was superseded only by his loyalty to his country.

      Simon McKinzie had and would walk through hell for his men, and twice for his country. He knew his men, singled out for constancy as well as individual talents, would do the same. There had been mistakes over the years—agents who failed, who couldn’t cope, or simply opted out. But never many, never an agent trusted above all others. And only once, the threat of a renegade.

      Until now, only David Canfield.

      Cradling the lighter in his hand, Simon remembered.

      David, the first, best of the best, a young idealist with a heartbreaking smile. Fifteen grueling years in the field robbed him of the smile, a final tragedy drew him to the brink, a step from disaster. There were enemies who wanted to hunt him down and, in destroying him, destroy The Black Watch. Simon fought for David and won. His ally, time and Raven McCandless.

      Gentle Raven, master potter, creator of beauty. A woman who brought love to a bitter, heartsick man, and at long last, salvation and peace.

      Simon had no gentle ally in this circumstance. He had only himself. Only he would be champion of the man and keeper of the secret. He could give his renegade that.

      And time.

      Balancing the telephone again between shoulder and chin, with a low growl rumbling at the base of his throat, he retrieved the yellow document. In a slow, deliberate move he dragged a corner through the fire, watching as the flame crawled the length of it to lick at his fingers. As heat singed the hirsute back of his hand, with a great sense of satisfaction and apologies to the meticulous cleaning crew, he dropped the crumbling ash into an immaculate garbage can.

      Time, Matthew, he thought, keeping a careful silence as a coil of smoke drifted in an eddying current of air and disappeared. All the time you need.

      The taut angle of his shoulders eased, grim lines that bracketed his mouth softened as he snuffed out the flame and set the lighter in its place. The bit of potter’s clay fashioned in a misshapen ball around a two-bit lighter was a six-year-old child’s first effort at his mother’s craft. A gift from Simon Canfield to Simon McKinzie, and the elder Simon’s greatest treasure.

      A child. A very special child. Proof that circumstances weren’t always as they seemed, and no man was beyond redemption.

      No man.

      “Casper.” The name began as a growl and ended an intimidating bark. “Shut up.” The preening monologue that poured in a torrent through the line halted abruptly.

      His patience at an end, smiling the infamous rictus of a smile that sent any sensible opponent running for cover, Simon set the record straight. “There will be no manhunt. No one could find the Apache unless he wanted to be found, no one could bring him in. No one except us. This is our problem, we’ll handle it.”

      More stupidly dense than most, Casper chose to argue. Simon cut him short in a low drawl that left no room for underestimation. “There will be no search and destroy. I repeat, none! The Watch will handle this in its own way. Consider this a personal warning—if anyone disregards what I’ve said, you will answer to me.” Simon paused to let his promise and what it entailed register in Casper’s slow-moving