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“I know you.” She shrugs and takes the tray to the desk so Juno can get her cup.

“Have you heard back from Vince?” Juno asks.

“Yes.” Fatima glances at her watch. “He should be here within the hour.”

“You should have some coffee, too. I know you’re just as frazzled as we are. I still can’t believe …” I don’t finish the thought, and I hear the phantom pop of gunfire.

“I’ve had enough tea today to fuel an entire army. Don’t worry.” Fatima smiles. “Even without the attack, it’s a lot. Caffeine is a must.” She glances around the Oval Office, the bit of wonder in her matching the same in me.

We’re actually here. Juno said it, and like she does with everything, she made it happen through sheer force of will.

“It’s nearly midnight.” Juno rubs her eyes. “I’d like a report on casualties so I can put together an address to the nation first thing in the morning.”

“Vince will be here soon. You know how he is.” Fatima takes the tray out of the room then leans back in. “Madame President, General Shaw has arrived.”

“Real coffee.” I savor each sip. “This is heaven.”

“Send him in,” Juno calls.

A man with more medals on his chest than hairs on his head strides in, his back painfully straight. “We’ve told the branches to stand down for now. Once you’ve given me the extent of the threat, we can mobilize.”

“Good.” Juno gives him a bleary-eyed look. “Terrorists can’t gain a foothold. Not now.”

“No, ma’am,” he says gruffly. “We’ll wipe them out before they so much as take their next piss.”

“Thank you, General,” Juno says, the dismissal in her voice clear.

He salutes and leaves, each step certain and steady.

“Wow, so he came all this way to just … say that and hightail it out of here?” I ask.

“The Pentagon isn’t a long way.” Juno shrugs, then cracks half a smile. “I bet he’s fun at parties.”

“Yep, a real class clown.” I can’t help but smile.

We’ve been huddled in the White House ever since the inauguration, first in some sort of underground bunker and then in a wood-paneled “Situation Room.” Once the Secret Service gave the all clear, we were able to come out and actually move around, trying to let the reality of living in the White House finally sink in. But it’s not easy, not when I’m seeing it through a nightmare lens. We all need to sleep off what happened, if that’s possible. To look at it with fresh eyes and recalibrate.

“I knew this would be a dangerous road.” Juno sighs and cradles her coffee cup with both hands. “But I didn’t expect it to turn to bloodshed so quickly.”

“I’m just glad you’re okay.” I take a bigger gulp of my coffee. “I’d hate to have to pull the sister card and make myself president if you were gone.”

She gives me a wry look. “I don’t think that’s how it works, sis.”

I shrug. “Give me the nuclear codes, and I’ll make sure that’s the way it goes.”

“I think you’re delirious.”

Letting my eyes close and stay that way, I say, “I think you could be right.” The adrenaline from earlier is gone, leaving lethargy in its wake. My head is full of cotton, none of my fragments of ideas blending into true thought. The one thing I can get a grip on is the feeling of arms around me, of being carried by a man who could save the world with his blood. How could he have risked himself for me like that? He’s irreplaceable. Hell, he should be under lock and key right this second. His blood—no, wait. Blood. It’s like a record scratch in my mind. The blood on the ground, the screams from around me. How many people died? Are there bodies still on the stairs, staining the red carpet a deeper crimson?

“He’s here.” Fatima’s voice snaps me back to reality. I almost spill my coffee as I sit a little straighter.

Vince stomps through the door, his expression even grumpier than usual and his sleeves rolled up.

“Well?” Juno asks.

Valen follows him in, his suit and appearance still impeccable. It’s as if nothing has touched him, not the death or the terror. His eerie stillness gives more credence to Juno’s claims of superhumans among us, and once again, his gaze finds me.

“They weren’t with Gray.” Vince sits heavily, the smell of stale sweat wafting from him.