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tomorrow,” Josie told her.
    â€œFine,” Amber said. “I’ll look forward to hearing from you.”
    The Vietnam Memorial, Washington, D.C.
    May 16
    It was a beautiful, warm day. The sun shone overhead; the breeze was light.
    There was quite a turnout for the ceremony. Sergeant Culpepper spoke eloquently about the men of the division, a Green Beret unit, more than seventy percent of whom had been left behind on foreign soil. There were tears among the friends and relatives who had come to remember. Amber felt the hot pressure of tears sting her eyes as she thought of the men who had fought in what was sometimes a forgotten war—not a war at all, as Sergeant Culpepper so eloquently reminded them, but a police action.
    The media were all there, for the president was making an appearance. That meant security, of course. And Amber, being with her father, who was with the president, could scarcely turn around without being swamped by a sea of men in their perpetual blue suits.
    The chaplain began the Lord’s Prayer.
    Amber folded her hands and looked down at the earth, then across the dais to where the chaplain was speaking.
    She started violently, almost crying out.
    The man from the park bench was there. The man with the curious ice-blue eyes. And he was staring straight at her.
    He didn’t look away. He continued to watch her, and she couldn’t begin to imagine what he was thinking. She felt a shivering begin all along her spine. Who the hell was he?
    She decided that she would be direct about the situation. When the ceremony was over, she would ask him. He must be a vet—a member of this unit, she imagined. He wasn’t in uniform, though. He was wearing tan cotton slacks and a white tailored shirt, open at the collar. He was very bronze, like a man who spent a lot of time in the sun. His face was rugged because it was weathered, and intriguing because it spoke of character. He was handsome, but more because of his magnetism than his physical features. He seemed charged with a certain energy, with a sexuality that was dangerous and exciting and as tempting to a woman’s curiosity as a flame was to a moth. She couldn’t take her eyes off him.
    The service was over. A cool breeze touched her face and lifted her hair. It was over, and she hadn’t even realized that it had ended. She had been staring at the stranger from the park.
    She meant to walk over to him. To introduce herself. It seemed like the most logical—and courteous—thing to do.
    She started to walk toward him, but her father stopped her, catching her elbow, and began to speak to her.
    By the time Amber turned around, the stranger was gone.
    The crowd had begun to thin out with the president gone; dozens of the people present must have been from the Secret Service. Amber looked around for her father. He hadn’t left with the president, she was certain. He wouldn’t have left without saying goodbye.
    She looked around. He was talking to someone; his graying head was bent over. Then he turned, walking away, his features caught in grim lines.
    He had been talking with the man with the blue-ice eyes.
    When he saw her, Ted Larkspur’s face changed entirely. He smiled, but it was a false smile, as if he had donned a mask.
    â€œDad!”
    â€œSweetheart. Want another lunch with the old man? I have about two hours before duty calls again.”
    â€œSure. I’d love lunch. Who was that?”
    â€œWho was who?” he asked. She could tell he was being evasive.
    â€œThe man you were talking to. The one with the intriguing face and the blue eyes.”
    Ted waved a hand in the air. “I don’t know. I spoke with a lot of people.”
    Amber thought it was curious that anyone could forget the stranger, but her father seemed worn and very tired. “Let’s go to the town house. I’ll make lunch.”
    â€œNo, I’ll buy you lunch.”
    â€œI’ll make it,”