They read bizarre but intriguing South American novels in the original Spanish, which they both spoke fluently. Characters could talk directly to angels, demons, and sometimes even God. They sprouted wings and flew. They wore magic rings, mated with wild animals, and slipped in and out of various universes.

Alex and Robert hit it off right away, bonding over shared experiences: rural blue-collar work-Alex had worked on a cattle ranch as a teenager, Robert put himself through college working on a dairy farm during summers in Michigan, feeding the livestock, hauling hay, shoveling manure, and taking the occasional dead calf out for burial. A few weeks after the course ended, the Secret Service assigned Robert to Seattle, then to San Francisco, while Alex worked out of FBI bureaus in Philadelphia and New York. They did not see each other for three years. Later, in 2006, when Robert was assigned to the White House and she had taken a job at Treasury, he tracked her down.

He was a Secret Service agent, but he was also a guy with a golden Labrador retriever named Terminator, whom he referred to as “my kid from a previous relationship.” He was Alex’s chess partner, a guy who wore a Detroit Tigers cap at home while he watched sports on TV, often reading a new book at the same time. He was a four-handicap golfer and an amateur guitarist. Unlike anyone else she knew in law enforcement, he could play the opening riffs from Led Zep’s “Black Dog.” This had given him a great nickname in his class at the Secret Service Academy in Turco, Georgia.

Black Dog.

Many of his peers still continued the nickname. It was often his code name on assignments. Alex though it was funny. In many ways, Robert was as white bread as it got. And he sure wasn’t any dog. Hence the nickname, perfect in its imperfection.

Time out: Washington insiders knew Secret Service personnel to be very arrogant. Touchy. Showy. Difficult to deal with because they always put agency agenda in front of everything, even personal relationships.

Time back in: “People ask me what it’s like to date a Secret Service agent,” Alex would tell people. “I always say, ‘I’m not dating a Secret Service agent, I’m dating Robert Timmons.’ ”

Time out again: Secret Service people were also known to be the best shots in the federal service. According to folklore, they could knock a cigarette out of a chickadee’s beak at fifty feet and still leave their little feathered pal chirping. The bird shouldn’t have been puffing on a butt anyway.

Time back in: On the pistol range, Alex was better than Robert, something he grudgingly admitted and admired.

So the relationship worked. He was everything to her and vice versa. He was also something that no one else had ever been, the one person who was always there for her and accepted her exactly the way she was. He was also the guy she went to church with on the Sunday mornings when he wasn’t on duty, which was something very special to her.

They were completely compatible.

He set up a chessboard at her apartment. He liked the figures from the Civil War and they always had a game in progress. Sometimes when he would stop by they would do two moves each or four or six, the game ongoing day-to-day.

He loved leaving affectionate or funny notes for her to find, nestled into towels, under a piece on the chess board, in the medicine cabinet, in the freezer, on a window.

Anywhere.

Then, while away, he would send her emails suggesting where to look for the notes. “Look inside the Rice Chex box,” said one. “You might want to look behind the television,” said another.

He could not travel without calling her. If they could, and they always managed some way, they always had a last kiss before he went out of town on an assignment.

They both shared a soft spot for country music, to the horror of many of their eastern friends. Heartfelt white soul music by people whose names could be reversed and they’d still work just fine-and-perfect, good buddy: Travis Randy, Tritt Travis, Black Clint, Paisley Brad, Gill Vince.

Even Chicks Dixie.

“Waffle House music,” Robert called it. But he admitted that he liked it too, with particular attention to early Cash Johnny.

Waffle House music. Robert always made her laugh, but they had had their serious talks, too, both before and after deciding to get married. Robert had talked with her once about dying young.

“If I’m going to go to my grave early, ‘in the line of fire’ isn’t a bad way,” he said. He told her that if something should happen to him after they married, she should allow a new husband to find her. It was all hypothetical, of course. Neither of them ever thought disaster would really strike. Horrible things like that only happened to other people.

Alex drove to the gym on Eighteenth Street and Avenue M.

In the women’s locker room, she changed from her office attire-“the monkey suit,” she called it-into trim dark shorts with a Treasury Department insignia, a sports bra, and a loose-fitting white T-shirt with the likeness of U2-the Irish band, not the Ike-era spy plane-across the front.

She went to the second floor and spotted some friends shooting hoops, including a close friend, Laura Chapman, who worked at the White House as a liaison between Secret Service and other protective agencies. Laura, a former Secret Service agent herself, now had her own agency and department.

Alex and Laura worked their way into a co-ed game, along with two other women. The gym was warm, noisy but not deafening. Two other games were in process on nearby courts. Runners thundered around the track overheard, and somewhere in one of the side rooms a martial arts class was in session. A local George Washington University kid carried the whistle, wore a striped shirt, and reffed the pickup hoops. He called a good game.

Recently, two new guys had worked into the rotation. She didn’t know much about them. A wiry guy named Fred, who looked like a banker: all arms and elbows and jerky movements. The other players called him, “Head and Shoulders.” Another new guy was Juan, a muscular Latino who was a law student at GW. At five foot six, he was a tall dwarf in basketball terms-shorter than both female players. But he made it up in speed and court savvy. The star of the game this night, however, was another regular gym rat, a strapping big guy from North Carolina named Benjamin.

Alex liked Ben, though she knew him only from the gym. He’d been a marine gunnery sergeant in Iraq where a remote control roadside bomb in Anwar Province had taken off his leg below the knee.

Now he had a prosthesis for a right leg. He was in the process of getting his life back together.

Ben was the slowest guy on the court, but at six four was also the tallest in more ways than one. He played center for Alex’s team and played it with a huge heart. From her guard position, Alex loved to feed him quick high passes that he’d pick off with his huge hands and slam into the hoop. The half-court helped him.

On this night, Alex’s team won 29-25. Ben had a dozen. Alex had five, including a swished trey from the corner.

After the game, she toweled off, went to the weight room, worked out, ran laps, and was finished. She grabbed her stuff, headed back to the lockers and showered quickly. She changed into casual clothes and joined Robert for dinner, arriving a few minutes after ten at the Athenian in Georgetown.

The Athenian was a small, dimly lit Greek seafood place, red and white checkered tablecloths with a small candle on each table. The place was owned by a hulking mustached guy named Gus.

Gus was an émigré from Cyprus, a moody quick-tempered sort but an admirable host. Gus liked to pour free glasses of ouzo for his favored guests, which included anyone who displayed a reverence for Maria Callas, the Aegean, or a knowledge of soccer.