First Thrill

by Steve Richer

  Chasey snorted. “Trust me, there’s definitely a reason. You don’t usually get gunned down in a Howard Johnson for no reason. One guy, maybe. But five? No way.”

  “Isn’t everything possible in America?”

  Jeff smiled as he uttered this line and she followed his lead. The mystery didn’t interest him anymore. Last night it had been a diversion, but now it was only a pretext to spend time in the company of one of the most beautiful women Jeff had ever seen. You can’t pay and be this happy, Jeff mused.

  “So your article made it to Raleigh,” he said.

  He didn’t know much about the art of seduction, but one thing he was sure of was that conversations had to be steered away from business.

  “Yeah, it appeared in the middle of the Metro section, between an article about sewers and an exposé on the dangers of raw meat in the fast food industry. I get more spotlight in the local paper.” It seemed hard for her to admit. It was like she acknowledged that she knew she would never work for a big city newspaper. “A couple of TV reporters came over, asked a few questions, and that was that.”

  “You didn’t get any offers from city papers regarding the article? I thought it was a fantastic read.” Flattery will get you everywhere.

  “No, ain’t the way it works. But I’d like to though. Covering the real stories, not just the local science fair and the odd traffic accident, that’d be real swell. But I don’t have the kind of resume that I can send to The Washington Post.”

  “I wish you good luck with that. The Washington Post would really benefit from your kind of writing.”

  He didn’t want to be too obvious, but he felt it was the right thing to say in the circumstances.

  Chasey took a sip of coffee and Jeff seized the moment to steal a glance at his watch. He should be in Raleigh by now. He didn’t want her to notice him consult his timepiece. He didn’t want to seem bored by her presence. He really needed to go. He would have preferred a trip to the dentist’s rather than leave her.

  He told himself that his job depended on it but, at the moment, he didn’t care about his job. To him she was worth getting fired. His only incentive was that keeping Morales under tabs was part of safeguarding Canada’s national security.

  For the dramatic aspect of it, Jeff raised his left wrist and took a long look at his cheap digital watch.

  “Oh God, look at the time. I’m gonna have to bolt. I have to meet with the Sheriff and then I have to drop by the FBI field office in Charlotte.”

  “Can I quote you, say you’re in town looking into it?”

  “You can say I’ve been here, but I would appreciate if you didn’t use my name. We’re taking this matter seriously in Ottawa and we’re doing our best to resolve the situation. If you think of anything else that you might want to discuss with me, don’t hesitate to give me a call.”

  Jeff produced a pen and scribbled his home number on a paper napkin. He thought about inscribing his office number but he was afraid someone else would answer and give up his identity as a CSE employee. If you can’t sleep at night please call me, was what Jeff really wanted to add.

  “Okay, great. You do the same.”

  She wrote a couple of numbers on a napkin and handed it to Jeff. This was a memento he would guard with his life.

  With morning traffic, it took Jeff more than forty-five minutes to reach the Sheraton. He parked on the curb and just as he walked through the door he saw Morales at the front desk signing some papers.

  God no, Jeff nearly screamed. His mark was checking out and that had to mean that the meeting was over. Jeff had prepared himself for the eventuality, but it still pissed him off.

  He returned to his car before Morales could notice him spying and waited until Morales got into his rental. He waited seven minutes and the Venezuelan banker finally stepped into his car.

  He followed him all the way to the airport where Morales parked his car back into the service’s lot. Jeff pondered leaving the car on the street, but his computer and gadget case were in the trunk and he couldn’t risk losing them. He sped all the way to the visitors’ lot where he parked.

  He entered the airport and ran to the counter where he had rented his car. Just as he arrived, he saw Morales give the keys back. He trailed him to a gate all the way across the building. One glance toward the TV monitor sufficed to determine that Morales was going back to Venezuela.

  “Goddamn it,” Jeff muttered under his breath.

  There weren’t many things that Jeff could do at this point. He could have bought a ticket to continue tracking him, naturally. But he felt that there was no point anymore. He headed toward an island of public pay phones and called Bellamy.

  “What do you mean you lost him?”

  “I just did.”

  Jeff could have used his breakfast excuse, but he didn’t have the heart to. From his perspective, no explanation would be satisfactory. He couldn’t explain how the existence of a woman had completely astounded him. He couldn’t explain that her sheer presence had made him feel better than anything he had ever experienced. He couldn’t explain that leaving her had been the equivalent of shooting off his own kneecaps.

  “I’m sorry,” he sheepishly continued. “I really screwed up. When I got there he was gone. I’m sorry.”

  While Chasey had made his mistake bearable, he still couldn’t shake off the fact that he had jeopardized his mission. It was the first job he had found pride in and he had risked it for a woman.

  He had friends who would call him crazy, but then they had never felt what he was feeling for that North Carolina reporter. It was the first time of his existence where he saw the possibility of getting everything he had ever wanted from life: love and a career. One false move and he would have neither.

  “All right,” Bellamy said, his melodious voice sounding for the first time monotone. “Don’t worry about it. Come back to the office, we’ll talk about it all.”

  “Okay,” Jeff whispered before he hung up.

  He was tired and he was glad to go home. On the other hand, he didn’t want to leave. Chasey lived here and going away would mean renouncing what he thought could potentially be a magnificent relationship.

  He picked up the phone again and produced the napkin she had written her number on. He wanted to call her. What kept him from doing so was that he didn’t know what to say. He wasn’t interested in her on a professional level. How could he make that clear to her? He would sound stupid telling her what his feelings were.

  And what if he did? What would happen if she were also interested? He lived in Ottawa and she was in Emmetts Run. It would never work. He repeated this line over and over until he convinced himself that he had believed it. He was certain that he would see her face in his soup for a few months, but he would eventually forget her. It would be for the best.

  Yeah, right.

  Chapter 34

  Ledoux returned from Bermuda with his family to find that the maid had taken it easy during their absence. Dusting had never been her strong suit and it looked like she had decided to simply skip it.

  It was ten, Paris time, and their daughter was sleeping in her mother’s arms. The government official set the luggage down by the door hoping that his wife wouldn’t insist on unpacking tonight. He was tired and all he wanted was to go to bed. But he knew how his wife wouldn’t be able to sleep until the suitcases were empty. He headed toward his study while his wife put their daughter to bed.

  He fired up the computer and wiped the dust from his hands while it booted. He would have to have a talk with the maid about it. She wouldn’t work another week on his money.

  He checked his e-mail, more out of habit than of real interest. There was a message from the Secretary of State for International Trade. Fabrice Bisson’s words put a smile on Ledoux’s tired face.

  “I have received the money,” he read. “I feel uncomfortable holding it. Let me know where you want it deposited.”

  Ledoux erased the message from the page and s
witched the PC off. Bisson had been foolish to leave such a trail by sending an e-mail. He would give him his answer in person. But until then, he had to prepare to handle the money. To plan out his retirement.

  Bisson’s news made him rejoice, but not that much. The profit he was making on the deal was negligible. Through his arrangement with Hingle and Morales, he was supposed to fund their operation, that was his job. That’s what he had to do if he hoped to reap the riches later.

  But like any good investment, risk had to be weighed and avoided. He had forked over more than one million dollars to finance the endeavor. Bisson’s deal and the McDonald Mining Consolidated bribe were merely covering his expenses.

  Elections were coming and his party had fallen from the people’s good graces. Chances of re-election were slim and he knew he would soon be out of a job. He felt that he was too important to go back to his old accounting post now. How humiliating that would be to crawl back to his old company.

  He had met with the great ones of this world. Didn’t that make him one of them too? His regal standing wouldn’t allow him to go back to a 9-to-5 position. He would instead look toward the future. He would build an empire.

  He would soon have enough money to have a home in every major city in the world. He wouldn’t be treated like the help anymore. He would be a king and people would recognize him as such.

  What was paramount was how he would handle the money. To filter the money out to Hingle, he had used a small corporation he had formed in Paris for fiscal purposes. Hingle’s own corporation had bought a dilapidated building on the outskirts of Marseille for virtually nothing. Ledoux, through his company, had bought the building from him for a million American dollars. That was how he would instruct Bisson to pay him.

  But for the amount of money that he was expecting from the sale of the prototype, he had to be more refined.

  What he would first need to do was set up an offshore corporation. This international business company, which he would most likely set up in Panama, wouldn’t be necessary per se, but it would offer an extra layer of confidentiality. At seven hundred dollars per year for peace of mind, he thought it was extremely economical.

  The next step would be to establish a Latvian privacy account. The main attraction for this type of account was that it could be formed using the name of a company instead of the name of the actual account holder. What was even more brilliant was that the company didn’t even have to exist.

  There was no way an account could be traced because the account holder could make up the company name. And somebody had once told him that the bank offered web-based services. Ledoux could be anywhere in the world and still have access to his money. It was all perfectly legal too.

  So as soon as the prototype was sold and that the money landed in the Bahamas, Ledoux would transfer his share to his Latvian account which would be registered to a Panamanian corporation with a fake name. To have access to his money in a way that wouldn’t be questioned by onlookers, he would set up a small consulting business from the French corporation he already owned.

  His Panama company would hire him for his consulting expertise and would pay him accordingly. A corporate car would be provided, living expenses paid, and generous bonuses awarded. He would be absolutely legitimate.

  All he needed was to get a hold of some international legal consultants to handle the paperwork. Hell, he was certain he would even be able to do that anonymously over the Internet.

  His experience as a field man had loosened him up, Jeff thought. He remembered the last time he had met with Bellamy face-to-face. He had been straight and narrow, he had behaved like a model boss-fearing employee.

  Now he sat in his office, sitting in the square armchair like he was in a cushy recliner. He was slouching and he didn’t care about it. Maybe it was the jet lag or perhaps the comfort of familiarity, but Jeff didn’t feel like Bellamy was a god anymore.

  “So you lost him.”

  “Wow, how sharp you are.” The arrogance was intentional.

  Bellamy interlaced his fingers on his desk. “We’re gonna have an attitude problem now?”

  “I told you I wasn’t fit to go back to work after I was kidnapped by a band of fucking terrorists. You plays with fire you gets burned, my friend.”

  “Don’t use that tone with me. You’re a strong kid, Jeff. I knew it the first time I laid eyes on you. I knew it when I first glanced at your file. You were doing great, you produced some outstanding surveillance material. So don’t give me that emotionally-scarred bullshit.”

  “If I’m doing such a good job, then why are you icing my grill all of a sudden? This is my first time, this is my first goddamn mission. I never even signed up for this, I got this job because it beat working at Burger King. Next thing I know, I’m plunged into this international intrigue shit. Instead of blaming me, I think you should re-evaluate the competence of the employees in the personnel department.”

  “Cut it out, will you? You know and I know that you loved every minute of it. It makes you feel important, like you’re actually worth something. That’s how it was for me.”

  Jeff decided to keep his mouth shut. He even somewhat straightened up in the chair. Was he that transparent?

  Bellamy continued. “Suppose you tell me why you really lost Morales’s trail?”

  There was no way Jeff would admit to his feelings for Chasey or that his mission was jeopardized by an unexpected wave of romance. He opted to tell the rest of the story nevertheless.

  “So the lack of hotel rooms in Raleigh had me travel all the way down to Emmetts Run. The evening was lonely, and I started talking to some of the locals, and they’re telling me how some people got killed over at my hotel a week before.”

  “This is the US, happens every day.”

  “That’s what I said. So I ask around, turns out that four of the five corpses originated from the Great White North. They don’t know who the other guy is.”

  “And that concerns us because…”

  “I don’t know, it just seems like an odd coincidence. Morales has a meeting in Raleigh, we know there’s a Canadian connection, and then we find out a bunch of Canadians were killed nearby. Oh, and I learned these guys were employees of a security firm, Azinger Security, she told me.”

  This gave Bellamy pause and he considered the statement before speaking. “Do you know if the RCMP knows about it?”

  “I was told the FBI had told them.”

  “Well, there you go. It’s all been taken care of.”

  “So that’s it?”

  “That’s it.”

  “What about that Bermuda meeting and everything related to it?”

  “It’s out of your hands now. You did a real good job. I want you to go home, take a long shower, and sleep for two days. Have a beer, go to a club. If you don’t want to come in on Monday, that’s fine by me.”

  “Sweet. I’m gonna bounce then.”

  There was nothing left for Jeff to add. He stood up and headed for the door. He grasped a lot during that meeting and he would juggle with his new knowledge during his dinner.

  When an agent was out in the real world, he understood that the only rules worth playing by were his own. It was the only way to ensure survival. Jeff might not have had to find out firsthand, but he saw how future missions would have to be executed in that manner.

  The next time he would ask to be provided with the objective and he would see that it was reached. Just as long as he wouldn’t have to explain his methods. That was how the most successful secret agents worked. Jeff could have explained it to his boss, but he feared that the man already knew.

  It would be how he would work from now on.

  AUGUST 10

  SATURDAY

  Chapter 35

  A nine-hour slumber was a good remedy for Jeff’s fatigue. Another dose might have been called for, but Jeff was wide awake by 6am. His first instinct was to blame it on the uneven blinds that allowed sunlight to peer through.

&nbs
p; Like every morning, he made a mental note to purchase new ones. The truth was that he knew what was keeping him from getting back to sleep. He got up and prepared himself a glass of chocolate milk. Man, he’d been acting so grown-up this past week and he was still drinking chocolate milk? What was wrong with him?

  He read the Ottawa Citizen for a half-hour, but it was in the sports section that he found the most interesting news. He wasn’t a big sports fan, but reading that the Montreal Alouettes had won again put a smile on his face. He really liked Canadian football. Once in a while he tried to watch an NFL game, but he could never get past the dark mist that hung over the league. Cry-baby players who earned dozens of millions of dollars each year, thinking they were God’s gift to mass entertainment, but who couldn’t be unpretentious if their lives depended on it.

  Most players in the CFL made less than a hundred thousand dollars per season and the crowds loved them for it. High salaries had killed professional sports and the only teams who could survive were successful clubs with multinational corporations backing them. Jeff believed that in ten years there would only be ten teams in each sports league.

  He had once been a baseball enthusiast, but the 1994 strike had ruined that. It had been the season where the Expos were miles ahead in the standings and no one doubted that they would have played in the World Series. Greedy players had ended his dream. That’s when he had switched to football.

  Jeff had never done much on Saturdays. For him it was a day to snooze and watch movies. But something was different today. He paced around his one-bedroom apartment, pondering how he would spend his day. He eyed his DVD collection and debated popping in a James Bond movie. It sounded too unproductive though.

  The Emmetts Run shooting still haunted him. When he focused on it, he thought about Chasey. It was a great feeling. That’s when an idea occurred to him: if he could dig deeper into the situation, he would have an excuse to see Chasey again. That was worth spending a Saturday working.