On one of those cubicles hangs the cheap, plastic nameplate ‘Charles Wisniewski, Special Agent.’ The nameplate on the cubicle across the narrow aisle, which shared half its space with a large Xerox machine, would read ‘Edward Barnett, Special Agent,’ but it had fallen off weeks before and lay under one of the stacks of folders and reports that littered the desk. Wisniewski wore his usual dark blue polyester suit, dingy white shirt, and polka-dot tie his grandkids had given him for Christmas. Barnett was now clean-shaven, dressed in an open-collared dark blue shirt, dress jeans, and a tweed sports coat with the sleeves pushed up. He was still wearing the earring, however, as he sat at his desk, slowly pawing through a file labeled 'Unauthorized Importation of Defective Auto Parts.’
Frustrated, he looked across the aisle and finally asked, “What did we do to deserve this, Charlie?”
“We?” Charlie asked, barely looking up from the sports page and the open box of Dunkin' Donuts on his desk. “Oh, no, Podnah, that was all you. And it might have had something to do with the belly dancer you ordered-in for this week's staff meeting.”
“I thought she might liven things up a bit, and God knows this place needed a little lightening up.”
“Oh, she livened things up, all right,” Charlie laughed and went back to his paper.
Barnett’s telephone rang. He picked up the receiver and said, “Acme Storm Door Company, Ace speaking… No, no, Louise, it's me… yeah, it’s really me.”
Charlie sat across the aisle, chuckling, munching, and shaking his head.
“Yeah, a little FBI humor… Yeah, very little FBI humor… And I'm sure J. Edgar would be really pissed if he caught me, if he even knew who I was, which he doesn't, because he’s dead. So what's up…? Oh, Jeez, does it really have to be now? I don’t know how the Bureau could possibly do without me this afternoon. You know, all this National Security stuff I’m working on,” Barnett said as he looked at the stacks of old file folders on his desk.
Charlie began pounding his head on his desk, trying so hard not to laugh that he ended up choking and coughing up a piece of donut.
Barnett turned away and covered the phone. “No, nothing, Louise, somebody just got sick, that’s all… And I do know how hard it is for you to get away too… I know, I know, you’ve got make-up, production meetings, and all those script changes. You don’t need to give me the whole schedule… Yes, your work is just as important as mine. Honest!”
Barnett glanced over and saw that three other agents were now standing across the aisle, watching him, and laughing along with Charlie as they dug into his donuts.
“Okay, okay, Louise,” Barnett went on, ignoring them. “Not here. In my other office, in thirty minutes… but no guns, no knives, and no ashtrays. If we’re going to fight it out, it’s going to be bare-knuckles… Yes, very funny.”
He hung up and turned toward Charlie and the others. “Louise?” Charlie asked. “You need backup? Or you want I should call the SWAT Team?”
“Nah, she’s only dangerous in private. Out in public, she has her image to protect… and I can usually outrun her.”
“My ass,” Wisniewski said as he shoved half of a donut in his mouth. “That is one formidable woman you got there, Edward.”
“I got? That’s a laugh,” Barnett said as he stood and headed for the fire stairs.
“You want I should cover for you? Whadaya want me to say this time?”
“Tell them I’ve gone out to fight for ‘Truth, justice, and the American way.’ ”
“Yeah, I’ll do that,” Charlie said as he went back to his sports page.
Eddie Barnett slipped out one of the Hoover Building’s side doors and quickly passed through the crowd of clerks, GS-2s and 3s, and Junior-Assistant Undersecretaries trying to look inconspicuous as they snuck a smoke. Barnett was happy just to be out in the open, the hell away from that building, and the hell away from that stack of files on his desk. Two blocks down, he passed a large poster in a bar window that said “Skins – Cowboys, Big Screen HD, Sunday at 1:00, LIVE — HERE,” and slipped through the front door of The Hog.
At the far end of the bar, Barnett saw six men drinking beer and laughing. Their suit jackets were off, ties down, and their shoulder holsters and handguns clearly visible. He knew them all and did not need to see badges to know they were cops. When they saw Barnett, they laughed even louder and pointed. He tried to ignore them, but it was hopeless.
“Hey, Eddie! How about a large pepperoni?” one of them called out.
“And hold the freakin' anchovies!”
“Goddamn, I bet the Director just loves your ass,” another piped up. “You want to come back to DC Metro, give me a call. But it better be quick, it’s a long distance call from the pay phone in Starkville.”
“Is that where the Director’s sending the screw-ups now?” asked another one.
“Nah, this week I hear it’s Fargo,” another cop added.
Barnett waved and kept walking. It had been a week since they took down Billy-Ray Perkins. He’d been avoiding The Hog ever since, but he knew he couldn’t keep that up much longer. Even Lennie the bartender joined the chorus. “The Sting ‘Broken Music Tour ‘05’ shirt? And the little paper hat?” he said as he continued washing glasses in the sink. “They looked great on the ten o’clock news, Eddie.”
“Et tu, Lennie? Gimme a break, huh?”
“I would; but with your tab, if you get your ticket punched I’ll be in Chapter 11.”
“Very funny. By the way, I’m expecting a visitor.”
“That little Egyptian guy again?”
“No, no, this time it is a well-known local TV personality.”
“Oh, Christ!” Lennie said as he looked around at all the glassware and mirrors behind the bar. “If she breaks anything, you’re payin’, and it’s cash this time!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Barnett dismissed him with a wave of his hand. “I’ll be in my office,” he said, and headed for the booth in the rear corner. He had just sat down and got comfortable, when the front door opened and Louise Taylor walked in, made-up and drop-dead gorgeous, looking like she had walked off the TV-6 news set.
Every male in the bar turned to watch as Louise walked to the center of the room, where she paused and let her hard eyes scan the tables of cops. “Hi, guys.”
The cops turned away and ducked, as if someone had just tossed a live hand grenade into the room. “Oh, Jeez…” “Hi Louise…” “Hey, long time, no see, Louise…” “Yeah, long time…” they all mumbled.
“Well, that's one hell of a reception! You boys been giving my Stud Muffin trouble?”
“No!” “No.” “No, Louise. Jeez, we wouldn’t do that.”
“No, I’m sure you would never do something like that, because that might piss me off, wouldn’t it!” She put her hands on her hips and glared at them. Finally, she turned toward Lennie the bartender. “He back there?”
“Who? Uh, Eddie? Gee, I don’t…”
“Screw you, Lenny, I saw him come in.”
“Look, if you start breaking things…”
“I'm fine! Just bring me my usual, unless you’re trying to piss me off too?”
“No, no!” Lennie said, as he suddenly got very busy behind the bar. “The usual, comin' right up, Louise.”
Finally, Louise turned and sauntered toward the booth in the back corner. She was thin-wasted, big-breasted, long-legged, and languid, and her eyes homed in on Eddie Barnett like a heat-seeking missile. He slumped back in the booth and groaned, watching her approach and slide into the booth next to him all sweet and reserved as she wrapped herself around his arm.
“Uh, I saw your ‘Breaking News’ thing yesterday and the 5:00 p.m. slot,” he said, trying to ignore the firm breasts pressing into him. “You looked good.”
“I always look good, Eddie. And you haven't returned any of my calls,” she shot back as she ran her fingertips up the inside of his thigh.
“Louise!” he said as he grabbed her hand. “I thought we neede
d a little ‘cooling off’ period, that’s all.”
“Me? Cool off? I think that’s the first time I’ve ever heard you say that.”
“Yeah, well…”
“We had great times, Eddie. You can’t say we didn’t.”
He looked at her, touched the almost-healed spot on his forehead as if by reflex, but offered no reply.
“Okay, about the ashtray, look, I'm sorry. That was…”
“Hard? Sharp? A bit ‘over-the-top’ even by your standards?”
Louise glared at him, her eyes flaring angrily. “Eddie, I know I can be a teeny-bit ‘driven,’ a little — how should I put it — ‘intense at times?’ Well, I was wrong and I admit it. But I am this close to a Network slot,” she said as she held her fingers up, with a tiny millimeter gap between her thumb and forefinger. “You got any idea what that’s worth? How hard I’ve worked for it, all the crap I’ve put up with from that jerk Jeff Wang, the pinches on the butt from the Director, the suggestive comments from the Producer…”
“It's worth me, Louise, but don't let me stand in the way of a budding career.”
“Career? You are ragging on me about career? Eddie, you could have made Deputy Director by now if you gave a damn about moving up the ladder, if you let me help a little. A word here, a nudge there…”
“That’s not my style, Louise.”
“No! A pie in the face, or mooning the Director is more your style.”
“Oh, come on,” Barnett shook his head. “He didn’t recognize any of us.”
She glared at him. “I’m serious! I saw the tape of what you did with that pizza delivery thing. Hell, I wrote some of the story. Taking on four rednecks? Are you nuts — Don Quixote with his Polish Sancho Panza! Damn it, Eddie, you could think about us once in a while.”
That was when Lennie the bartender arrived with the tray of drinks. From his expression, he knew he was stepping between the Hatfields and McCoys as he placed a Diet Coke in front of Barnett and a can of Tab in front of Louise. “You must be the only one in DC who still drinks this Tab stuff, Louise,” he tried to joke.
“One ‘teeny,’ little calorie, Lenny.”
Lenny rolled his eyes, picked up the tray, and left.
Louise looked down at her watch, getting serious as she tried to find the words. “Look, I gotta go, Eddie. Please come back. Please. You know how I get without you.”
“And I know how you get with me.”
“Ed–die,” she reached out and touched his hand, looking up at him with cow eyes.
“Hey! No whining. Remember? You got the apartment, the cat, and all the Miles Davis CDs; and I got…”
“Understanding,” she answered.
“Louise, if I want understanding, I'll call your mother.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Well, understand this, Eddie,” she said as she flipped him the bird and stormed out. “I love you, and it ain't over 'til I say it's over!”
Behind the bar, Lenny watched as Louise took out her frustration on his front door, slamming it behind her. “A woman of few words,” he said.
“But always well-aimed,” Barnett added.
CHAPTER NINE
Washington, D. C., Friday, September 27, 4:25 p.m.
Forget the fall color, the NFL, and even duck hunting; by the end of September, it was the ‘political season’ that was at its peak in the Nation’s Capital. Congress had only been in town for a couple of weeks, but the angry rhetoric was already at a fever pitch. Both parties had their fingers locked around the other’s throats and were lashing out, laying all the blame at the doorstep of the White House. The economy kept bumping along in first gear. Oil was up, the National Debt was up, and jobs were down. There were revolutions all across the Middle East, China and Iran kept flexing their muscles, and European debt threatened to sink everyone’s ship. North Korea was being run by a kid who made his BBF Dennis Rodman look sane, narco-gangs controlled Mexico, there was anarchy and piracy in eastern Africa, a newly aggressive Kremlin was awash with oil money, and they kept killing each other in the Middle East. That was Washington in late September. Summer vacation was over, and there was more than enough cannon fodder for the ‘talking heads’ on Sunday Morning.
Things were not much better inside the White House, President Michael Wagner concluded as he stared out the Oval Office window. This was only his second year in office, but the honeymoon ended a long time ago. He turned away from the window and walked back to his desk, intending to review his notes before heading off to yet another meeting. Normally, he hated them, but this one he was actually looking forward to.
For a year and a half, he wished he could set everything else aside and put all of his energy into one problem — just one — and that was what he decided to do. It was oil. That was the big problem that either underlay or could impact all the others, domestic or foreign. If he could get control of oil, he could get control of the economy, employment, jobs, inflation, foreign trade, home building, car sales, the balance of payments, and the dollar. Through those, he could control tax receipts, spending, the deficit, and the national debt. With those under control, he would have the Saudis, the Russians, the Europeans, and the Chinese in the palm of his hand. But what could he do? Solving oil meant solving the Middle East, and that meant getting a real peace settlement in place. To do that, he must bash the heads of the Israelis and their major Arab neighbors long enough and hard enough to get it down on paper for them to sign and shake hands over. Unfortunately, that meant dealing with some uncomfortable truths, and the American public did not want to deal with truths, much less hear about them or understand anything that went beyond CNN sound bites or a Fourth Grade civics text.
The Middle East. It kept festering in an ever more ominous deadlock. The dreams of the Arab Spring had turned into the nightmare of Islamist takeovers everywhere, and it was all so predictable. Force democracy on the Middle East? Ridiculous, Wagner thought. Obviously, no one in the State Department read Kipling. The US was now completely isolated, with an entire region turned against it. The mobs in the streets wanted our blood, and the Saudis, the Emirates, the Jordanians, and all the other the moderates were scared to death to trust us.
Wagner decided to hold this meeting outside the White House, where the other parties could come and go with much less notice. Walking through the underground corridor that led to the old Eisenhower Executive Office Building across the street, he knew that his one saving grace was that no one had expected him to come up with anything dramatic when he won the election not quite two years before, and he hadn’t. Now, the Mid-Term Elections were just around the corner and all the signs pointed to a drubbing for his party. His image had been of a tough legislator who could work with Congress, not as an innovative leader. Well, he decided he had a few surprises in store for them. After six years in the House representing the west suburbs of Chicago and a term in the Senate, if he was going to fail as President, he’d rather go down swinging than keep slogging along in the mud, getting nowhere.
Like most presidents, he had a small group of close, unofficial advisors and friends who predated his run for the White House. After the attack on the bus in Israel and the retaliatory air strikes in Lebanon yesterday, they were the ones he called together to discuss some new ideas for the Middle East. The political pundits who expected two more years of a do-nothing President were about to be in for a rude shock.
When he walked into the basement conference room, the small, eclectic group waiting for him included Senators Art Jensen and Isaac Portman, one a moderate Republican and one a moderate Democrat whom he had worked with in the Senate. Congressman Winston Fields was a southern Democrat and Chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee. A good ole boy on the stump, Winston had a passion for Vivaldi and chamber music. Anna Korshak had been with Wagner since his first try for the House. She became the DuPage County Democratic Chairperson and won his seat when he moved up to the Senate. She had been a liberal on social and economic issues, but a conservative hawk o
n the House Armed Services Committee. Wagner laughed when he thought how he shocked many people by appointing her Secretary of Defense, but she was his choice. So was Langford Andrews, a former college professor and now his Secretary of State. Anna was a tenacious in-fighter and Lang had the sharp mind and delicate wit he needed.
“Lang, you taught history, and you know it’s always been one of my little passions, too. I’ve come to two basic conclusions. First, the next few years may be the last chance we have to turn things around, if it is not too late already. Second, if we don’t, I’m going to be the first of a long series of one-term presidents and the country can’t take that kind of instability for very long. This year is the pivot,” he continued. “A strong step now will have two years to work. If it does, the next election is a walk-over. If it doesn’t, I’ll be home writing my memoirs, and the book will be a little shorter than I planned.” He laughed as he sat back down in his chair.
“I’ve asked each of you here because you are going to work with me on a problem, just one, but it is the biggest — the Middle East. These latest attacks and reprisals only reinforce my opinion that we will never get anywhere until we have a comprehensive peace in the region. That means guarantees, Jerusalem, taking on the settlements, disarming the radicals in the West Bank, a legitimate homeland, and building bridges instead of walls — even if we have to jam it down everyone’s throats.”
Aim True, My Brothers Page 8
