Brian Haig - PrivateSector

"I believe you called me,” I informed the very attractive young lady seated at the desk.

She appeared not to have heard me.

“Excuse me, Miss. Major Sean Drummond… the phone, you called, right?”

She replied, sounding annoyed, “Yes. I was ordered to.”

“You’re angry.”

“I’m not. You’re not worth getting mad about.”

“I honestly meant to call you.”

“I’m glad you didn’t.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I was tired of you anyway.”

She stared into her computer screen. And indeed, she was mad. It occurred to me that dating the boss’s secretary might not have been a good idea. But she was quite good-looking, as I mentioned, with smoldering dark eyes, bewitching lips, and, I recalled, beneath that desk, a pair of splendid legs. Actually, why hadn’t I called her?

I leaned across her desk. “Linda, I had a wonderful time.”

“Of course you did. I didn’t.”

“I’m truly sorry it didn’t work out.”

“Good. I’m not.”

I searched my mind for an appropriate sentiment and finally said, “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

“What?” She finally looked up.

“ The Great Gatsby… the final line.”

“Fuck off-that’s Jackie Collins, if you’re interested.” She added, icily, “And take your hands off my desk. I just polished it.”

Goodness. Now I recalled why I never called her after that first date. Actually, I never called her before the first date-she called me. But I learned long ago that what matters is not who starts it but who ends it.

I straightened up and asked, “So, why does the old man want to see me?”

“Ask him.”

“I’d rather ask you.”

“All right. Ask more nicely.”

“Fine. Please, Linda… why am I here?”

“I’m not at liberty to tell you.” She smiled.

Well, what more was there to say? She was being petty and unreasonable.

I backed away, far enough that she couldn’t staple my hand to my crotch or something. That smile, however, bothered me. “Absit omen,” I mumbled- May it not be an omen.

I suspected it was, however. So I spent a moment thinking about that. It occurred to me that nearly two months had passed since my last session with the boss. These are never pleasant meetings. In fact, they are never intended to be. The boss and I have a relationship that might be described as messy, and he has developed this really weird opinion that if he rides my butt hard enough, and often enough, it will fix itself. He calls them preemptive sessions. I call them a waste of time. They have not worked in the past, and we all know that persistent failure is not fertile ground for future success. But he stays at it. This must be what it’s like to be married.

“I’ll just wait here till he’s ready,” I informed Linda. It fit, I decided-General Clapper would toast my ears a little, and nosy, vindictive Linda would press her ear to the door and indulge in her vicarious retribution. I’d tune him out, as I always do, and I’d assure him at the end, also as I always do, that he’d made some very constructive points and had seen his last trouble from Sean Drummond.

No big deal. Right?

Wrong-ahead lay murder, scandal, and deeds so odious and foul they would turn my life, and this entire city, upside down. In fact, while I cooled my heels in this office, the murderer was already plotting the first of what would become many kills. And those who would become kills were going about their lives, unaware they were in the crosshairs of a monster.

But I don’t think Linda foresaw that. I don’t think she even wished it.

Incidentally, I don’t work in the Pentagon, where this particular office was, and still is, located. I hang my hat in a small red-brick building inside a military base in Falls Church, Virginia, a tiny place with high fences, lots of guards, no signs, and no confusing room numbers. But if you’re into confusing room numbers, Clapper’s office is designated 2E535-2 connoting the second floor, E signifying the outer and most prestigious ring, and 535 indicating the same side of the building that got clobbered by Osama’s boys. In the old days of the cold war, the courtyard in the middle of the Pentagon was called Ground Zero, the innermost A-Ring was Suicide Alley, and the outermost E-Ring was the place to be. But it’s a new world and things change.

“He’s ready for you now,” announced Linda, again smiling.

I glanced at my watch: 1700 hours, or 5:00 P.M., the end of the official duty day, a warm early December evening to be precise. I love this season. I mean, between Thanksgiving and Christmas no-body in Washington even pretends they’re working. How good is that? In fact, the last case in my in-box had just danced over to my out-box, and it was my turn.

Anyway, I stepped into Clapper’s office, and he seemed so delighted to see me he even said, “Sean… I’m so delighted to see you.” He waved at a pair of plush leather chairs and asked, “Well, my old friend, how are things?”

My old friend? “I’m fine, General. Thank you for asking.”

“Well, good. You’ve been doing great work, and I’m very proud of you.” His ass relaxed into a stuffed chair, and it struck me I was getting enough phony sunshine stuffed up my ass to be a health risk. He asked, “That Albioni case, has it been wrapped up yet?”

“Yes. This morning, in fact. We reached a plea agreement.”

For some reason, I had the annoying sense he knew this already.

By the way, I’m what the Army calls a Special Actions attorney. If you want to know, I’m actually a defense counsel in a specialized compartment of lawyers and judges. We’re specialized because we manage the legal issues of the Army’s black operations, a menagerie of people and units so spooky nobody’s supposed to know they even exist. It’s all smoke and mirrors, and we’re part of that circus.

In fact, my office supposedly doesn’t exist, and neither do I, which often makes me wonder why in the hell I get out of bed in the morning. Just kidding. I love my job. Really. However, the sensitivity and seriousness of our work means we work directly for the Judge Advocate General, a line on Clapper’s organizational chart he bitterly regrets, as we, and particularly me, are a royal pain in his ass.

So, what else? I’m 38 years old, single, have always been single, and the way things were looking, the past was lining up to be a prologue to the future. I regard myself as a fairly decent attorney, a master of the military legal code, clever, resourceful, and all that. My boss might object to any or all of those points, but what does he know? In my business, it’s the clients who count, and I rarely get complaints.

But, back to my superficially perfect host. He inquired, “So tell me, Sean, what punishment did Albioni take in exchange for his guilty plea?”

“You know… it was fair and just.”

“Good. Now describe for me please your idea of fair and just.”

“All right. Two years in Leavenworth, honorable discharge, full benefits.”

“I see.” But he did not look happy.

The subject in question was Sergeant First Class Luigi Albioni, who was part of a unit that collects intelligence on foreign targets and who had been dispatched to Europe with an American Express card to shadow the dictator of a country that must remain anonymous. If you’re curious, however, think of a large pisshole slowbaking between Egypt and Tunisia, a place we once bombed after it sent a terrorist to blow up a German disco filled with American GIs, and we still aren’t invited to each other’s barbecues. Yet it seems the dictator likes to don disguises on occasion and escape the stuffy Muslim ways of his country to partake in the decadent ways of the West, and Luigi’s job was to skulk around and obtain photos of the camel-jockey as he shot craps in Monaco and cavorted in Amsterdam’s brothels.