Дэвид Балдаччи - The Fix

“All good questions and to which I hope you speedily find the correct answers,” said the President. He looked at his NSA. “And now we need to provide you some information which may prove germane to your investigation, and perhaps lend it even more urgency. It’s why we called you here tonight, in fact.”

All eyes were fixed on Charles. She took out an electronic notebook and scrolled through some digital pages.

“This just came in, which prompted our meeting tonight. The Joint Chiefs have been briefed, as has the full Council.” She paused to read down the lines on the page and continued, “As you probably know, the secrets stolen by Mr. Dabney may have allowed enemies of this country to hack into some of our more secure databases. That was worrisome enough. Now our colleagues over at Fort Meade have picked up chatter suggesting strongly that an attack on this country is imminent. We don’t know what shape or form the attack will take, but the quarters we’re receiving this from — though they have no idea we’re listening in — have been very reliable in the past.”

“No idea as to the target?” asked Brown quickly.

“Based on further analysis just completed, we believe that the target may be symbolic somehow. The world has become a very different place in a fairly short time. We have a new Cold War starting up at the same time we have hot spots erupting all over the Middle East. Fascist movements are taking root in some of the governments of allies of ours and much of the world is a tinderbox. So we can’t rule out any possibility, quite frankly. And if an attack does come and we identify its source, we will have no choice but to respond accordingly. And that could set in motion a chain of events that could have global repercussions of the most negative kind.”

Admiral Howard cleared his throat and said, “The military agrees with that assessment.”

“As does the State Department,” added the Secretary of State.

The head of Homeland Security nodded in agreement.

Decker voiced the obvious question. “You called us here tonight because you evidently believe your concerns are connected to our case. Why is that?”

Charles glanced at the President, who nodded.

She turned to Decker and said, “Because the chatter we intercepted was all Arabic , except for one word.”

“What word?”

“It was a name, rather.”

“What name?” asked Bogart.

“Dabney.”

“I’ve got to call my mom,” said Jamison when they got back to their apartment.

“Why?” asked Decker.

“Do you really have to ask?” she said incredulously. “I just met the President .”

“That meeting was classified, Alex. You can’t talk about it to anyone. You can’t even acknowledge it ever happened.”

Jamison looked doubtfully at her phone. “Maybe I could tell a little white lie and say we just ran into each other?”

“You just ran into the President of the United States? Where? At the gas station? Or a Starbucks?”

She put her phone down. “I guess you’re right.”

Decker took off his jacket and hung it up on a peg by the door. “Dabney,” he said.

“I know. That’s really weird. To hear all these words in Arabic and then to hear that name? Freaky.”

Decker sat down on the couch and put his feet up on the coffee table.

Jamison perched on the arm of the couch. “I wonder if Melvin and Harper have gone on a second date yet?”

“Yeah, I’m surprised she didn’t bring it up in the Situation Room at the White House. The President was probably wondering too.”

She cuffed him on the shoulder. “You know what I mean.”

“I just don’t like to get caught up in other people’s lives like that.”

“But getting caught up in other people’s lives is a really big part of most people’s lives, Decker.”

“Not mine.”

She sighed. “The meeting tonight puts things in a whole new perspective. I mean, if an attack on this country is planned, we need to solve this thing really soon.”

Decker closed his eyes.

She stared at him in disbelief. “Are you going to zone out on me? If so, I’ll just go to my room and go to sleep.”

“Okay. Good night.”

She pushed his legs out of the way, sat down next to him, and said, “Damn it, Decker, will you please talk to me?”

He looked at her, clearly annoyed. “What do you want me to say, Alex?

“Our country is going to be attacked. What are we going to do to stop it?”

“I’m thinking about it. I am working on it. But I’m not a magician.”

“But everyone thinks you are, me included. The things you can do. It’s amazing. You never fail.”

“I actually fail lots of times. And I’m not a damn machine. So if you’re worried about the sky falling, don’t look to me to fix it.”

He abruptly stood, grabbed his jacket, and headed out.

“Decker, wait, I didn’t—”

But he had already slammed the door behind him.

He trotted down the stairs and out into the coolness of the night. And he started walking, each exhaled breath releasing tiny clouds into the sky.

He was angry and he didn’t want to be. He knew that Jamison was actually complimenting him, voicing her complete confidence in his abilities. But he was feeling the pressure of preventing an attack. Even in his altered state where he didn’t “get” normal social cues, he clearly understood what was at stake.

This was a long way from being a PI in a rust belt town back in Ohio, hustling for clients in all the wrong places.

Not that long ago I was living in a cardboard box. And now I’m supposed to be the savior of the country? How effed up is that?

He shoved his hands into his pockets, pointed his head down, and kept walking.

He reached the river and stood and looked out over the expanse of water.

It mirrored his thoughts: dark, murky, deep.

He had to get traction on this case. Something to hang on to. There were so many moving parts, and just when he thought he had something, it fell apart, or was overtaken by a new development.

Was that intentional? Are they trying to keep us reactive?

He shut his eyes and let the frames roll through. It occurred to Decker that this process was like how the old-time animators would do their job, drawing slightly different versions of a character on multiple pieces of paper that you would then flip through to show motion.

Well, he was hoping for some motion of the forward variety.

He decided to begin at the beginning.

One more time.

And something had just occurred to him.

It had to do with real estate.

He made the phone call, and on the third ring Faye Thompson, Walter Dabney’s partner, picked up.

“What is it?” she said when Decker identified himself.

“I was just wondering about something.”

“Look, I’m up to my ass in lawyers and federal investigators. I don’t have time—”

“If you cooperate it will look better for you,” interjected Decker.

He heard her sigh and then she said, “What do you want to know?”

“When you joined the firm it was doing well?”

“Yes. Very well.”

“How about when Dabney first started out? Was he in the same office space you’re in now?”

“Of course not. It was only him way back when. So he didn’t need that much space. And he couldn’t have afforded it anyway.”

“Because he was building up his business.”

“Yes. It takes a lot of work and hard times to build something like Walter did. He started out on a shoestring and slowly built from there. He maxed out his credit cards more than once, I heard. But he was hugely successful in the end.”