Rhead slammed his binder shut and beat the leather book on the coffee table so hard that Cooke feared for its structural integrity. “Are you out of your mind?” the DNI yelled. The Secret Service officer standing by the door shifted his stance automatically in response to the sudden display of aggression.
“Mike!” Stuart shouted at the man. The DNI looked at the president, unapologetic for his show of temper. “There’s only one person who gets to yell at people in this office and you aren’t him. Care to explain yourself?” It was not really a question.
“Kyra Stryker is a case officer I ordered Director Cooke to fire a month ago for incompetence and insubordination. And you”—Rhead leveled a finger at Cooke—“disobeyed that order.”
“And I’d do it again.”
“You’re fired!” Rhead snapped. “I want your resig—”
“Put a lid on it, Mike! I decide who gets fired in here,” Stuart practically yelled at the man. “Kathy, what’s the story on Stryker?”
“Stryker is an excellent case officer, Mr. President,” Cooke started. “She graduated from the Farm last spring with the second-highest score on record. Her first assignment was to Caracas—”
“She botched a clandestine meeting with an asset and almost got herself arrested,” Rhead cut her off. “And you sent her right back into the field, against my orders, to exfiltrate an asset in a city that’s even more hostile! You’re as incompetent as Stryker!”
Stuart silenced Rhead with a look. “Kathy, I’m assuming there’s another side to this story?”
“There is, sir. The meeting in Caracas did go wrong, that’s true, but it was a meeting that Stryker had argued against.”
Barron nodded. “There were clear signs that the asset was a double agent working for the Venezuelans. We determined that he couldn’t have had access to the intelligence he was providing us even though it was checking out. So we decided to terminate the relationship rather than risk our people.” He stopped suddenly, clenched his jaw, and fought the urge to launch out of his seat. Surprised, Cooke saw that he had balled his hands into fists. She’d never seen him so tense. When he finally spoke, he was fighting to keep his demeanor professional. “But the chief of station refused our assessment and ordered the original case officer to maintain the relationship. He refused, so the COS took him off the case and assigned Stryker. He threatened to terminate her assignment if she didn’t go. Even so, she went under protest. She made it to the site and figured in two seconds that the meet was an ambush. There were at least a dozen SEBIN commandos hiding around the bridge. Stryker outran them on foot but she took a bullet in the arm for her trouble. She got to a safe house and had to perform first aid on herself with some hemostatic gauze and morphine and almost overdosed. We evaced her to the States and she’s spent the last two months on medical leave.”
“Your chief of station sounds incompetent,” Stuart said.
“He’s not our chief of station, strictly speaking, sir,” Barron said. “He’s not a CIA officer.”
“Who are we talking about here?” Stuart asked.
“I think Director Rhead should answer that question,” Cooke said. Heads turned in the DNI’s direction.
Cooke sat back and Barron suppressed a smile. Rhead looked like he was suppressing the urge to strangle the CIA director only because the Secret Service officer would have beaten him if he had tried. “Sam Rigdon.”
“Rigdon…,” Stuart said. “Why do I know that name?”
Barron turned to Rhead. “Are you going to tell him, or am I?”
Rhead gritted his teeth. “Because, Mr. President,” he said, “he was your ambassador to Kenya during your first term. And he donated money to your reelection campaign.”
It took almost ten seconds for the implication to register, and then Stuart ran his hands down his face, pale white. “You gave a chief of station slot to a campaign donor?”
“Six months before you nominated me to take over CIA,” Cooke told him. “The acting director at the time had no political leverage to stop the appointment.”
“Rigdon was a CIA analyst for five years before he went to the private sector—,” Rhead started to argue.
“Analysts read reports and give bad PowerPoint briefings,” Stuart said. “They don’t run ops! What were you thinking?”
“I was thinking that you had a major contributor with some qualifications who was more interested in playing spy again than in being a diplomat to some rat-hole country that nobody cares about!” Rhead shot back. “We give ambassadorships to donors! Chiefs of stations are just the intel equivalent, they answer to me, and there’s no law that says they have to be CIA bodies.”
“Unbelievable,” Stuart muttered. “Talk about politicizing intelligence.”
“Is he still in Caracas?” Showalter asked.
“Yes,” Cooke said. Barron had done his duty and it was time to get him out of the direct line of fire. “Director Rhead disagreed with our after-action report and refused to let us remove Rigdon. Instead, he decided that Stryker was at fault and ordered her fired.”
“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here!” Rhead snapped.
“Shut up!” Stuart ordered. “I’ve heard enough from you.”
“Harry—,” Rhead started.
“Shut up!” Stuart yelled. Rhead slumped back and closed his mouth. “Get Rigdon out of there right now, Mike. Do it or I’ll have State revoke his passport and he can stay in Caracas. Kathy, put somebody in who can do the job. And I don’t care if we have to give Rigdon his money back; once he lands in Miami, shut him up. I don’t even want to think what the Post headline would read. And don’t get me started on what could happen on the Hill if this gets out. Mike, are there any more Rigdons out there? Don’t talk, just nod.” Rhead shook his head. “Good. Kathy, can Stryker get the job done in Beijing?”
“Yes, sir, we believe she can,” Cooke said. “Nothing’s guaranteed, but we believe that for this assignment, she’ll do as well as anyone else that we could put on it.”
“When will you pull Pioneer out?” Stuart asked.
“We haven’t asked Stryker to take the mission yet,” Cooke said. “We need your approval for the operation first.”
“You trust her?” Stuart asked.
“Absolutely, sir,” Cooke said.
“Then it’s your hide. Tell her godspeed.”
“I will, sir.”
“And Mike?” the president said, turning to his director of national intelligence.
“Yes, Mr. President?” The DNI sounded hesitant.
“You will not pull a Valerie Plame on that girl. If I see Stryker’s name in the Post, so help me, I’ll turn the attorney general loose on you. You understand me?”
“Yes, Mr. President.” Resignation this time. Cooke watched the DNI’s shoulders slump down.
Kyra had not wanted Mitchell to be an impressive man. Quite the opposite, she had wanted him to be very much the one kind of station chief she already knew, arrogant and unruly. It would have saved her from the guilt of staying silent about beating a Chinese intelligence officer near to death, and that emotion was hollowing her out. Mitchell clearly was competent and he seemed like a decent man, which almost certainly meant he would send her, and probably Jonathan, to the airport the minute she confessed. But the right thing and the proper thing weren’t the same at the moment.
Mitchell was past his prime, in his midfifties by her guess. His time as a field officer was nearly finished, and clearly it had not been wasted. His office walls weren’t covered with trophies like some station chiefs’, with ceremonial weapons or gifts from foreign intelligence services. Mitchell’s office was far more spare. In fact, he had allowed himself only one significant career decoration, but it told enough of his story to make Kyra feel small. Under the glass covering his cherry desktop was a framed array of some fifty challenge coins collected from military divisions and brigades, foreign and domestic, mingled with a few from foreign intelligence services. It was a modest tribute to a covert career that entitled the man to far more hubris than he had shown her. Mitchell had led the life she wanted for herself. Now denied, she wanted to hate him for it but had no good reason to disrespect the man.