“Morning, Jack,” a voice said from the corridor door.
“Hey, Robby.” POTUS pointed to the coffee tray. Vice President Jackson got himself a cup, but passed on the croissants. His waistline looked a little tight. Well, Robby had never looked like a marathoner. So many fighter pilots tended to have thick waists. Maybe it was good for fighting g-forces, Jack speculated.
“Read the PDB this morning. Jack, this Russian oil and gold thing. Is it really that big?”
“George says it’s even bigger. You ever sit down with him to learn economics?”
“End of the week, we’re going to play a round at Burning Tree, and I’m reading Milton Friedman and two other books to bone up for it. You know, George comes across as pretty smart.”
“Smart enough to make a ton of money on The Street-and I mean if you put his money in hundred-dollar bills and weigh them, it is a fucking ton of money.”
“Must be nice,” breathed a man who’d never made more than $130,000 in a year before taking on his current job.
“Has its moments, but the coffee here’s still pretty good.”
“It was better on Big John, once upon a time.”
“Where?”
“John F. Kennedy, back when I was an O-3, and doing fun work, like driving Tomcats off the boat.”
“Robby, hate to tell you, my friend, but you’re not twenty-six anymore.”
“Jack, you have such a way of brightening up my days for me. I’ve walked past death’s door before, but it’s safer and a hell of a lot more fun to do it with a fighter plane strapped to your back.”
“What’s your day look like?”
“Believe it or not, I have to drive down to the Hill and preside at the Senate for a few hours, just to show I know what the Constitution says I’m supposed to do. Then a dinner speech in Baltimore about who makes the best brassieres,” he added with a smile.
“What?” Jack asked, looking up from the PDB. The thing about Robby’s sense of humor was that you never really knew when he was kidding.
“National meeting of artificial fiber manufacturers. They also make bulletproof vests, but bras get most of their fibers, or so my research staff tells me. They’re trying to make a few jokes for the speech.”
“Work on your delivery,” the President advised the Vice President.
“You thought I was funny enough way back when,” Jackson reminded his old friend.
“Rob, I thought I was funny enough way back when, but Arnie tells me I’m not sensitive enough.”
“I know, no Polish jokes. Some Polacks learned to turn on their TVs last year, and there’s six or seven who know how to read. That doesn’t count the Polish gal who doesn’t use a vibrator because it chips her teeth.”
“Jesus, Robby!” Ryan almost spilled his coffee laughing. “We’re not even allowed to think things like that anymore.”
“Jack, I’m not a politician. I’m a fighter jock. I got the flight suit, the hackwatch, and the dick to go along with the job title, y’dig?” the Vice President asked with a grin. “And I am allowed to tell a joke once in a while.”
“Fine, just remember this isn’t the ready room on the Kennedy. The media lacks the sense of humor enjoyed by naval aviators.”
“Yeah, unless they catch us in something. Then it’s funnier ’n hell,” the retired Vice Admiral observed.
“Rob, you’re finally catching on. Glad to see it.” Ryan’s last sight of the departing subordinate was the back of a nicely tailored suit, accompanied by a muttered vulgarity.
So, Mishka, any thoughts? ”Provalov asked.
Reilly took a sip of his vodka. It was awfully smooth here. “Oleg, you just have to shake the tree and see what falls out. It could be damned near anything, but ‘don’t know’ means ‘don’t know’. And at the moment, we don’t know.” Another sip. “Does it strike you that two former Spetsnaz guys are a lot of firepower to go after a pimp?”
The Russian nodded. “Yes, of course, I’ve thought of that, but he was a very prosperous pimp, wasn’t he, Mishka? He had a great deal of money, and very many contacts inside the criminal establishment. He had power of his own. Perhaps he’d had people killed as well. We never had his name come up in a serious way in any murder investigations, but that doesn’t mean that Avseyenko was not a dangerous man in his own right, and therefore worthy of such high-level attention.”
“Any luck with this Suvorov guy?”
Provalov shook his head. “No. We have a KGB file for him and a photograph, but even if that is for the right person, we haven’t found him yet.”
“Well, Oleg Gregoriyevich, it looks as though you have a real head-scratcher on your hands.” Reilly lifted his hand to order another round.
“You are supposed to be the expert on organized crime,” the Russian lieutenant reminded his FBI guest.
“That’s true, Oleg, but I ain’t no gypsy fortune-teller, and I ain’t the Oracle of Delphi either. You don’t know who the real target was yet, and until you learn that, you don’t know jack shit. Problem is, to find out who the target was, you have to find somebody who knows something about the crime. The two things are wrapped up together, bro. Get one, get both. Get neither, get nothing.” The drinks arrived. Reilly paid and took another hit.
“My captain is not pleased.”
The FBI agent nodded. “Yeah, bosses are like that in the Bureau, too, but he’s supposed to know what the problems are, right? If he does, he knows he has to give you the time and the resources to play it out. How many men you have on it now?”
“Six here, and three more in St. Petersburg.”
“May want to get some more, bro.” In the FBI’s New York OC office, a case like this could have as many as twenty agents working it, half of them on a full-time basis. But the Moscow Militia was stretched notoriously thin. For as much crime as there was now in Moscow, the local cops were still sucking hind tit when it came to government support. But it could have been worse. Unlike much of Russian society, the militiamen were getting paid.
You tire me out, ”Nomuri protested.
“There is always Minister Fang,” Ming replied with a playful look.
“Ah!” was the enraged reply. “You compare me with an old man?”
“Well, both of you are men, but better a sausage than a string bean,” she answered, grasping the former in her soft left hand.
“Patience, girl, allow me to recover from the first race.” With that he lifted her body over his and let it down. She must really like me, Nomuri reflected. Three nights in a row. I suppose Fang isn’t the man he thinks he is. Well, can’t win ’em all, Charlie. Plus the advantage of being forty years younger. There was probably something to that, the CIA officer admitted to himself.
“But you run so fast!” Ming protested, rubbing her body on his.
“There is something I want you to do.”
A very playful smile. “What might that be?” she asked while her hand wandered a little.
“Not that!”
“Oh …” The disappointment in her voice was noteworthy.
“Something for work,” Nomuri explained on. Just as well she couldn’t feel the shaking inside his body, which, remarkably enough, didn’t show.
“For work? I can’t bring you into the office for this!” she said with a laugh, followed by a warm, affectionate kiss.
“Yes, something to upload onto your computer.” Nomuri reached into the night-table drawer and pulled out a CD-ROM. “Here, you just load this into your machine, click INSTALL, and then dispose of it when you’re done.”