Shattner brought his kids to her house promptly at six in the evening. They were ecstatic when they heard they would be spending a few more days away from school, with their aunt Elaine.
She doted on them and spoiled them silly, and they took full advantage of that.
Lisa unbuckled and scrambled out of the car even before he had turned off the ignition when they reached Pelham Bay. By the time Shawn and he had got their bags out, she had leapt into Elaine’s arms, the dogs yelping and running excited circles around her.
‘Prick,’ mouthed Elaine silently in Shattner’s direction and then bent down and crushed Shawn in a hug.
‘Cookies and milk first, homework second, and play afterwards. You know my rules,’ she told Lisa and Shawn sternly, and then she grinned widely, ‘and you know what I think about stupid rules!’ She high-fived them and shepherded them inside and then turned back and stiff-armed Shattner outside the door as he was stepping inside.
‘Not you, prick. Your job is done,’ she hissed, out of earshot of the kids.
‘But, Elaine, I need to—’
‘You need to disappear,’ she said, cutting him off and slamming the door in his face.
Shattner, his face burning, banged the door again till she flung it open, stony faced. From inside he could hear the excitement in the kids’ voices as they reacquainted themselves with her dogs and cats.
‘There’s a mobile in Shawn’s bag with some instructions. He should use the phone only in an emergency. Lisa’s stuff is in her bag. I left a locker key in her bag, with some instructions. I’ll be back in a couple of days and will keep you posted… I’ve closed the loop at school for them. Let me say bye to them,’ he pleaded.
‘Bye. I’ll tell them.’ The door slammed in his face again.
Shattner stood there looking at the door, a wave of helpless anger sweeping over him. He forced a deep breath and walked back to the car. As he turned the key, he looked back at the house, hoping to see Lisa and Shawn in the windows, but knew that Elaine’s warmth had temporarily displaced him from their minds.
Elaine hated his guts, but would take care of his kids.
Forever, if she had to. If he did not return.
Part 2
Chapter 7
Broker stretched his long legs ahead of him and admired his Louboutin shoes. Broker was dressed in an immaculate gray suit, a white shirt of the finest Egyptian cotton and those shoes. With his shoulder-length shaggy blond hair, blue eyes, and executive threads, he was New Age surfer dude — equally at home in the boardroom as on the beach. He drew second glances from women and grinned unabashedly at them when their eyes met.
Broker was just that, a dealer who traded in information. The intel he traded in was sought after by governments, politicians, oil companies, intelligence agencies, security companies; in fact, just about anyone who could afford him. He had a real name, but Broker had stuck to him for so long that it was what he went by.
Lobbying firms came to him to know about the sexual peccadilloes of senators. Government agencies approached him to cross-check their intel on nuclear material on sale. Politicians consulted him to see which Middle Eastern leader was supportive of government policy. Oil companies wrote him blank checks to find out which African despot preferred which oil company. Russian oligarchs consulted him on which banks in the world offered the most secure and anonymous deposits. Mercenaries or private military security firms came to him to get the lie of the land in the most dangerous hot spots on the planet.
Broker was an equal opportunity vendor of information, with a few iron-clad rules. No trade with the dark side. No trade in information of any kind on women and children. No trade in anything against the national interest. Broker preferred to deal with those who used his information for the greater good, and he had often thrown clients out if he felt they were misusing his intel.
Broker had grown up in Lawrenceburg, Kentucky, with foster parents who had brought him up as their own child. They had lost their only daughter to a rare form of blood cancer when she was six, and when young Broker came into their lives, they showered all their love on him. His father was the county clerk and instilled a strong sense of right and wrong in his son, a set of moral values that were reinforced by his homemaker wife. They were the proudest parents in town when Broker enlisted, and they organized civic receptions for him whenever he visited them, much to his embarrassment.
Broker’s ties to the town were severed when his parents were killed in a car accident. A drunk had lost control of his truck on an icy road and had rammed into their compact.
He had started his career as an intelligence analyst in the US Army, and his unique way of analyzing, identifying patterns and correlating seemingly disparate incidents had not only secured him a fast growth through the ranks, but also put him on first-name terms with four- and five-star generals in the Pentagon.
Broker had been one of a kind as an intelligence analyst since he also got deployed with Special Forces covert and overt missions to read the local situation. It helped that he could handle a long gun much better than the average soldier.
He had injured his leg in his last mission and still had the faintest trace of a limp. He had retired from the army after that mission, set up shop as a trader of information, and had discovered a natural flair for business that had made him immensely wealthy. He had an army of analysts working for him, and the best paid informants and hackers in various parts of the world. He still got actively involved in certain projects, and one such project had brought him to the small coffee shop in Dupont Circle in Washington.
Broker let the aroma of hot coffee and the ebb and flow of conversation in the café wash over him, creating a moment of suspended time. The white door swished in and Broker’s meeting stepped in. The man took a sidestep and paused, waiting for his eyes to get accustomed to the darkened interior of the café.
Washington, D.C., was home to only two animals.
Ones who were important and others who thought they were. General Daniel Klouse belonged to the former species.
He stumped across the café on spotting Broker, pulled out a chair, and sat into it heavily, glaring at Broker. Washington was hell on his left leg.
A high-velocity concrete slab had taken a shine to it when a suicide bomber had driven through the gates of the US Marine battalion headquarters in Beirut with a truck bomb. It was many years back, but at times like this, in the heat, it felt like yesterday.
Despite his leg being nearly crushed by the concrete slab, General Klouse had dragged himself out of the rubble, using a metal pipe as a makeshift crutch, had taken command of the aftermath, and secured not only the safety of the survivors, but also had mounted a defense. His swift, courageous handling had taken him to the rarefied air in the Pentagon, and when the White House was looking to make a high-profile yet experienced appointee, General Klouse’s name was the only one on the short list.
General Klouse was the National Security Advisor. He was also that rarest of animals in Washington, an apolitical one, and because of that, he was the President’s most trusted confidant.
‘This stuff you gave me about the North Koreans,’ the General began without any preliminaries after pulling out a sheaf of papers from inside his jacket, ‘where did you get it? The NSA and the others were gagging for it, threw their best at it, and came up with the big fat zero. So how come a nobody analyst like you got it?’
‘General, I got a few things going for me that none of your agencies have. Mine is a private enterprise, for one. I pay big bucks for my information. And lastly, I am trusted. My sources know they will never be fingered or subpoenaed or WikiLeaked if they work with me.’ Broker smiled at him.