CHAPTER 53
Stephanie focused on the van until it disappeared around a corner.
The staff and some of the curators joined her on the library’s loading dock.
They’d all worked hard to get the crate safely inside the van, their task over.
It would be up to Cotton and Cassiopeia now.
She said her goodbyes and headed back through the main building and out the front door.
The weather today was much better than yesterday, the sky overcast but lacking rain clouds.
The temperature felt like Atlanta in the fall, but she realized that heat and humidity were not so common this far north.
She didn’t like sending Cotton and Cassiopeia directly into the line of fire.
They both meant the world to her. If anything happened to either one, she would never forgive herself.
True, she was an experienced professional and dealt with life and death daily.
But this was different. They were rolling some really dangerous dice.
All she could do now was wait.
She checked her phone. Earlier, she’d received a text from her son.
That was their main form of communication considering the differing time zones in which each of them lived.
She was generally a twenty-four-hour-a-day person, her job literally never ending.
Mark lived in a cloister monastery that adhered to strict religious rule.
Though he was in charge of the facility, he too had to adhere to the same regulations that governed all of the other brothers.
Texting seemed the easiest and quickest way to stay connected.
His message had confirmed that she was welcome to visit the monastery in a few weeks.
They’d been talking about a face-to-face, which they hadn’t managed in a while.
She’d quickly replied and said she would be there.
But his reply surprised her. He’d told her to bring Danny along, if she would like.
Her choice. Her late husband, Mark’s father, remained a sore spot between them.
But both of them had admitted they’d been wrong about him.
Mark with his unrealistic admiration, and she with her bitterness and resentment.
Her son knew about her relationship with Danny.
She’d decided that there would be no more secrets between them.
Mark had been receptive to the situation and now, with the extended invitation, he seemed to even be welcoming.
Her phone vibrated in her hand.
She found the unit and saw the call was from Danny.
“Were your ears burning?” she said to him. “I was just thinking about you.”
“Hopefully in a good way.”
“Always.”
And she meant it. Good to hear his voice. “How are things in the United States Senate?”
“No deferring for you, Ms. Nelle. What have you got yourself into there?”
“Your babysitter came to see me.”
“I don’t look at the chief of the European station as a babysitter.”
“More a pain in my ass.” She stepped away from the library’s entrance and found some privacy beneath the trees that fronted the building.
“The White House has called and demanded to know what you’re doing over there.”
“How high up the pole?”
“The friggin’ national security adviser. Who I don’t even like.”
“And what did you say to her?”
“That you are a grown-ass woman who does not report to me your every act.”
She smiled. “Good answer.”
“They said you have a defector on your hands. A big fish on the hook.”
“Is that all they mentioned?”
“Yep. That means there’s a whole lot more going on that you don’t want them to know about.”
“Not yet.”
She wondered how they knew about Ivan. Koger? Doubtful. Then it occurred to her. “Which intelligence agency flagged the defector?”
“CIA. They received some intel out of Russia. The SVR is not happy.”
“How unhappy?”
“The they-are-willing-to-do-anything kind.”
“It’s under control,” she said to him, trying to keep the conversation as uninformative as possible, as they were on an open line.
“I’m sure it is. But I worry. Occupational hazard.”
She appreciated the gesture. “Cotton and Cassiopeia are both here. I’m fine.”
“I have no idea why you’re there. None of my business. But what is my business is you. Let them handle the heavy lifting. Stay out of the field.”
“I intend to do just that.”
“When will you be back?”
“By the weekend.”
“I’ll meet you in Atlanta.”
“That would be nice.”
And she meant it.
“Congress is out for two weeks. Summer recess. And you keep avoiding the issue.”
She’d been around a long time, served presidents from both parties, so she knew the game.
White House advisers did not call just to chitchat.
Especially this White House and its advisers.
The current administration was proudly ultra-conservative.
Though elected on a pledge of bipartisan cooperation, its attitude had been unbending.
It wasn’t their-way-or-the-highway, it was their-way-and-only-their-way.
Foreign policy had been particularly hardcore and happenstance.
The lingering conflict in Ukraine was still not resolved, and American troops were now deployed to even more tight spots throughout the world.
Southeast Asia was heating up, as was western Africa.
Nobody knew if the war on terrorism was being won or lost. The White House liked to proclaim that the tide had turned, but she knew that, privately, many officials were concerned about the lack of progress.
Compounding all of that was the fact that she was not one of President Warner Fox’s favorites.
Two efforts to replace her had fizzled. Maybe because nobody wanted her job?
Not much glamour in working out of a nondescript Atlanta office, away from mainstream politics, out of sight.
Careers were woven from much thicker thread.
More than once she’d asked herself why the White House kept her around. Easy.
They feared her.
Maybe she’d write a tell-all book, or end up on CNN as their resident intelligence expert, spouting catchy twenty-second zingers that pointed out the administration’s stupidity.
Warner Fox would hate that. He liked a uniform message.
His message. No variance. One voice. So they tolerated her.
Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.
That sort of thing. She was hoping that no one at Justice or the White House knew a thing, but now she’d materialized on somebody’s radar screen, and at a high level too.
“Stephanie,” Danny said. “You know that this administration’s foreign policy is fairly basic. You either love us or not. There’s no middle ground. And they hate Russia. Any opportunity to stick it to Moscow, they are going to take. No matter the consequences. Do you have this under control?”
“Cotton can handle himself.”
“It’s not him I’m worried about.”
“I know, and I appreciate it.”
“I would never tell you what to do, nor criticize your decisions. Just remember that bad luck seldom comes alone.”
“You read that from a fortune cookie?”
“Actually, I’ve lived it all my life.”
“Here’s another one for you,” she said. “Even if you fall flat on your face, you’re still moving forward.”
“The problem with those words of wisdom is that you’re still flat on your face.”
“I hear you. I’ll watch myself.”
“And I got your back here.”
He’d told her, on more than one occasion, that he would always have her back. Not to tell her what to do, or say I-told-you-so or, God forbid, try and fix things. Instead, as he put it, If you fall, know I’ll be right there on the ground, ready to cushion the impact.
Which she loved.
“I’ll see you in a few days,” he said to her.