Final Finesse

by Karna Small Bodman

  “They know the rules here. It’s take-it-or-leave it. Take the ten or leave all of their equipment and get nothing,” the dictator said forcefully.

  “We do have problems with that sector though,” the fixer said.

  “Don’t you think I know that? Our production is down 50 percent.”

  “And the skimming of the profits has depleted our funds from the health program you promised.” Rossi knew that he was one of the few people in the palace who could point out trouble to the president and not get sacked for it. He knew because he not only pointed out problems, he brought solutions. “We may have to replace the head of Petroleos de Venezuela. He’s getting a bit too greedy for my taste.”

  The president swiveled in his chair and put his hands behind his head. “You may be right. PDVSA may be the best state-owned asset we have, but the profits are sinking. We have to bring it under control.”

  “Of course, we too have been using their funds for our programs,” the fixer observed cautiously.

  “That’s where we get the majority of our money for the poor. We all know that. But we need more. There were more riots in the food lines yesterday. We can’t have that. And yes, your idea of replacing those people may help.” He got up from his chair and started pacing his lavish office. “There’s another thing we have to handle.”

  “What is that, sir?”

  “The gangs. The kidnappers seem to think they can roam around and impersonate FARC. I don’t care what FARC does in Colombia, but we can’t have their copy cats operating here in Caracas. We still need foreign expertise to run some of the companies. At least for a little while until your so-called supervisors can take over.”

  The president gazed out his window at blue skies with a few wispy clouds off in the distance. “Look at it out there. Is this not the most beautiful city? Is this not the very best weather?”

  The fixer joined him at the window and quickly agreed. “Yes it is. They are having big storms, snow and ice up north while we bask in sunshine. It is a glorious country, Mr. President. Even though we have shortages and problems with the supply chains, I know you will succeed.”

  The president beamed and said, “Yes. We may have our troubles, but we also have our plans. And speaking of plans, how did you like my speech the other day at Saint Anne’s Chapel?”

  “It was brilliant. I got the message. It was carried out perfectly.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THE WHITE HOUSE–WEDNESDAY MORNING

  “I’m pulling together a Crisis Action Team,” Samantha announced as she stood in front of her boss’s desk.

  “Aren’t you being a little jumpy about this? It sounds like GeoGlobal just has a lousy maintenance issue on their hands, and you want to call in the cavalry.” “Sorry, Greg. I’ve got a very bad sense about this one. I’ve already set it up. We’re meeting in half an hour over in the Cordell Hull.”

  “In the SCIF?”

  “Yes, the SCIF,” Samantha repeated, referring to room 208, the Sensitive Compartmentalized Information Facility in the OEOB across West Exec. It was one of many completely secure rooms where communication lines were scrambled, computer systems were hardened, and the walls and floors were shielded from prying eyes and ears.

  “Well, I need you here.”

  “I can’t be here. I’m going to be there,” she said defiantly. “I believe we may have a major problem with sabotage on those gas lines. We’ve got people freezing in several states, and if you don’t think there’s a problem … I’ll be glad to brief you after the meeting.”

  “Samantha. Listen to me, her boss countered, I know you’re all hell bent to watch out for our oil and gas supplies. Okay, fine. That’s in your bailiwick. But I’ve got the whole damn directorate to worry about. You heard what happened near Charleston.”

  Samantha crossed her arms and stood her ground. “Yes, I know. They confiscated possible components of a dirty bomb off the coast there.”

  “Now that’s what I call a Homeland Security issue, not a gas line fizzling out.”

  “They didn’t fizzle out. They exploded!”

  “So they exploded. Let Transportation or Energy worry about that one. They’ve got a division that’s supposed to be overseeing the pipelines in this country. They’ve probably got a GS-15 down there right now investigating the whole thing.”

  “We’ve got what could be a major disruption of an energy supply in this country, and you think a GS-15 in Oklahoma should handle it?” she asked in an exasperated tone.

  “Yes, I do,” Greg said. He paused a moment and added, “If you must go play mother hen on this one, go ahead. But remember, I need talking points on the Charleston situation. I’m on MSNBC at three.”

  Samantha rolled her eyes and stepped out of the room.

  Shoving the notes into her black leather folder, Samantha hurried down the first flight of stairs leading to the West Wing basement and then stood aside as Vice President Jayson Keller accompanied by his retinue of secret service agents walked up the other way.

  “Afternoon, Samantha,” the charismatic man said as she nodded a greeting. “More trouble in your shop today? I heard about Charleston. Now with another gas line going up in flames, you’ve got your hands full.”

  “Yes, sir,” she said, holding up her leather folder filled with papers.

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d keep my people in the loop on both of those.”

  “Of course, sir. We always try to do that.”

  “Thanks, appreciate it.” With a slight wave, he and the agents were gone.

  At least he gets it, she thought as she continued down the stairs and out the door to the OEOB. She shivered when she raced across the driveway. She never bothered to put a coat on to run between the two buildings. No one ever did. They just ran, especially in the winter months. She headed inside and walked along the black and white tiled corridor to the elevator that took her up to the second floor.

  Inside the SCIF, she took her seat at the head of a small conference table. Staffers from the Departments of Energy, Transportation, and Homeland Security were already there.

  As she greeted them, two others breezed into the room. Dave Major was a smart-mouthed FBI agent who seemed to run afoul of the bureaucracy quite frequently. She had worked with him several months ago when there were attacks on some American airliners. It seemed as though every agent, operative, and intelligence source had been involved in that one, but she particularly liked working with Dave, even if he was the most irreverent of the bunch.

  She had also invited a CIA agent, Will Raymond, another source who had proved invaluable in the airline attacks. He obviously had a huge list of contacts all over the world, and she wanted him on her team for this investigation, though she figured he probably had a lot of other pressing issues at the moment.

  “Thanks for coming over on short notice,” she said, opening her folder. “You all know what happened in Oklahoma and then again in Kansas last night on the GeoGlobal lines. There are some who may just want to blame the company for faulty maintenance, but I’m afraid we may have a situation of sabotage on our hands and we’re going to need a thorough investigation.”

  “If it’s criminal, FBI takes the lead,” Dave said.

  “Wait a minute, if this looks like a terrorism issue, and it very well could be, then obviously, DHS is the lead agency. Our intelligence people are already looking at this one,” a staff member said.

  “With two-hundred and forth thousand employees, how can they even find their intelligence people?” Dave whispered to Samantha.

  “What was that, Dave?” The DHS deputy said.

  “Just wondering how we’re going to figure out who’s in charge of this thing, that’s all,” Dave replied.

  “Look folks,” Samantha said, taking control of the meeting, let’s review what we’ve got so far and also take a look at a similar situation in Mexico. Trying to sabotage energy supplies is nothing new. We all know that EPR took credit for a series of attacks on natural
gas and propane lines in Celaya and Coroneo near Mexico City. Those pipelines fed the area where a whole host of companies, including some of ours like Kellogg, Hershey, and several auto plants were operating. They all had to shut down. It was a mess. The Mexican economy took a nose dive.”

  “Those rebels were just trying to get some of their guys released from prison,” Will said.

  “I realize that. But the interesting thing is that we all figured EPR was made up of a bunch of peasants, but those attacks showed that they’ve reached a new level of sophistication, if we can put it that way,” Samantha said.

  The deputy from the Department of Energy chimed in. “That’s true. They targeted valves, sections that were above-ground and also some of the transfer terminals. But are you trying to say that the same group has come up here to mess with our pipelines? That seems like quite a stretch. I mean, what’s their motive?”

  “I didn’t say it was EPR,” Samantha said. “I’m just saying that blowing up pipelines is nothing new. We need to get on this problem and figure out exactly what happened here.”

  The Transportation Department official commented, “Our guy in Oklahoma was out there inspecting the damage. He reported back that the section that was hit in Oklahoma was above ground, but our field office that covers Kansas just called in and said that the particular break there occurred underground, and so they can’t figure out how it happened. I mean, you couldn’t get a visual on that particular stretch of pipeline to set an explosive.”

  Samantha stared at the man. “Strange. Very strange.”

  “On the other hand,” Will said, “more to your point about attacks on energy supplies gaining momentum, remember the arrest of almost two hundred Islamic militants who were evidently plotting to attack oil installations in Saudi Arabia? If they had pulled off even half of their plans, the price of oil would have gone through the roof. And with the Saudi’s pumping out a hefty percent of global supply, you can imagine what would have happened”

  “To say nothing of the hit that their own economy would have taken,” Samantha added. “Okay, so we know that we’ve got a vulnerability here and we don’t know, yet, what really happened in Oklahoma and Kansas.”

  She turned to the FBI special agent, “Dave, see what you can dig up from your sources in those states. Suspicious activity around the pipelines. Local law enforcement. Anything,” The agent nodded and made some notes.

  “Will. Let’s see if our station chief in Mexico City has heard anything new about groups down there. I know it’s far-fetched, but we have to check out every possibility.” “Look, Samantha, with all due respect, I think we’ve got this one covered” the deputy from DHS said. “Our people are the experts at fusion function, combining our intelligence with what we get from the private sector. We collect the dots, and then we string them together.”

  “Fine. We know that,” Samantha said. “You collect your dots, but we all know it sometimes takes a lot of time to work all those dots through the bureaucracy. I’m trying to short-circuit the process here, folks. I think we all need to work together on this one. Anyone picks up anything, and I mean anything, you let me know, and copy the others. Do we have that straight?”

  David looked at Will and shook his head. “This’ll be a first.”

  “Then let it be a first,” Samantha said. “And while I wait for any intel you get on those explosions, or whatever they were, I’ll be coordinating with GeoGlobal.”

  “You got a pipeline into that company? Uh, so to speak?” Dave asked.

  Samantha hesitated for just a moment, closed her notebook and simply said, “Yes.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA–THURSDAY EARLY MORNING

  Tripp punched the power button on the TechnoGym treadmill and started his warm-up. The Turnberry Fitness Center was bustling with a half dozen others going through their early morning routines. Tripp ignored them all as he shoved a pair of ear phones over his head in an effort to tune them out.

  The television set in front of his machine had been set to the SciFi channel where they were playing a show called “Countdown to Doomsday.” Well, that’s appropo. Grabbing the remote and switching to Fox News he heard the anchor list the 6:00 a.m. headlines.

  The president was due back from the Economic Summit Meeting in France, another small submarine had been spotted off the coast of Mexico, and nineteen Haitians had swum ashore in Naples, Florida. Tripp jerked his head up and watched as pictures of wet, bedraggled men, three women, and two young boys trudging down Gulf Shore Boulevard filled the screen. I’ll have to call dad and find out if he saw them.

  Then the announcer said, “This word just in. An elderly couple who had refused evacuation from their farmhouse in Oklahoma was found dead early this morning. They reportedly died from hypothermia. Meanwhile, in Washington, senators from Kansas and Oklahoma have called for congressional hearings on the gas line explosions in their states. The hearing may be combined with another one on energy issues and could be scheduled as early as the day after tomorrow as investigations proceed on the cause of the disruptions.”

  Dead? A couple has died? Frozen to death? My God! Those poor people. This is a total disaster. And now, instead of getting more generators and actual help to their constituents, Congress wants hearings? Jesus!

  He hit the Quick Start button. He was running now, running from the frustration of not knowing why or how their lines were being sabotaged. Running from the frantic phone calls from the control rooms down south. Running from the pressure of a possible trip to Venezuela that was certain to be a total waste of time. He finally hit the stop button, and pulled the small white towel from around his neck to wipe the sweat from his forehead. The only thing he didn’t want to run from was Samantha.

  He had seen her again last night. He had called her on his way home. He said he had wanted to give her an update on the Kansas situation, but the truth was he just needed an excuse to see her again. She had sounded harried, saying she was working late again, but she finally agreed to a late night glass of wine at her place.

  He had driven to Georgetown, not certain what he could tell her because they were still getting reports in from the field. He figured he could finesse that one. All he really wanted to do was see her again, hear her voice, hold her, touch her.

  He hadn’t done much of that last night, although he did manage to kiss her good night. Better not rush that one. Don’t want to screw it up. After all the other women he had known over the years, Samantha was suddenly the one thing in his life that seemed to make sense. Everything else made no sense at all.

  He finished his run and went over to lift some weights. He saw a familiar face, a rather attractive redhead lifting a pair of small barbells. He had seen her in the hallway a few times. Before he met Samantha he had toyed with the idea of getting to know her. But not now. She was wearing a tee shirt that read, “Cancel my subscription. I don’t want your issues.” He shook his head. I don’t want my issues either, but there’s no way I can cancel myself out of my job.

  “Take a look at this,” Godfrey said, careening into Tripp’s office at the end of the day. “We’ve got more problems.”

  “What else is new?” Tripp asked. “I’ve been in conference calls all day, we’ve had complaints from the Hill, the negotiations in Caracas are breaking down, I can’t get hold of Samantha. Uh, I mean the White House …”

  Godfrey gave him a knowing glance and said, “No, I mean bigger problems.”

  “What’s bigger than our lines going up in smoke and congressional hearings in two days? I’m getting to feel like a traffic cop in a straight-jacket.” Tripp said.

  Godfrey handed Tripp a memo marked URGENT.

  “What’s this?”

  “Just read it and tell me what the hell it means,” the lobbyist said.

  Tripp quickly glanced at the document, ran his fingers through his hair and exclaimed, “Holy hell!”

  “Right.”

  Waving the piece of paper,
Tripp almost shouted, “But how could that be?”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  SILVER SPRING, MARYLAND–THURSDAY EARLY EVENING

  “Samantha, thanks for coming,” Angela said. “I know you’re swamped, and I didn’t want to impose, but mom really wanted to include you tonight.”

  Samantha took off her coat, hung it in the hall closet of the modest two story colonial and handed her friend a bottle of Chianti Classico with a ribbon tied around it. “New outfit?” she asked, staring at Angela’s white skirt and puffy red blouse.”

  “Hey, thanks for the wine. We’ll serve it for dinner.” She glanced down at her blouse. “Mom gave it to me to wear tonight” She lowered her voice. “I wouldn’t wear it anywhere else. Trouble is. I look like a strawberry shortcake.”

  Samantha grinned and said, “Um. You may have a point.” She checked her watch. “I’m afraid I can’t stay long. I’ve got more work to do at home tonight.”

  “Still working on those gas line problems?”

  “Absolutely. We’re trying to figure out the who, how, and why of it all. I mean, why would anybody want to blow up a gas line in the middle of winter?”

  “Beats me. But whoever is doing it is causing real havoc down south. I mean, people have died, for Lord’s sake!”

  “Believe me, I know!” She followed Angela into a dining room with red flocked wallpaper, brass sconces, and a large table with two leaves in the middle set for ten. “Can I help you with anything?”

  Angela handed Samantha a can of Pam spray and reached for a votive candle on the table.

  “What do I do with this?”

  “Just spray a little bit in the bottom of each holder. Then I’ll put the candles in. Makes it easy to pop them out when they burn down.”

  “Oh, clever.” Samantha said, squirting a bit of the oily spray into the small glass containers.

  “Here I’m working on votives and you’re working on motives,” Angela said. “Guess that’s why they pay you the big bucks.”