by Dale Amidei
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 - The More Things Change
Chapter 2 - Level Zero
Chapter 3 - Every Day a Monday
Chapter 4 - Head and Heart
Chapter 5 - Fade to Black
Chapter 6 - Give and Take
Chapter 7 - A Walk in the Park
Chapter 8 - Control Issues
Chapter 9 - Swords
Chapter 10 - Night Work
Chapter 11 - Any Means Necessary
Chapter 12 - Outside the Box
Chapter 13 - Family Business
Chapter 14 - Plus One
Chapter 15 - Best Efforts
Chapter 16 - Cause and Effect
Chapter 17 - Return to Zero
Chapter 18 - The Morning Agenda
Chapter 19 - London Fog
Chapter 20 - Chewing Judas
Chapter 21 - Insights
Chapter 22 - Conduits of Clarity
Chapter 23 - Spontaneous Combustion
Chapter 24 - One Last Scent of Jasmine
Chapter 25 - Multiple Choice
A note from the author:
And if I may:
Also by Dale Amidei:
One Last Scent of Jasmine
By Dale Amidei
Kindle Edition
Copyright 2016 Single Candle Press
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission in writing from Single Candle Press, PO box 91153, Sioux Falls, SD 57109.
Cover design by Dale Amidei
© Single Candle Press February 2016.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, locations, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Registration with the United States Copyright Office pending.
Acknowledgements:
I dedicate this novel to those who have taken their oaths seriously. These go to God first, and then to country, and after to those whom the keeper loves. Ordered otherwise, no one could go to war, and sometimes circumstances demand this. For those who have been to the dark place, you must know doing so under righteous priority made each of you admirable beyond expression.
-DA
"... for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God"
-The Apostle Paul, Romans 3:23
“Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing.”
- August Wilson
Chapter 1 - The More Things Change
Fairfax County, Virginia
Barely Saturday
It was after midnight, and Terrence Bain Bradley sat in the kitchen of his wife’s expansive Fairfax County home. The Colonial was the centerpiece of a horse property which had been her father’s gift on the occasion of her first marriage. Now her second husband lifted the glass of Scotch from the granite-topped island in front of him for another sip. He heard the ice therein tinkle at virtually the same time as the onset of noise announcing her overdue homecoming … the vibration emanating from the motor operating her garage door.
Friday had been a bad-to-the-bone fourteen hours finishing a work week nearly as intolerable. People overseas died in the service of their country yesterday, caught in the maelstrom of violence seeming to engulf one piece of American-held ground after the other. This time around, CIA was dead set against revealing the Agency’s involvement in placing personnel inside the command structure of the losing side. Bradley had found no reason to countermand the consensus of the Agency’s Director and Deputy Director of Operations. Two more black stars go up in the lobby in Langley. Two more Covert Action Star awards will be on my desk Monday for me to sign. Bradley heard the door of her crossover slam in the garage. There was time for another sip of his Scotch. At least I’m not the one who will call the families.
Her keys rattled in the entry door, and Janine Harrison-Bradley—his wife of just under a year—stepped in. A startled expression appeared on her face once she saw him sitting in the kitchen. Jan recovered, he noticed, as quickly as possible. Her dominant hand went to her tousled hair while the other tried to cover the incriminating state of her disheveled clothing. “Terry … you’re home.”
“Hi honey,” he replied, forcing the words. She walked over to the bar, looking contrite, and then angry, and then resolute all within the space of a few moments, he observed.
“You’re not as late as you thought,” she commented. “I didn’t even see your limo on the road.”
Bradley smirked. “No. Once things get to a certain point there’s nothing left to be done.” He shot her a look over the rim of his nearly depleted glass of whiskey. “Know what I mean?”
“Oh, I know what you mean, Terry. Believe me.”
He set the tumbler down in front of him, folding his hands. A heavy sigh followed. “Janine, where have you been?” he asked, knowing his eyes must have fairly pleaded for the truth this time.
Setting her purse down on the breakfast bar, she straightened, her hand going to her hip. “Fucking Alec Harper,” she said in a deliberately brutal tone. A disgusted expression took over her face immediately afterward. “At least, I thought I was.”
Bradley sighed again, his head dropping. “Goddammit, Janine.” He felt his heart palpitate. It’s a good thing I got some Scotch down while I had a chance.
“Goddammit nothing, Terry. You knew. You knew all about it. How long did you let me go before you decided to put an end to it?”
What the hell is she talking about? He sent an angry look her way, only his confusion mitigating the rage he felt. “Jan, are you insane?”
She slammed her hand down on the granite surface beside her purse. “No, Terry. I am scared. Scared nearly to death by what you did to me tonight.”
What the hell happened to her out there? “Janine, I don’t know what—”
“Oh, don’t give me that. My God, at least you could be honest about it.”
The sheer irony of her barb struck him, and his brow furrowed. “Oh, honesty? Yes, Jan, let’s go there. How long have you been riding the Chairman of the Equestrian Board, for instance?”
Reddening, her grimace turned into a snarl a moment later. “Since I gave up on you being home on nights like this one.” She took the following silence and turned it into a moment of reinforced determination. “Terry,” she added, “this thing I thought we could make work isn’t going to happen. Not in the way I thought. Not after what happened tonight. I won’t live like this.”
He picked up his jacket from where he had cast it on the countertop. “Yes, Jan, for the first time since you got back, I think you might be right.” Traversing the kitchen, he headed toward the entrance she had used only a few minutes previously. The Director of National Intelligence realized his hand was trembling as he lifted the keys to his Tahoe from the hooks near the door. He turned his head enough to see her there, staring at his back. “I’ll send some people over for my things,” he informed her.
“As long as it’s in the daylight, dear.”
She looked, he thought as he held the panel open, as if she wanted nothing more than to see it close behind him. It’s over then. I should have known better. “Good-bye, Janine,” he said, knowing his tone conveyed more than just words.
“Good-bye, Terry.” Her inflection was a fitting end to their brief conversation.
Bradley stepped out into the garage, still lit by the activation of her remote, and pulled the knob until he heard the
latch click into place. He thumbed the illuminated button which began the grinding ascent of another overhead door. In a matter of seconds, he heard her lock the dead bolt from the inside. Yeah, doesn’t that say it all, though? It’s time to find myself a room, I guess.
Her hotel was on the outskirts of Washington Dulles International Airport, from whence yet again an Air France flight would be winging her back across the Atlantic. Dr. Rebecca Boone Hildebrandt, her still-damp body wrapped in one of the hotel’s soft, terrycloth robes, looked into her steamed bathroom mirror. She tried and failed to tally the number of international air miles—both legitimate and covert—she had accumulated already this year. One that’s barely half over. You’re turning into a real jet-setter, kiddo.
She wiped the mirror as best she could. The high-temperature cascade of her hot shower had helped relax those muscles left positively wiry by postoperative tension. Adrenaline, she knew from its physiological symptoms, still lingered from her unsanctioned, late-night social work. It’s probably a good thing I’m leaving the country … after what I just did. Roughing one of the smaller hand towels through her bobbed, auburn hair, she tossed it onto the rim of the bathroom’s tub. Turning, she looked her reflection in the eyes once again. Here we still are, Boone. Making our decisions and then living with them. “You think we’ll ever get better at it?” she asked the woman in the mirror.
The soft knock at the nearby entrance door came just afterward, almost as a reply, and caught her by surprise. Oh, God. Who is this? Boone took the few steps to where her small pistol lay on the dresser and only then went to the door, approaching it as silently as possible before lifting herself up on her toes to use the peephole. Terry. Shit. Oh shit oh shit. She swung the door guard away and unlocked the dead bolt, her hand clutching Little Swiss yet hidden behind the panel. Cracking open her room’s door, she managed, “Terrence … this is a … surprise.”
“Boone, dammit, I know it’s too late. I just remembered once I knocked that you’re flying out tomorrow,” he said.
Look at him. He’s not angry. He’s miserable. Boone felt a crushing wave of regret. Well, you told Janine tonight to straighten up her act or let him go. Looks like it didn’t take long for her to decide, did it now? “Nonsense, Terry. It’s a late morning flight. Come in.”
He accepted her invitation and moved inside, still looking remorseful. She relocked the door without a thought and moved past him, returning Little Swiss to the P290’s shoulder holster. With a mental start she suddenly realized her night’s working clothes, black from her mock turtleneck to the supple leather of her riding boots, were still strewn where she had left them: on the first of the room’s two queen beds, the one also holding her luggage. Relax. You wear black a lot. Get your game on, Boone honey, or you’ll blow this. “So, Mister Bradley, sir,” she said in an officious tone, “is this unexpected visit business or pleasure?”
“It’s … personal, Boone. Sorry. I don’t have anyone else to dump on right now.”
Damn you, Becky B. You’ve just broken up a marriage. “Terry, what is wrong?” she asked, giving up her usual Euro attitude as Bradley took another step and sat heavily on the edge of the second bed. Mere minutes ago she had planned on occupying it—alone. That would still be the best idea, girlfriend. She gathered the front hem of her robe into a more modest display and leaned backward against the room’s faux cherry dresser.
Sighing, Bradley shrugged. “I get home earlier than I thought.” He raised his hands, looking around as one would at an empty house. “Janine comes in a few minutes later, looking like she’s just back from prom night. Hair messed, clothes torn up, the whole nine yards.”
“Oh, Terry—”
“Next thing I hear, my wife’s informing me she’s been …” he seemed to reevaluate his initial choice of words, “having a damned affair.”
Boone realized she had clenched onto her own arms and tried to relax her hands. “Terry, I’m so sorry. You don’t deserve this.”
With an exasperated sound, he countered, “Ah, that’s just it. Maybe I do.” He continued before she could interject. “Never home. Busy saving the world … or at least trying to salvage the parts Washington cares about.”
To Boone he looked only a little better for having told someone. She watched his eyes turn back to her.
“Now Janine thinks I’m having her followed, or something. I never heard what spooked her. For all I know, it’s paranoia. Hell … maybe she’s been doing coke, too.” Bradley stood once more. “I only know it’s over. Eleven months and six days tomorrow.” His jaw clenched. His eyes fixed on her own now, weakening her resolve. “I guess I wanted you to hear it from me.”
Boone felt the sadness of her expression radiate. “Oh, bullshit. You needed someone to listen to you vent, and there was no one else. You don’t have enough real people in your life, Terrence Bain Bradley. All you have are seventeen agencies full of spooks and their emergencies. You should work on that … until I see you again.”
The DNI—her boss, her friend and once not long enough ago her lover—nodded, perhaps realizing himself the danger of the two of them being alone in this room. “Not a bad idea, Doctor H. Thanks for the advice.” He moved uncomfortably near, passing in front of her to walk toward her door.
Staring at his back, still holding herself, she did not dare to join him there. “Keep me in the loop, Terrence, please?” she pleaded in a low voice.
“You’ve got it, Agent Hildebrandt,” he replied, forcing himself, as she could tell, to use his Director's Voice. He was through the door a second later—and not a moment too soon.
Her hand went to her face as she clutched her eyes and slowly shook her head, amazed at the devastation she could wreak by trying to help a friend. Dr. Rebecca Boone Hildebrandt, Level One Case Officer for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, raised her chin and stared into space, her fingers now at her trembling lips. Oh, Terry, you poor man. I’m so sorry.
McCormick Place
Chicago, Illinois
Four months later
It will be dawn soon. Is the symbolism not delicious? Valka Gerard, though she was standing offstage and not on the floor in the midst of his jubilant supporters, applauded with a vigor equal to any of them. Their President—and her protégé—now occupied the stage for his campaign victory speech.
The overnight wait had been long and tense. Going into the evening, Gerard knew the ground game to be in place in the key battleground states. She also knew the precinct captains in the urban areas—those where critical votes could most easily be generated by any number of methods—to be meticulously marshaled and schooled by her party’s National Committee. Despite the challenger’s slight lead in the polls leading up to Election Day, she believed the outcome was never really in doubt. Nevertheless, Ohio, the last state to be called and holding the deciding bundle of electoral votes, remained too close to call only an hour previously. Once the reserve ballots in Cuyahoga County were added to the tally, her President was indisputably in the lead there as well. Even the Eagle Network was forced to declare the long contest—and the hours of Election Night standby—finally to be over.
A gracious concession from the opposing candidate had followed, and then it was time to reward the patience of the true believers in the McCormick center. Expectations are to be put into place. Idolization is to be promoted. Catharsis is then released as reinforcement. Better than almost any other woman on Earth, Valka Gerard knew how to bring a politician into power in the twenty-first century. This is how things are done. And we are so much better at it than the other side.
The applause of the crowd seemed to be building on itself rather than subsiding. And why not? It was held long enough in waiting. Those managing the audience, per direction, had yet made no move to settle them down. The effect was as much a part of the man’s aura as any of the campaign’s many other engineered moments. Our side knows how to win. And in the end, that’s all that really matters.
Finally, on
ce the arm raising, the gestures of acknowledgment and the broad smiles from the stage had placated enough of the significant attendees, the TelePrompTer system illuminated. She knew the floor crew would now begin the process of quieting the crowd so as to allow the man to speak. Indeed, when it was time, he began his delivery.
Gerard had not bothered to review the text of his address this time, allowing the President and his speechwriters to indulge themselves. It would be much the same as before, she was certain. Long on promises and nonspecific in regard to means, it would feed image and not perception. This, too, was part of the overarching strategy of those who knew How Things Were Done. The masses needed someone in whom to believe, not immersion in the minutiae of policy. Strategy is information for leaders, not followers.
Instead of listening to the speech, Gerard watched the faces of the people in the front ranks, those who had not even considered seeking a seat farther back on the floor or in the rows above. Few of them knew—or would care if it was so—how many of his words were actually hers. It had been so from the time he emerged from Illinois politics onto the national stage of his first and only Senate campaign.
A naturalized citizen, she was one who had come out from her native Estonia with her parents in the 1950s. As a result, it was she who could never directly experience election to the highest office in this land. Regardless, this night was hers as much as the President’s. Her philosophies, her strategizing, her priorities and her initiatives had constructed him whom the adoring faces in the front rows believed they saw. From such levels of support was derived the dedicated action of a campaign, and from action derived power. And power is what allows us to reshape a society into what it needs to become in order to accommodate the future.
The shape of things to come, she believed, would envelop and propel her politics into prominence, becoming the accepted norm. Too much time and energy is wasted in the current system. We need defined leadership. They need to accept reality without question; it is we who make the guiding decisions. Only then can the true engine of progress begin to turn and move us forward.