Covert Interview

by Missy Marciassa

  It was a relief to get out of her work clothes into jeans and a tee. Elle tried to reach Marni and Tina by the internet, but they didn’t respond. They were probably out clubbing or asleep, since it was nearly midnight in London. She ate her dinner at the little table by the window and then was glad to stretch out on her bed.

  Elle ended up turning on the TV. She had virtually never watched TV in college: she was always on the go, either studying or meeting up with Marni or Elle or Adam (her ex-boyfriend) or something. Now, there wasn’t much else to do: it was too early to call it a night. Maybe Elle really had jinxed herself with her parting words to Marni and Tina: she was sure they were having more fun than she had today.

  ***

  The next morning Elle was greeted by another librarian named Betsy Wallace she had met when Mrs. Raleigh led her through the library on her way out the door to human resources.

  “So Raleigh didn’t scare you off, huh?” Betsy asked with a grin.

  Elle had to laugh. Okay, so she wasn’t the only one who thought the library director was draconian. “No, not yet, but I got to spend most of yesterday in HR, so we’ll see.”

  Betsy laughed with her. “Well, the rest of us are glad to see you. We need to update this place, even if she’s determined to live as far back in the 1900s as she can.” She lowered her voice, her tone conspiratorial. “Between you and me, something tells me she’s still mourning the fall of the Confederacy.”

  Elle’s eyes widened. “Why does that not surprise me?”

  “Every December she has all of the full-time staff out to her home. It’s designed very much like a plantation mansion with a Confederate flag outside the front door.”

  “Seriously?”

  Betsy nodded with a grin. “Some of the African Americans aren’t too thrilled, but really, she has a good heart. She just isn’t a fan of change.”

  Elle had noticed some confederate license plates and flags on some of the houses, and it struck her as bizarre. Didn’t they know they had lost the war?

  “Welcome to the south,” Betsy said with a laugh. “Let me show you around all of the libraries.”

  Betsy took her on a tour not just of the main library, which was where they both had offices, but also the smaller libraries around campus. She had graduated with her master’s degree in Library Science only a couple of years ago, so she was close to Elle’s age.

  “My program wasn’t as updated as it sounds like yours was,” she told Elle, “but I’m going to enjoy seeing what you do. The bigger research universities in the state put us to shame: our students need to be exposed to more sophisticated library research.”

  Elle said, “I’m glad to hear someone thinks so. I understand Mrs. Raleigh’s love of books, but I don’t think books and technology have to be mutually exclusive. For all the people who won’t ever see a priceless first edition of a classic, getting to read those books in digital form means they’ll still be read. Technology makes literature and information more accessible, not less so.”

  “You’re preaching to the choir. Most of us agree with you. You just have to manage Raleigh and a few of her cronies.”

  It was good to know Elle wasn’t alone. After they finished touring the smaller satellite libraries around campus, they stopped for lunch.

  “I’m married,” Betsy told Elle. “My husband is in medical school here, so it was great that I was able to get a job here. How about you?”

  “I’m single.” She didn’t know how to describe Preston.

  Betsy gave her a coy grin. “So are you seeing anyone? Or are you on the dating market?”

  Elle hesitated. She couldn’t say she was dating a spy for the CIA. Yet she didn’t want to lie, either. “I’m seeing someone,” she finally said.

  Betsy leaned closer. “But… I hear a ‘but’ in there.”

  They both laughed. “He has a job that requires a lot of travel for long stretches of time.”

  “Is he in the Navy?”

  “No, not-”

  “Well that’s good,” Betsy nodded, taking a bite of her sandwich. “Those sailors have a lot of fun when they get ashore after being stuck on a ship for months at a time.” She winked at Elle. “If you know what I mean. You don’t know what they’ll bring home.”

  For a moment Elle was shocked before she started laughing. “I guess I can see that.” Preston had been a Navy SEAL, and he’d been in the Navy before that. She would have to ask him what the sailors did when they docked in a port.

  “So he hasn’t put a ring on your finger,” Betsy observed with a shrewd glance at Elle’s hand.

  Elle was startled again. Betsy got right to business. “I’m not ready for that just yet.”

  Betsy gave her a sympathetic look, causing her to explain, “I dated the same guy for three years of college, but it didn’t work out.” He was lured to cheat with a surgically enhanced classmate, but Elle figured she would save that story for another day. “I started dating Preston, but I want to just enjoy a few years of being single.”

  Betsy nodded, seeming to genuinely understand. “I have to say, Norfolk doesn’t have the greatest dating scene, but a lot of my friends are meeting guys on the internet. One of my friends got engaged to a fellow she met on the internet a couple of months ago.”

  Internet dating. Elle knew plenty of people were doing it, but she’d never thought of it herself.

  “Excuse me, ladies, but I couldn’t help overhear talk of internet dating,” a guy said.

  Elle looked up. He was cute with thick curly hair, vivid green eyes, and a smile that compelled a smile in return. This guy didn’t have Preston’s charisma, but he likely didn’t have trouble dating, either.

  Betsy rested her chin on her hands, her wedding ring clearly visible, as she gave him a smile. “I’m off the market, but my friend here kinda is.”

  “’Kinda’ on the dating market?” He gave Elle another grin. “That’s like being ‘kinda’ engaged: not really possible.”

  Elle felt her cheeks warming up as she laughed again. ”Kinda seeing a guy who works a lot.”

  “All work and no play makes for… not much.” His eyes seemed to sparkle in a way that made clear he didn’t make that mistake.

  “He travels for work,” she tried to clarify. “So he’s gone a lot.”

  The man straightened up, the sparkle extinguished. “Navy guy?”

  “No, not in the Navy,” she said, wondering why he’d gone so cool so fast.

  The sparkle returned, along with the grin and a wink. “I won’t steal a Navy guy’s girl, since they’re serving our country and all. But otherwise, if the rooster doesn’t guard the hen house, he risks a fox coming along and showing the hens a good time.” He didn’t hide the once-over he gave her.

  Elle suddenly understood the phrase “he undressed me with his eyes,” which gave her a bit of a thrill. She couldn’t help being intrigued. She had never, in her twenty-two years, heard anyone close to her in age refer to roosters, ever, even though she’d heard the phrase, but he inspired her to play. “So you’re a fox, huh?”

  “Oh, I can be a lot of things,” he assured her. “You’re not from around here, are you?”

  “Elle’s new in town,” Betsy supplied, eager to help, “hails from up north.”

  “The Midwest, I’m guessing.”

  How did he know that? “Is it that obvious?”

  “It’s what’s not there. No valley girl accent, so you’re not from out west. No jersey girl accent, so you’re not from New York City or Jersey. No accent at all- that’s how you Midwesterners talk.”

  Elle grinned at him. “Impressive deduction.”

  “Went to law school in Philly,” he said and handed her his business card. “If you want someone to show you around the great city of Norfolk, look me up.”

  “So you’re a lawyer who moonlights as a tour guide?” Elle grinned at him.

  “I have many talents,” he replied with another wink. “I’ll leave you ladies to your lunch.” And wi
th that he was gone.

  A business card. Elle couldn’t help feeling flattered even if she had no plans to call him. The business card read Lyle Quade, attorney. She could practically hear her mother’s voice: “Good prospect.”

  However, she would feel like she was cheating on Preston, even though he had made it clear to her she was free to date whoever she wanted. She hadn’t heard from him since their last night in DC together, which wasn’t surprising, and may not hear from him for months.

  “Are you going to call him?” Betsy’s eyes were practically dancing as she sipped from her straw.

  Elle shrugged. “Probably not.”

  “It can’t hurt to hang onto his card. You always want prospects.”

  Something told Elle Betsy was a talented matchmaker. “Very true.” She slipped the card into her purse.

  Chapter Seven

  When Elle arrived at work the next day, Raleigh motioned for her to enter her office as she passed.

  “Good morning, Miss Paquet.”

  “Good morning, Mrs. Raleigh.” Elle had felt fortunate not to see her yesterday, but she supposed she couldn’t count on being so lucky always.

  “I know you will be evaluating our collections and circulation for technological improvements,” Mrs. Raleigh said, “but I also need your support on both the reference and circulation desks. I’ve added you to the schedule for the circulation desk for this morning until ten, and then you have an appointment with a doctoral student for a consultation about library research.”

  Okay. Elle wasn’t supposed to work much in either of those areas, but she nodded. After her consultation, she could start to look at the searching and cataloguing currently done for the libraries. “Sounds great.”

  Mrs. Raleigh dismissed her with a nod and returned to her paperwork, so Elle continued on her way to her office. She had a small office with just the basics: an empty bookshelf, a desk, a couple of chairs, and an ancient desktop computer.

  Elle put her tote down and then headed to the circulation desk. The circulation desk, which was checking books in and out as well as shelving books, was supposed to be something student workers did, but Betsy had told her they didn’t have many student workers in the summer, so the regular staff had to fill in.

  It was quiet at the circulation desk. Most students were gone for the summer, so there wasn’t a lot of activity anywhere on campus, but it was especially true at the library. Elle was organizing some books on a cart to be shelved- at least a student would do that- when she heard:

  “I have an appointment at ten o’clock with Miss Paquet?”

  Elle looked up to see a guy in jeans, a university t-shirt, and a university baseball cap standing there. But something was off. Looking into that immobile face, she knew: the suit was missing. It was Mason. The intensity of his eyes wasn’t even dimmed behind the black-rimmed glasses.

  Elle tried to cover her surprise. “Oh, yes, that’s me. I-”

  A student joined her behind the desk. “I’m here, Miss Paquet,” she said. “I can take over.”

  Elle gave her a smile. A month ago, they would have been peers, and now this girl was addressing her by her last name. “Thank you.”

  She turned to Mason. “Come back to my office.” As she went to open the locked door for him, she took a deep breath. Raleigh was probably watching; she had to act normally. The sight of uptight Mason in jeans was a shock, however. He looked really young without his suit.

  They walked back to her office. As soon as Mason was inside, he closed the door behind her. Elle kind of stood there, not quite sure what to do.

  “This is when you sit down at your desk,” Mason told her as he unzipped his backpack. He took out what looked like a little box, plugged it in to an outlet by the door, and turned it on. It made a static kind of noise. Elle realized he must really not want to be overheard.

  “Oh, right.” She took her seat. It made sense. If someone popped their head in, it would look weird if he were sitting behind her desk, and there were only two chairs in the office.

  Mason sat down in the chair across from her. “We have a problem.”

  Elle felt her heart start beating faster. This was it. Whatever it was. She had developed a straightforward algorithm based on a model that contained certain identifiers for specific types of transactions. “Is there a problem with the program?” She hoped not. It was the first formal thing she had done as a full-time CIA employee; she’d shoot herself if she made some simple, silly error. She shouldn’t have gone out to dinner with Preston after all-

  “We can’t get the program you wrote uploaded to the corporation,” Mason said.

  Elle sat back in her chair, trying not to look openly relieved. As long as this problem wasn’t her fault.

  “Our operatives have tried everything abroad. We’re even cooperating with the Feds, but their operatives haven’t been successful either.”

  “This sounds like a job for one of the…” Could she say spy? Did the white noise machine make a difference? She’d better play it safe. “For someone in the clandestine service.” Someone like Preston.

  “Those would be the operatives we’ve had trying to do this abroad.”

  Oh. Right. She bet Preston could have pulled it off. Elle rubbed her forehead. She had to think about this, what Mason was saying. Not Preston. “Can we develop a way to download it electronically? Like a virus or-”

  “Network’s too secure. I can assure you, we tried all of that. It’s not our first time at the rodeo.”

  The two looked at each other for what felt like too long to Elle.

  “The corporation is Williams-Whitman Holdings,” Mason said.

  Elle knew her mouth dropped open but couldn’t stop it. She could practically feel her brain short-circuiting as her mouth went dry. “The- the Williams-Whitman Holdings in Illinois?”

  “Yes.”

  Breathing became much more difficult. Elle felt as if Mason’s words had knocked the wind out of her. She started shaking her head even as she spoke. “But- my father- my dad-” Her father was many things, many things that weren’t too nice because he was so ambitious, she knew, but a terrorist?

  “Your father is clean to the best of our knowledge. There are some subsidiaries in the corporation that the head execs don’t realize are shell companies for terrorists. They’re laundering money without even knowing it.”

  Now that Elle could believe. Her father was a pragmatist who was about making money; he wouldn’t endorse any ideology that put himself in danger or could cost him money. Or his reputation.

  “We’re just after his laptop.”

  Her father never went anywhere without his damn laptop. There were workaholics, and then there was her father. But what did that have to do with her?

  “We want you to access his laptop and upload your modified program onto it.”

  Elle blinked, trying to make sense of what he was asking. He wanted her to go out into the field to… to spy on her own father? She opened her mouth, but nothing came out, so she closed it. Now she looked like a damn fish.

  “I thought-” She cleared her throat. “I thought we- C-I- employees would never be asked to spy on their own families.” She remembered that from the informational videos Jack and Henry, two CIA recruiters, had played for her Careers class just- just a few months ago.

  “We never do operations on domestic soil,” Mason said.

  Thinking back, Elle remembered the words from the video. “We can assure you you’ll never be asked to spy on your family or friends. The CIA’s operations all occur outside of the United States, so you would never be asked to spy on domestic soil.”

  “My father’s in Illinois,” she pointed out.

  “Your father’s vacationing in the South of France.”

  Elle hadn’t even known; they hadn’t spoken since the day of her college graduation, yet Mason knew. Figured.

  “We want you to invite yourself out there.” Mason sat back, folding his arms across his chest. “For so
me fun in the sun.”

  Elle was surprised Mason knew anything about fun in the sun. The man was like a machine. How did she explain that she didn’t vacation with her father and his second family? That she wouldn’t be welcome to join in the “fun”? “I- we’re really not that close-” she began, feeling the beginnings of a headache, but Mason just shrugged.

  “It’s your graduation present.”

  Elle shook her head as she fumbled around in her purse. She really needed some aspirin. “He already gave me a graduation present.”

  “So his little princess wants another.”

  Elle found the aspirin bottle, twisted off the cap, and tapped a couple of pills into her palm. “I’m not his little princess.” She popped them into her mouth, drank some water, and tilted her head back, aware of Mason’s eyes on her the entire time. She was not going to get into her family relationships with a colleague, certainly not her supervisor.

  She looked Mason in the eye. She might as well find out the whole deal right now. “You said this is an opportunity.”

  He looked right back at her. “An opportunity to help protect your country from a significant terrorist threat.”

  “By spying on my father,” she said, not shrinking down either, despite the throbbing in her head.

  “Think of it as a ‘unique’ opportunity.”

  Oh, now he was going to use her words against her. Bastard. “And if I…” She tried to think of a diplomatic word, “decline this opportunity?” She was in the middle of her probationary period. Would she be fired over this?

  Mason didn’t sit forward; his only movement was to unfold his arms, but something about the hint of steel in his voice made it seem like he wasn’t just sitting up but leaning forward in challenge. “Then I would have to wonder, Ms. Paquet, if you’re interest in having an association with us is nothing more than a passing interest. You told me you were committed, not just interested.”

  “I- I am- I’m committed, but-” Elle searched for something, anything, to say. “You- you also said the C- the agency needed loyalty. How loyal would I be to- to spy on my own father?”