Before Jen could answer, her iPhone vibrated in spasms as it sat on the glass-top table.
“Shit,” Jen said as she read the phone’s display, informing her that Stacy Flannigan was the caller. “It’s Flannigan. Shit.”
“Just answer it, tell her you skipped out for a late lunch.” Lisa paused. “But, don’t tell her my name. Don’t tell her anything about you and me meeting. Okay?”
The worry was plain to see on Lisa’s face. Jen knew that the reality of what Lisa had volunteered to do had smacked her hard in the face the moment Congresswoman Flannigan made her virtual appearance. “I won’t say a word. Trust me. No matter what happens, no matter how much trouble or danger I get into, your name will never come up. Promise.”
She slid the “Accept” button on her phone. “Hello, it’s Jennifer.”
“Enjoying your little lunch date, Jennifer?” Stacy’s voice sounded creased and distant. Like the cell connection was wavering. “I believe you said that getting me my requested information was a top priority. But, there you sit, with your friend, discussing who knows what, while my request grows older and colder.”
“Stacy…”
“Congresswoman Flannigan, if you don’t mind,” Flannigan interrupted.
“Yes, of course. Congresswoman Flannigan, I’m still waiting for the information you requested, but I haven’t made any headway yet. I didn’t have lunch yet and, well, I just wanted to grab something quick.”
“Something quick is what you’ll have, but you won’t find it on the bill o’ fare at The Round Table. Tell your Census friend, Lisa, that you need to be running along now. Hurry back to the office and remain diligently working at your little desk outside of my office until you either collect my required information or I call to release you from your daily duties. Understood?”
“Yes Congresswoman Flannigan,” Jen stammered.
There was a pregnant pause before Congresswoman Flannigan spoke again. “Let me hear you tell Lisa that I say ’hello.’ ”
Jen’s face fell instantly slack as the blood and color drained quickly. Her lips began the slight but noticeable quivering nervous habit that she had tried so long to rid herself of. She remembered working with her debate coach in high school who had noticed Jen’s nervous tell-tale sign, and suggested that her previous practice of biting her bottom lip did nothing but draw more attention to her trembling lips. “Take a second, pause, breathe deeply, then set your resolve and carry on,” her debate coach had told her.
But as she lowered the phone a few inches from her quivering lips, the deep, calming breath would not come. “Lisa, Congresswoman Flannigan told me to say, ‘hello’ to you.” Jen quickly mouthed “I’m sorry” to Lisa as tears rushed to form heavy pools in the bottom of her eyes.
“Thank you, Jennifer,” Flannigan said. “Now, off you go, back to the office. You have work to do, remember?”
The call was ended without any additional words exchanged or the chance to say anything in response to Flannigan’s reminder. Jen, her sights still fixed on Lisa, gently and carefully placed the phone back onto the table, then said, “My God, Lisa. She knew we were here. Both of us. My God, Lisa.”
Lisa’s eyes darted around the room, looking for anyone who seemed suspicious or was making an attempt to overhear what she and Jen were discussing. Apart from the waitress, who was engaged in reading something apparently important on her smartphone, there were only six other patrons; they were all either busy slamming calories into their mouths or were engrossed in conversation with their table-mate. No one acted or seemed the least bit interested in whatever was being discussed at Lisa and Jen’s table.
“We need to get out of here,” Lisa said, grabbing her purse and putting on her light jacket. “What did she tell you to do?”
“To get back to the office, get back to work and to stay there until she calls me or I find the information she asked me to get,” Jen said as she, too, grabbed her clutch, stood and plowed her arms through her coat’s sleeves.
“Go back to the office,” Lisa said as the two hurried towards the door. “Act busy but for God’s sake, do not try to get that information. I’m going to call my friend for advice. I’ll call you as soon as I speak with him. Stay cool and make sure your cell is on you at all times.”
“Lisa,” Jen said as the two left The Round Table and started heading back to their respective offices, “what the hell did we get ourselves into?”
“I don’t know and, honestly, I don’t care. If Congresswoman Flannigan is up to something, I’m damn determined to find out what the fuck she’s up to. She knows something and she knows I’m involved, and that just pisses me off. She thinks I can be intimidated by a freshman member? She’s got another think coming.”
When they reached the corner of Pennsylvania and Third Street, Lisa turned left, heading towards her car and Jen continued towards the Capitol building. “Just sit tight and relax,” Lisa said. “If she’s up to something, we’ll blow her out of the water, the bitch won’t intimidate me. That I will guarantee.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Jennifer LaMore sat at her desk, marking the passing of each second, till her cell phone rang. It was Lisa.
“Can you talk?” Lisa asked.
“Give me a second.” Jen double checked Congresswoman Flannigan’s office, making sure it was empty. She then peaked her head out into the hallway outside her office, checking for Flannigan or anyone overly interested in the comings and goings of Flannigan’s office, before retreating back to her desk. She thought about using Flannigan’s office and shutting the door to maximize her privacy, but chose instead to use a softened voice. “Okay. What did you find out?”
“My friend will meet us at his apartment in Alexandria at seven tonight. I’ll text you his address.” Lisa paused. “Flannigan isn’t in her office, right?”
“No,” Jen said. “She never came back and I haven’t heard anything from her.”
“Good. Listen, my friend isn’t exactly what I told you he was.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s a bit higher up in the agency than I said. You have to promise to keep everything quiet. If anyone finds out that he’s helping us, he’ll be in big trouble.”
“Is he an agent?” Jen asked, encouraged by the possibility.
“Special agent, actually,” Lisa whispered. “I have no idea what the difference between an agent and a special agent are, but it sounds more important. He probably has access to more resources.”
“Good,” Jen said before the call was ended. “Because I think we are going to need plenty of resources to figure this whole thing out.”
Though there was only an hour or so left before she could leave the office behind, Jen struggled to maintain her composure as she waited for five o’clock to arrive. Something was twisting her gut, sending streams of nerves and anxiety racing to all parts of her mind and body. It was Jen’s inability to identify the actual thoughts, the one “thing” that she knew was at the center of all her worries and fears, that was causing a layer of disturbing mystery. She could identify her worries about Congresswoman Flannigan being involved in something suspicious. She could easily list enough reference points to explain why she felt the Congresswoman was focused on unusual things and had requested bizarre information. It was easy for Jen to recall conversations with Flannigan that entitled her internal alarms to begin humming in anticipation.
But she knew there was something more, something deeper about Flannigan. Her mind shot back to how Flannigan was aware of her lunch with Lisa, and how the call she had received from Flannigan while she and Lisa were busy planning their next steps was seemingly delivered by a cool, stale whisper of air. She dismissed her thoughts of some paranormal energy that Flannigan could control, as well as the brief flash of a thought about Flannigan being part of some top secret, military committee, which had invented an invisible tracking “entity” that only announced its presence by a drop in the nearby temperature. The bugs would have to be
worked out, of course, before the technology could be used to silently and invisibly invade the homes, offices and secret meeting rooms of enemies of the state around the world.
It was that chilled air and musty, murky scent that Jen’s mind centered on. Remembering that others in The Round Table had noticed is as well gave Jen relief, knowing that her anxiety wasn’t creating invisible monsters roaming about. “Other people felt that air, too!” she said to herself.
The air. The scent.
When her mind centered on the scented air, an unidentified part of her core vibrated. She had found the origin that had and continued to birth all her worries, fears and concerns about Congresswoman Stacy Flannigan. But having isolated the origin gave her no answers.
She glared at the clock hanging on the far wall.
<<<<>>>>
Lisa opened the door for Jen, greeted her with a tentative smile then immediately handed her a heavily poured glass of red wine. “Couldn’t remember if you’re a white or red kind of girl.”
“Right now,” Jen said, “I’m a ‘whatever is in this glass’ kind of girl.”
Jason Kennedy was standing in the kitchen, refreshing his own glass of red wine as Jen and Lisa walked over to his living room couch. His apartment was located on the twenty-second floor of his forty story Duke Street apartment building. He had wanted to move into Old Town but his salary and his determination to not have a roommate wouldn’t stretch far enough to accommodate his living preference.
One look at him, and Jen understood her friend’s attraction to him. He stood just over six feet tall. He was lean and muscular and his short cropped brown hair, years away from any potential graying or receding hairline, gave him a look of confidence and determination. It was when he smiled that Jen really understood Lisa’s attraction.
“Jen,” Lisa said as Jason walked over towards the two woman, “this is Jason. Jason, Jen.”
His handshake was firm but far from the type of handshake that someone employs when trying to assert dominance or to demonstrate strength. “Jen tells me your new boss is quite a character,” he said, his radiant white smile dispelling any worries or fear that Jen was holding on to.
“That would be an understatement,” Jen replied.
The three sat, Jason and Lisa close together on the couch and Jen in an overstuffed, La-Z-Boy recliner. Not being one for small talk when serious matters were the intended topic of conversation, Lisa recapped the conversation she and Jen had at The Round Table, then proceeded to catch Jen up to speed. “First off, what happens in this apartment, stays in this apartment. Think of this as Vegas. Agreed?”
Jen quickly nodded her agreement.
“I’ll let Jason fill you in on what he found out, but I want to tell you a few more things I dug up first. Every member of Congress is supposed to share their calendars with the Secret Service. Makes sense since practically everyone in Washington is a target of some group. Anyway, Flannigan hadn’t followed protocols and was called out last Friday. Another friend of mine, this one without benefits,” she said then gently bumped her shoulder into Jason’s, “works over in the Department of Homeland Security in the Scheduling and Service office. I called him after you and I left the diner. He told me that Flannigan was told either she share her calendar or her travel budget would be suspended. So, she sent over her travel schedule the next day. My being the crafty and highly persuasive young lady that I am,” she smiled again, “convinced him to send a digital copy of her schedule to my Gmail account.”
“And?” Jen asked, impatiently.
“Well, if her schedule is to be believed, Congresswoman Stacy Flannigan is scheduled to meet with some constituents outside of Columbus, Ohio tomorrow. She drove there today and isn’t expected to be back in D.C. till next week.”
“Any idea who her constituents are?” Jen asked.
“This is the point in the conversation,” Lisa said, pausing to take a sip from her glass of wine, “that my delicious looking boyfriend chimes in.”
“You love to be dramatic, don’t you, Lisa?” Jason said as he rubbed Lisa’s knee. “So first off, Jen, I have to tell you that I’m really overstepping my bounds here and need to make sure that anything and everything we talk about is, as Lisa said, treated like we are in Vegas.”
“What happens in Alexandria, stays in Alexandria,” Jen said.
“I’ve been with the CIA for four years and made Special Agent just over a year ago. Not as exciting as it sounds, so don’t start thinking that I’m some international spy, charged with stopping terrorists and getting assets for the CIA. What I do is a bit more mundane. I’m part of a team that keeps an eye on anyone and everyone in government. Kind of like a police department’s Internal Affairs. Most of the time, I sit on my ass and read flagged emails from officials. I’ve probably read five thousand emails and never had to start a follow-up case as a result of any of them.
“But, I think Lisa told you that we also do a background check on every new member of Congress as well as a pretty basic refresh on every member each year. We also do a bunch of snooping when a member is considered for any committee, especially for any intelligence committees. So, I was assigned to check the backgrounds of twenty members this year: Four new members and sixteen incumbents. Flannigan wasn’t assigned to me but I have access to all the case files. So I did a bit of my own research.
“You know about her missing eleven months and you know that the people she asked you to find contact information on, Cardinal O’Keefe, Badr Irani and Ronal Novak, were also missing during the same time. O’Keefe was on a sabbatical, Badr was listed as being overseas, perhaps in Saudi Arabia and Novak is a mystery. We know local police in Upstate New York have Novak as one of their ‘usual suspects’ and that they keep a close eye on him. But during those same eleven months, not one officer made any contact or listed Novak in any reports.
“Here’s the interesting stuff: Badr isn’t on DHS’s watch list, but I have a feeling he’s going to make that list very soon. He’s not associated with any mosques or Imam’s that raise any concerns but he does live outside of Cincinnati in a house owned by, you guessed it, Stacy Flannigan. We don’t know the connection between the two nor do we know if Badr is the only one living in that house. There’s a field agent in the area that is going to dig up some info. I’ll find out more when the agent’s report is filed.
“Also, O’Keefe’s office in New York City informed me that Cardinal O’Keefe is visiting friends and will be out of his office for most of this week. Church officials, those high up in the church, are used to agents calling them since, for whatever reason, Cardinals and Bishops receive more than their fair share of death threats. I called, acting like I was just checking in when O’Keefe’s assistant told me about his travel. A Cardinal traveling is no big deal, usually. But his assistant told me where O’Keefe was heading. Care to take a guess?”
“Columbus?” Jen said.
“Damn straight.”
“So, Flannigan and O’Keefe are scheduled to be in Columbus and Badr lives about two hours away. Seems awfully strange that at least two of the people on the list Flannigan gave you are going to be in the same area this week,” Lisa said.
“But the strangeness doesn’t end in Columbus,” Jason continued. He waved his empty wine glass in front of him. Lisa took it, grabbed the half-full glass Jen was holding, and headed to the kitchen. She returned with both glasses filled and a freshly opened bottle of red wine as Jason continued talking.
“Flannigan’s travel schedule has her in Columbus for two days, then in New Hartford, New York this Friday and Saturday. Upstate New York is not her district.”
“And is where Ronald Novak lives, right?” Jen confirmed.
“Exactly,” Lisa added.
“What the hell?” Jen sighed.
“So,” Lisa said as she sat back against the couch, “since I haven’t used a vacation day in well over a month and your boss is doing whatever the hell it is she’s doing, guess where you and I are going
Friday?”
“New Hartford, New York?” Jen said. “Why? Why would we want to go all the way up there?”
“To find out what Flannigan is up to and to see if the others are there as well.”
“I don’t agree with Lisa’s plans,” Jason said, “but I know her well enough to not try to talk her out of it. I can’t make the trip and I can’t have an agent work with you up in New Hartford, but I can help you two out with some State Police assistance.”
“Wait a minute,” Jen said. “This doesn’t make any sense. I get that Stacy traveling to Upstate New York is weird and so is the possibility that she’s meeting with O’Keefe and Badr in Columbus, but we don’t know that she’s doing anything wrong. If we go out there and she sees us, we’re both in hot water.”
“Why would we get in trouble?” Lisa said. “Nothing at all wrong with one friend joining another friend on a trip up to her hometown for a visit.”
“You’re not from Upstate New York,” Jen said.
“Flannigan doesn’t know that. And the chances of her seeing us are ridiculously remote.”
“Maybe, but if she does see us, she’s going to want to know why I’m not in the office. And she’s smart. She’ll put two and two together and figure out that we found out about her travel plans and are up there to spy on her.”
“If she sees us, which she won’t,” Lisa said, “you tell her you had the day scheduled as a vacation day for a few weeks. Flannigan doesn’t have anything to do with approving your days off. She’s your boss, yes, but she isn’t in Human Resources.”
“Like I said,” Jason continued, trying to quell the obvious worry etched across Jen’s face, “I already put a call into a Trooper that I know. He’s off that day and is more than glad to escort you two around. He’s trying to get a job with the Feds so he’s eager to help.”
“And what do you propose we do if we do find Flannigan? Which we probably won’t, by the way.”
The Demon Senders Page 13