A Brewing Storm

seal and a pair of mounted longhorns from a Texas steer.

The senator rose from behind his desk but made no effort to walk forward and greet them. He let them come to him with outstretched hands.

“About time you got here, Jedidiah,” Windslow snapped, as he shook the CIA spymaster’s hand. “You’ve kept me waiting ten minutes.”

Windslow looked at Storm, and the two men immediately sized each other up, like two schoolboys squaring off during recess.

Tall and thin, Windslow was in his early seventies and instantly recognizable. He was a familiar face on Sunday morning television talk shows and evening newscasts. But it was his haircut and voice that made him memorable. He had pure white hair that he wore in an outdated, carefully coifed pompadour swept back from his forehead and held firmly in place with a glossy shellac spray. He spoke with a slow, deliberate Southern drawl that was sprinkled with homespun sayings that he frequently used to remind voters that he was one of them, a yellow- dog Democrat. In Texas, which he had represented for more than thirty years, he was considered undefeatable.

“So this is your man,” Windslow said.

“Senator Windslow,” Jones said, “this is Steve Mason. He doesn’t work for me, but he occasionally does piecework for me. He’s a private detective.”

“You’re the fixer?” Windslow asked bluntly. “You’re the man who gets things done no matter what-am I right?”

Storm didn’t like the fact that there were three others in the office. He’d identified FBI Special Agent April Showers as soon as he walked in. A telltale bulge under the jacket she was wearing had given her away. He’d recognized the senator’s wife from news articles. But he had no idea who the twenty-something-year-old girl was sitting nearby.

“I’m here to lend a hand,” Storm said, dodging the senator’s questions.

“I’ve already got enough hands,” Windslow replied. “I’ve got the entire FBI lending a hand, and so far, it hasn’t done any good. What I need is someone with a fist.”

No one spoke for a moment, and then the senator’s wife said in a quiet voice, “My husband seems to have forgotten his manners. My name is Gloria Windslow.” She rose gracefully from her seat, showing the emotional control of a well-trained politician’s wife. Even in times of great emotional stress, she knew that she needed to be composed.

Her grip was soft. Her fingernails manicured. She was at least thirty years younger than her husband and was dressed in a pricey New York designer outfit that had been tailored to accent her figure.

Storm had read about her in the media. As soon as she’d finished high school, Gloria Windslow had fled the poor, rural Texas town where she’d been born. Her ticket had been her breathtaking good looks and unbridled ambition, which had led to her winning a spot on the Dallas Cowboys cheerleading roster. She’d gotten pregnant, married a star NFL quarterback, and then divorced him two years later, after claiming that he’d abused her. She and her newborn had made the covers of both People and Us magazines, where she’d been portrayed as a determined single mom who’d refused to be bullied by her famous husband. Gloria and the senator had met two years later at a Dallas political fund-raiser where supporters had paid three thousand dollars a plate to hear him speak. She’d arrived on the arm of one of the city’s most eligible bachelors, a prominent lawyer, but had traded up, leaving with Windslow. A month later, he hired her to work in Washington as his personal secretary. A year later, Windslow filed for divorce from his wife of thirty years, causing a dustup back home. The new couple’s age difference raised eyebrows, but Windslow hired a Manhattan public relations firm to salvage his well-crafted reputation as a good Christian family man, and by the time the Madison Avenue spin masters were finished, Gloria was no longer a home wrecker. She was now a confident and trusted advisor to her husband, with a passion about education, libraries, and women’s issues. At Christmas, she invited special needs children to a party at their estate, and gave them pony rides in a heated barn.

She was still stunning in her mid-forties, thanks to a strict starvation diet, cosmetic surgery, and regular Botox injections.

After introducing herself, Gloria directed Storm to the other women in the office.

“This is Miss Samantha Toppers,” she said, directing his attention to the youngest. “She and my son, Matthew Dull, are engaged to be married.”

As Toppers rose from her seat on a sofa to meet him, Storm realized that he was looking at an architectural marvel. She weighed less than a hundred pounds and was under five feet tall, but she was so top-heavy that Storm wondered how she kept herself from tumbling facedown when she reached out to shake his hand.

“Nice to meet you,” Toppers said in her childlike voice.

When he finally got around to looking at her face, he saw that her eyes were swollen and red from crying.

“And this is Special Agent April Showers,” Gloria continued.

In her green eyes, Storm saw a look of irritation. She couldn’t have been any more opposite in appearance to Toppers. The FBI agent was six feet tall and had a world-class marathoner’s body, which meant she averaged two pounds per inch. In her mid-thirties, she had porcelain white skin and wore her red hair tied in a bun.

“Now that you’ve met everyone,” Senator Windslow said, “let’s get to it. My stepson, Matthew, has been kidnapped. They grabbed him while he and Samantha were walking across the Georgetown campus.”

“Fortunately,” Gloria interrupted, “they didn’t bother Samantha, but they did kidnap my son.”

For the first time since Storm had entered the office, he saw a crack in Gloria Windslow’s veneer. Tears began to form in her eyes. She removed a tissue from her purse and dabbed them.

“The kidnappers,” Windslow continued, “left Miss Toppers hysterical on the sidewalk.”

Storm looked for some sign of sympathy in Windslow’s face, but there was none. Had he expected the top-heavy Toppers to fight the assailants?

Toppers lowered her eyes, avoiding contact with Windslow’s glare.

“I think it would be best,” Gloria said, between sniffles, “if Special Agent Showers gave you the details. It is difficult for me to discuss the facts without becoming emotional.”

Taking her hint, Agent Showers said, “The kidnapping happened three days ago. A white van pulled up at an intersection on the edge of the Georgetown campus where Mr. Dull and Miss Toppers were waiting for a red light to change. It was shortly after fourteen hundred hours. Three men, all wearing ski masks, leaped out of the vehicle. One stayed behind the wheel. The first assailant fired an automatic weapon in the air to scare onlookers. The other two overpowered Matthew and forced him into the van. We found the van abandoned six blocks away.”

“No fingerprints or trace evidence, I assume?” Storm said.

“That’s right. Wiped clean.”

“How about the shell casings left behind?”

“It’s all in my report,” she replied curtly.

“Which she’ll be happy to give you after we are done,” Windslow declared. “I spoke to FBI Director Jackson this morning, and he has instructed Agent Showers to cooperate fully with you. No questions asked. Isn’t that correct?”

“Yes,” Showers said. “I’ve been ordered to help you.”

“Agent Showers doesn’t think bringing you into the investigation is a good idea,” Gloria Windslow said. “My husband and I feel differently.”

“That’s because the FBI hasn’t done a damn thing so far,” Windslow declared.

Storm saw Showers’s jaw muscles tighten. He suspected she was biting down hard to keep her response from slipping out.

“I got a ransom note,” Windslow said, “the day after those bastards snatched him. They demanded a million dollars, which I immediately agreed to pay.” Windslow shot FBI Agent Showers a disgusted look. “Agent Showers here assured me that if I played along with these sons-of-bitches, the Bureau would be able to catch them when they picked up my money.”

“But that’s not what happened,” Gloria Windslow said, cutting in on his account. The two of them made quite a tag team. For not wanting to discuss the case, both seemed eager to do it.

“The Bureau here screwed up,” Windslow said.

“With all due respect, Senator,” Showers replied. “We followed standard procedures. The ransom was left