“No,” Brenneman said. “If it relates to Cullen White’s activities in Sudan, it’s all our concern…mine, yours, and Brynn’s. You can forget about trying to compartmentalize.”
“Fine, sir,” Stralen said. “That is fully understood. Indeed, I might agree with it. But then why isn’t the DIA a participant in White’s interrogation?”
Brenneman looked at him. “Are you serious?”
“Of course.” The skin tightened over the well-defined planes and angles of Stralen’s face. “Do I sound like I’m joking?”
“Joking, no,” Brenneman said. “But in frankness, I don’t see how you think the DIA can participate. Only the CIA has clean hands here. DOD, State, this very office-we’ve all compromised ourselves.”
“How so? What precisely have we done wrong? ”
“If you don’t already know, Joel, you are in pronounced denial,” replied Brenneman.
Stralen was shaking his head. “The worst we can be accused of is misappropriation of funds. And even so, the distribution of CINC discretionary resources has its gray areas. As far as seeming to run against our own embargo, we could argue-”
“My God, we shipped arms to the very people who killed my niece, ” Brenneman said sharply. He inhaled, struggling to control himself. “Enough, Joel. You can save your argument for other ears besides mine. But while you’re here, I do have a question for you. A blunt one. And I would appreciate a direct response.”
Stralen did not budge from the middle of the room but simply met the president’s gaze. “I’m listening, sir.”
Brenneman felt his whole body tense. Every muscle, every tendon. He had not wanted to ask this of the man standing there in front of him, someone he had called a friend for decades. Had not even wanted to consider it.
“When you funded Simon Nusairi…did you have any inkling he’d been involved in Lily’s death? I mean, any knowledge he may have been responsible for what happened to her?”
Silence fell over the office. Both Brenneman and Fitzgerald were looking at Stralen now, but he kept his own eyes on the president’s face.
“Sir, I am heading to my Virginia retreat for the weekend. It has been a long six months, and my objective is to gather stamina for the political battles to come,” Stralen said. “Should you still want to ask that question on my return, I will answer fully and completely.”
More silence, Brenneman felt its weight press down on his shoulders, felt his very heart sinking underneath it.
“Very well,” he said. “Do as you wish.”
And continued to feel his heart sink like a rock as Stralen abruptly turned and left the room.
EPILOGUE
WASHINGTON, D.C.,VIRGINIA BEACH
The CIA safe house on Twelfth Street NW off Massachusetts Avenue was a very intentionally nondescript three-story redbrick building opposite Our Lady of Divinity Catholic Church and book-ended by a pre-World War II apartment house on the corner of Massachusetts and another small walk-up heading toward the M Street intersection.
Stepping out into the fresh air after the preliminary debriefing that had taken just shy of four hours, Kealey looked down the short flight of stairs descending to the sidewalk and saw John Harper leaning against his double- parked black Suburban, hands in the pockets of the light raglan trench coat flapping around his knees.
“Ryan,” he said. “Seems I’m right in the nick of time.”
Kealey went downstairs, crossed the pavement, slid between the front and rear bumpers of two curbed vehicles. Harper took a hand out of his pocket and extended it as he approached.
“Same set of Agency wheels as ever,” Kealey said, eyeing the vehicle as they shook.
Harper shrugged. “You know what they say about old habits.”
“Yours or the Agency’s?”
“Some would say there isn’t a damn bit of difference.”
Kealey grunted. “Don’t you get a driver anymore?”
“My option. I’m on unofficial business today.”
Kealey looked at him in silence.
“This is a far cry from where we last met in Pretoria,” Harper said after a moment.
Kealey nodded. “No Springsteen music,” he said.
“No.” Harper smiled a little. “No jukebox either.”
They stood regarding one another in the shade of an elm tree as traffic and pedestrians moved quietly by on the street.
Harper checked his watch. “Almost five o’clock,” he said. “I’m wondering if you’d like to come over for dinner. Stay the night if you want.”
“That’s okay,” Kealey said. “Your people booked me at Best Western. It has room service, a decent view.”
“All the amenities one would desire for a visit to the capital.”
“Just about,” Kealey said. “I’m set there, anyway.”
Harper looked at him. “Julie knows you’re in D.C. and is hoping to see you,” he said. “It’s been a long time.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Why not?”
“Things have happened,” Kealey said. “A lot’s changed…”
“Nature of life,” Harper said with a mild shrug. “That and getting older.”
Kealey hesitated. “Listen, thanks for the offer. And regards to Julie. But there’s no point in her going to the trouble.”
“No trouble,” Harper said. “She invited a few friends over, anyway. Some staffers from back when she worked at Mayo. One of them’s a woman named Allison Dearborn. She hooked up with Julie through me…long story there…and they organized a little reunion.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m going to be bored stiff listening to their hospital war stories and complaints, Ryan. It would be a real favor.”
Kealey looked at him. “That’s another habit you can’t seem to shake.”
“Asking favors of you?”
Kealey nodded, prompting a chuckle from Harper.
“This isn’t quite as big or demanding as the last,” Harper said, “and it comes with Julie’s great cooking. Chicken Marsala tonight.”
Kealey turned his head, gazed up the street awhile at nothing in particular, then finally looked back at Harper and shrugged. “What the hell, John. But just so you know, it’s Julie, not you, that I’ve missed.”
Harper grinned, reached for the handle of his passenger door. “I’ll take that as a positive once removed,” he said, opening it for Kealey.
General Joel Stralen stood on the balcony of his Hampton Roads condominium, looking out over the white sands of Virginia Beach from ten stories up, watching the blue Atlantic waves lap at the shoreline. He had always loved this place, with its contemplative silences and placid vistas…always felt his most whole here.
Holding the balcony’s rail, he turned his face up at the cloudless sky, closing his eyes to let the warm sunshine beat against them. He had been something of a sun worshipper his entire life, not the smartest of habits, soaking up all those UVs. On the other hand, it took a while before they got to you, and they hadn’t gotten to him yet.
He sighed into the breeze. Cullen White was on his way to the United States with John Harper’s man Ryan Kealey, someone who was not even Agency anymore. On his way across the land and sea to testify that the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, and a friend of President Brenneman, had not only engineered an illegal arms trade with Sudanese militiamen but also…
