contained the usual potted plants and a reception desk manned by a woman who, by any measure, should have made an appearance on one of those reality shows where looks compensated for lack of plot. She had the pale, clear skin that went with naturally blond hair, and blue eyes without warmth.
As Jason approached, she watched with cold disinterest. From a few feet away he could read the tag pinned to the black camisole-type top, which, though not transparent, gave the impression of frilly lingerie underneath. He was not surprised to learn her name was Kim, nor would Lisa, Lori, or Ashley have been a shock.
He knew from previous observation that her fingers were never more than a few inches from a panel of screens that, when touched, could do everything from locking every door in the building to lowering a steel curtain between the entrance and the receptionist. Behind her, a mir rored wall was actually two-way glass, giving a complete view of the lobby to armed men who waited in perpetual readiness for whatever situation might arise. The place's security was second only to the White House's.
Kim imitated a smile, flashing teeth that would have inspired any orthodontist. 'Help you, sir?'
'Good morning, Kim. I'm Jason Peters, and I'm expected.'
She gave Jason a slow inspection, making no effort to conceal the fact that she was appraising him in the same way she might decide whether an insect was likely to sting or bite. Under other circumstances he might have taken a lingering look like that as interest, but her manner was of one who had no intent of inviting personal overtures. An expensive fur coat draped over the far corner of the counter explained a lot. He doubted Kim could have purchased it on her salary. She already had a 'friend' with a bankroll.
Girls like Kim got minks the same way minks got minks.
'If you'll just step over here, sir.'
Jason was familiar with the drill. Extending both arms, he placed the thumb of each hand on a screen that was part of the top of the desk.
She watched a monitor behind the desk. 'Mr. Peters, I see you have a meeting in a few minutes. Know your way?'
'Indeed I do.' He walked to the left of the desk, bowing slightly. 'A delight to have made your acquaintance.'
Kim had already returned to staring at the monitors in front of her.
A previously invisible door wheezed open, and Jason entered a small room, where he was patted down by one man while another, an M16A2 assault rifle in the crook of his arm, observed. A large dog of indeterminate breed sniffed for explosives.
The dog made Jason think of Pangloss, and he wished they both were back in the low-tech world of the Turks and Caicos. By now the day would be well under way there, the sun up hours ago. Reality intruded and he sighed, aware that it was unlikely he would ever claim North Caicos as a residence again, not if he wanted to stay alive. The place would be under observation.
'You'll have to empty your pockets.'
Jason produced the rental car keys, a handful of change, and a small pocketknife.
The man not holding the rifle looked skeptically at the latter. 'This some sort of weapon?'
'Not if you're attacking anything larger than a mouse. The blade is less than two inches long.'
A moment of indecision. Jason could almost hear the line of thought: if box cutters could be used to take over airliners…
Jason handed it over. 'Tell you what: you hold it till I come back through. If I have to kill someone, I'll do it with my bare hands.'
'Thank you, sir.' The man was clearly happy to be relieved of having to make a decision. 'It'll be waiting for you.'
As Jason stepped forward, there was a buzz, the snick of heavy bolts sliding, and the door on the other side of the room whirred open. A bank of two elevators faced him. Jason knew there were no buttons for selection of floors inside either. The cars moved at the direction of people elsewhere in the building.
Two floors up, another man greeted him with an expressionless face and voice to match. 'This way, Mr. Peters.'
Without waiting for a reply, he turned to precede Jason down a corridor flanked with steel doors.
The hall was deserted, filled with only the faint hum of electronic equipment and the sound of four shoes squeaking on linoleum. At the end a door swung open, throwing a beam of light into the otherwise dim hall. Framed in silhouette was a woman whose features appeared clearer as he drew close. Not old but not young, either. She wore listless brown hair in a bun behind her long, thin face.
She dismissed his escort and extended a slender hand to touch Jason's. The feel of her skin was as arid and cool as the first autumn breezes along the Potomac. She wore the fragrance he remembered, something that smelled of dried flowers.
'Bond, James Bond, to see M,' he said in an overdone British accent.
She favored him with the threat of a smile. 'Hello, Jason. Good to see you again. You're looking fit, all tan. The tropics must agree with you.'
'Certainly more than Washington, Miss Tyson.'
She clucked disapprovingly. 'Now, now, Jason. We're happy to see you again.'
He wondered if the pronoun included her boss. He had never known the boss to be happy about anything that didn't involve death, destruction, and mayhem of some sort.
'Nice to see you again, too.'
Still holding his hand, she drew him across the threshold and the door silently swung shut.
Jason glanced around, noting the lack of change. The same bleak reception area, furnished with only a desk and secretarial chair that faced a worn leather couch. The walls were without windows or pictures. The room had the personality of a dial tone. He had often wondered how someone could spend time in such quarters, looking at nothing. Particularly if, as was the case with Miss Tyson, they never seemed to have anything to do. Perhaps she came in here only when her boss was expecting someone.
As though reading his thoughts, she pointed to the only wooden door he had seen in the building. 'Go right in.'
He knocked briskly, the comparatively mellow thump of wood somehow soothing after all the steel, and the door opened.
On the other side, the office was as lavish as Miss Tyson's space was spartan. Jason stepped onto the muted blues and reds of an antique Khurasan that cost more than most houses. The rug's colors were softly repeated in four original Renoirs whose gilt frames hung on fabric wall covering. An Edwardian breakfront occupied most of the far wall, behind its rippled glass a collection of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century first editions. Floating on the rug's center medallion like a ship adrift, a mahogany partners' desk was topped with hand-tooled, gold-edged
Behind the desk sat an enormous black woman clad in a flowing caftan with an African print. With a hand the size of a catcher's mitt, she held the receiver of the telephone that was the only item on the desk. With the other, she motioned Jason into one of four Scalamandre silk wing chairs arranged in a semicircle in front of her.
He was unable to understand the language she was speaking, but, from the rare familiar word and hand gestures that accompanied each utterance, he guessed it was some dialect of Arabic or Farsi. He sat and waited.
Jason had to smile as he watched her, the ultimate minority-business-program beneficiary. An emigre from Haiti, she was simultaneously black, female, and non-Christian, embracing a belief in the African gods of voodoo and Santeria. She was the poster girl for politicians espousing egalitarianism above all. Unlike many such recipients of government largesse, however, she had qualifications beyond race, sex, and religion. As former second in command of her native land's Tonton Macoute, she was skilled at interrogation, torture, assassination, and manipulation of the political process, a resume the awareness of which no elected official could admit. Had anyone demurred at the government doing business with a person previously associated with an organization whose brutality made Hitler's Gestapo look like Boy Scouts, he would have been denounced not only as a racial and religious bigot, but sexist as well.
She served her only client well and was generously compensated for taking on unsavory tasks to which no democratically elected government could admit, but which no government, democratic or otherwise, could do without. Any scruples she possessed related only to her 'boys' and to the proper preparation of the fiery Creole cuisine of her homeland. Dealing with the nation's enemies of today required an unrelenting barbarity that made
