take a chance on you. So there it is,” he finished. “Time to roll the bones.”
Danielle failed to suppress a grin. It made sense to her. It fact, it actually seemed fair. The bargain itself would probably infuriate Gibbs, but that almost made it more appealing. “All right,” she said. “I’ll take your offer. I can’t promise anything until I have it cleared, so I won’t. But I’ll talk to the people I know and if there’s a deal to be had, I’ll give it to you. Fair enough?”
“Fair enough for me.”
As Hawker finished, a broad-shouldered man with a thick moustache and deep tan approached. With his impeccably moussed hair and a spotless white dinner jacket, he looked like a movie star from a bygone era. He carried two glasses in one hand and an expensive bottle of Chilean wine in the other. He introduced himself as Eduardo, owner of the club and sometime benefactor of young Mr. Hawker. The two friends shook hands and then Eduardo turned his full attention to Danielle.
“Who is this lovely vision?” he asked. “And what great misfortune has her spending the evening in such company?”
Hawker feigned distress at Eduardo’s comment even as Danielle held out her hand. “Pleased to meet you,” she said. “My name is Danielle.”
Eduardo smiled, kissed her hand, then turned back to Hawker. “An American,” he noted. “Like you.”
“An American,” Hawker said. “But not like me.”
Eduardo raised an eyebrow. “A good thing for her, no doubt.”
“No doubt,” Hawker said.
Eduardo turned serious. “You ran into a problem.”
“I can’t tell you what they look like,” Hawker said. “Or even what they’re wearing. But I’d guess they’re still searching for us.”
“Don’t worry,” Eduardo said. “I’ll send you home in my car. In the meantime I’ve put some extra men on, friends from the
Hawker looked pained. “This is your biggest night, that’s going to cost you.”
Eduardo laughed softly and then turned to Danielle. “Our friend Hawker, he’s okay, but not too bright when it comes to business. I know of no better way to attract a crowd than to tell them they can’t get in. I’ll do this again tomorrow night and all through the week and by next Friday, I can double the prices and still fill the place three times over.” Eduardo shook his head softly. “Already I’m asking myself, why didn’t I think of this years ago?”
“I owe you for this,” Hawker said.
“No,” Eduardo said. “Not you.”
His attention returned to Danielle. “I’m afraid I must leave you for a while.” He placed the bottle of wine on the table. “But please, cheer him up while I’m gone. He’s far too serious for one sitting with such a beautiful woman.”
Danielle smiled at Hawker, and then back at Eduardo. “I’ll do my best.”
With that Eduardo bowed and stepped away.
“Your friend is charming.”
“Yeah,” Hawker said, rolling his eyes. “I think he likes you too.” He picked up the bottle of wine, examined the label and then uncorked it and let it breathe. “Looks like we’re going to be here for a while,” he said. “Might as well make the best of it.”
She agreed and pushed her glass across the table toward him.
CHAPTER 8
Arnold Moore had returned to Washington, his residence in absentia for three decades spent traipsing the world. In all that time, he’d spent less than a thousand days in Washington, and never longer than two months at a stretch. After so much time away, returning felt awkward, like being a stranger in his own land, a guest in his own empty home.
Still, this time it would be different. He’d come back to a career winding down and a superior who appeared to be growing tired of their endless clashes. This time, Moore reckoned, he’d come home for good.
Stuart Gibbs, director of operations, was a fairly paranoid man—paranoid and grossly ambitious, a combination that had led to many a metaphorical beheading of former colleagues and confidants. Based on the deteriorating tone of their last few conversations, Moore guessed he was next on the chopping block.
As if to reinforce the point, Stuart Gibbs had spoken to him only once since his arrival. No explanations had been offered and Moore’s repeated calls since had been blatantly ignored. Now, after a week of such treatment, he’d been summoned to a meeting. If it was to be his end, then he intended to air his grievances.
To meet with Gibbs, Moore traveled to the NRI’s main office, a sprawling campus known as the Virginia Industrial Complex, or more affectionately the VIC. The VIC consisted of five sleek buildings nestled among rolling hills, winding paths and rustic stone walls. The glass-walled structures were modern and attractive, the paths around them lit and manicured like those at an expensive resort. Even with the trees and lawns dormant for the winter, the complex felt more like a university mall or suburban office park than anything governmental in nature. Only the presence of armed guards in the parking lot, with their bomb-sniffing dogs and long mirrored poles, suggested otherwise.
Looking forward to the meeting, Moore arrived at the lot early and began a determined march through the crisp January air. Because of a quirk in the topography of the land, the five buildings that made up the complex lay spaced at odd intervals, with four clustered on the eastern side of the property and the fifth, housing the Operations Division and its director, Stuart Gibbs, alone on the western edge, separated from the others by a low-lying ridge and a row of seventy-foot oaks. As a result, Building Five wasn’t visible from the street or the main gate or even from the other structures, and one had to make a lengthy winding trek to reach it. It was supposedly a random occurrence, one Moore had his doubts about, but either way it had always struck him as both ironic and perfectly symbolic of the NRI’s dual and conflicting nature.
The NRI had come into existence in the late ’90s, a Frankenstein’s monster of an organization, divided and charged with two completely separate tasks. The Research Division, its main component, worked with corporate America, universities and leading entrepreneurs. Under that umbrella, corporate members gained access to advanced facilities, specialist personnel and reams of declassified data from NASA and the military. Its purpose was to boost the fortunes of American industry, to counter the subsidies and government assistance that corporations in Europe and Japan enjoyed.
But Research Division was only part of the organization, sometimes referred to as the civilian side. There was another side to the NRI, a darker side, and that was the Operations Division.
Six months after NRI’s creation—and well before the first shovel of dirt had turned at the VIC—a rider was attached to a last-minute spending bill being rushed through Congress. The rider amended the NRI’s charter, effectively dividing the organization in two, or more accurately adding a new division to the NRI’s existing structure. That new entity was called Operations Division, or OpD.
OpD was tasked with a more sinister mission—the active gathering of industrial secrets, including those belonging to foreign powers and entities. In other words, industrial espionage. Appropriately, OpD had been run from its very inception by former members of the CIA, beginning with its director, Stuart Gibbs.
To the outside world the change was invisible. OpD appeared to be almost irrelevant, little more than the support apparatus for Research Division, a handmaiden to its charming and successful big sister. It was Research Division that garnered all the press, Research Division that senators and CEOs enjoyed being linked to, that articles in
As Moore walked past the other buildings he couldn’t help but smile. In all his years with the NRI he’d yet to set foot in any of them—a fact that wasn’t going to change today. Whatever the future held, it waited for him on the other side of the hill, with Stuart Gibbs, in Building Five.
At the end of his half-mile trek, Moore felt energized. He bounded up the steps and into the lobby, flashed his
