Operator B

woman thought when she first saw him. A hardcore military type? A busted old man? At least he kept in shape. The women were all wonderful actors. They acted like nothing was wrong when they saw his…

From the marbled bathroom, he heard the hiss of the shower creak off. At the same time, though, the intercom on the nightstand beeped.

“Sir, this is the CQ. Is everything all right?”

“Yes, Sergeant,” Farrington answered. “Everything’s terrific.”

“Your dinner will be ready in—”

“Cancel it. I’m not hungry.”

“Sir, you haven’t eaten all day. I really think—”

“Cancel it,” Farrington repeated with more edge in his voice. “And I don’t want to be bothered for the rest of the night. That’s an order.”

A long hesitation. “Yes, sir.”

The intercom clicked off.

Steam gusted like smoke when the bathroom door opened. The young woman sauntered out on beautiful long legs, all curves, flawless white skin, and green eyes like emerald fire. She was still trying, he had to give her that. But sometimes even men had “headaches.”

She stood fully naked, unabashed, drying herself with the terry towel. “Some men like to watch, they like to look,” she said.

Ain’t working tonight, baby. “You’re very beautiful,” he admitted. But then so was his wife, who’d swallowed a bottle of insecticide a year after his “death” had been relayed to her. If that wasn’t love, what was?

The woman propped one foot up on the bed, slowly drew the towel down her thigh and calf. “Hmm?”

Farrington knew the score. The Air Force contracted these girls all the time—the ones who weren’t drug addicts or street scum—and paid them to “surrogate” special personnel. Sex ops, they were called; this whore probably had a Secret clearance. They mainly catered to the sexual whims of double agents in hiding, or demanding defectors.

And then there’s me, he thought. The one man the Air Force wants to keep happier than anyone else.

He watched the sway of her perfect breasts as she continued with the towel. A quick glimpse at the soft thatch of her pubis nearly had him going. But he was tired of using people, just as he was often so tired of being used. That, or: Maybe I’m just getting old.

“Take your pants off,” she whispered through the most sultry of grins. “I’ll get you in the mood.”

“No, really. Too much on my mind, you know?”

She stood straight, dumbfounded. “Well…this is the first time I’ve ever taken a shower in a client’s place before I got dirty.”

“I thought you’d like the digs,” Farrington jested. “How many bathrooms you seen with genuine marble tile and gold fixtures?”

“Not many,” she said. Clearly, though, she was insulted. She began to put her clothes back on right in front of him, her lips pursed.

Why should he care? Nevertheless, Farrington got up, walked to the silver cart and poured her a glass of Epernon from the obsidian black bottle in ice. “They always bring me these fancy wines when I have, uh, guests,” he said and passed her the glass.

She stared at his hands for a moment, then took it.

“Aren’t you having any?”

“No,” he said. “I don’t drink. I quit drinking in 1975 when Giap took Saigon. By then, I’d drunk enough Ba M’Ba to fill a gas station.”

“God, this is wonderful,” she commented, sipping. Then she picked up the bottle. “Jesus, this was bottled in 1914!”

“You like it?”

“Well, yes, but—”

Farrington stuffed the cork back in it, put it in a bag. “Take it. Show off to your friends.”

“Well…thanks.” She was dumbfounded—by the entire night. Farrington guessed the barrack chiefs had already paid her a thousand dollars for this. It was only money.

“But I’m sorry, you know,” he said, “about the rest. Thanks for stopping by.”

The woman looked confused through tousles of wet chestnut hair. “They paid me to stay till morning.”

“Well then tonight’s your lucky night. You’re off early.”

She blinked, incomprehension in the slits of her eyes. “Is there something—”

“Nothing wrong with you at all,” he said. “I guess I’m having my period tonight.”

She spared a laugh.

“The CQ will have a driver take you home,” Farrington said.

She shrugged. “It’s your dime.”

Not really, it’s the taxpayers’. “I’m glad you like the wine. But let me ask you something.” Farrington’s jaw set. He looked at her, then held up his strangely mittened hands. “Aren’t you going to ask about…this?”

“They told me not to ask anything.”

“Of course.” What was he thinking? “Good night…and take care of yourself.”

He showed her out, locked the ornate double doors behind her. That’s right, honey. Tonight’s your lucky night…and tomorrow’s my lucky day.

He was staring into the mirror over a Hepplewhite dresser. An image flashed, and he saw himself a decade younger: firing up the grill on the patio of his Oxen Hill home. His smiling wife bringing out a bowl of potato salad to the picnic table. His perfect little daughter playing in the sandbox.

Then the image dissolved into the chisel-faced secret staring back at him.

The strange black mittens touched the dresser’s brass knobs. He slid open the drawer, releasing a cedary scent of old wood. The framed picture of his wife remained face-down, as it always would. He couldn’t look at it, but he couldn’t throw it away either. Beside it, though, face up, lay a photograph from the ‘70s: Farrington, a major, standing in his Marine Corp flight suit on the ladder ramp of his Harrier V8B. He was surprised they’d let him keep it; any photograph of him was classified now.

His face was classified. All files of his existence had been officially deleted.

I’m deleted, he thought.

“Esprit d’corp,” he whispered to himself. “Ain’t duty grand?”

He stared at the drawer’s remaining contents—trinkets. A Purple Heart, three Silver Stars, a Distinguished Service Cross, a Congressional Medal of Honor that Jimmy Carter had draped around his neck.

Only one more thing remained in the drawer…

««—»»

The compound loomed behind her, a quiet fortress in plumes of sodium light. She kept the bottle of wine tucked under her arm, her high heels ticking across cement as she approached the lit gatehouse.

Her name was Tina, not that names mattered. She’d joined the Army in 1993 at age eighteen, hoping to escape a drunk mother and abusive father. When she’d passed the polygraphs—Have you ever taken drugs? Do you gamble? Have you ever committed an act of theft?—INSCOM had plucked her out of Basic and launched her career as a restricted sexual surrogate. A whore by any other name. She didn’t care. She liked sex, and the money was good.

“Hello,” she said. She held up the bottle of wine. “He said I could have this.”

The young Air Force driver nodded at the gate. “One moment, please, ma’am,” and he took the bottle into the gatehouse where an SP in a white helmet inspected it. A drab-blue government van sat just past the gatehouse, a door open. The van had no windows in the back, a protocol Tina was used to. She wasn’t allowed to know where she was.

“Ma’am?”