Hidden Agendas

Japan.'

Her hands felt damn good on his neck as she kneaded the tight muscles there. 'Uh-huh,' he said. 'You don't want to go back to Africa? See your homeland?'

'Sheeit, what I want to do that for? There's plenty of black folks in this country.'

He laughed. He liked her. 'Maybe next time I get to Japan, I'll bring you back a souvenir.'

'I'd like that. A nice red silk kimono.'

Platt rolled over. She lifted a little, then settled back down over his legs when he got turned. He grinned at her. 'One red silk kee-moan-oh, no problem.'

'My, would you look at that?' she said. She flashed even, white teeth, bright against her chocolate skin. 'What do we have here?' She reached down. He slid his hands around under her butt and lifted her slightly. Hel-looo, baby!

Tuesday, December 21st, 8:15 p.m. Washington, D.C.

In his office, Hughes finished a synopsis of what he wanted White to say at his meeting with the vice president tomorrow before White went back to Ohio for the holidays.

There was a knock at the door. Speak of the devil.

'Bob?'

'I thought I'd find you still here,' White said. He sauntered into the office and put a small package onto the desk. 'Christmas present. You didn't think I'd forget, did you?'

Hughes smiled. 'Now how could I think, that, Bob? I wrote the reminder in your day log myself.'

Both men laughed.

Hughes reached into the drawer, pulled out a Christmas-wrapped box, and handed it to White. It was hard to buy stuff for a millionaire who bought himself whatever he fancied, but Hughes always worked to find something unusual. And he knew White loved being surprised.

'Can I open it?' Just like a kid.

'Sure.'

Eagerly, the senator ripped off the green and red foil and pulled the lid from the box. He removed what looked like a small leather candy dish mounted on a wooden stand from the box. Inside the leathery cup was a game infoball, an iridescent, silvery orb the size of a marble, made to be slipped into a SonySega PlayStation, a device that White had owned since the first ones had come out. He looked at Hughes and raised one eyebrow.

'That's the beta-test full-VR version of DinoWarz II,' Hughes said. 'Won't be generally available for a few more months.'

'Really? Wow, thanks, Tom! How'd you get it?'

'I have a few contacts in the right places.'

White rolled the ball in his fingers, and Hughes could see he was itching to run home and play the game. The senator looked at the container. 'This a candy dish? Looks unusual.'

'It's a plastic-coated bull scrotum,' Hughes said.

'What? You're kidding.'

'Nope. I can think of a few people you might want to offer peppermints to from it.'

White laughed and shook his head. 'Well, I'll be taking the family jet home in the morning. You need a ride anywhere?'

'Nope. I'm hanging around here, finally be able to get some work done with you out of the way.'

They laughed again.

'Guess I better open my present now,' Hughes said.

He did so. Inside was a carved ivory figurine, seven or eight inches long, a woman stretched out, lying on her side, propped on one elbow. Hughes knew what it was. It was a Chinese medical doll. Once upon a time in China, women of breeding never let any man but their husbands see them unclad, sometimes not even their husbands. When they needed to see a doctor, they took the doll with them. When the doctor asked where the pain was, they showed him on the figurine, and he made his diagnosis based on that and symptoms, without ever seeing or touching his patient's body. Knowing White, Hughes figured this statuette was probably worth a fortune. The work was exquisite.

Hughes made appropriate noises. 'It's beautiful, Bob. Thank you.'

'Well, it isn't a bull scrotum, but it's the best I could do. It belonged to some emperor's wife or concubine, I forget which. Bertha's got the documentation on it. She'll give it to you after we get back from the holidays.'

'I appreciate it, I truly do. Working with you has been so beneficial to me, I can't begin to tell you how much.'

That was surely the truth.

'I couldn't have ever gotten the job without you, Tom. Merry Christmas.'

'Merry Christmas,' Hughes said. And with any luck at all, the New Year will be my best ever — though it might be your worst, when the shit hits the fan…

Chapter Ten

Wednesday, December 22nd, 8:25 a.m. Quantico, Virginia

Alex Michaels wanted to keep the staff meeting short so they could get back to their desks. With Christmas only a few days away, not much work was getting done as everybody geared up to go off for the holidays. The office didn't shut down, of course, there was always a skeleton staff, but anybody not stuck with that duty who wanted to take off early could do so. He looked around the conference room, at his primary players: Toni, Jay, Howard, and Joanna Winthrop. They were all senior enough, except for Joanna, and she was working out of Howard's command, so they didn't have to stick around here for Christmas.

'Okay, that pretty much covers the basics. You all know this poster business is critical, so take your flatscreens and if you get any bright ideas, log them in for the rest of us.'

He already knew their plans, and no matter where they were, they'd keep grinding away at this thing. Toni was going home to the Bronx for a week's visit with her family. She'd be back next Wednesday. Jay's parents were visiting relatives in Thailand, so he was hanging around the city and would probably would spend much of the time here at HQ. Howard had relatives visiting. He'd be in town. Joanna was going to meet an old friend at a mountain cabin in Colorado. She'd be back Monday. And Michaels was going to Boise to see Susie. And Megan too.

There was a case of mixed emotions.

'Anybody got anything new?'

Jay said, 'Well, I came across some interesting statistics in the new Murray Morbidity and Mortality Report. According to the MMMR, life expectancy for men in Washington, D.C., is the lowest of any metropolitan area in the country. In fact, it's lower than any rural area too, except for a couple of counties in South Dakota. Sixty-three years. Whereas if you live in Cache County, Utah, you can expect to live fifteen years longer, a ripe old seventy- eight. And you can add eight or ten years to both those numbers if you're a woman.'

'I bet it feels a lot longer in Washington,' Howard said.

'I don't know,' Toni said. 'Have you ever been in Utah?'

'Yeah,' Jay said. 'I think maybe they all get too bored to die.'

Michaels smiled. 'Fascinating. Anything that might relate to what we do in this agency, Jay?'

'Nope. I got through the poster's firewalls, but the trail petered out, a dead-end in a box canyon. I haven't been able to draw a bead on him since.'

'Yee-haw,' Joanna said quietly.

'Excuse me?' Alex asked.

'Private joke,' she said. 'Sorry.'

'All right. That's it. If one of you catches the poster before we take off for the holiday, I'd bet big that Santa Claus will put something nice in your stocking, a Presidential Commendation at the least.'

'Oh, boy,' Jay said. 'A new floor for my parakeet's cage.'