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Vice President-elect Ross strode across the room and stopped at the far end of the conference table. He was in a charcoal gray wool suit with a white shirt and a silver-and-blue tie. In his manicured right hand he held a copy of theTimes. He threw it down on the conference table, unbuttoned his suit coat, and placed a hand on each hip.
“I have great appreciation for how difficult this business is, but this can’t continue. I’m trying to save your jobs right now.” Ross pointed to each of the four. “I’ve explained to Josh that we have a good team at Langley. I don’t agree with everything you do, but I’ve told him you are competent people. Now, this morning I wake up to this, and I’ve got the next president of the United States asking me if I’ve lost my mind.”
Ross paused. He looked at Ke
No one answered. In fact Ke
Ross’s fiery eyes settled on her. “I’m under direct orders from President-Elect Alexander to get to the bottom of this and put it behind us as quickly as possible. Please tell me this reporter has got it all wrong. That there is a simple explanation for why Mitch Rapp shot this man four times.”
Ke
Ke
Ke
“Sir,” Ke
“That sounds like damn lawyer speak,” Ross snarled.
Ke
Ross’s nostrils flared in anger. He hesitated for a split second before answering and then said, “I expect you to do your job, and I expect you to follow the law. Get this mess sorted out and do it fast, or you’re all going to be looking for new jobs. And that comes straight from Alexander himself.” Ross turned and marched out of the office.
Ke
Ke
“We’re done?” a surprised Billings asked.
“Yes. We’ll reconvene right here at one.”
All three men grabbed their stuff and got up to leave. Ke
“Do I need to bring anything?”
“No.” Ke
“Are you going to meet Rivera?”
“Yes.”
“Expand your search to Ross. See if she can get you the Secret Service logs from his detail, and ask Marcus if he thinks he can do a workup on him without raising too much suspicion.”
“I’ll take care of it. When is your press conference?”
“I’m leaving to see the president shortly. I’ll call you and let you know how it goes.” Ke
43
Special Agent Rivera sat at her desk and flipped through the Yellow Pages. She foundKarate, and underneath it saidsee Martial Arts. She flipped through the pages to the M’s and found it. There were six full pages of listings in the DC area. She shook her head and began searching for one between the office and her apartment. When she’d arrived at the dojo this morning, she found the contents of her locker waiting for her in a brown grocery bag by the front door. Her sensei was in the middle of teaching a class, and he didn’t bother to come out and talk to her, or for that matter make eye contact. She was being thrown out after only five weeks, and she didn’t need to ask why.
Rivera stopped reading the listings and closed her eyes. What in the hell am I doing? she asked herself. She felt as if her whole life was falling apart around her. For three straight months she’d been in denial. She knew her career was over, but she was hanging on in hopes that they would give her a second chance. One of her bosses had actually told her yesterday that he was recommending grief counseling. The bastard, she thought.
She’d asked him if he thought she needed the counseling to deal with the loss of her fellow agents who had died in the attack or for her career which was now dead. He looked at her stone-faced and told her no one blamed her for what had gone wrong. He was probably right about that, but it didn’t change the fact that no one wanted her around. She was a living, breathing reminder of one of the Service’s worst days since Dallas in 1963. Another colleague told her to get out of Washington. Take an assignment in Miami or L.A. Work counterfeit and fraud. It was challenging and gratifying work, and if she didn’t want to do that, she could at least apply for the Joint Counterterrorism Center. Do anything just so long as it didn’t involve working Personal Protection.