The phone rings for a while before someone picks up. “Cactus Bar and Grill.”
I rack my brain, trying to remember the proper countersign. “What time is happy hour?”
The guy on the other end sounds bored. “Happy hour is all day, every day.”
“24-7,” I say. “And is it still ladies’ night every night?”
That should be the call-and-response to let the operator know I’m legit, even if it is a couple of years out of date.
“That’s right,” he says. “Anything else I can do for you?”
“Is Nick there?”
Long pause. “Who wants to know?
“I need to leave a message for Nick.”
Another long pause. “Nobody by that name here.”
I’ve been out of the loop for a while, but I can’t believe Cantrell would shut down all his old listening posts. He might not be officially CIA anymore, but he’s still plugged in deep.
“He was a regular there. I need to get in touch with him. Can you take my number, at least? Just in case he comes in.”
“I told you. There’s no Nick here. Sorry.”
“If Nick comes in, let him know I called.”
“Whatever, man.”
He hangs up, and I get the impression I annoyed a perfectly normal bartender for no good reason.
I wait for five minutes, then another ten. Then another ten. Kelsey waits, not sure what I’m doing, but not willing to disturb me.
I’m just about to give up and call some other old numbers when the phone rings.
I hesitate a moment. Then I curse myself for waiting. If you’ve decided to do something, even if it’s hard, you do it. Waiting around doesn’t make the choice any easier.
I pick up the phone and hear the voice of the man who taught me that.
“You must be desperate,” Cantrell says. “Nobody’s called the Cactus in a long time.”
“Well, you didn’t send me a new decoder ring this year.”
He laughs. “That’s what happens when you quit the official Captain Midnight club, kid. You gotta pay the dues if you want to remain a junior birdman. How’s things going?”
I suspect he already knows what’s going on, but I give him a brief, edited version anyway. The job, getting burned, and now being tracked with a kill order on my head.
“Sounds like you got a problem,” Cantrell says.
“Who’s looking out for Preston? As soon as my name came up, they told him to terminate me. What the hell is he into?”
Cantrell laughs again. “You asking me?”
“You always had all the answers.”
“So what makes you think I’m going to give them to you? We already covered this. You quit.”
“Fine,” I say. “Nice talking to you. I’ll see you around.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa there. No need to go sulk in your room yet, princess. I might be able to help you out.”
“I’ll survive on my own. I’m pretty good at that, remember?”
“I’m not so sure anymore,” Cantrell says. He drops the down-home glaze, and his voice becomes clinical and cold. “You’ve got no money, no weapons, no base of operations, and no way to get any of that back without exposure. You’re dragging a civilian around. Even with your talents and training, this story only ends with you on an autopsy table. You’ve fucked the dog pretty good here, John. Honestly, I trained you better than this.”
That stings. I’m surprised—and annoyed—by how much I still want Cantrell to think well of me.
“Why do I get the feeling you knew all this before I ever picked up the phone?”
I can hear the smile in Cantrell’s voice when he answers. At least I redeemed myself a little bit with that question.
“Well, I thought you might get in touch. Preston asked his friends to check you out. I might not be on the official payroll anymore, but they still come to me when one of my kids is out there causing trouble.”
That makes sense. Anyone who wanted information on me would go straight to Cantrell. Which means he’s had plenty of time to think about my problems.
“See, your mistake was underestimating your target. You thought your bullshit cover story would hold up. But you weren’t expecting someone with real muscle to start looking at it. People with access to classified files. Like your personnel records.”
That narrows it down. There are a couple of black-ops agencies with that kind of clearance. But only one that would have the information available that quickly, just sitting on the other end of a search query.
“You’re telling me Preston is working for the CIA?”
Cantrell laughs at the tone in my voice. “Not like it’s an exclusive club. They hired you, didn’t they? Anyway, when those people found out who you were, they immediately gave him the order to drop you because they don’t want you peeking inside his head. Too many secrets in there. Lots of stuff they don’t want out in the world.”
“Like what?”
“Come on, son. That’s classified.”
“They didn’t tell you, did they?”
He laughs. “That’s not considered part of my operational area these days. But let me run a little hypothetical past you. You know the CIA has its own venture capital arm, right? Investing in high-tech companies for the good of the nation and all that?”
“Sure.” Everyone who reads Forbes knows that. It’s called In-Q-Tel.
“Right. The guys you’re up against, they’re like the quiet version of that. The one that doesn’t put out press releases. They’re the ones backing Preston and OmniVore.”
“Yeah, but everybody knows the CIA invests in these kind of companies. It’s not a secret. Why would they suddenly start dropping kill orders?”
Cantrell makes a tsking noise, like this should be obvious. “Well, John, why do you think? You’ve already seen what data mining can do if it’s turned against you. Preston’s got access to every fact in the public record about you. He had your bank account numbers, your address, your mortgage, your passwords, everything, in just a couple hours. What does that tell you?”
I feel like I’m back in training. But I answer anyway. “That he’s inside every one of OmniVore’s clients. He built backdoors into all of their data.”
“Pretty good guess,” Cantrell says. “Now, do you think the CIA might have some interest in the hidden data of every major corporation that’s hired OmniVore? You think they might have some use for searching through every financial transaction a bank makes? Every stock sale that goes through a major brokerage? Being able to trace every credit-card purchase of any customer they want, anywhere they go, anytime? Searching through the flight records of every major airline to find a particular passenger? Every email you’ve ever written, every dick pic you sent your girlfriend, every drug you’ve ever been prescribed—”
“I get it, I get it,” I say. I’m not a complete amateur, the last twenty-four hours notwithstanding. “The CIA can finally compete with the NSA, using America’s most trusted brand names to do the spying for them.”
“Right,” he says, and to my shame, I feel like I just got an A from the teacher. “So you can see how they might be a little leery about having someone like you—a free agent, nobody watching you anymore, totally outside the chain of command—knowing all the same secrets that Preston knows. You can probably imagine the shitstorm that the Agency would have to endure if any of this got out. People are already paranoid enough about their privacy settings on Facebook. Imagine how the Fortune 500 would feel if they discovered that the company they hired to protect their data was actually sluicing everything over to the CIA? The blood would be knee-deep in the streets in Washington. Hell, someone might even have to quit and go get a high-paying job as a lobbyist. Much easier to have him kill you. Which is one reason they’ve got a squad of heavy hitters following that boy everywhere he goes.”
“But they didn’t tell him everything about me,” I say. “Preston’s men had no idea what they were up against.”
“Maybe they thought he didn’t need to know. You’re still considered a pretty big national secret yourself.”
“Not as valuable as Preston, apparently.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Cantrell says, and lets it hang there.
And here it is. Cantrell is not on the line with me out of charity. There’s always a motive. Nothing’s free.
“Something tells me you’re going to offer me a solution here.”
“Really? You must be psychic.”
God, I am getting tired of that joke. “I’ve heard you pitch before. I know the rhythms.”
“You’re right. I can make all your problems go away.”
“How?”
“Come back in.”
I’m actually stunned into silence. Times like this, I wish my talent worked over the phone.
“You want me to work for you again?”
“And America. Motherhood. Apple pie. The USA and Chevrolet. Truth and Justice. All the good stuff. We invested a lot into you, John. As much as it pains me to say it, you were one of our best. We’d take you back.”
“And my problems with Preston?”
“Disappear,” Cantrell says.
“You have got to be kidding. You just told me the Agency wants me dead.”
“There are wheels within wheels, John, and my father’s house has many rooms,” Cantrell says. “There are always a shitload of competing agendas. You know that. Someone panicked. Made a bad decision. But we can rectify that now. After all, you’ll be on the right side again. Nobody would worry about you running around with their secrets once you’re back inside the fence.”
He sounds serious. For a moment, it’s tempting. There’s a lot to be said for having the government on your side. It’s like having a big brother to beat up all the bullies in your neighborhood—except he’s armed with nuclear weapons and billions of dollars. It’s certainly working out pretty well for Preston right now.
There’s only one bit of sand in the gears. Kelsey.
“What about the civilian?” I ask.
“What about her?”
“Can you guarantee her safety?”
Kelsey’s been listening to my half of the conversation the whole time, but now her attention sharpens on me like a needle.
“She must be a looker.”
I wait.
“Negotiable,” he finally says.
“Not good enough.”
“Whoa, a looker and good in bed too. If she cooks, marry her.”
“I’m serious.”
“What do you want from me? You’re talking about some big secrets here. And she’s not part of the family. I’m telling you she’s got a better chance of surviving if you’re inside the tent than if you’re outside pissing in. That’s the best you’re going to get.”
I suspect he’s right. Cantrell never lied to me—depending on how you define a lie, of course. This seems like the best deal I’m likely to get.
Not so great for Kelsey, admittedly.
“Son, you’re up shit creek and I’m driving the honey wagon,” Cantrell says when I don’t answer. “You going to jump aboard or not?”
Kelsey is still looking at me. Cantrell waits.
For a long moment, I don’t have an answer for either of them.
“Let me get back to you,” I say.
“You and your goddamn conscience. This is a limited-time offer. You know that.”
“I know. Twenty-four hours. I’ll call back at this number.”
Cantrell sighs. “If that’s what your pride requires. Don’t wait too long.”
An ugly little suspicion occurs to me. Before I can stop myself, I open my mouth and let it out.
“You know, I have to wonder. All of this seems almost designed to get me out of the private sector and back into government work. My client flakes out on me, Preston steals everything I own and puts a price on my head. It’s like someone’s cutting off all my alternatives. Then I call you, and you magically have a job offer waiting.”
A long pause. “You got a question for me, John?”
“These people you talk about behind Preston—any of them happen to sit in your chair? Did you set me up, Cantrell?”
That brings another laugh. It even sounds genuine. “No,” he says. “You give me too much credit. No way I could have planned this. I’m just improvising here, trying to find the silver lining in this clusterfuck for all of us.”
Then he pauses.
“But, son, even if I did, do you think I’d ever be stupid enough to admit it?”
He’s still chuckling when he hangs up.
Like I said, there are times I wish my talent worked over the phone. Then again, sometimes, it’s probably better that it doesn’t.
There are some things I don’t really want to know.