He rubbed his hand against his forehead and took a long, deep, clear-your-head-in-the-morning breath.
Definitely too many cocktails last night.
Hungover, okay, yes. But there was something else, something vague that came back to him, like a memory on the edge of memories, as if he were trying to make out a shape encircled in mist but not quite being able to.
A figure walking with him. Foggy, but that much was clear.
A woman.
Yes.
The memory had to do with a woman, that much he could tell. He couldn’t picture her face or even remember what she wore, but he did recall meeting her and coming back to the room with her and then…
Oh.
No.
Immediately, he went to his wallet to see if he might have been robbed after he passed out, but all his credit cards and even his cash were there. The cash surprised him since, had she been a hooker, he imagined he would have paid her before they got started, or at least she would have taken her payment with her when she left.
As all those thoughts rolled through his mind, he found himself staring blankly at his wedding ring.
He’d kept it on last night. He didn’t always do that, but he hadn’t been planning on picking anyone up when he left his hotel room.
Then again, it was Vegas.
Not quite subconsciously, he covered the ring with his other hand.
Roger traveled a lot, was gone on business nearly every week, so, sure, he’d had a few nights over the years that he hadn’t spent alone in his hotel room. Maybe more than a few. Nobody could begrudge him that. He was just a normal guy with needs that had to be met.
But last night, whether or not he’d brought the woman whom he vaguely remembered back to his room — well, he couldn’t be sure about that one way or the other.
Leaving the wallet on the dresser, he walked to the bathroom to splash some cold water on his face.
As soon as he flicked on the lights, he saw the sentence written in lipstick on the mirror: Go home to your wife, Roger.
For a long and unsteady moment he stood there staring at the words.
So he had brought a woman back here last night after all. And she hadn’t robbed him, but instead she’d left this message for him.
How much did you tell her about Janice?
He didn’t know, couldn’t remember, wasn’t sure he wanted to.
Roger had no idea what he might have done with the woman before she left, or how long she might have been here in the room with him, or who she was, and despite himself he felt a lump form in his throat.
He thought of his three children at home with Janice, his wife of nine years, what she would think if she saw these words, what his children would think if they knew what their daddy had done last night and done all too often on those other nights on his business trips. They didn’t know about sex yet, but they did know that a mommy and a daddy are supposed to be with each other. And only each other.
Wetting a washcloth, he worked at removing the lipstick. It came off easier than he thought it would, but even after it was gone, it wasn’t gone. He still saw the words as clearly as before, hovering in front of him, written, as it were, across his reflection like scarlet letters etched on his chest, and he wondered if he would see them every time he looked into a mirror.
Go home to your wife, Roger.
His eyes went back to his wedding ring.
Go home.
To your wife.
He had a decision to make.
And he did. He kept the ring on, and he vowed he was going to be able to stare into a mirror again and not be afraid to look himself in the eye.
“What do you mean it wasn’t there?” the voice on the phone said.
“It wasn’t there. I tore that place apart, and the information isn’t on the hard drive. I’ve been scouring through it since I got it from the house.”
“You know how small a USB drive is. You can hide one just about anywhere.”
Silence. “He might have had it with him.”
“I’m not ready to depend on what might have happened.”
“Someone else showed up before I could finish.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know.”
“No. They must have called 911. By the time I circled back to the house, the cops were there.”
“I know some people in the department. I should be able to find out the number they called in from. That’ll lead us to the person who made the call.”
“Yeah, they might have the drive, but—”
“You’re going to have to pay them a visit to find out.”
“This is out of my league. You just told me I needed to check the house.”
“I told you that you needed to retrieve the files.”
“I’m not the right guy to—”
“Remember the photos I sent you.”
A pause. “Yes.”
“Don’t make the mistake of assuming that I will be reticent to post them online, as I spoke with you about earlier. I’m a resolute man.”
This stretch of silence was the longest one so far. Finally the reply came: “How much latitude do I have in… obtaining the information?”
“Right now the only thing that matters is retrieving those files. I don’t care how you go about doing it.”
“Okay, I’ll take care of it.”
“Yes, I know you will.”
Two formidable Hispanic men met Colonel Byrne at the curb outside baggage claim. One of them was a medium-height, wide-bodied brute, thick and muscular. The other was at least six foot six and had a flat and pockmarked face that made it look like he’d run face-first into a brick wall at some point in his life and never quite recovered.
The colonel carefully set the suitcase in the back of the SUV, then took a seat inside the vehicle.
Each of the men wore jackets, but Derek could see tattoos on both of their left wrists. From his work in the military he recognized the Hezbollah insignias.
It didn’t surprise him that the men were inked like they were. Over the last fifteen years Hezbollah, the Mujahideen, and Iran had developed a complex, mutual web of arms dealing, military tactics training, and intelligence sharing with the cartels of South and Central America.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend—it has been an operating principle of unlikely bedfellows for millennia. And the enemy of their enemy was America.
A driver sat quietly in the front.
The two tattooed thugs positioned themselves on each side of the colonel. One of them produced a blindfold and handed it to him.
“It’s either this or drugs.”
He accepted the blindfold, put it on, and the vehicle pulled away from the curb.
Autonomy
The only sound in the RV is the flipping of pages as Xavier and I make our way through the files and photocopied pages he has spread out before us on the table.
I have a pen in hand, and I’m taking notes from the “Technology Horizons” Air Force document as I move through it.
It states the priorities of Air Force research and development in the coming years:
Two key areas in which significant advances are possible in the next decade with properly focused Air Force investment are: (i) increased use of autonomy and autonomous systems, and (ii) augmentation of human performance; both can achieve capability increases and cost savings via increased manpower efficiencies and reduced manpower needs.
Autonomous weapons and augmented human performance. Precisely what Xavier had been telling me about earlier.
As I read on I feel a squirm of discomfort in my chest when I consider the implications of what this document has to say.