“Now that’s a T-Rex,” she said.
Kurt Jenkins sipped a cup of green tea as he read an intelligence briefing, a Russian area analyst standing in front of the director’s mahogany desk and a stunning brunette sitting back on the sofa, her slim legs crossed. Jenkins had gotten off the SAT phone with Jake Adams an hour ago, immediately asked his analysts for more information on the old Soviet virus development, and had been somewhat surprised they had come through for him so soon. It was only a two-page brief, but quite thorough and in-depth.
The analyst, a man who looked like a computer geek right out of college, thick glasses and a bow tie, with a crumpled white shirt that looked like he had slept in it, alternated from one foot to the next like a stork. His dark eyes kept shifting to the side to catch a view of the pretty woman.
“Are you sure the Soviets were actually developing a modified version of the nineteen-eighteen H1N1 influenza A virus back in the 80s?” Jenkins asked the young man and then sipped more tea.
“Yes, sir.” The analyst pushed his glasses higher on his narrow nose. “And as far as we know, they still have the virus frozen at their research facility.”
“But no indication they have ever had any breach of security or theft of the virus.”
“No, sir. But…” His eyes drifted again toward the woman and then back to the director. “But we might never know for sure. As you know, the old Soviet Union collapsed around that time and security crumbled to a certain extent.”
Jenkins didn’t need this young man telling him that, since he had spent much of his covert life cleaning up messes in the former East Bloc.
“What about what Jake Adams mentioned,” Jenkins said, picking up the briefing for reference, “this guanidinium thiocyanate.” He struggled with the words and shook his head.
The man nodded and adjusted his glasses nervously again. “Yes, sir. That would render the virus inactive, but our scientists would still be able to study it and come up with a way to battle any release, inadvertent or otherwise.” He cleared his throat.
“So you recommend we use this…stuff…before transporting?”
He nodded. “Yes, sir. Jake Adams was right on the mark with that.”
“You know Jake Adams?”
“No, sir. Just heard about him. His work with the Joint Strike Fighter, Kurdistan, the Dolomites, China, and his more recent work in Austria.”
“Sounds like you’re a fan,” Jenkins said.
The analyst smiled and nodded.
“That’ll be all.”
The man turned, checking out the woman as he did, and left the office.
When he was gone, the brunette rose from the sofa and took a seat in a leather chair closer to the director. Toni Contardo had recently taken on a special projects role at the headquarters after working in the field in mostly Europe for the past couple decades. She was in her early forties, but could easily pass for thirty-five. Some would say she was in her prime as a field officer, having risen to station chief in Austria and Italy. But Jenkins asked her to take on this new position and she reluctantly accepted. After all, she had not even lived in America for nearly twenty years.
“What do you think?” Jenkins asked Toni.
“I think your analyst has more ticks than a Tennessee coon hound,” she said. “And he just might have a man crush on Jake.”
“Are you jealous?” Jenkins knew all too well the history between Jake Adams and Toni Contardo.
“I’m so over him.”
“If you say so.”
“Besides, isn’t he still shacking up with that Austrian Interpol whore?”
Jenkins smiled. “But you’re not bitter.”
“Can we get on with this? What kind of shit has Jake stepped in this time?”
My God she was still beautiful. But all business with him. Too bad. “All right.” He briefed her on what Jake Adams had been up to from start to finish, leaving out nothing. When he was done, he waited and watched her carefully.
“And Colonel Reed is not working for us?” Toni asked, a face of incredulity.
“Not officially. We have not been able to reach him yet. But we have assets in the area looking for him. You know Reed, right?”
“Yeah. But just by reputation. Jake talked about him. He had nothing but good things to say about Reed. Jake also mentioned the death of Steve Olson. But that happened before Jake joined the CIA and before we met. So it was always past tense. I knew they had been good friends, though. Jake would have gone off to the Arctic to bring back his body, or at least find out what happened to the man.”
“How’d you know I was going to ask you that?”
“How many years in the field? Besides, it’s the question I would have asked. Why would Jake take off to the Arctic on a whim? And, perhaps more importantly, was Jake and Colonel Reed into something they shouldn’t be into? You said the Interpol slut was with him?”
“Let it go.”
“No, I’m just thinking she wouldn’t have been involved in this if she didn’t think it was important. Is she sanctioned by Interpol?”
“We haven’t verified that yet.”
Toni leaned back in the chair, her dark eyes settling on the ceiling tiles.
Jenkins had not been entirely sure he should have involved Toni with this, considering that she and Jake had been lovers for so many years — their relationship nearly highlighted in the agency manual as what not to do as covert officers. Yet, despite their relationship, it had never cost them a case. In fact, the two of them worked so well together, they might have to reconsider conventional wisdom on how close to get with colleagues.
“What you thinking?” Jenkins asked her.
She turned to him. “I’m thinking you haven’t told me everything about Jake.”
He let out a heavy sigh and shook his head. “I could never keep anything from you.” He thought about if she needed to know this and decided she did. “Jake has gone through some rough times in the past three months. He’s been drinking too much and hasn’t taken on any new cases. Quite the mess.”
She looked concerned. “I didn’t know.”
“Well, he isolated himself after his sister died in a car accident.”
Toni shifted forward in her chair. “Jake has a sister?”
“Two sisters and a brother. How well do you know him?”
Slumping back in the chair, she said, “Not as well as I thought. So his sister died three months ago?”
“Four. It took his siblings a month to find him. By then his sister had been buried.”
“Wow. He never mentioned any siblings. Anything else I should know? Parents? Children?”
“He told you his parents also died in a car accident when he was in college?”
“He told me that. He just left out the siblings.”
“As you know, a lot of officers do that. Jake figured the siblings could be vulnerable if anyone knew about them. They could use them to get to him.”
She lowered her head and shook acknowledgment. “Why do you need me?”
“I need you to fly to Oslo with our scientists and a an Army team to secure the virus. They’ll inactivate the virus and bring it back to the Army lab.”
“Why me?”
Jenkins swiveled in his chair. “Because I don’t know for sure what Colonel Reed is up to, and I don’t want Jake deciding to turn this over to him instead. He trusts the colonel.”
“And you think he’ll trust me more,” she said. “Because of our background.”
Jenkins shrugged.
“When do I leave.”
“One hour.”
“You know I just got married,” Toni said.
He knew. “Three months ago. The honeymoon’s over.”
She got up to leave but he stopped her with a wave of his hand. “Yeah.”