Foreign Agent

CHAPTER 30

Lilliana Grace was an attractive woman in her late thirties. Chestnut hair, perfect teeth, and just the right amount of makeup. She had made it her business by being twice as smart and twice as hungry as any of the other reporters at the Washington Post.

She didn’t like sneaking around, but from time to time, it was a necessary part of the job. Senator Wells had chosen the location. A seedy bar in southeast D.C.

“You’re positive?” Wells asked. “One hundred percent?” As he talked, he jabbed the tiny squares of ice in his cocktail with a bright green plastic straw.

They were seated in a small, stained booth with duct tape over the rips in the seats. The table between them was covered with cigarette burns. The lights were low and the place smelled like spilled beer and urinal disinfectant.

“You take a lot of meetings here, Senator?” Grace asked, waving her own straw around the dimly lit bar.

“Only the important ones. Now, keep your voice down and answer my question.”

“I told you. I came up with nobody.”

“Not one single person?”

“That’s usually the definition of nobody,” she replied as she took a sip of her gin and tonic.

“Fuck.”

“It doesn’t mean the information you were given isn’t true. It just means none of my contacts know anything.”

Wells had not survived in D.C. as long as he had without being very careful. He wanted to believe Rebecca was right — that what she had picked up at her CIA boyfriend’s apartment was right — but it was so damn risky.

If the President and the CIA had known about the threat to Secretary of Defense Devon in Turkey and had done nothing about it, it was a huge story. He couldn’t break it, though, hell — he couldn’t even hint at it, unless he was sure it was true.

Grace was the chief intelligence correspondent for the Washington Post. Before that she had been assigned to the Pentagon. She had the best damn sources in town. If she couldn’t substantiate Rebecca’s claim, it wasn’t worth taking public.

“I believe you have something for me?” she asked as Wells fell silent and played with his ice.

“Excuse me?”

“We had a deal. I look into your rumor and in exchange you give me the background on what happened in Anbar.”

“Right,” said Wells, refocusing on their conversation. “Anbar.”

Grace removed a pen and notepad. She knew there was no way the Senator was going to let her record this.

“It was a CIA operation. They were hunting high-level ISIS members,” Wells began. “A lot of mistakes were made.”

The conversation didn’t last terribly long. Senator Wells still didn’t have much information.

The only new piece of information he had was on Ashleigh Foster, the CIA officer from the U.S. Embassy in Jordan. McGee had sent over a memo explaining that Foster had been dating one of the men on the CIA SAD team. She had convinced the other two women from the Embassy to travel with her to Anbar. From start to finish, it had been an exercise in extremely poor judgment.

“That’s it?” Grace exclaimed, once Wells fell silent and went back to stirring his ice.

The Senator nodded.

“How about the names of the specific ISIS members the CIA was looking for? It sounds like they dispatched a pretty high-level team. They also sent two very covert helicopters. They must have had some idea of who they were going after.”

“No clue,” said Wells, who raised his empty glass and signaled the bartender to bring him another. “The CIA Director wouldn’t tell me.”

“You mean he wouldn’t tell the committee.”

“No, I mean me. Personally. My committee was never briefed, nor was the House committee.”

Grace leaned forward. “Excuse me?”

“Director McGee only came to me after the attack in Anbar.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. Even if the President decides covert action is necessary, he has to issue a signed, presidential finding authorizing it. And that finding has to be presented to both committees ASAP, before any activity begins.”

“It didn’t happen.”

Grace thought for a moment. “If memory serves, the President can delay reporting, but only in extraordinary circumstances. He can also limit who the report goes to. At a bare minimum it would have to go to the House and Senate leaders of each party, as well as the chair and ranking member of each intel committee. Were they briefed?”

Wells nodded. “But only vaguely, and not until after, with no explanation for the delay.”

“Interesting,” the reporter replied as the bartender set down the Senator’s drink. “No, I’m good. Thank you,” she said when he gestured at her glass.

She was hard for Wells to read. There was blood in the water. She should have been able to smell it. She was a media shark.

“So?” the Senator asked.

“Like I said, it’s interesting.”

“Interesting enough to do an article?”

Grace set her pen down. “You’re running for president.”

“I have made no such determination.”

She smiled at him. “A story like this could be damaging to your opponent.”

“It could also generate some excellent revenue for your organization and be good for your career,” Wells countered.

“Maybe.”

Maybe? What the hell was she talking about? He was offering her a scoop. He hated how inscrutable she was. He didn’t like when he couldn’t read people. “Perhaps I made a mistake coming to you,” he said.

“You made a mistake, but it wasn’t in coming to me,” she replied. “Your mistake was in thinking I’d take what you told me and run with it.”

He leaned forward and smiled. “Have I ever steered you wrong in the past?”

No, he hadn’t. But this was different. He was gearing up for a possible run at the presidency. Anything he offered that was damaging to the current administration had to be viewed through that lens.

She shook her head. “You’ve always provided me with solid information.”

“And I am doing so again.”

“What is it, specifically, that you think the White House is up to? Why are they playing coy with Congress?”

“Off the record?” the Senator asked.

“Off the record,” she agreed.

Wells leaned in even further. “I think President Porter, in conjunction with the CIA Director, is running his own extremely black ops program and intentionally keeping it from Congress.”

Picking up her pen, the reporter signaled the bartender that she was going to need another drink after all. It was going to be a long night.