Jackpot

26

When Agents Malmon and Parks finally made their way over to interview Millie, she was ready.

“We talked to the agents at the hotel before we came over here,” Parks said.

“Good,” Millie said.

“They weren’t exactly complimentary of you or your leadership skills.”

“Leaders sometimes have to tell people who work for them that they’re morons. Those people don’t generally appreciate the criticism and therefore speak poorly of their leaders.”

“Their concern was less with your tone or what you called them and more with your... lack of leadership skills.”

“You mean my lack of... Can I say ‘balls’ to you? Will that offend you? Will it show poor leadership on my part?”

“Very funny, Ms. Martindale, but it does seem their concerns about how you handled this operation were justified.”

“I was supposed to discern not only that the woman in that penthouse was a decoy, but to anticipate that she would be gunned down by a hijacked drone?”

“How did you know the drone was hijacked?” Parks asked, trying to raise an eyebrow suspiciously, but only succeeding in looking like he was twitching.

“Of course it was hijacked. Unless you believe the Chinese military was trying to kill a woman pretending to be a spy.”

As Millie said the words, it dawned on her that maybe the drone hadn’t been hijacked. Maybe the Chinese government really did aim to kill the woman for some reason.

“Do you have reason to believe the Chinese government wasn’t behind this?” Parks asked.

“I can’t divulge the details of my operation, but I can tell you that the Chinese government would have known that woman wasn’t Li Feng.”

Millie had thought she was ready for this conversation. She’d planned to give short, respectful answers that provided enough information that she’d appear compliant without taking any blame for what happened. She hadn’t absolved herself of the guilt, but she would talk to Lance and deal with it appropriately. She would not let some internal affairs jerks likely sent by Arrow Donaldson get to her.

It wasn’t going great, but she was hoping she could still turn the conversation her way until she heard the helicopter overhead.

Everyone in the parking lot looked up and watched it land. Millie expected Arrow Donaldson to step out, which made it even more surprising when she saw her boyfriend, FBI agent Quentin Phillips, emerge from the helicopter and walk toward her.

“Who are you?” Agent Parks asked.

Quentin brushed passed him and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Millie.

“Quentin Phillips. I’m with the FBI.”

“Ms. Martindale is a CIA officer and therefore under the jurisdiction of—”

“I have a letter here signed by the president of the United States that demands you stand down and let Ms. Martindale get back to work.”

“The FBI has no jurisdiction in China.”

“I’d think the seal and signature of the president would be enough to calm your territorial instincts, but since that doesn’t seem to be the case, I’ll let you in on a little secret. The drone that was shot down was hacked through a network of servers, one of which is in the United States of America. The drone itself was built with schematics that are alleged to have been stolen from a United States defense company. That’s corporate espionage, and that’s FBI jurisdiction.”

Parks and Malmon looked at each other with confused irritation before stepping away to confer with each other. When they returned, Agent Malmon spoke for the first time.

“This isn’t over.”

“Have your boss call my boss and we’ll set up a playdate,” Quentin said.

Malmon and Parks argued all the way back to their car while Quentin put his arm around Millie in an awkward side hug. She pushed him back with a wry smile.

“I can fight my own battles, you know,” Millie said. “I don’t need a man to rescue me.”

“The president, who authorized my visit to rescue you, is a woman,” Quentin said.