Lockout

CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

Four days later

National Security Agency, Ft. Meade, Maryland (9:30 a.m. EST)

Jenny Reynolds stepped into the NSA, somewhat surprised that her security badge was still valid. She was still in a fog of emotions. Seth had relayed word to take the rest of the week off, but her world had shifted, and she was off balance. Work was to be her anchor to normalcy.

Seth was waiting when the elevator opened, scooping her into a full body embrace that he would have never dared just a week before.

“We’re so glad you’re okay, and so very proud of you!”

When it was apparent he didn’t know when to let go, she gently unfolded his lanky arms from around her, knowing her smile was too thin and uncertain to properly thank him, but trying nonetheless.

“I just want to get back to work, Seth,” she managed, finally.

“You will.”

“And I’m so glad you… I mean, that there was no involvement…”

He nodded back, rolling his eyes. “I didn’t know for awhile there whether you had gone rogue, or I had, or the agency, or what. It was all terribly confusing.”

“God, was it ever!” she echoed, following him side by side at a slow walk toward the double doors leading to her section. “Is there any word on Will?”

“How do you mean, Jenny?” Seth asked, nudging her along.

“I got the impression he was in big trouble with his bosses, but he hasn’t contacted me since that night.”

“After what you two pulled off, I seriously doubt he’s in trouble. Politics may be rancid, but when the president is singing your praises, the intelligence community is all ears. Not that we aren’t anyway,” he said with a smirk.

Seth opened the double doors for her, and Jenny stepped in, stunned to see the whole extended team in the large room standing and looking at her, and even more dumbstruck when they started clapping and cheering. She had to suppress the urge to run, or at least to turn to see if there was someone else they were applauding.

Seth motioned for quiet and raised his voice, addressing the group and rambling through a brief speech about their pride in her perseverance and the number of people who probably owed their lives to her—a sentiment she didn’t share. After all, it had been her old code the air force general’s people had used. All she’d done was try to defuse the bomb they’d built with her unwitting participation. And, she thought, it was mainly Will who wouldn’t give up.

Her face visibly reddened from the embarrassing attention, she smiled as broadly as she could manage and mouthed a thank you as she waved to her colleagues and followed Seth into his office.

“That was very moving, Seth. Thank you!”

“Hey, everyone was involved. There’s even a cake for later.”

“No!”

“It’s a small one. We’re government, after all.” He looked at her quizzically. “What’s wrong, Jenny?”

“Frankly?”

“Yes. No holds barred.”

“I’m scared, Seth! All this attention—I’m afraid this has raised the bar so high for me I can never jump over it again.”

“No one expects you to defuse an international incident every week, Jen!”

He could see there were tears gathering in the corner of her eyes. “The president of the United States asked me… ME… how it felt to have stopped a nuclear war. Where do I go from there, Seth?”

“Maybe that was your moon landing.”

“Sorry?”

“All the astronauts who walked on the moon—and especially the first ones, Buzz Aldrin in particular—wondered the same thing. How do you top that? Talk about raising the bar on yourself.”

“So how did they handle it?”

“As a beginning, not an end. What you did was a milestone that showed the world what Jenny Reynolds is made of. The incident simply showed us the real you. It didn’t define you. Make sense?”

“A little. I’m sorry.” she said, dabbing at an errant tear. “I just want to get back to work and convince myself the world isn’t a hall of mirrors with nothing as it seems.”

“Well-l-l, to a certain extent it is, but I anticipated that you’d feel this way, so…” he reached over to the corner of his desk and picked up an intimidating stack of papers and binders. “This is your assignment for the next week or so. I need intercepted electronic intelligence traffic out of southern China carefully analyzed and compared to determine whether we are seeing a substantive shift in the encoding routines used in snap-on transmissions—especially important given their island building activities.”

She shuddered as he placed the stack in her lap. “Really? Is this a thinly-disguised re-entry program?”

“Maybe a little, but I really do need your expert analysis. When you’re ready, I’ll get you briefed on the background political reasons.”

“Okay.”

“Why don’t you stay in here for a few minutes until you’re ready to go plow through all the adoring fans out there. I’m going upstairs for a meeting.”

“Seth, one question.”

“Sure,” he said, standing.

“Do we, does anyone know, whether Moishe Lavi was behind all this?”

Seth pursed his lips and nodded slightly. “We’re all suspicious, and what I pick up from those way above my pay grade is that this just couldn’t have been a wild coincidence. But do I either know, or have a need to know, what undoubtedly the president now knows? In a word, no.”

“You’d tell me if you knew?”

“Not if I’m told not to. Of course, I might wink at you and stomp the floor a few times, but, no need to know equals no formal information for Jenny.”

“Okay.”

“My guess? Not having enough info?”

“Yes, I trust your guesses,” Jenny said.

“So, my guess, based on the fact that Mr. Lavi had access to the best intelligence operatives in the world and was determined to have it out with Iran, my guess is that his last act was a magnum masterpiece of deception, and only a brilliant and intrepid southern gal who doesn’t think she has an accent got in his way. That’s what I think.”

“Thanks, Seth.”

“Oh, one more thing. Pick up my desk phone and punch ‘3.’”

“Seth, not another accolade, I hope.”

“Naw. Just someone who wants a word with you.”

She lifted the receiver as he closed the door behind him, and an instantly familiar voice filled her ear.

“Will! How are you?”

“Actually, pretty good, Jenny. They stopped shooting people over here before they got to me.”

She hesitated, and he jumped in.

“Just kidding! We weren’t guilty, it seems, and for some reason they think I saved the world. I told them it was you, but they doubted a female could pull it off.”

“What?”

“Okay, that’s a joke, too.”

“You’re in rare form this morning.”

“And I’ll be in rarer form this evening, depending on you. Where are you?”

“I think you know. I’m in my boss’s office.”

“Yeah, and that was the wrong question. I was going to drop into a Barry White voice and ask what you’re wearing.”

“What I’m wearing?”

“Don’t answer that. Just meet me at the same place in the same shopping center at the same time tonight. And this time we’ll really do dinner and a movie.”

“Really?”

“To start.”

“Pretty bold, Bubba, thinking I’d automatically accept putting myself in peril with you again,” she laughed.

“Didn’t you, somewhere in that safe house, say, ‘Coffee now, seduction later’?”

“I guess I did.”

“Well, did I not deliver on the coffee?”

“You did.”

“So, do we have a date?”

“Very well, I will agree to dinner and a movie, and I will agree to listen to you plead your case. Beyond that, no guarantees.”

“Cool.”

“Same time, same place, and two more requirements.”

“Shoot.”

“This time, no sneaking up on me and no idling black SUVs mysteriously waiting in a loading dock.”

“Promise.”