Westwood began to respond, but then he stopped himself, changed course. “Anyone see you come in?”
The young man sniffed out a little laugh. “Before I started at ODNI, I was a DIA field tech for four years. I know how to watch my back.”
J.W. moved the conversation along. “What do you have for me?”
“Nicaragua.”
Westwood didn’t sayWhat about Nicaragua?Instead, he said, “You passing over some intelligence?”
“Yes.”
“From what agency?”
“TheAgency.”
“Actionable?”
“Very.”
Westwood leaned closer, drummed his fingers on the table a moment. “What have you got?”
“It’s definitely a ‘hair on fire’ type of thing on the seventh floor.”
The seventh floor of CIA headquarters was where the executive suites were and therefore where the highest-level decision-making happened.
Lewis went on. “There’s an asset in Nicaragua who’s demanding to be pulled out. Claims to have been burned.”
“Related to which operation?”
Shaw downed the rest of his coffee, rose, and poured himself another cup. “I don’t know.”
“Who burned the asset?”
Shaw shook his head as he reached for the creamer. “Dunno. In this case I only have visibility into the op orders themselves, not the intel that initiated them. I’m spoofing the credentials of a midlevel staffer; she’s got some of the raw data but not all. I can make inferences, of course, but there’s no explanation about who burned them or what they were working on. Only that it happened.
“Icantell you that this came out of nowhere. The CIA is scrambling to put a package together to make the extraction happen. Like, fast.”
“Like…howfast?”
“Like, tonight. The asset has requested an American present at the extraction, and Managua station says they can’t expose their operatives on such a high-risk event. Looks like the seventh floor is considering using either a paramilitary or a trusted contractor.” He shrugged. “They’ll probably send some Gauntlet asshole down there.”
Shaw said, “Gauntlet isn’t the only contract group working in the intelligence community.”
“No, they’re just the president’s favorite.”
J.W. let it go. He asked, “You have the time and the place?”
“Exact time and place have not been determined. But I’ll get it. The lady whose account I’m spoofing will see the seventh-floor decision as soon as it’s made. I just knew you were…interested in U.S. government activity in the region, so I figured the sooner I got this to you—”
“You did the right thing,” Westwood said. Then he added, “But I don’t love you showing up here, in person. Going forward…wait till businesshours, wait till I’m at the Center, and then you can impress upon me how I couldn’t survive without you to your heart’s content.”
“That works.” Shaw finished his coffee, then stood. “I’ll get you the location and time.”
As he headed for the kitchen door to the rear garden, Westwood called out. “What I would give to know exactly how you are getting access to this intelligence.”
“We have our system, sir. I feed you…you feed…them.”
J.W. said, “And I’m suretheyappreciate what you’re doing.”
