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"Double down," Powers chimed in. "Get the Texas boy on a plane with a couple suitcases filled with cash."
"It's a possibility that I already floated with the White House. They're getting nervous, though, and for good reason."
"They should be," Kennedy said. "They just burned one of our most valuable assets trying to do a personal favor that as far as I can tell has nothing to do with national security."
"Bingo," Powers said.
Stansfield was quiet for a moment. "I have a back channel I can use with the CEO. He wants this employee back, and I think when I explain to him what happened to our man, he'll offer to pay for both. It should help cement the idea that Schnoz was working as a freelancer."
"It better happen quick," Kennedy said. "We never know how long someone will be able to hold out. If they break Schnoz..." She stopped talking and shuddered at the thought of the damage that would be done.
"I know," Stansfield sighed.
"Rescue op?" Powers asked.
Stansfield looked slightly embarrassed. "Not going to happen. We knew it going in. Beirut is still radioactive."
"What if we get some good intel?" Kennedy asked.
"That's a big what if."
"But if we do," Kennedy pressed her point, "we need assets in place."
Stansfield sadly shook his head.
"Corner office or Sixteen Hundred?" Powers asked.
Kennedy understood the shorthand question to mean was it the director of CIA who was freezing them out or the White House?
"White House," Stansfield replied.
"Our friends at the Institute." Powers offered it as a suggestion. "They're in the loop?"
Stansfield tapped the leather ink blotter on his desk while he considered the Israeli option. The Institute was the slang Powers used to refer to the Institute for Intelligence, or as they were better known, Mossad."
"I'm told they knew before we did."
"Maybe let them handle the cowboy stuff ... if it comes to that."
The fact that it had not occurred to him to have Mossad handle the rescue spoke volumes about the complicated relationship. "If something concrete comes our way I'll consider it, but..."
"You don't want to owe them the farm," Powers said.
"That's right. They would more than likely demand something that I'm either unwilling or unable to give them."
"May I say something, sir?" Kennedy asked.
Stansfield wasn't sure he wanted to hear it, but he knew he needed to let his people vent. He nodded.
"This problem is never going to go away until we send these guys a very serious message."
"I assume you mean the kidnapping?"
"Yes."
"I told the director the same thing five minutes before you walked in the door, but it seems we lack the political will, at the moment, to take a more aggressive approach."
"Pussies," Powers muttered, and then looked at Kennedy and said, "Sorry."
