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“Mitch, I—”

“You know what kind of people I deal with every day?”

“Yeah, I guess,” he mumbled.

“Then you’ll believe me when I say that I couldn’t give a fuck about a bunch of people running around stealing credit card numbers. What I care about—all I care about—is you putting me in front of this guy.”

Dumond reluctantly pulled out a pen and began marking through names. It turned out to be more than Rapp would have guessed. When he was finished, there were only about twenty names left.

“Mitch is right,” Kennedy said. “But let’s take it one step further. How many of the remaining people have you hurt, Marcus? Blocked, stolen from, or made look foolish? How many hate you enough that they’d fight you every step if you ever tried to get to them?”

He scanned through the list. “Maybe four.”

Rapp tapped the page with his index finger. “Then that’s where we start.”

• • •

Rapp followed Irene Kennedy into her office and closed the door behind him.

“What do you want to talk to me about?”

Normally Rapp avoided headquarters like the plague, and that day he’d been forced to take the full tour—public elevators, the basement, and more crowded hallways than he could count. As a man who valued anonymity beyond all other things, being gawked at and backslapped by half the Agency wasn’t going down well.

“Please have a seat.”

He would have preferred to stay close to the door, but there was a weight to Kennedy’s tone that suggested the meeting was going to be neither quick nor easy.

“What is it?” he said, doing as she asked.

“I have a meeting with the president scheduled for later this afternoon.”

“Let me guess. Kamal Safavi?”

Tensions between the United States and the Iranians continued to escalate, with accusations being flung from both sides. Tehran had completely shut down diplomatic relations, and President Alexander was talking about a new round of sanctions. In the meantime, the fledgling cooperation between the two countries with regard to controlling the Sunnis was dead in the water.

“Iran’s one item on the agenda.”

“What are the others?”

“The Russians. Fahran Hotaki. The fact that someone has the Rickman files and there’s no way for us to be certain they haven’t accessed them. What Rick knew and how he got that information . . .” Her voice trailed off.

Rapp didn’t envy her. There was nothing politicians liked to do more than Monday morning quarterback decisions that they themselves wouldn’t have the guts to make. As long as things were going well and they were getting reelected, they were content to stay in the background. But when things got tough, they didn’t just abandon the sinking ship, they drilled holes in the hull on their way out.

“Is that all?”

“No. I assume the subject of my resignation will come up.”

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

“I’m afraid not. We had a lot of history with President Hayes, but the situation with Alexander is completely different. He wants to do the right thing but at some point politics wins.”

“So we have the walls coming down around us and they’re going to install some political hack to make it look like they’re reining us in? If he gets in my way, Irene, I swear I’ll put a bullet in the back of his head.”

“I wish you wouldn’t say things like that.”

“I’m not joking. If anyone tries to stop me from turning this situation around, they’re going to have serious problems. The choice between some wound-up bureaucrat and one of our guys in the field is pretty easy for me.”

“I think we can avoid it coming to that. With all the gridlock and posturing that goes along with getting a new director confirmed, a temporary head of the Agency will have to be named. I think the president will strongly consider any recommendation I make.”

Source: www.allfreenovel.com
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