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So most days the grand view is at his back as he gets busy at his cluttered desk. There’s a standard company-issued computer terminal at his elbow, and on his desk are two separate MacBook laptops, each using a different encrypted system to allow him to romp around the wilds of the internet without being easily traced. He also has an office phone, his personal cell phone, and two burner phones he gets from a nearby Duane Reed and uses for a couple of weeks before throwing them away.
At Criterion, Tom’s beat is terrorism, defense, and national security, which is pretty ironic, considering that’s also his wife’s beat, though hers is more up close and personal.
There are bookcases, piles of newspapers and magazines on the floor, and a number of family photos of Tom alone, Tom with Denise and Amy, and one of Amy alone, back when she was in the Army, stationed at an FOB in Afghanistan, wearing battle rattle and smiling for the camera.
The rare visitors to his office always ask the same two questions:Is your wife still in the Army?
Answer:No.
What does she do now?
Answer:Security consultant.
And that would always be that, unless someone presses him and asks, “Well, what exactly does she do?” His stock answer to that has always been the same: “Makes enough money so I can be a kept man.”
But today’s kept man is working hard on his developing story.
He looks up at the clock.
9:00 a.m.
Right on the dot.
He takes out a small notebook he keeps in his leather carrying case, flips through the pages, finds the number he needs. With burner phone one in hand, he dials the number.
Ring.
Ring.
Ring.
“Yeah?” comes the answer, and Tom can hear machinery in the background.
“It’s Cornwall. What do you have?”
The man says, “There’s some sort of deployment, I know that. Assets are being reassigned.”
“Where?”
“Right now it’s the Atlantic coast: Boston, New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, Norfolk, and Jacksonville.”
“What kind?”
“Recovery and relief,” the man says. “Like somebody’s expecting the hurricane season to start early. Or maybe it’s just a planned drill I know nothing about. Yet.”
A couple of horns sound. “Gotta go.”
“Thanks,” Tom says, clicking off the burner phone.
The man he just talked to is an executive in the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA). Tom had met him years back in Iraq at its main port of Basra, when Tom was desperate to find a battery for his laptop. The man had helped him out, and when the man shyly asked Tom for advice about his teenage son, who wanted to be a journalist, Tom had helped the kid out with article critiques and college recommendations.
The guy had never forgotten—and had been a good source ever since. As Tom learned a long time ago, military amateurs talk strategy but professionals talk logistics, and when it comes to preparing for war or something else, the DLA provides everything from blankets to bullets.
So what’s up?
Then there’s ableepon one of his open MacBooks,and his iMessage chat logo begins to blink.
Talk about timing.
