Jeff finds himself in Washington DC on business trying to close a big deal for his company where he meets up with Nancy again, the FBI agent he had fallen in love with in Atlanta nearly two years ago. Jeff is separated from his wife because of Nancy
Chapter 27 of K Street
Tuesday, 2:04 PM: The Iranians
They decide to
change the plans for the meeting this afternoon based on Jeff's suspicion. The
General gets the OK for the arms deal. Nancy
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- Chris Lamela
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Author contact: Chris Lamela,
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K Street, Chapter 27
Tuesday,
2:04 PM: The Iranians
Arnie smirked at Nancy Nancy
“Well, the threat is valid, so I won’t fault you,” Nancy
She glanced around the table, “Okay, people, listen up.” All eyes turned
to her, she looked at her watch. “Nothing more is going to happened until at
least one or one thirty, so let’s take a lunch.”
The room got up trickling out the door person-by-person until it was
just Nancy, Arnie, and Jeff left in the room.
Nancy looked at her watch again turning to
Arnie, “Look Arnie, I promised Shawn that I would meet him in twenty minutes
near downtown, will it work if I am back her by one thirty? I mean I’ll have my
phone with me, I can dash over here if there’s news.”
“Yeah, go. I don’t expect we’ll hear from the General much before that, in
the meantime we have to figure out how we can make contact again with the
Iranians. I’m thinking that we want to get a meeting ASAP, maybe, I don’t know,
talk about the weather if we don’t get word from the General before then, what
do you think?”
She nodded picking up her coat and purse, “That’s probably a good idea.
If we get the word things could move really quick, this will be our best chance
to get our shooter off the street, so that’s good thinking.” She glanced at
Jeff, “You okay for lunch?” Jeff nodded reaching for his coat, “Good, then I’ll
see you guys in a couple hours,” she pushed through the curtain.
Jeff shook his head slowly looking at the curtains settling from her
rapid departure, turning to Arnie, “Is it me or is she chasing picket fences
like they were wild horses?”
Arnie frowned, “Honestly, she’d have better luck with the horses.” He
picked up his coat, “Come on, let’s go get some lunch. How about O’Malley’s?”
“Yeah, but I’d better skip the Guinness, I have a sneaky feeling it’s
going to be a wild afternoon.”
“Come on, we’ll take my car,” they walked through the curtain, Arnie
tied it back, they headed for the front door, Arnie stopped as though something
occurred to him, “Wait, I’ll be right back. He went up to three men standing
over a table with small stacks of papers. Arnie spoke to them, turned back to
Jeff.
“Now come on,” he motioned to Jeff walking to the door, “time for lunch.”
As Jeff climbed into Arnie’s beat up old red Dodge convertible with the
torn rag top he laughed, “Arnie, what the hell is this?”
“Hey, don’t laugh, it’s paid for!” they both laughed together. As the
car pulled away Arnie immediately turned toward Jeff as he drove, “So tell me,
what’s this about you and a bomb?”
“I thought you weren’t supposed to talk about cases when you are away.”
“Are you talking about the agency superstition about discussing cases
away?”
“Yeah, that’s what I heard.”
“All that superstition stuff is crap, don’t believe it. It’s just an
excuse not to work twenty-four seven. So tell me about your suspicion, I really
want to know.”
“I just keep thinking that this guy is going to want a big move, you know to really get this
deal killed. What better way to do it?”
Arnie shook his head, “You know, my friend, if this was coming from
anybody else...” his voice trailed off. “So what do you think we should do?”
“Honestly, I haven’t really thought it out.”
They pulled up to O’Malley’s, got out of the car heading to the door, once
inside went straight to the back room they had been in with the General. A
minute later Arnie ordered food for them both, he turned to Jeff, “So, let’s
think it out right now. Let’s do a scenario.”
Jeff sat back looking to the ceiling, “Scenario…” frowning in thought,
looking sharply at Arnie, “Okay, we all show up at the ODS office this
afternoon. Me, the Arabs, Tom, maybe Shawn but I don’t know about him, get all
comfortable with our coffee in one hand, pens in the other, then BOOM!” hands
slapping table, “deal is dead. So are all the witnesses. Very clean actually!”
Arnie stared at Jeff. Then speaking so softly that Jeff had to lean to
him, “You mad man, this makes perfect sense. This guy is smart. He wired your
room. He sent poison special delivery but the messenger got cold feet. He’s
killed two congressmen. The Iranians are paying the bastard five million
dollars for this.” He shook his head, “Why couldn’t the room see this, why is
it you always have to be the one who figures this shit out?”
“Arnie, I’m not that smart. It’s probably because I don’t have your
guys’ inside view of things. You know, forest through the trees and all that. This
is like a really weird little vacation for me, not my job like you guys.”
“Boy you sure know how to do weird little vacations, that’s for sure.”
They both leaned back, two tall ice teas were set in front of them along
with two big plates of brisket piled on rolls, a huge basket of French fries
laid between them. Without another word they dug in stuffing mouths in silence
for five minutes.
Finally Arnie leaned back, took a long sip of tea, wiped his mouth,
setting his napkin down. “So we need a plan.”
“First, remember that the bad guy thinks I’m dead, we need to plan
around that. I can only show up to anything once we know the coast is clear,
right?” Jeff paused, “Or for maximum effect.”
“Okay, so how’s this. We will show up in separate cars a few minutes
before four, keep everyone in their cars. We will have Tom or somebody else, maybe
Shawn go up ahead of us, we will wait on the street until he signals the coast
is clear. Then we go up.”
Jeff finished his food pushing his plate away taking a long drink of
tea. “No, not good enough. Maybe we all show up in separate cars like you say,
but then we direct everyone to somewhere else, maybe a conference room at the
Plaza. Someplace known only to me and you. Or better yet, just you. Then
there’s no way the place can be watched or wired or anything.”
“Yes, that’s good!”
“Yes,” Jeff leaned forward, “By having everyone show up, already planned
we don’t have to risk phone calls or any way to alert the shooter.”
“Yes, this is good, this is very good! The best part is that this can be
done entirely by me and my team, we don’t need to involve anybody else!”
Arnie’s cell phone rang, he reached into his pocket, pushing a button on
the phone, “Arnie here.” He listened, “thanks, good job.”
Arnie stood, “Come on, we got the meeting with the Iranians at two.”
“Is that what you were telling the guys before we left?”
“Yeah, one of them, John, is really well connected, he’s always my go-to
guy for that kind of thing. Nancy
“But we didn’t get the General’s okay yet.”
“I guess that means we’ll be talking about the weather then.”
Ten minutes later they were walking through the door of the ops house when
Arnie’s phone rang again. He reached into his pocket, “Arnie here,” with a
quick smile, “yes sir, but sir, can I get you to hold one minute?” He cupped
his hand over his phone, “It’s the General, quick, into the room!”
Arnie gave a loud whistle, with his left arm swirling over his head
followed by a rush of familiar faces dashing to the conference room with Jeff
lagging behind, walking through the entry he undid the tie, pulling the curtain
taught, sitting down quickly.
Arnie sat down, “Yes, sir, one more second,” he snapped his fingers at
Yvonne for a pen and paper. “Yes, sir, go ahead again, hold on though, let me
put you on speaker phone.”
Arnie pressed a button on his phone, the speaker turned on just in time
to hear the General clear his throat. Arnie lowered his mouth to the phone,
“Okay, yes sir General, we have our team here, can you hear me General?”
“Yes, Arnie I can hear you clearly,” Jeff was amazed at the clarity of
the voice. “Like I said I have news from the Joint Chiefs pow-wow which I just
left.”
All necks craned toward the voice coming from the tiny box. “Yes General,
what is the decision?”
“They followed my recommendation from our meeting last night. They will
approve only the exact mirror deployment to…well you know who to. No more and
no fewer systems. You can meet with them to give them a verbal commitment, of
course they are to pay for the systems, this is not on the house. Tell them
that we will have the usual blah-blah conditions which will be worked out. As
for your crazy shooter, you can put whatever conditions on this that you deem
necessary. I will want to know those conditions off the record for my own
information, there is to be nothing in writing concerning those conditions. As
a matter of fact, there is to be nothing in writing about any of this.” Yvonne
was writing like a fiend, finally looking up.
The General cleared his throat again, “Arnie, are you still there?”
“Yes General, I’m here.”
“You tell that gentleman who was at the table last night, I’m sorry but
I forgot his name.”
“Do you mean Jeff, sir, the civie that was with us last night?”
“Yes, him.” The General coughed, “Yes, that’s the one. You tell him that
this is really good work. You’ll do that for me, right Arnie?”
“Well, General,” Arnie smiled to Jeff, “you can tell him yourself, he’s
right here.”
“Jeff? Are you there?”
Jeff leaned toward the phone still in Arnie’s right hand, “Yes sir, I’m
here, and thank you sir. Actually sir, I got the seed of the idea from one of the
analysts here, his name is Earl.”
Earl’s brightened expression nearly jumped off his face and danced
around the room.
“Well Arnie, you tell Earl good job, too. You’ve got a good team there.”
“Yes sir, thank you sir, we are lucky.”
“Okay, I’ve got to go, but Arnie keep me posted,” they heard fumbling on
the other end, a final click the phone was hung up.
Arnie turned to Earl, “There, satisfied? You just got an atta-boy from a
three-star General!” Earl beamed a huge thankful smile to Jeff.
“Okay guys, now we have a really
busy afternoon, there has been a change of plans that we need to get going
right now. Gather around.” He glanced at his watch, “Nancy
It took only three minutes for Arnie to describe the change of the four
o’clock meeting at the ODS office dispatching everyone with tasks to make
preparations, they all pushed back out through the curtain leaving only Jeff
and Arnie in the room.
It was agreed that the meeting
will be at another ops center in Potomac ,
across the river not far from this location. “It’s not operational, feels more
like just a house right now,” Arnie described to Jeff. “I don’t know, the hotel
just feels too public.”
She laughed at Arnie, “No, but I’ll tell you what, Shawn is amazing!” she
held up a small black-velvet box waiving it around, holding it in front of them
opening it. There was a gold necklace with a small golden heart with a
decent-sized diamond in the middle, “Isn’t this beautiful?”
“It’s no diamond ring,” Arnie
scowled, obviously not taken by this little show of a love tryst amid all the
angst of the day.
“No, but it is a diamond!”
“Here, let me see!” Jeff reached for it. Nancy
“Oooh, a man who knows his stones! Yes exactly, three-quarter carat! Full
GIA, look at the sparkle. Isn’t it beautiful?”
“Do you need help putting it on?” Jeff offered.
“No, not now,” she frowned at Arnie, “I wouldn’t want to spoil the mood in here!” She snapped the
small box closed, sliding it into her purse.
Arnie let her waltz to her chair, watching her float down to sitting. She
looked so detached from the moment that Jeff wondered how they were going to
get her to come around enough to tell her the developments.
Arnie reached up into the heavens pulling her down hard, “Okay, enough,
too much has happened since you left so get the goddam cupids out of your
eyes.” Her eyes drifted up to the ceiling dreamily.
“NANCY
It worked.
She jerked toward Arnie, “What? Why are you yelling at me!”
Arnie glanced another what the
hell look at Jeff, turning to Nancy , “Nancy
“Yes, and we have a meeting at two with the Iranians!”
Sarcastically he turned to Jeff, “What do you know, she can tell time,
too!”
Jeff put up his hands, “Okay you two, enough! Nancy
“Yeah, that sums it up.” Turning to Nancy
“Boy, you guys have been
busy!”
Arnie went on to quickly tell her the plans, they all stood up to grab
their coats heading for the door. “I’ve arranged for Ted to drive us,” they
walked outside, Ted was sitting in his big black Chevy Caprice.
Twenty minutes later they were at the garage gate of the Iranian Embassy,
Ted rolled down his window pushing buttons on a panel sitting on the curved
post, the gate opened.
Jeff felt really confident that this meeting would be very calm, he
patted the little gun in his pocket thinking about all that calmness.
A minute later they were out of the car approaching a man standing by
the same door that Jeff had been taken into yesterday. Jeff recognized the man in
the short black beard, one who had abducted him yesterday, the man actually
gave a friendly knowing nod to Jeff!
“Please to follow me,” he said turning through the door. A minute later
they were stepping out of the elevator, the second man who had kidnapped him
yesterday was standing next to a table holding a white scanning wand. “I will
need you to leave your weapons and keys and anything metal.” Nancy Nancy
“Very good, now please follow me,” the bearded man turned down the
hallway, they followed, the second man brought up the rear.
In a minute they were back in the same office Jeff had been before with
three chairs set in front of the desk, the men seated as before.
“Wonderful! And you,” Omar stood up reaching his hand to Jeff, they
shook politely, “I trust you made it back okay, and your wife, how is she?”
“She’s fine.”
“Yes, she is a fine woman. You are a very lucky man to have such a
beautiful and charming wife.” Jeff nodded.
Waving his hands courteously in front of him Omar continued, “So I know
you called this meeting, but let me start, this is our Assistant General Consul
who happens to be my brother. His name is Abdul.” Abdul stood shaking
everyone’s hands.
“I guess it is my turn,” Jeff said as graciously as he could muster
though he suddenly realized how nervous he was hoping it didn’t show in his
voice, introducing Nancy
Jeff noticed peculiar knowing nods exchanged between Arnie and Omar.
When the introductions were done, Omar turned to Jeff, “So tell me Jeff,
why are you here?”
Jeff glanced toward Nancy
Omar nodded, his fingertips together in front of his chest.
“You have offered me money to also stop it.”
“Which you took, of course,” looking toward Nancy and Arnie to make sure
they knew.
“Yes, which I took. You remember me asking if there was any way that you
would call off your other man but you didn’t commit. As a matter of fact, I
believe that he is still contracted with you because you so want to kill―I mean
stop―this deal that you figure it’s better to cover all your bases.”
Omar nodded, “Yes, I have told you how important it is to us that our
adversaries do not have an upper hand. It is very unfortunate that our other
contractor is using methods that are so violent, but we don’t know the American
way in these matters.”
“Oh Christ, come off it!” Arnie belted out caustically.
“Arnie, wait!” Jeff scolded.
Arnie scowled, “Jeff, listen to this guy, he was schooled here. He knows
damn well that it’s not the American way to
have somebody going around killing congressmen.”
“Arnie, please,” Jeff turned setting his hand on Arnie’s shoulder lowering
his voice, he spoke directly into his ear, “Arnie, this is the home stretch,
let me handle this.” Arnie turned to Jeff. “Please?” Arnie nodded.
Jeff glanced to Abdul, turned back to Omar, “Omar, what if we were to
offer another way out of this?”
Omar sat forward with his hands on the edge of his desk, Abdul turning
to him with an inviting expression, both obviously expecting some kind of good
news.
“If we were to make a deal with you, would you call off your killer?”
“Killer, that is a strong word you use there.”
Arnie scowled, “Omar, cut the crap! If you want we’ll leave and you can
just hope that we don’t go hiring somebody like your guy to come have a little
talk with you!”
A tidal wave of REASON suddenly flooded into the room, both
Omar and Abdul sat back feeling the threat washing over them.
Arnie was anxious to jump into the mix, “Omar, you don’t really have an embassy here. We can do whatever we like.”
Omar and Abdul exchanged nearly frantic glances that were not lost on
the other three.
“So,” Jeff continued, “unlike your little offer to me yesterday which of
course was made with the kindest regards but with the threat that I have no
choice, we are going to make you an offer that we think you will like, that you
will take back to Tehran which they will be very happy to do because you are
going to be the best salesman you have ever been in your life. Do you
understand?”
Omar nodded with a worried glance at Abdul.
Jeff turned to Arnie who spoke up, “Turnabout is fair play, right? We
want to make our offer in the same spirit of, how should we say it…oh yes,
compulsory participation. That’s fair, right? Just like your offer to Jeff.”
Omar nodded frowning. “Omar, our offer is simple. You are doing all this
because we are shipping surveillance systems to Iraq
“Any deal can be called off,” Omar posed tentatively.
“No, not when the DOD wants it.” Omar sat back again in perplexed
silence.
“So here’s what we propose. We have it from the highest levels of our
government, coming directly just in the last hour from a member of our Joint
Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon to make you an offer that you will not refuse, in
exchange you will call off your killer.”
“We do not need money, what could you possibly offer us?”
“I am authorized to offer you exactly the same number of these UAV
surveillance systems that we are selling to Saddam.”
Omar’s jaw dropped, stunned at these words.
“You will pay for them, of course, though you have already made a five
million dollar down-payment,” Omar looked confused, Arnie couldn’t help but
grin, “with the money you tried to give Jeff, remember?” Omar nodded weakly, “There
are very complicated logistics to work out, but we will deliver to you exactly
the same number of systems and spares. No more. No less.”
Omar’s blank expression surprised Jeff.
“How will we know that you are giving us the same?” Abdul’s quivering
voice was so soft Jeff had to lean forward to hear.
“You will have the word of a three-star General, the man in charge of
middle-eastern affairs at the Pentagon. None of this will be in writing.” Abdul’s
expression showed abdication to this point.
“And none of this will have ever happened.”
These words seemed to wake Omar, “Well this is news, certainly. But you
understand that this decision is above my level. It is late in the night in Tehran
“What do you think the answer will be?” Nancy
Omar looked deeply around the faces in front of him realizing that he
was being offered a chance to get out of a very complicated situation that was entirely
of his making. He looked at his brother’s pleading eyes knowing that he had no
choice.
“The answer will be yes.”
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