Nothing but Trouble_ A Kevin Kerney Novel - Michael Mcgarrity [96]
“Isn’t it lovely?” she asked.
“You’re a bad girl to wear such naughty things,” Spalding said sternly.
“I know.” She let the robe drop to her feet. “I shan’t do it again.”
“Turn around.”
She handed him an unwrapped condom. “Are you going to punish me?”
“Mind your elders and turn around.”
Shivering slightly in the cool air, Victoria turned and bent over to be spanked.
Ten minutes before Sara was due to meet Fitzmaurice outside the hotel, a knock came at her door. She opened up to find two men, one of whom flashed a Department of State special agent shield.
“Colonel Brannon,” the man said, “I’m Daniel Withers, with the Bureau of Diplomatic Security assigned to the American embassy, and this is Major Stedman, assistant military attaché. You are to come with us.”
“What’s this about?” Sara asked, eyeing the two men. Withers, a man nearing thirty with a receding hairline and a dimpled chin, nodded at the major, who wore civvies.
Stedman stepped forward and handed Sara a paper. “The deputy secretary of defense has ordered your immediate return to the Pentagon, Colonel. You are to cease all current activity and accompany us to the airport for a flight to Washington.”
Sara read the order. It was original and authentic, most likely delivered overnight by courier. She looked at the major. No older than Withers, he had an intelligent face and close-set, baby-blue eyes that gave nothing away.
“Let me see some identification, Major,” Sara said.
Stedman fished out his military ID and gave it to Sara. He was a Marine officer, but what else? She guessed he was with the Defense Intelligence Agency, which routinely assigned personnel to embassy duty.
“May we come in, Colonel?” Stedman asked, smiling affably.
Sara handed him back the DEPSEC order and his ID. “I see nothing in the order that authorizes you to take me into custody, Major.”
“No, ma’am,” Stedman replied. “Our orders are to see you safely on your way home.”
“Very good, Major,” Sara said, “then you can wait in the hall while I pack.”
“We have orders to stay with you until your departure, ma’am,” Stedman said, pushing his way into the room. Withers followed, closed the door, and stood in front of it with his arms crossed.
So much for not being in custody, Sara thought grimly. She kept her composure in front of the two men and started packing. She passed by the window, hoping to spy Fitzmaurice on the quay waiting for her, but he wasn’t there. She wondered if some senior foreign service officer from the U.S. embassy was sitting in the Garda commissioner’s office at that very moment, arranging to have the Spalding investigation disappear completely.
While Stedman and Withers watched, she pulled clothes off hangers and stuffed them into her bag, emptied her toiletries from the bathroom into her kit, and dumped papers into her briefcase, her mind racing. The orders from DEPSEC had apparently left General Clarke out of the loop. She was to report directly upon her return to Thatcher’s boss, the provost marshal general, who also commanded army CID. That meant Clarke hadn’t shut down the operation and quite possibly didn’t even know it had been canceled.
How had the mission been compromised? Had she made a mistake by telling Fitzmaurice about Carrier? Outside of General Clarke he alone knew that Thomas Loring Carrier was a target.
Sara took another quick look out the window. There was still no sign of Fitzmaurice. She decided to trust her instincts; there was absolutely nothing duplicitous about the man. That left General Thatcher, her petty, childish tyrant of a boss, who was Carrier’s good friend and second cousin of a powerful senator.
She stood at the desk, blocking Stedman’s line of sight as she packed up her laptop. She knew that as soon as she walked out the door, the room would be searched and cleaned by experts, who would leave nothing behind. When Withers glanced away, she slipped the disk containing Spalding’s file under the waistband of her slacks. Somehow she had to get it to Fitzmaurice and