Hidden Agendas by Tom Clancy

Author:Tom Clancy
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Suspense, Thriller
ISBN: 9780747261155
Publisher: Feature
Published: 1999-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Two

Monday, January 3rd, 8:02 a.m. Quantico, Virginia

Alex Michaels leaned back in his chair and wished he was somewhere else. Just about anyplace would do, instead of sitting here listening to one of Senator White’s staffers drone on at him over the phone.

“You understand our problem, don’t you, Commander?” Oh, yeah, he understood, all right. He made a sympathetic noise he didn’t mean: “Um.”

Congress was still out for the holidays, but the staff people got a lot of work done when the bosses weren’t around. Probably more than when they were here, getting in the way. The truth of it was, Washington was run by staff. Without them, most congressmen and senators would not have a clue as to what was really going on. How some of the most influential people in the country ever got elected amazed Michaels. Some of these bozos probably had to be led to the bathroom and shown how to work a zipper.

“So I can pencil you in for the committee meeting?” Michaels thought about it for a second. What if he said no?

That would be fun. They’d have to subpoena him. Would Net Force security keep out a federal marshal looking to serve papers if he asked them to? Probably, but Michaels would have to leave the building sooner or later. And the good senator would make mounds of political hay out his refusal to take the hot seat voluntarily. Did the Commander of Net Force have something to hide? An honest man doesn’t fear a few questions, does he?

“I’d be happy to talk to the senator’s committee.”

“Thank you, sir. Eight a.m. on Monday the 10th. I’ll e-mail you to confirm.”

“This isn’t going to be another of those week-long deals, is it, Ron?”

“No, sir. The senator is going on a junket—uh, a fact-finding mission—to Ethiopia on the 12th, so we’ll wrap by Tuesday.”

So, at worst, he’d be on the hot seat for a day or two, assuming nobody else was slotted. And it was unlikely that he’d be the only sacrificial lamb—White’s committees always had plenty of victims they wanted to skewer. What an idiot.

After he hung up, Michaels leaned forward in his chair, feeling tired. He’d like nothing better than to take the day off, go for a nice long ride on his bike, to enjoy the cold, crisp morning while working up a little sweat. Or, as long as he was wishing, why not a week in Tahiti? Lie on the beach, soak up whatever rays the sunblock would let past, drink coconut and tropical fruit and rum. Listen to the waves break. Boy, did that sound good.

He grinned at himself. There was a pile of work on his desk that he couldn’t get done if he worked twenty-four-hour days for a month. The deeper that pile got, the more he felt like dragging his heels. Did everybody feel that way? Or was it a contrary streak in him, just like wanting to spend money the most when you were dead broke?

Well. You knew the job was dangerous when you took it, right?

Right.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.