It was a beautiful dream, and I told him as much.
It’s just… it wasn’t my dream.
Rather than keep the conversation going, I lean back and close my eyes, feigning sleep. Except I’m so exhausted, I don’t feign long.
I fall into a deep slumber and don’t wake up until we land in Langley.
CHAPTER 7
Ladd
It’s almost two a.m. when we arrive at Langley, and we’re launched right into debriefing. Fortunately, we’d both caught a few hours’ sleep on the plane.
Greer and I are interviewed separately at first, and we’re waiting now on a final interview that’s being done jointly. It’s a checks-and-balances system to determine if our stories match, especially given that the intel she gathered will be the nail in Mejia’s coffin, and our government will be able to take a major arms dealer out of the criminal equation.
Greer sits across from me at the conference room table, head bowed and staring at her hands. She has no cell phone as her belongings were left behind in her tiny San Salvador apartment, not that it matters. It wasn’t her personal cell phone so it’s no great loss, other than she has nothing to do but stare at her hands.
When she walked in about ten minutes ago, I was glad to see they let her take a shower and gave her clean, fitted clothes, even though it’s nothing more than a gray sweatshirt and sweatpants. She still has the same tennis shoes on that I rescued her in.
Her hair is fully dried because we’ve been in our individual interviews for hours. We were provided breakfast and lunch, but the questions kept coming for hours. Now that the individual interviews are complete, we can wrap up this joint interview, and I can be on a flight to Pittsburgh before dinner.
I’ve not been engaging Greer as we sit here, and that’s not just because I’m busy surfing my cell phone. My feelings are all over the board where Greer is concerned. We parted on such bad terms all those years ago, and I place the blame squarely on her shoulders.
Greer accepts that blame, too, and that should mollify me.
And maybe it did for a while, but now that I’ve seen her again, I realize that maybe I’ve buried a lot of anger over the years, and it feels like it’s threatening to bubble over.
For about the millionth time, I ask myself why I bothered to go rescue her when I’m still so damn mad at her.
Because she was the love of your life, dipshit, and she broke your heart.
Even though she crushed me, there’s no way I could ever leave her to die. I didn’t have it in me.
And despite the still-sore feelings, I want to know what she’s been up to. Has her life panned out differently than what she wanted? Is she still happy in her career? If I know Greer, she’s ready to go right back out on the next mission.
I don’t get to ask her, though, as the door opens and a woman walks in. She’s wearing a simple black pantsuit with a white button-down blouse, and her ash-blond hair is pulled into a tight bun. I’d guess she’s mid- to late-fifties, and she wears no makeup. Her eyes are a startling blue, magnified slightly by her glasses.
Greer immediately stands from her chair, and I presume she knows this woman. I assume she’s high up in the organization. I stand, too, but only out of politeness.
As the door is on my side of the table, the woman approaches me first with her hand outstretched. “Mr. McDermott, I’m Gayla Newman, director of operations for Central and South America.”
The operations directorate is one of five major divisions in the CIA. Broken into regions, it oversees a collection of foreign intelligence and covert actions.
This woman only has two bosses ahead of her: the director of operations who oversees all regions, and the CIA director. I’m stunned to see someone of her level here to manage a joint debrief for one of what is probably hundreds of human intel agents currently in the field.
We shake hands, and she leans across the table. “Agent Hathaway… I’m glad to see you safe and sound.”
Greer takes her hand and acknowledges her sentiment by nodding and replying, “Ma’am.”
“Sit,” Newman says pleasantly, and Greer and I resume our seats while Newman takes one next to me. She has nothing with her. No files, folders, or laptop. No means by which to take notes—not even a recorder.
She’s not here to debrief.
Her gaze comes to me first. “Mr. McDermott, I just want to say on behalf of the CIA, thank you to you and Jameson Force Security for helping to effectuate Agent Hathaway’s safe return, as well as retrieval of the valuable information she was able to obtain for us.”
“Just doing my job,” I reply, not because I’m humble but because there’s something very off about this meeting.