Brown stammered something about protocols. McKenna shrugged.

“You have anything else, Brown?” Mack asked.

He shook his head.

“Good. We get the jet fuel’?”

“Working on it.”

“Well, work harder,” said Mack.

Brown nodded, apologized, then left.

“Why don’t we just buy off the civilian suppliers?” asked McKenna.

“Damned if I know,” confessed Mack. “There’s a whole bureaucracy dedicated to making sure I can’t get what I need.”

“The civilian suppliers are cheaper than the fuel Brown’s been getting.”

“How do you know?”

She smiled. “It’s coming through the government, right?”

“Yeah, we have some sort of contract or something.”

“You’re pretty naive, Mack.”

“What do you mean?”

McKenna explained that certain citizens have interests in certain businesses, which the old administration of the air force had been involved with.

“Not crooked, exactly,” she said. “Just a lot of backslapping.”

“So they want to be paid off now, is that it?” Mack asked.

McKenna laughed. “What they want is for you to leave. You’re an outsider, Mack. They want you out of here. They’ll do what they can to make you look bad”

Mack felt his face getting hot. “That’s a pretty dumb game. Dangerous.”

McKenna shrugged. “You can take care of most of them.”

“How?”

“Cut their balls off.”

“Thanks.”

“It’s easier than you think,” she said. She pulled up a chair.

“What do I do?”

“Find another supplier. Then suddenly they’ll have plenty of fuel for sale.”

“You know of one?”

“I might be able to find some fuel, if you’re not too particular about where it comes from.”

“All I’m particular about is if it works.”

“It’ll work.”

“That why you came in?”

“Actually, no. I had an idea on how to flush those Sukhois out, if they’re there.”

“I’m listening”

“Requires practicing some  air-to-air refueling between the Dragonflies and EB-52”

“Forget it, then. None of these guys are good enough to fly an A-37 Dragonfly behind the Megafortress. It kicks off some very wicked wind shears. It took a while for the computers to figure out how to do it with a Flighthawk”

“I could do it. If someone who knew what he was doing was flying the Megafortress.”

Mack listened as she detailed the plan. It involved a fly-around of the island by a Megafortress and two escorts two or three days in a row to establish a basic pattern. On the third or fourth day, one of the A-37Bs would pretend to have an air emergency. As it recovered, it would fly close enough to the airstrip to get a good look at it. An aerial reconnaissance pod under one of the wings would snap some pictures and they’d be set.

“That airstrip is eighteen miles inland,” said Mack. “You’re talking about overflying their territorial waters and then running in there—I don’t know. Those planes come up, you’re cooked”

“If you can handle them, I can”

“Too risky.”

“Well, if you’re too chicken—”

“I’m not too chicken,” snapped Mack. Then he smiled at her, and laughed at himself.

A little.

“Don’t do that, McKenna,” he told her. “Don’t try to out-macho me. Okay? Just be straight. No head games. You don’t need them”

She shrugged, not particularly remorseful.

“I’ll take it under advisement,” said Mack. “That it?”

“Breanna Stockard tells me she goes home Tuesday. What are the odds of me doing some time in the pilot’s seat before she leaves?”

“Go for it.”

McKenna smiled, and got up.

“There’s a tanker sailing to the Philippines with some jet fuel that’s supposed to be sold to a private investor there,” said McKenna. “I may be able to find a phone number so you could put in a counter offer.”

“That private investor wouldn’t be your ex-boss, Ivana Keptrova, would it?”

McKenna shrugged. She might not be much to look at, Mack thought, but she was one hell of an operator.

Just the sort of person he needed around here.

“Do it,” said Mack. “Buy it.”

“How much?”

“The whole thing. The ship if you have to. There’s this guy named Chia in the Finance Ministry—”

“That’s Gia,” said McKenna. “Gee-uh.”

“You know him?”

“I’ve heard of him.”

“Yeah. He has this line of credit for us, operating money we can spend, but getting him on the phone is next to impossible so you have to go over there and see him in his office, buttonhole him, you know what I mean? And then on our side there’s Braduski—”

“Bradushi. Like sushi. He’s the guy who cuts the checks for you. I had to talk to him to get paid. He has a mother who needs an operation in Manila.”

“Oh?”

“He was on the phone when 1 came into his office,” said McKenna.

“Well, we can help him, right?” said Mack, catching on. “We make sure we fly her over there, he makes sure we have our fuel.”

She just smiled.

“You just got yourself a raise and a promotion, McKenna,” said Mack. “Air Commodore McKenna, second in command.” She started to laugh.

“Hey, if I’m a minister, second in command can be a commodore,” he told her. “Play your cards right and you’ll be ‘Air Marshal’ at the end of the week. Take that office with the windows down the hall. You want a secretary? Take one of mine. The pretty one”

“No way. She can’t type and she can’t figure out the phone, let alone the computer. I want somebody who can do some work”

“How do you know she can’t type?”

McKenna rolled her eyes. “If I want something good to look at, I’ll get one of those buff boys pulling security in front of the office”

“They’re eighteen years old,” said Mack.

“And?”

“Kick butt, Commodore.”

“I intend to,” she said, marching out.

With McKenna gone and his biggest logistical problem on its way to being solved, Mack began tackling the paperwork, signing his name with abandon. He was about a quarter of the way through the pile when the phone rang. Mack picked up the line quickly, only to find himself speaking to a woman with a thick Russian accent.

“Mr. Minister Smith, good afternoon; I am so glad to have this opportunity to speak to you,” said the woman.

“I didn’t quite catch your name,” said Mack.

“Ivana Keptrova. You have heard of me? I work with  friends in the president’s office. The Russian president,” she added.

“Just the person I wanted to speak to,” said Mack.

“And I you. It appears you have hired an employee of mine.”

“Problem?”

“Not a problem perhaps,” said Ivana. “An opportunity maybe. But I would watch her.”

“Oh, I intend on it. Why are you calling?”

“You are in the market for aircraft, are you not?”

“I’m looking for a squadron of F-15s,” said Mack. “You have any?”

“You’re making fun. But if you were more serious, we could speak of the Sukhoi, a very excellent plane,” she said. “With some adjustments here and there, they are twice the plane the Eagle is.”

“Right,” said Mack.

“I can arrange a demonstration.”

“I’ve flown Sukhois,” said Mack.

“Then the sale will be easy”

Mack wondered if the encounter had been meant as a sales demonstration. There was only one way to find out.

“Maybe we can talk in person,” he suggested.

“Of course. How about lunch tomorrow?”

“Lunch?”

“You don’t mind mixing a little pleasure with business, do you Mr. Minister?”

“What time?” he asked.

Washington, D.C.

8 October 1997, 2300

Jed Barclay was almost to the Metro stop when his beeper vibrated. He stopped, hung his head, and without bothering to check the number walked back to his office in the White House basement. He’d learned from experience that, whatever other virtues his boss had—and he did have many—understanding that his aides needed sleep was not one of them.

But it wasn’t Freeman who had called him. It was Mark Stoner, who’d sent a message to the NSC duty officer asking that Jed contact him immediately.