"A scary, smart, sweet, sexy CIA tale" -- Kirkus Reviews
Dennis is glad to be back at work. His wife's death left him devastated but he'll do anything to lose himself into work at the Inspector General's office of the CIA. A brilliant, if prickly investigator, he's spent his career chasing down the Agency's thieves and liars. When his boss forces him to take a low-level assignment to investigate a missing employee in Australia, he soon finds that even in the red dust of the Outback, there is romance - and death - just a sweltering heartbeat away.
Chapter 1
He was not angry. Not now. It was too late for that. As he lay on the ground staring at a pair of shoes that were inches from his face, he felt a profound disappointment. The shoes belonged to the person who had just shot him. How sad and strange that he missed the hints that led to this moment. So many peculiar things had occurred, and now, as the deafening roar of the discharged weapon faded, he could see how stupid he’d been in not figuring it out. He, the smart one! The one too cynical to be taken in by lies. And if regret were not enough to torment him as he slid away, it was that damn poem (a poem of all things!) that kept repeating in his head like a skipping vinyl record: “Happy are men who yet before they are killed can let their veins run cold.”
Six months earlier.
They looked at each other in near silence.
The only sound came from Marty’s school bus–yellow No. 2 pencil he tapped on top of his desk like a droning metronome.
“It feels demeaning,” Dennis said.
“Oh, don’t be silly,” Marty said. “It’s nothing of the sort. It’s a project you could take on without skipping a beat. You’d be done in a couple of weeks, maybe a month.”
More silence.
“Dennis, this is the perfect assignment to get you up and running again. Get your sea legs back. Open and shut in a month, max.”
“This kind of thing is more suited for a junior investigator,” Dennis said. “What about that new hire, the kid you hired about a year ago from Army CID?”
“No,” Marty said. “I can’t have some beginner chasing down this one.”
“But an MIA?” Dennis said. “I can’t remember being asked to evaluate a Missing-In-Action investigation. I didn’t think we had purview over that kind of stuff. Operations folks police their own work.”
Marty sighed.
“Dennis, the CIA Office of Inspector General has a wide scope of practice, and you know that. We have efficiency experts, accountants, lawyers, and a small team that does the really crappy work. You’re on that team, and you’re there because you’re good at it. The IG has been asked to review an old investigation into an MIA. I’m repeating myself here, but you’ve just returned from a six-month medical leave of absence, and this is the perfect assignment for you. Please trust me on this one, OK?”
Silence fell over the two men again, but it was different. Dennis’s expression was one of reluctant acceptance. Marty beamed in victory, dancing the kind of small, triumphant jig that managers do every day after cajoling employees to take on tasks they tried to avoid.
“Four weeks max,” Marty repeated.
“OK,” Dennis said, standing.
“Read the report I sent you and get your travel planned. We’ll go over the case tomorrow and get you going.”
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The story sounds very intriguing.
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