It hadn’t taken any persuasion at all to convince him to join her for dinner. He was waiting when she and Chamberlain came out from their meeting, and he offered to show her out. They shook hands and he held hers a little longer than professional courtesy dictated. When he asked if she was going to be in town for a while before going back to her base, she said yes, and her dinner invitation was quickly accepted.
He’d offered to pick her up, but she declined, saying she’d meet him here. The Air Force driver had dropped her off a block away, and Blaine was waiting for her at the bar. They shared a drink until their table was ready. Jo hadn’t seen Suarez anywhere, and now was beginning to think the Argentine spy would be a no-show. Well, she’d just have to endure the dinner and call it a night. Things didn’t always go according to plan.
Blaine had his own plan, though, but she had to give him credit, he was smooth. Lots of eye contact, always a smile, and occasionally he’d reach across the table to touch her hand. She allowed the contact, thinking that it was usually the woman who did that, to show she was interested in the man. Now he was probing a little too much, asking her about her Air Force work. She had to assume that he didn’t know the full extent of it, but it was better to steer away from it entirely.
“I thought the meeting with the congresswoman went well,” Jo said, dodging his question about what type of training she was doing down in Florida. In truth, she wasn’t sure how it had gone. Chamberlain was businesslike, cordial, but clearly she didn’t like the military and had every intention of following through with her hearings when Congress convened in the New Year. Explaining that her work was often of a sensitive nature, Jo asked to be removed from the witness list. Chamberlain said she’d consider it, and Jo didn’t leave feeling very hopeful. But maybe Blaine had heard something different.
“You made a good impression on her,” Blaine said, sipping at his glass of merlot. “Normally, military people have the opposite effect. You must’ve said something right in there.”
“Some of my work for the Air Force is classified,” Jo said, telling him as much as he needed to know. “I think I was able to impress upon her that there are plenty of other female officers who could talk a lot more freely about their experiences.”
“Good experiences, and bad ones?”
“It’s like any other job in that respect, Ethan,” she said, sipping her Chablis. “Women have a ways to go in the military, but things are a lot better now than they were fifteen or twenty years ago, or so I’m told.”
“What about combat arms?” he asked. “Doesn’t the fact that women aren’t assigned to front-line units limit their chances of promotion?”
Jo had to smile at that. She’d already seen a lot more combat in her career than most men did, but it wasn’t the kind that would show up in the newspapers. “Women have been in combat in all of our nation’s wars,” she said. “The Air Force and Navy already have women pilots.”
“But not in fighter wings,” Blaine said. “Can women handle that kind of stress?” He said it with a sly grin, sipping his wine, but his eyes were intense.
“You’d be surprised what kind of stress women can handle,” Jo said, meeting his gaze. He blinked first, then sat back.
“Enough about that,” he said. “You look great out of uniform.”
“I take that to mean you like my choice of civilian attire,” she said. For this particular dinner date she’d gone with a low-cut off-white blouse, showing off what cleavage she had, and a tight skirt that showed more leg than her uniform had offered him earlier. Stiletto heels not only brought her height closer to his but accented her legs, something she knew he’d appreciated when he followed her back to the table.
“Very much,” he said. She knew that look, having seen it from men before. But she hadn’t seen it from Ian. Was he thinking of her, now, on his ship thousands of miles away? She stifled a sigh.
“Well, shall we order?” She picked up her menu.
They’d just finished the main course when she saw the woman. Not quite as glamorous as the photo made her out to be, but it was definitely her, turning heads as she walked toward the bar. Her hair was shorter than in the photo, though, and her outfit wasn’t as daring as her father had described, but it was close: she wore a black pantsuit, her jacket covering a revealing red blouse, and the pumps matched the blouse color. Taking a seat at the bar, she glanced around once, then quickly back to zero in on the table Jo shared with Blaine.
“There’s a woman at the bar staring at us,” Jo said.
“What?” Blaine turned to look, then did the briefest of double-takes. “Oh. Just someone I know,” he said.
“A friend?”
“Yeah.” He turned his attention back to Jo, but she could tell he was on edge. “Say, what do you think about getting a nightcap somewhere? I know a place a couple blocks from here, and they have a jazz combo tonight.”
“Well, I don’t know, Ethan, I have an early flight back to my base tomorrow.”
“Just one drink. It’s still early.”
Jo considered her options. The bait was dangling in front of Suarez, but she hadn’t taken it quite yet. “Can we walk there?”
“Sure.” He beckoned at the waiter.
***
They hadn’t been at their tiny table in the jazz club five minutes when Jo said, “Your friend just walked in.”
She could see the briefest hint of panic in Blaine’s face, but he recovered quickly. “It’s a free country,” he said. “What would you like to drink?”
Her glass of wine at dinner had taken up half of her personal limit. Anything more than two, she knew from past experience, would shave precious split-seconds off her reaction time, if something came up that required a reaction. “A gin and tonic,” she said.
Within a few minutes, a well-built young man joined Suarez at the bar. It was evident that they were acquainted. She laughed at something he said, but to Jo it looked forced, and Suarez had been glancing their way every minute or so. She was on her second drink already, and that was on top of the one she’d had at the restaurant bar.
Jo decided to let this game play out a little longer. Two couples were on the small dance floor as the band got into a Wynton Marsalis number. “You like to dance?” Jo asked.
She led him to the floor and held him close as they started moving together. He relaxed, moving his right hand down her back to her hip, then slowly over the cheek of her derriere. Jo turned them slightly, and a glance told her Suarez had seen the hand.
Back at their table, Blaine had evidently forgotten about Suarez completely. He was focused entirely on Jo. “So, you’re heading back to your base tomorrow?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, “’fraid so.” Over his shoulder, she saw Suarez finish off a drink and stare at her. Jo gave her a bit of a smile. Next to Suarez, the man touched her on the arm and nodded toward the door. She shrugged him off and got up from the bar stool. Jo saw her start walking their way. It was showtime.
Blaine was making his pitch. “Look, Jo, I don’t want to seem forward, but I really enjoy being with you. My place is only a few minutes away—“
“Let me guess, Ethan, she’s your long-lost cousin from Japan, right?” Suarez said, slurring a couple of the words. Jo sat back in her chair making sure her hands were free. The well-built man was right behind Suarez, his face a bit flushed. Jo knew this could go either way.
Blaine’s eyes went wide, but he recovered quickly, turning to face her. “Carmen! I didn’t see you come in.”
“Obviously. You’ve been pretty focused on your cousin here.” She only had a slight accent, Jo noticed, and that struck her as odd. An Argentine national speaking English was certainly not unusual, but one without a real accent was. Something wasn’t quite right here.
“JoAnn isn’t my cousin,” Blaine said. “She was a guest of the congresswoman today at the office, and I offered to buy her dinner before she leaves town.” He looked back at Jo with a tight smile, but she could see he was getting more agitated.
“Just dinner? I’ll bet I know what you want for dessert.”
Blaine stood up. He was taller than Suarez, but a good six inches shorter than the man behind her, whose high-and-tight haircut had military stamped all over it. “Carmen, you’ve had a little bit too much to drink,” Blaine said. “Why don’t you have G.I. Joe here take you home? I’ll give you a call tomorrow.”
“Watch your mouth, wise guy,” the man said, moving forward a couple inches. Jo moved slightly to her right, clearing her legs from the table. She carefully scanned both Suarez and the soldier. No sign of weapons, but you never knew what might be in a pocket.
Blaine looked the soldier right in the eye. Jo could see his body language change slightly, and not in a good way. He was about to get confrontational. That would not be a wise move. “Ethan, perhaps we should leave,” she said. “We don’t want any trouble.” She stood up carefully, taking a short step away from the table, bringing her closer to Suarez and the soldier. She steadied her breathing, allowing her senses to expand and focus on the man and woman who had now become potential threats.
She could see Suarez starting to soften a bit, but the soldier chose that moment to ratchet things up. “Yeah, buddy, why don’t you take her home? Chinese take-out’s pretty tasty.”
“Tommy, don’t—“
Blaine ignored Suarez and took a step toward the larger man. “You better watch your mouth, wise guy.”
Jo saw the punch coming even if Blaine didn’t. She grabbed his arm and pulled him back toward the table, but Tommy’s fist still managed to clip him across the face. Blaine crashed backwards into the table. Out of the corner of her eye, Jo saw the bartender pick up a telephone.
Tommy was moving in to pound Blaine, but Jo stomped down on his left foot with the heel of her stiletto. The heel broke but Tommy yelled in pain, hopping backward. Suarez now came at Jo with a yell, throwing a wild right cross. Jo easily blocked the punch and controlled Suarez’ arm, bringing it around easily into a chicken-wing hold behind her back. “Calm down, missy,” she said into Suarez’ ear, “your joints are very fragile back here.”
“Fuck you!” Suarez screamed.
“Wrong answer,” Jo said, applying a bit more pressure. Suarez gasped as the pain shot from her wrist down to the elbow and then up to the shoulder. Jo saw Tommy starting toward her and she maneuvered the helpless Suarez in between them. “Back off, soldier, or I’ll break her arm.”
The door to the bar opened and two policemen rushed in. Jo breathed a sigh of relief. A bar brawl wasn’t exactly how she had wanted to spend her evening.
***
Jo was waiting up for her father when he arrived just after ten. She’d changed into pajamas covered by an old bathrobe that her mother had kept since Jo’s high school days, always waiting for her in the closet of the guest bedroom.
“Is your mother asleep?” Joseph asked as he hung his overcoat up in the hall closet.
“Yes, just a few minutes ago. I thought you’d want to hear what happened.”
“Already did,” he said. Joseph tossed his suit jacket on a side chair, loosened his tie and sank into his favorite recliner. “Got a call from my Bureau contact during the reception. I’d let him know where to reach me.”
“The tac team wasn’t needed, thankfully.”
“That’s what I understand,” her father said. “I’m told you handled the situation very nicely. Not that I ever doubted that you could,” he added with a smile.
“The police arrested Suarez and the soldier,” Jo said. “Probably just disorderly conduct, they’ll get fined and walk.” She hesitated. “One thing bothered me, Daddy. Suarez spoke without much of an accent, and I can hardly believe the Argentines would post an operative here who has such trouble keeping her cool. What’s going on?”
“You’re very observant, and you’re correct to be suspicious,” he said. He sighed, then leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “My friend told me that Suarez is of Argentine descent, but she’s a native-born American. She’s also a lieutenant j.g. in the Navy, posted at the Pentagon. The FBI and Naval Intelligence have suspected her of being the source of a security leak, probably the one that landed you on Chamberlain’s witness list.”
Jo felt her temper rising. “I have to ask you, Daddy: did you know she wasn’t an Argentine agent?”
“Not until tonight. What I told you this morning was what I was told the day before.”
“Then why the deception?”
He sat back, his brow furrowed. “I don’t know for sure, but I suspect it’s because of your involvement, and the fact you’re my daughter. The Bureau and the Navy saw a chance to expose Suarez, and keep you off that witness list. Telling me there were foreign interests at play was probably designed to make it more attractive to me as far as getting you involved.”
“But, that doesn’t make any sense,” Jo said. “As if you would refuse to help them out in a purely domestic intelligence case. As if I would refuse.”
“That’s the way things work in this town sometimes,” her father said. “My friend has always been reliable before. I’ll have to have a chat with him about this. In any event, the Bureau is interviewing Suarez right now. Her friend will walk, he isn’t part of the security problem.”
“So, what will happen now?”
“Suarez will tell them what she knows, I’m pretty confident about that. Their interrogators are quite good. I would imagine that Mr. Blaine will be getting a visit from some agents tomorrow.”