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“Thanks, Dad,” Pete said but it was a glum response, despondent. The boy seemed miles away.

  Wentz glanced over. “Hey, partner, what’s wrong? You look like somebody shot your dog…and you don’t even have a dog.”

  “Well…Mom said…”

  Wentz smirked. “What? What did your mother say?”

  “She said you might be bluffing.”

  “Bluffing about what?”

  Pete shrugged morosely.“About retiring from the Air Force.”

  Damn it! Wentz ground his teeth, then pulled the station wagon over to the shoulder and skidded to a stop. He looked right at his son. “Pete, when I told you and Mom that I’m leaving the Air Force, I meant it.”

  “Really?”

  “Really, Pete. Look, I know it’s been tough on you and your mother. Half the time I wasn’t around—no wonder she divorced me. But we’ve been talking about it for months, and it’s settled. On Monday I retire, your mother and I get back together, and we’ll be a family again.”

  “Yeah, but you said that a bunch of times in the past, and then it never happened.”

  Shit, Wentz thought. Nothing he could say could make it right. Even the truth was an excuse. “Yeah, but that’s because stuff came up at the last minute that I had to do for the Air Force. You know, stuff I’m not allowed to talk about.”

  “Secret stuff.”

  “Yeah. That’s why I was never around very much. I had to do it, Pete. When you’re in the service you have to obey orders.”

  “I know.”

  When Wentz glimpsed his own face in the windshield’s reflection, the basest impulse urged him to punch it, to just put his fist right through the safety glass. In one second he saw all of his regret—and all of his arrogance disguised as service. This is my son, for Christ’s sake, and I’m snow-jobbing him. I’m making excuses. When Pete was four, he’d almost died from pneumonia; Wentz was flying a classified recon op over North Korea. When Pete had hit his first home run in Little League, Wentz was flying at 100,000 feet testing new fuel-tank seals in an SR-71. And when Pete had been sent home from school for fighting, when he’d most needed a father’s counsel and discipline, Wentz had been joyriding a YF-22 Advanced Tactical Fighter over the White Sides Mountain Test Reservation.

  Some fucking father, he thought. Always passing the buck to Joyce, always too busy playing Big Bad Top Secret Flyboy.

  “I’m telling you, Pete, that stuff in the past—it changes now. Your mother’s giving me one more shot, and it’s no jive this time. We’re patching things up, getting back together, and it’s going to work out.”

  For the first time since he’d gotten in the car, Pete looked genuinely enthused.

  “And you’ll move back to the house?”

  “No, I’m going to pitch a tent in the back yard. Of course I’m moving back to the house! I’ve got my stuff all packed, got the mover lined up. It’s a done deal.”

  Pete’s eyes widened on Wentz. “You promise?”

  “Roger that, buddy-bro,” Wentz said with no hesitation. “You can count on it.” He pulled the car back onto the road. “And there’s nothing in the world that’ll make me break that promise. Now let’s go watch the Yankees kick some tail.”

  ««—»»

  The office stood dark. Beneath a wan lamp, the folder lay open on the desk.

  The leader sheet on the right read:

  _______________________________

  TOP SECRET

  EYES ONLY - RESTRICTED:

  OFFICER EVALUATION REPORT (OER)

  DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY, MARINE CORP BRANCH.

  Subject: FARRINGTON, WILLARD, E.

  Grade: 0-7/DOB 13 FEB 48. SERVICE #220-76-1455

  Spouse: (DECEASED)

  Children: ONE (F/ADOPTED)

  Other Living Relatives: NONE

  DE: DETACHMENT 4,

  UNITED STATES AIR FORCE

  AERIAL INTELLIGENCE COMMAND

  FORT BELVOIR, VIRGINIA.

  DUPLICATION OF THE ENCLOSED IS PUNISHABLE BY DEATH VIA AIR FORCE REGULATION 200-2 AND U.S.C. 797 OF THE INTERNAL SECURITY ACT.

  TOP SECRET

  _______________________________

  A personnel photograph was fastened to the left side of the folder, and staring up from its glossy surface was the face of General Willard Farrington.

  A hand closed the folder. A sputter was heard. Bold typeface on the folder’s manila cover read:

  OPERATOR “A”

  It was General Rainier’s hand which closed the MILPERS folder, and it was his voice which muttered, “God damn,” a moment later.

  Another officer—a major—sat in the room, submerged in darkness. He was a Tekna/Byman liaison field agent; hence his name was classified.

  “Jesus,” Rainier said. “Who would’ve thought something like this would happen?”

  “It all went so well for so long, sir,” the Major responded. “Perhaps we took the circumstances for granted.”

  Rainier looked up testily. “Yeah, I guess we did. The guy’s been doing it for more than ten years without a hitch.”

  “Yes, sir, but remember the retrieval time table. We don’t have another ten years. We don’t even have ten months.”

  “And you’re telling me there’s no alternate?”

  A slight crack in the Major’s voice betrayed his nervousness. “N-no, sir. Given the highly critical criterion, not to mention the most recent Presidential amendments to AR 200-2, it was deemed too sensitive a risk to have a fully briefed and fully trained alternate on line.”

  Rainier strummed his fingers on the desk. “I’ve never heard anything so reckless and ill-advised in my life. Matters like this should never be disclosed to these ludicrous temporary occupants of the White House.”

  “You can be sure, though, sir, that the President hasn’t been briefed on the QSR4 data.”

  “Thank God.”

  It was just a figure of speech, of course. General Rainier didn’t actually believe in God. From where he sat, the lone desk lamp projected the shadow of Rainier’s head onto the wall. It looked like a halo, and here was Rainier, the angel with no God. Instead his shrine was the Pentagon, and his church the most restricted warrens of the NSA. Technology—and death—were the only gods he could trust. He was probably the most powerful man in the United States’ military, but it was all unofficial: an angel of might but with no wings. Only the jaded halo.

  “And we do have a contingency, sir,” the Major added as if to offer some consolation. “No one prepared, but at least—”

  “You have someone in mind is what you’re saying.”

  “Affirmative, sir.”

  The chair creaked when Rainier leaned back. He spoke with his eyes closed, struggling against a headache. “He’s the best we’ve got?”

  The Major stepped forward into the smudge of light and picked up the MILPERS folder labeled OPERATOR “A”. He inserted it into the feed slot of a Gressen automatic paper-pulverizer.

  “He is now, sir.”

  The machine whined for a split instant, then disgorged its powder into a burn bag.

  Presto—gone, Rainier thought. He wondered how many real lives he’d disposed of just as efficiently.

  Next, the Major set down a second folder, this one labeled:

  OPERATOR “B”

  General Rainier opened the folder to glance down at a personnel photo of a lean-faced, hard-eyed white male in his forties.

  “The candidate’s name is Jack Wentz,” the Major augmented. “He was promoted to general O-7 two days ago. He’s been Top Secret/SI with eleven suffixes for more than twenty years, and he’s our senior restricted test pilot. He’s also got more black flying hours than any man in the world.”

  Rainier appraised the face in the photo as if calculating an ancient arcana. His fingers continued to strum the desk, and he wondered how angels felt when they struck down innocents with their swords in the name of God.

  “Get him,” Rainier said.

  CHAPTER 4

&nb
sp; Something scrabbled in the box, a chittering noise. There was something alive inside.

  “Careful,” Wentz warned. “Once they grab you, they don’t let go.”

  Pete stared fascinated into the styrofoam box. “I didn’t even know they got this big, Dad.”

  Wentz pulled the station wagon into the driveway. “See, Pete, your old man’s not as dumb as he looks. I know a guy in the Coast Guard who had to chart part of the Chesapeake for the government a few years ago, and they have this thing called thermal sonar. That’s why we went to the West River estuary, ‘cos this friend of mine, see, his sonar picked up thousands of really big crabs out there. No one knows about the place except me and him.”

  “Cool,” Pete enthused. “Thermal sonar.”

  “Come on. Your mother’ll never believe it.”

  Wentz grabbed the crab traps while Pete brought the box. Wentz felt strange walking up the driveway of the quaint Alexandria colonial, a house he’d bought a decade ago and had soon thereafter moved out of when Joyce divorced him for familial negligence. Wentz deserved it, of course. He’d promised her three times he was retiring—then canceled his retirement papers. He’d scheduled vacations with her and Pete, then simply didn’t show up. The last straw had been the time he’d promised her he was getting Christmas week off on leave time, then turned around to volunteer for special duty when he’d heard Test Command was looking for sign-ups for a variable-wing mini-fighter.

  What a tubesteak I was, he thought now, lugging the gear into the garage. War was one thing, but joyriding was no reason to snowjob your family. In truth, Wentz didn’t want some other stick-jockey to fly something that he hadn’t. He’d been jealous, so he’d abandoned his family.

  Yeah, what a dick…

  The out-processing counselor had made some pertinent points. Coming off twenty-five years of military service might mean some serious adjustments. And Wentz knew that he’d have to put any former bitterness aside or this simply wouldn’t work. It was Joyce who’d agreed to give him this last chance. The rest lay with Wentz. First thing on the To-Do List is stop being an asshole, he thought.

  That’s why he hadn’t said anything to her on Friday when he and Pete got home from the baseball game. He was pissed off royally when he’d learned that Joyce had told Pete he was bluffing about his retirement. But then he remembered what the counselor had said, about compromise, about making an effort to see the past from Joyce’s viewpoint. What right do I have to be pissed off about anything? he realized. She’s the one giving me the chance. What did I ever do except let her down for ten years? Nothin’.

  So he’d said nothing about it.

  “Damn it, Pete,” Wentz said. “What’s all this garbage in the garage? You know, you could do a better job keeping this place clean.”

  Pete looked dumbfounded at his father. “What? I cleaned it last week. There’s nothing wrong—”

  “Don’t talk back to your father, son.” Wentz pointed. “Like that tarp over there. Looks like you just threw a tarp over a pile of garbage. What’s under there?”

  “I don’t know!” Pete exclaimed at the accusation.

  “What’s under there? You hiding something?”

  Exasperated, Pete pulled up the tarp.

  “Oh, wow, Dad! Thanks!”

  Propped up on its kickstand was a brand-new Honda XR800 dirt bike.

  “It’s the latest model,” Wentz said, “and wider tires for better traction. Ninety horse-power; you’ll definitely be kicking up some dust. Just remember, you can’t drive it on the road.”

  “Thanks, Dad!” Pete rejoiced, hugging his father. “You’re great! Can we take it out now?”

  “Let’s do the crabs first. Then we’ll take it out to Merkle’s Farm.”

  Pete was ecstatic. But it wasn’t just that Wentz had bought his son something he wanted; Wentz looked forward to showing Pete how to maintain the bike, how to heed the safety precautions, how to assume the responsibility of owning it.

  Father stuff.

  “Mom!” Pete shouted when they stomped into the kitchen. “Dad got me that Honda dirt bike! It’s the best one they make!”

  Joyce Wentz half-smiled, leaning against the counter. Statuesque, long chestnut hair and noon-blue eyes. “I hope he got you a helmet to go with it.”

  “Of course I did,” Wentz assured. “And knee and elbow pads. I also told him he could pull wheelie’s in the back yard. That’s okay with you, right, honey?”

  “Funny guy.”

  Wentz kissed his wife on the cheek.

  “Oh—jeeze,” Joyce blurted. “No offense, but you guys smell like low tide and—”

  “Cat food, right, Mom?” Pete answered.

  Joyce paused through a queer expression. “Well, yeah—”

  Wentz slapped his son on the back. “Like I was telling you, Pete. Your old man’s not as dumb as he looks. It’s a little trick I picked up when I did TDY at Whidbey Island. Puncture a can of cat food with an ice-pick and put it in the trap. On the west coast, the watermen all use cat food as crab bait instead of chicken necks.”

  “Well,” Joyce remarked, “I guess cat food smells better than chicken necks… So just how many crabs did you catch? Last time you guys went out, you brought home two crabs.”

  “Check it out.”

  Wentz smiled when Pete opened up the styrofoam box. Joyce nearly shrieked when she looked inside.

  “They’re huge,” she commented.

  “Half a bushel,” Wentz added. “We’d have caught more but we didn’t have a bigger box.”

  “I have to admit, I’m impressed,” Joyce said.

  “You’ll be even more impressed when we’re cracking these suckers open,” Wentz guaranteed. “Pete, put an inch of water in the pot and pour in a cup of vinegar. Then lay in the steamer tray.”

  “Okay, Dad.”

  Joyce curled her finger at Wentz. “We’ll be right back, Pete.”

  She took Wentz by the hand into the dining room. Wentz paused to look at her, and thought, Jesus, what a beautiful woman. What did I do to get this lucky?

  Last night, they’d made love for the first time in a year. It was wonderful… probably more for Wentz than for her; he hadn’t exactly been the Man of the Hour, more like the Man of the Minute. They’d fallen asleep wrapped up in each other; Wentz slept dreamlessly. The only dream he wanted was in his arms.

  He was about to kiss her, tell her he loved her, when she pressed a hand against his chest. Suddenly, she didn’t look pleased.

  “So what’s with this dirt bike?” she sternly asked.

  Wentz stood duped. “It’s something he wanted so I bought it for him. What’s the big deal?”

  “The big deal is you can’t buy your son.”

  Wentz’s gazed thinned. “I’m not trying to buy him. He worked hard and got his math grades up, so I gave him a dirt bike. What, a father can’t give his kid a present?”

  “Not an absentee father,” Joyce countered.

  Careful, Jack warned himself. Look at it from her side. “The absentee part ends on Monday when I retire.”

  “Don’t you get it? Giving your son presents whenever you decide to come around isn’t being a father.”

  Bust my chops a little more, why don’t you? But, still, Wentz remained silent, like a scolded child.

  “It gives him the wrong impression about things, Jack.”

  “I thought he deserved it, that’s all,” Wentz said very slowly. “For getting a B in algebra.”

  “That’s not how it works in a family. Don’t you think you should’ve talked to me about it first?”

  “Yes, you’re right.”

  “Don’t you think we should’ve given him the bike, Jack?”

  “Yes, I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”

  Everything she said made sense, of course. It always did. Wentz had no idea how to be a real father because he’d never been around to assume the role. He was just a guy who stopped by every now and then, bringing presents.

&nbs
p; She faced him, her lips pursed, her arms crossed under her bosom. “If you really are going to make a go of this, Jack, you’re going to have to do better than this.”

  As hard as Wentz wanted to keep it all in check…he couldn’t. Suddenly he felt attacked, and the instinct to defend himself shattered his better judgment.

  “Fine, great. I’m an asshole, I’m a prick. I’m an absentee father who buys his kid presents to cover up his guilt. But contrary to what you obviously believe, I really am going to try to make this work. It would really be nice if just once you could give me a break.”

  “I won’t even respond to that,” she said.