Free Abandoned: A Thriller by Cody McFadyen

little more class than that.”
    “But others won’t.”
    “Correct.”
    Now it’s my turn to relax, to lean back and consider. I turn to AD Jones, who has remained silent throughout. “What do you think, sir?”
    He doesn’t respond for some time. He seems tired to me, tired in a new way that I haven’t seen before.
    “I think the director is right,” he finally says. “You are the best. And his motives are clean.” He sighs. “Bad times are coming for some parts of the FBI, Smoky. Maybe this will all be averted, but I’m for saving what we can if they’re not. You should think about it.”
    I turn back to the director. “I’m not saying yes yet. How would it work, if I did?”
    “Once I get your agreement, I’ll go to the attorney general. He’s on our side.” He hesitates. “So is the President. He can’t afford to alienate the members of his own party pushing for this, not with an election year coming up, but he’s a good politician and the strike team gives him air cover. If the network is dismantled and retasked and a bunch of tenyear-old girls get killed because the locals were inept …” He shrugs. “The President can say he opposed it from the beginning and that he had the strike team formed to shore up the loss.”
    “I’m talking about logistics, sir. I have a child, a fiancé. I have my team.”
    “We could keep you based in Los Angeles for now. Other than getting your name in the news whenever possible, you won’t have any political interface. You’d start out directly under me.”
    “And later?”
    “No promises. Ideally you’ll end up centrally located at Quantico, but we’ll have to see.”
    “And my team?”
    “Oh, we’d uproot them with you. They’d form the strike team.” He nods at Rachael Hinson. “Rachael’s done a pretty intensive workup on what’s behind your success. It’s her opinion that your existing team is as vital as you are.”
    “She’s right,” I say, looking at his number two with newfound respect.
    “Functionally, your purview would be nationwide. Since we currently still have our network functioning, you’d be called out only on the most high-profile crimes. If the worst-case scenario comes to pass …” He shrugs again.
    “We’ll be juggling murder across fifty states.”
    His silence is my answer.
    “What do you mean exactly by ‘getting my name in the news whenever possible’?”
    “Well, there are two points to creating this team. The primary—and largest—one is pragmatic. If they dismantle your function within the field offices, we’ll still have a way to put boots on the ground. The second is to create goodwill and general awareness of how vital it is for the FBI to have such a team. We highlight your story and past successes. We do the same with future successes. Self-preservation of the team would be the first goal of that kind of PR. A hopeful third would be to lay a foundation for later reconstitution of the network.” He smiles, and for the first time it looks tired. A few less teeth are flashed. “Of course, as I said, perhaps we’ll be lucky and none of it will come to pass.”
    “If it doesn’t? What happens to the strike team?”
    “We’ll cross that bridge then.”
    I sit back and consider everything. It’s too much to answer sitting here and now, of course, but the idea itself … It makes me look at the director with new eyes. Maybe there’s more than just a nice suit sitting across from me.
    I run a hand through my hair. “How long do I have to give you an answer?”
    “Twenty-four to forty-eight hours. Seventy-two on the outside.” I gape at him. “That’s nuts. All due respect, sir.” He nods again, looking tired again. Perhaps more irritated now. “You’re right. But it’s the way it is.”
    “Why?” I venture, a final question.
    “Because everything in this town takes too much damn time, Agent Barrett. Because both the President and I have our share of political enemies, and we need as