When he picked her up, however, he looked worse than she felt, not like someone headed for an enjoyable afternoon.
“What is it?” she asked.
“The movie was just an excuse, Benita. You remember the name Dink? I may have mentioned he works for the Select Committee on Intelligence, reporting directly to Senator Morse.”
“My own dear Senator Morse?”
“That one, yes. The DEA got some feedback from an agent planted way, way deep in a Colombian cartel. It seems Charles Dinklemier is well known down there. Well known, much valued. He clears the way for a lot of shipments.”
She stared at him, at first not getting it at all. Then it began to trickle in, like reading a thriller when you’re half asleep, missing it when the author throws a curve at you. “Does the senate committee know?”
He exhaled. “I think I mentioned to you that there’ve been some rumors about where certain soft contributions to senatorial campaigns came from. Dink works for Morse. Morse gets lots of soft money. This has got to be where it’s coming from.”
“What does Morse do in return?”
“He votes for the war on drugs. Votes more money for the DEA. Makes sure there’s no drug policy reform. The War on Drugs keeps the market up, keeps the dealers working, keeps the money flowing. They don’t want drugs legalized. It’d be like what happened when we stopped Prohibition. The gangsters didn’t want it stopped. They made millions.”
“What does that have to do with our problem right now? With the ET’s?”
“All of a sudden there are ET causometers on every lawman’s wrist, and the market is drying up. The drug cartels, the DEA, the private prison lobby, they’d do almost anything to get rid of the ET’s. Which means that since the administration is supposedly supporting the ET’s, drug money is being used to discredit the administration, the ET’s, and anyone or anything to do with either of them.”
“Including us.”
“Including us.” He laughed shortly. “The White House has been hoping it can declare a victory in the war on drugs now that the illicit ones can be controlled, but the big money is all on the other side.”
She smiled grimly. “So we’re being eaten alive by ET predators, we’re going to have thousands of addicts going cold turkey, and it seems a whole bunch of our legislators work for a foreign business. It’s nice it’s all happening at once. I hate things all strung out.”
He gave her a sickly grin.
She returned it, saying, “I’m hungry. Since there’s to be no movie, can we have some supper?”
They did so, with wine, though the wine didn’t assuage her feeling of impending annihilation. “All it does is make me feel I’m floating on doom instead of drowning in it.”
“Chiddy and Vess are looking for the predators, right?”
“So they said when they left.”
“And until they find them?”
“I don’t know. Let the storm rage, I guess.”
“Hope it isn’t too long, Benita. If our domestic storm gets to the point of a feeding frenzy, you may get tossed to the sharks as a delaying tactic.”
She looked up from her dessert plate. ‘They promised to keep me out of it!”
“They promised they’d try. You can try to keep a secret, but if some damned congressional committee subpoenas you, you can’t keep it long.”
“The president wouldn’t tell where I am!”
“Benita, Benita. If the predators took Bert, they did it because they’d been in touch with McVane. Why else? So, if the predators found you, then McVane knows where you are. This makes me, as a friend, say thoughtfully to myself that if someone has anything to hide, someone had better hide it really well, because sooner or later, people are going to start digging.” He gave her a limpid gaze which succeeded only in making her angry.
She snarled, “Chad, I am exactly who I have always said I am, and I have no sins on my conscience, sexual, financial, or otherwise. This business has me … I don’t know. This whole thing is maddening!”
“You feel like a rabbit thrown to the wolves, I’ll bet.”