The Perfect Weapon Chapter 12 part 3 section 2 of 5
"Gotcha. Let's see. Hmm…." What word game should she use….There was fortuitous, but…
While she pondered the question, one of the assisting agents walked up and ignoring her, said to Jack, "Sir, I'm wondering if we should move the item in question?"
"Are you questioning my decisions, agent?" Jack asked coldly. Did this wet-behind-the-ears neophyte know his history of bad judgment? Or had Kendall told this, this kid to keep an eye on him? Or was he just being paranoid? Again.
She looked at him curiously, once again seeing him change in a flash from the relaxed man she thought of as 'her' Jack to this….different person, this hard, cold man she would never want to find herself operating against.
"No, but sabotage by the suspect is a concern with the item being so close at hand and--"
"Let me explain this to you. If I want your opinion I'll ask for it. Don't hold your breath."
"Yes, sir."
"Is that all?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then sit down."
"Jack…."
"Do not, do not berate me for being too hard on that kid. What is it with you and these…young men? Oh, forget it!" He sliced the air with the side of his hand. Why the hell was he babbling on? Was he jealous? Oh for---
"Jack."
"I don't want to know! I really don't---"
"Shut up." He shut up and looked over at her. Oh no, he could sense….
"Sa…bo…tage," she said slowly, drawing the word out as slowly in a deepened accent and in as husky a voice as she could manage. Not as good as that little purr he could affect, but…watching him close his eyes, swallow hard and grip the arm rest, she knew she had him anyway. It did not have to be perfect after all, just effective.
She had him. Just like that.
Then, his eyes opened directly into hers. She hitched her breath. The heat in his eyes was enough to melt her right there in her seat. She waited….He did not disappoint. In that voice, that voice that every time, without fail, made every hair on her body stand at attention, her mouth dry up, her softness wetten, her nipples stand erect, that voice, he whispered her name as he had never, as no one had ever, ever done before, "Irina."
He had her. Just like that.
Staring at each other, he touched her hand lightly. Neither spoke, neither moved, neither breathed for long moments.
Then his mouth quirked up and he whispered, "Did you like that as much as I liked sabotage?"
She looked into his lap. "I don't know if my response was quite as big as yours, but…." She reached her hand out toward him and he grabbed it before she could touch him, a look of alarm on his face. They smiled at each other and she said slowly, "But I did enjoy it quite a bit. Why, did you have another idea, another word?" She tensed, preparing herself---
"Well, if that didn't do it for you, I was just going to play around with the word.....Bang….kok."
She choked again, sputtered, "Bang….kok? I…You….We….Here…."
"Nice idea, but," he sighed, "That's hardly going to happen here in the plane, now is it? Bathroom's too small, isn't it? So, move along to a safer topic, back to the torture game."
"Torture is a safer topic than making love?" she asked softly, lightly touching his arm.
"Infinitely. I'm waiting…." He said, tapping his fingers impatiently on the arm rest, dislodging her hand.
Suddenly feeling alone, she suggested, "Solitary confinement" and wondered at the sudden, fleeting stillness in him.
"I see," he said blandly. Almost too blandly. What was that about? Some other hint…along with that business about not counting paces in a cell. The truth serum was sounding better and better. She waited, deciding to use the silence on him, would it work? He continued finally, "Solitary? Hmm, so can I assume, remembering your little….interests, that there would be cameras to catch me if I played….solitaire?" She hissed in a breath, distracted from her internal questioning. "Would you like it if I did that for you?"
She bit her lip to prevent the moan from escaping. "You bastard."
"I bet there would be cameras. You were always fond of photography as I recall, especially human photography. Especially somewhat duplicitous or surreptitious photography. Who else do you have in your portfolio?"
"The only man, person, of whom I ever took photographs like that was you, as you well know, Jack Bristow!"
"Ah, so your portfolio was a small one, then. I guess I'm relieved to know…"
"Oh shut up. You're irritating me now."
"I can tell," he said with a drop of his eyes to her chest. "I'll leave." He got up and began to walk away. Suddenly he stopped and pivoted. In one long stride he reached his seat and she patted it, hoping he would sit back down. "Sorry, I do have something I need to do, just realized I need to confirm an appointment. Here -" he reached up into the compartment. She sighed. He looked down quizzically at the noise. Catching her gaze on his pose, he smiled to himself. Reaching into the compartment, he pulled out the Rambaldi document in its leather portfolio. Carefully placing it on his seat, he smoothed his hand over the cover. She looked at his hand, then up at him. "Here," he said, patting the portfolio.
"What? What do you mean?" She was practically quivering with anticipation, he saw with resignation. He was amazed at her self control, that she had not grabbed it off the seat.
"Why don't you get a head start on analyzing it for me, us?"
"What? You're going to let me…." Now she did reach a hand out and swiftly opened the straps.
"Sure."
"Why?"
"Two reasons. One, you're one of the world's foremost experts on Rambaldi. Clearly we need to know what Sloane wants in that document and you're the best one to tell us and here you are." Gee, what an amazing coincidence. "Why shouldn't we use your knowledge?"
"And the second?"
"You are dying to look at it. Consider it my little gift." Probably meant a lot more to her than some idiotic red roses, he thought, dryly. Probably would go down in her mind as his best gift ever. Let's see, twenty-five years was silver, fifty was gold, forty was rubies and their thirtieth could be Rambaldi documents about the human heart. How positively…ironic considering that his heart felt frozen every time he saw her fingers twitching to grab the portfolio, heard that song in his head again...
I'm losing your love I know
So sad the feeling
I can tell, somebody's stealing
stealing away your heart
How ironic, considering that he sometimes doubted she had one. Maybe that was what her next theft should be, stealing a heart for herself.
"Thank you."
He looked down at her. "Well, enjoy yourself," he said softly. She looked up at him and her hands stopped their movement until he walked away. She watched him walk forward and begin speaking to one of the backup agents.
"Jack," she called out softly. He came back over, put one hand on the seat and raised his eyebrow. "I…thank you for trusting me with the document."
"No problem," he said, shrugging. She smiled and touched his hand. "I counted every page and already made a photocopy and used the digital camera to record every page." She snatched her hand back. "What?" he asked softly. "That's SOP. You know that."
She nodded, looked down at the document. Began pulling the pages out, traced a finger around a drawing of the human heart.
Watching her surrender to the lure, the temptation before her, he walked away. She never noticed.
"Is there something we are overlooking?" Susan asked, rubbing the back of her head against the chair.
"Definitely…." Barnett answered. "I keep getting the feeling that there is some….key, some way to unlock this puzzle, some way to reach him, if only…Let's review."
"Again?"
"Again. Let's start this time from a different angle…his assignments."
"Okay." Susan picked up the synopsis they had written from his duty sheet. "From the beginning, he tended to be assigned missions that had some psych op angle - that's how he met Dave, in a training program on psych ops."
"Of course. Jack's dissertation on game theory--"
"Have you looked at that yet, by the way?"
"No. It's on my nightstand, to put me to sleep some night. Whew. I paged through the front part of it, game theory gobbledygook for hundreds of pages. And they say we psychologists talk in psychobabble. And all those stinking numbers. It made my eyes cross. But he told me his work was on manipulating people."
"Well, he sure spent a lot of time in the field, as it were, manipulating women."
"What?" Barnett looked up quickly.
"Didn't you look at his duty sheet? Before he met…Laura, Irina--"
"Whatever," they said in unison.
"Yes. I forgot." Barnett shook her head tiredly. "Too much information in my brain at this point. But, you're right, he was assigned a lot of seduction and snatch missions in the early days." And he had almost always been successful. How? How had a young man with self-esteem issues seduced others? How could you play a confidence game if you lacked confidence? And okay, Jack had been attractive objectively speaking… ahem….but he had been young when he started on those missions….How had he been so successful, what did he have….Okay, Judy, get your mind out of that gutter, wow you really need to sleep…It was definitely too late for this. Hmm, wait - this was Jack. How did he approach everything? Had he, had he approached women in the field as if it were a game, one of his games? In which he had total confidence…. in that area of his life, he was totally confident. Well, that would explain his successes. The man could write a manual on how to apply game theory to almost anything, after all. Picking up his personnel file, she saw that he had 'voluntarily requested reassignment' from those missions on…hmm. "This is interesting, Susan. He requested reassignment from those missions not long after he met Laura. They were just boyfriend and girlfriend, not even engaged and---"
"He must have felt she was the one. Yeah, his boss was really ticked too, judging from these comments on his next evaluation," Susan said, holding out another page, "'Whipped and he's not even married yet, waste of expertise, research..' It goes on and on in, let us say, derogatory terms referring to Jack's manhood." She rolled her eyes. "Bet he had a case of short man syndrome. Or is the technical term penis envy?"
"I believe the technical term is jerk. But that supervisor sounds like a lovely man all 'round. Just fabulous guy to work for, I'm sure," Barnett said dryly.
Susan curled her lip in disgust. "Bet he was the type that stares at your boobs the whole time he's talking to you."
"Probably. His mind spent so much time in the gutter, he could neither recognize nor value personal honor when he saw it." She added softly, to herself, "Although Jack probably sees it now, not as honorable, but as foolish."
Running her index finger down the page, Susan added, "And later, after he was married, apparently the same supervisor tried to get him to return to those missions, but…hold on, apparently Jack threatened to resign….He got an initial reprimand for insubordination."
"Wow, Jack Bristow being insubordinate? There's a shock. If Kendall were the type to file those types of reprimands, that's all he'd spend his time doing." Barnett laughed.
"That's probably why he doesn't bother. Everything that comes out of Jack's mouth with that guy is either insubordinate, snotty or well, who knows, with Jack? But Arvin Sloane, who was by then Jack's direct supervisor stepped in--"
"Ah, he was still a real friend then?" When had that changed? Wait - that supervisory recommendation…something happened in those intervening five or so years…."I'm sorry, I was thinking, what did you say?"
"Well, Sloane argued said that Dave could take the assignment, that Dave knew the woman too. And that Jack had, after all, trained Dave in the work and…What? Trained him? How do you train someone…."
"I do not want to know." Barnett gave a melodramatic shudder, then a smile. "What else is in there?" she asked, yawning.
"Hmm, there's a notation that no one went on the mission. That the contact in question in Cairo was killed and the whole op cancelled and they had to find a new contact, start over again completely. And there was some question, some whisper of an investigation as to whether her death was really an accident in a street brawl or….there was some question as to whether or not the brawl was naturally-occurring or just a plant, a cover for an assassination. They, his supervisor anyway, thought Jack might have set her up so that he would not have to take the assignment." Susan ended, looking up at Judy.
"Would Jack have done that?" She tapped her fingers against her chin, pondering.
"Well," Susan said slowly, looking up, "The woman who wrote 'My husband, Mine' on the back of that day-umm photograph would have." They both looked at each other and nodded. "If he told her about it…."
Barnett nodded. "Apparently he told her almost everything. Work-related anyway. And if he were prepared to resign, he might have naturally told his wife, to prepare her for a life change."
"And if he left the Agency…." Susan began.
Barnett continued, "Then her assignment would be over…."
"And if she did love him, she would have not wanted to go…"
"Or maybe she wanted to continue her work. Maybe she just liked her work."
Susan nodded. "Or maybe both. For both personal and professional reasons, she wanted to stay with him. So…."
"So…bye bye Cairo contact. Problem solved." Barnett swiped her hands together, back and forth. "Just like that. Good strategy, really. Logical, linear thinking. Jack's being targeted to go on an s and s with this woman because they had some kind of history..."
"And given Mrs. Laura My-Middle-Name-Is-Possessive Bristow…. Or would that be Irina Possessive Derevko?"
"Whatever," they both said with grim smiles.
Susan continued, "A history of contacts gives you yet another reason…"
"True. And if it weren't this particular contact, this particular woman, Dave or another agent could have gone. So…get rid of the contact and baddabing, two problems solved. Very good, very smart. And…since they wanted to send Jack in because they thought the contact had gone double to the Soviets….well, then, the contact's usefulness to the Soviets was over and therefore…." Barnett paused, raising her eyebrow.
"Therefore….justification for the termination. All she would have had to do was make a phone call telling a superior that the Cairo contact had been made and--"
"Nice and clean. No dirty hands. No 'out, out, damn spot' for that Lady MacBeth."
"As a former English teacher it does my heart good to know that you still remember 11th grade English. But, back to our lady. So, Jack turns down this assignment and she's pregnant not long after."
Shaking her head, Barnett noted, "That still makes no sense."
"Why? She could have made a mistake."
"Operatives in her position don't make those kind of mistakes. Jack knows that. He always knew that…His therapist, even as inexperienced as he was…noted, detected 'Subject's extreme agitation, beneath the surface, whenever the subject of his daughter and her conception was raised.' It was the one time 'subject admitted to confusion.'"
"This therapist…."
"I've been harsh in my assessment of his work," Barnett admitted. "But truly, Jack did not want to be helped at that point, could not be…he still had to have time to reintegrate himself and then he needed a gifted, experienced therapist, one who could find a way to get beneath that mask he wears, someone who understood the way the mind of a gamesmaster works…. Someone," she sighed, "like his friend Dave. Ack…I need a break. This angle isn't working either. What else is left?"
"Let me look at the files list the Archives sent over. Wait, this is a mess. Let me stack up these files. I think we've gone through all of them." She said absently while gathering up papers, "Are you going to tell Jack about those supervisory recommendations?"
"Yes. Carefully. Another…. Damn, I wish they had let Dave treat Jack. I wonder what he would have….If I were Dave, what would I….He knew Jack better than anyone on the planet."
"Better than Laura?"
"Yes. I think, my instincts tell me, that Jack may have kept certain aspects of himself from Laura either to protect her from what he thought of as his dark areas or to protect himself…"
"The self-esteem issues?"
"But Dave, if he was as good as everyone says in these files on him, as Jack says he was…and Jack trusted him, clearly….
"Well, we can't hold a séance, so….let's move on. Oh wait, speaking of speaking from the grave, here are the copies of the files removed from Dave's house after his death. Why did you ask for them anyway? Did you look at them yet?"
"No, give them over, although I doubt there's anything. I don't know why I asked for them. I guess I'm just being anal about this case, wanting to leave no stone unturned. But maybe we just need some sleep. Nah, let me have it. It won't take long..."
"Famous last words," Susan commented, rolling her eyes.
"There is a god," Barnett said softly some time later, looking over at Susan, dozing in a chair. Waking up quickly, Susan saw the shock in Barnett's face, her voice. "Or at least a guardian angel. Or at the very least…immensely good luck."
"What, what is it?"
"Plans. Jack Bristow's best friend, who was - clearly - -a brilliant psychologist, sat down and wrote out an analysis of Jack's problems and issues, both current and those relating to the past, and then devised a therapeutic plan to treat him. There will have to be some modifications. After all, I'm not Dave and Jack's had nearly twenty years to build up higher and higher walls. And we don't have all the time…. But...the basics still hold true. I was going in the right direction, trying a bunch of methods all at once, according to him. He calls it 'multiple modes of attack, because let's be honest, Jack is going to see any therapy, even one with a friend, as a form of attack. Somehow, I think this is going to be the most difficult psych op I've ever done.' Ha. No sh*t, Sherlock," Judy muttered, then flipping quickly, she added, "He recommends direct confrontation most…." She said laughing in relief. She patted the file. "It's all right here."
Susan reached out and patted the file. "It's sat in the Archives for twenty years. Just waiting…."
"Waiting for the right moment. Timing. We found it just when he was ready to hear it. How….?" They looked at each other. "Was it just an amazing coincidence or…." They looked upward.
"Well, one thing it definitely was, was the result of hard work on your part." Susan said firmly.
"It was an inspiration at 3am yesterday morning. And you know what? It was inspired. Just showing him this file, these documents may be enough, in the limited time we'll have with him tomorrow, to set him on the right path."
"Just the file, just showing him the file?"
"Yes. Because of what it represents. Across time, past the grave. It's still here. It's all right here in this file, these documents. The connection, the link he needs. It's right here in my hand. The love Dave felt for his friend. Right here in my hand just when he needs it most. I'll put it in his and then it's all up to him."
"Irina…." He said softly and held out his hand for the Rambaldi document on the heart. "We'll be landing soon."
She looked up. Her eyes refocused on him. She came back to him and sighed. He stood there, in black again; he had changed. And it wasn't into one of those suits he wore like armor. Sigh. He looked sooo….So, when would they be going out alone? She hoped Sloane did not take too long…She really wanted….She handed the Rambaldi portfolio back to him, watched him open it up and check the contents and then carefully stow it away in the upper compartment. As he closed it, she asked again, "Jack, why did you take me on this leg of the mission?"
Resting his hands on the upper compartment, he shrugged, "Because I wanted to."
"WHY?" she ground out, wanting to smack him.
"Because I….wanted to see what it was like to be on a mission with you when I was not incoherent with rage." The words, the truth, the regret -- on his side at least, he thought -- fell like a stone into the stale air of the airplane, making him want to shudder as if they had hit a particularly bad pocket of turbulence. Or was that just the ache in his gut that felt like a hard rock had taken residence inside him?
"Me too. I am glad you trusted me," she said finally, glad that he had the same desires to work together, at least once, that she did. They had so often been on the same page, it was almost a shame…but no. Stop it. It was a good thing, he could get as distracted by their relationship as she could, or surely….No, she was better than that, she had made no mistakes.
"No problem. You've proven yourself, after all." Was she really buying this? He must be a better player than he thought or she was more self-delusional than he had ever imagined. Or perhaps, more greedy than he had ever imagined. Was there nothing she would not do for the sake of her obsessions, for the sake of her drive, her ambitions? Even ignore the warning signals he must have sent out. I mean, he thought, I'm good, but not that good. Not with her. He did not think he'd made any mistakes…but good thing she can get as lost in this…whatever it is between us as I do.
"Jack…the mission, being together, it was…"
"Good, wasn't it?" Aside from the little fact that the moment she had been within sniffing distance of Rambaldi she was like a bitch in heat.
"Yes. We were always a good team." She looked up at him and they both nodded. Then he looked away, out the window. Her eyes dropped down over his body.
"We're almost home," he said softly into the silence that had fallen between them. Looking up at him, his arms still upraised, she bit her lip. Home. What did that mean? For her? For him?
Over the years, that little 'pose' as she called it, had become a ritual. First an unconscious one, then after Dave, after she tried to find little rituals, little moments to make their life together…special…Every time he came home from his trips, he would pause in the doorway with his arms upraised and she would drop whatever she was doing to run into his arms. So many times while he was away, she had stopped, imagining the moment when he would appear in the doorway for her. Just for her. And then, she had taken a photograph and the image of him in a doorway would be forever etched into her mind, frozen in that moment in black and white.
"Take a picture it lasts longer," he had grumbled that day, almost completely asleep, as she stared at him.
She had come back outside on this blazingly-hot, brilliantly-bright Southern California day, moisture dripping on the glasses of cold lemonade in her hand and stopped dead. Putting the drinks on the back stoop, she started forward, smiling. Jack was lying on his side, fast asleep, his head on the pile of red mulch as if it were a pillow, his hand still grasping the trowel. His blue tshirt was covered in dirt and mulch. His jeans, she sighed, looking at his rear end and thigh muscles, clearly defined as the denim stretched over them…his jeans were a mess too. How he could sleep like that, on the ground and mulch…But she supposed he had slept in far worse conditions and he had been clearly exhausted. She had just been gone minutes and he had already fallen asleep.
"Oh, no, honey, I'm fine. I want to help you in the yard," he had insisted this morning. Yeah, right. He had come home at 4am from the mission. Now that he was home she could sleep soundly, but he had been too keyed up and had only fallen asleep around the time she had woken. She had tiptoed around, but had accidentally woken him about an hour later when she pushed their squeaky wheelbarrow from the garage to do some needed work in the flowerbeds. At Dave's suggestion - to be less goal oriented, to enjoy the methods, the means, the moment more -- last year she had taken an extension class on landscaping and gardening.
To her surprise, she found that for both of them, planning, planting, watching, weeding had been a good way to relieve stress. Jack had especially loved digging in the dirt, he had laughingly imagined burying his enemies or annoying co-workers or that idiot of a division supervisor. How he hated that man, she thought, looking at the trowel in his strong hand. One of these days, as controlled as Jack was, that guy was going to push him too far and he'd end up with a broken nose. What a shame, she shrugged, hating the man too for the way he stared at her body when Jack was not looking. Oh well, sooner or later the guy would cross a line and spading the earth to plant geraniums or impatiens would no longer suffice and Jack would take care of him. Or, she shrugged, she would. Perhaps she could find a political reason for his termination, she'd have to speak to her case officer. It would be a doubleplay, serve her country and get the jerk out of Jack's hair.
Speaking of which, she thought, his hair was a mess too. He would have to take a shower. Perhaps she would join him. That was always good. She just stood there and stared at him, enjoying this rare moment of quietude from him. He was always so active unless she made him relax. Finally, his instincts had woken up to her staring; his eyes had opened briefly and he grumbled at her. She smiled. "Take a picture" indeed. Thank you, Jack, for the idea.
TBC at Chapter 12 part 3 section 3 of 5