in, Big Brother. Face it, you’re a renegade. A rebel.” Her voice was rising. “A man who’ll—”
“Run your Sex Files through my Quick Composite software?”
“It’ll only take a minute, Ollie,” she urged, polishing off the first half of her sandwich and reaching for the rest. “Everybody at the office wants to know what North America’s most erotic guy looks like. And you’re the only one who can show us.”
Grinning, he opened his arms wide.
She rolled her eyes. “You? Oh, please.” Reaching into the pocket of her leather jacket, she pulled out a CD. “Here. Just stick this in your ROM.”
As if he could deny Anna anything. She was the only woman on earth who could get away with calling him Ollie. “That’s the new Sex Files?” Oliver queried, pretending to hedge as he continued eating, but only because he loved teasing her. “You’re going to get me fired, you know.”
“Never.” She smirked. “You’re too good at your job.”
“Pride goeth before a fall.”
“Oh, don’t get puritanical.” She groaned. “From the way those sparks were flying on Rise and Shine, I—and everybody else—was imagining how you and Kate Olsen must have gone at it after you finished taping that show yesterday.”
“Did not,” he said.
Not that Kate Olsen hadn’t tried. Practically salivating, she’d come into the dressing room without knocking, and when she’d found he was only changing shirts, not pants, she’d looked seriously disappointed. She’d propositioned him, too. Reaching over and cupping his privates was about as direct as it could get.
Why he hadn’t gone for it, Oliver couldn’t say. But ever since he’d finished building his dream home near Quantico, women hadn’t held the same appeal. He figured it was because he was starting to look for something more than just sex. For somebody who intrigued him enough to share a life with. Or maybe, perish the thought, he’d just been too damn tired.
Between giving workshops on profiling, traveling to scenes of unsolved crimes around the country and promoting the new book, he’d been in fifty cities in the past twenty-five days. He’d lived in a string of hotels he didn’t even want to contemplate, and now he was having trouble sleeping in New York because of the noise.
At least Anna was leaving tomorrow. He loved his sister, and was sorry they wouldn’t be able to visit during most of his stay, but it wasn’t as if she didn’t visit Quantico on weekends. His New York assignment had unfortunately coincided with a vacation she’d planned with her boyfriend, Vic, a photographer for the Sex Files. Since this year’s Sex Files had been put to bed, the two had angled for—and gotten—a six-week unpaid leave. After they left for the Virgin Islands, Oliver could move from his hotel into their tiny—but quiet—West Village apartment.
And then he could finally sleep, providing their wily black cat, Midnight, let him. At least there’d be no more wake-up calls, intrusive maids and newspapers shoved under his door. Glancing around the office, Oliver decided the only thing worse than hotels was the new paperless FBI.
Like every large company, the FBI was deciding that hard-copy records took up too much space. Data was being transferred to computers, then destroyed. Trouble was, there was a huge margin for error in relying on electronic information. When Oliver’s e-ticket from L.A. to New York wasn’t at the airport, for example, Oliver had to buy another ticket that cost the agency—and ultimately the taxpayer—twice the price of the initial ticket.
The flight was a nightmare, too. Every time Oliver boarded an airplane, the seats got smaller and the food tasted more like plastic. How flight attendants survived, he’d never know. He sighed, thinking of the wanted posters usually displayed in airports and post offices. This week they were being recalled, soon to be replaced by an easier-to-read format. If you asked Oliver, it was all busywork, generated by people who weren’t good enough agents to actually solve crimes.
“You still here, Oliver?” Before he could respond, Anna added, “You know that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, right?”
“Good thing my name’s not Jack.”
She nodded at a blond man in an expensive suit wending his way through the cubicles. A distinctive birthmark stained his left cheek. “That’s Miles McLaughlin, right? He looks like Don Johnson on the Miami Vice reruns.” She paused. “And you’re right. He also looks like a jerk.”
Oliver eyed the head of the Information Systems Department, brainchild for the paperless FBI and co-creator of the new Quick Composite software. “What tipped you off? That he’s wearing sunglasses inside the building?”
Anna laughed, contemplating a tall, massively built black man with a shaved head who was as nattily dressed as Miles. “Yep. His sidekick looks like an African-American Bruce Willis.”
“Kevin Hall.” He was the other half of the Quick Composite team. “In their honor, I’m calling my next book Disappearing Evidence. Or maybe the Virtual FBI…”
“What about FBI Dot-Com?”
“Clever. They’re referring to this place as the E-Bureau.”
Anna giggled. “Really?”
“Really.”
“You sound cynical. I thought you backed the bureau all the way.”
Oliver had done so publicly, but for every criminal caught by new methods, others roamed free and, as far as he was concerned, the agency’s E-Bureau was siphoning manpower. Destroying hard-copy records was crazy. “You should see what’s happening downstairs.”
“That bad, huh?”
The basement was in pandemonium. On the first floor, files from open cardboard boxes were being scanned into a central database. Upstairs, Miles and Kevin were holding meetings, announcing that in the new global economy, evidence was going to become superfluous. “J. Edgar Hoover’s probably rolling over in his grave,” Oliver muttered. He slugged back a last gulp of mochaccino just as lightning flashed, illuminating the entrance to Grand Central Station.
“Big Brother,” Anna said, shaking her head, “you look grim. I think Kate Olsen hit the nail on the head.” Laughing, her eyes twinkling, Anna reiterated Kate’s words. “‘We know you deal with the darker side of life, Mr. Vargo, but what about the lighter side?’” Pausing, Anna offered her best dumb-doofus expression, then lightly mocked her brother, saying, “Duh? Lighter side? Fun? What’s that?”
Oliver couldn’t help but smile.
“Which brings me to something else,” she plunged on. “While I’m in the Virgin Islands, promise me you’ll meet some people. I’m leaving phone numbers for all my girlfriends who developed crushes on you when they saw you on TV. They all want you in the worst way.”
“So, it was you who put all those condoms in my wallet.”
“Who did you think it was? The condom fairy?” He chuckled as she continued. “You seem stressed and overtired, and you look like you need a vacation. Since it’s been so long that you’ve obviously forgotten, sex is the closest thing to a vacation when you don’t have time to go out of town.”
“It
