Hanley feigned a pleasant look upon seeing Brewer, but he had a ton of work to do and was in no mood to talk to Denny Carmichael’s newest foot soldier.

She stood with a charming smile. “Hi, Matt. Suzanne Brewer. It’s been a while.”

“Of course, Suzanne. How are you?”

“I’m good. I’ll be a lot better if you can give me ten minutes of your time.”

Hanley replied, “Can you make it five?”

“Five is great. Thanks so much.”

The two of them walked together into his office.

Hanley did not know Brewer well, but one couldn’t be a member of senior staff here without hearing her name on a regular basis. Her career had been skyrocketing straight up since she’d joined the Agency, just after getting her master’s at Villanova in International Studies. Hanley had seen her name tied to all sorts of successful programs, and she’d never spent more than two years at the same desk, instead working her way steadily up the ladder.

Hanley was still several rungs above her, but he felt sure he would top out long before Suzanne Brewer, who seemed to be just getting started. He could imagine her running the whole damn Agency someday, so he told himself he should go out of his way to curry favor with her on her way up, so hopefully she’d remember his actions later on when she had the power to make his life either a little more pleasant or a lot more difficult.

Hanley said, “So, I hear you are working on the Violator operation.”

“That’s correct. I was put in the Working Group when Violator showed up in D.C. I guess you could say this is my geography, considering I am in charge of domestic asset protection. So now I’m trying to guess Violator’s next move and, since I’m new to all this, I’m having some difficulty.”

“He’s a hard target, no question about that.”

“You heard about Babbitt, didn’t you?”

“Saw it on the news. You’re thinking that was Gentry?”

“Carmichael is certain of it.”

Hanley shrugged.

Brewer said, “Townsend Government Services had contractors hunting Gentry in Belgium last month. He killed several of them, as a matter of fact. We think it likely Gentry learned Babbitt’s name somewhere during the course of that operation, and that’s why he targeted Babbitt here in the States as soon as he arrived. He thinks it will take some of the heat off of him so he can pursue whatever his objective is.”

“That’s a plausible theory, I guess,” said Hanley, but there was no conviction in his voice.