Alien Diplomacy

and it seemed quite intentional. I looked back at Chuckie. Silence wasn’t working for me. “Why would Len and Kyle being new matter to the Three Stooges?”
    “No idea,” he said. “They didn’t recognize the drivers…” He stopped talking and looked at Olga. “But the drivers recognized me, didn’t they?”
    She gave him a small smile. “They did seem to leave the moment you were in the doorway of the American Centaurion Embassy.”
    My brain decided to kick in. “They recognized Chuckie, and clearly not as the international playboy he is.”
    “He pretends to be,” Olga corrected gently.
    “Right, whatever.” I took the logic leap. “So, they left not because they knew who Chuckie was but because—”
    “I’d know who they were,” he finished for me. “Len and Kyle are too new to know all the various terrorists out there…” Chuckie looked at Olga closely. “But that’s not what you’re insinuating. The drivers know me because we work together in some way.”
    She smiled. “See? I knew you would know.”
    “So they’re C.I.A.? They honestly don’t seem…sneaky enough. I mean, they’ve been sneaky and able to get past us, sad as it is to admit, but they just don’t seem up to the level of what I’m used to from the C.I.A.” I jerked. “They were in here yesterday, weren’t they?”
    “Oh, yes,” Olga said calmly. “Adriana did not leave them alone, and she and I refused to leave the building, even though there was the possibility of a dangerous gas leak.” The way she said it, it was clear that Olga, at least, hadn’t been even remotely concerned that the gas leak might be real.
    “Did they plant bugs?”
    “Of course they did.” Olga smiled at the expressions on our faces. “However, we do know how to find and remove them. Theywere in what I would call the standard places. All were focused on your Embassy,” she added casually.
    Chuckie’s eyes narrowed. “I had operatives come in here last night.”
    “You did. They were very polite. We allowed them to search, of course. It would not do for us to allow just anyone to know that we are able to spot and disable surveillance equipment. They might ask what I did before I married Andrei.”
    “You were some kind of special ops or KGB or something, weren’t you?” If my mother had been Mossad before she and Dad got married, why not Olga?
    She laughed. “How would an old lady in a wheelchair have ever been a part of the KGB? Really, such a silly question.” Of course, she winked at me as she said this.
    “Right, gotcha, Comrade.” She laughed again. “Okay, so, Chuckie, what did your teams think of the surveillance stuff they’ve found so far?”
    “It’s as Comrade Ambassadress said: They were in all the standard places. My teams searched in all the nonstandard places, but they were clean.” He cocked his head at me. “You don’t think they’re C.I.A., do you?”
    “I don’t know. But it wouldn’t surprise me if they were F.B.I. or Homeland Security or something. Do you know?” I asked Olga.
    She shrugged. “I believe I do. However, my assumptions are not the same as yours.”
    I groaned. “Are we still being bugged or something, and you don’t want anyone to think you’ve willingly helped us?” Olga was about to answer when Adriana came into the room with a rolling cart that had a pitcher of lemonade and several glasses, along with some little cakes and cookies.
    Adriana poured and handed glasses around. I could tell Chuckie wanted to do some sort of poison test on everything, though he took a glass politely. “There’s no alcohol in this, correct?” he asked pointedly, as White took his glass.
    Olga and Adriana exchanged an amused look. “No, Mister Reynolds,” Adriana said. “We wouldn’t want to cause any of our Alpha Centaurion neighbors distress.”
    “And I don’t believe we are still being bugged, no,” Olga said to me. She looked at Chuckie. “A part of you must be wondering if you should have asked to bring your dogs inside instead of sending the young men to take them safely home.”
    I thought about this. They weren’t Chuckie’s dogs, and she most certainly knew that. “Dogs…” I took my glass and decided to go for it. I took a drink. “Tart. Very nice.”
    “Dogs?” Chuckie asked, as he and White took the Lemonade Nestea Plunge and had a sip. None of us convulsed and dropped to the floor. I took a cookie.
    “There were dogs in each taxi. Big German Shepherds.