Stone - 25 - Collateral Damage

better equipped for a hunt in New York than we were in London, and we don’t have any more authority, either. Sometimes I think we need a change in our charter. I think we would have been a better place to spend the taxpayers’ money than creating this gargantuan Homeland Security apparatus.”
    “Have you talked with them?”
    “I’m relying on the FBI to do that,” she said. “I have to keep the peace.”
    “I haven’t heard anything on the news about a search for Jasmine,” Stone said.
    “I know, and it’s frustrating.”
    “Do you think she’s still here?”
    “I have no way of knowing. She could be anywhere in the country by now.”
    “Maybe Kate Lee needs to go to the president about this.”
    “She’ll know better than I when it’s time to do that.”
    “I suppose so.”
    Holly finished her glass of wine and waited for Stone to refill her glass, then she took a healthy swig of that.
    “I saw two men in a car near my house,” Stone said. “Are they yours?”
    “They’d better be,” Holly said.
    “Why don’t you invite them into the house? Put one inside my office outside door and one in the kitchen—that way they can watch both the street and the garden.”
    “You don’t mind?”
    “Mind? I don’t want my house blown up.”
    “I’ll do it, then.”
    “I feel better already,” Stone said.

Joan buzzed Stone. “Herbie on one.”
    Stone pressed the button. “Morning, Herb. How are you?”
    “Extremely well,” Herbie replied. “And you?”
    “Can’t complain.” He didn’t mention that there was CIA security at the front and rear of his house.
    “Is Holly in town?”
    “She is.”
    “Will the two of you have dinner with Harp and me this evening?”
    “Let me check with Holly—hang on.” Stone pressed the hold button, rang Holly and got an affirmative reply.
    “Sure, where and when?”
    “La Grenouille at eight?”
    “Nice choice. We’ll be there.” They both hung up. Stone reflected that he was unable to keep up with Herbie’s progress as a sophisticate. A year before he would never have heard of La Grenouille.
    —
    Stone and Holly arrived at the restaurant a little late, and Stone was surprised to find James Rutledge and Kelli Keane at the table with Herbie and Harp. He introduced Holly, and they sat down.
    A waiter appeared with a bottle of Veuve Clicquot Grande Dame champagne and presented it to Herbie, who nodded. “Would anyone prefer something else to drink? Stone, I’m sure they have Knob Creek.”
    “My favorite champagne is always good enough for me,” Stone said, as the waiter made his rounds, then brought them menus.
    “When is your book out, Kelli?” Stone asked.
    “Very soon,” she replied.
    “I hope I’m not going to get a raft of calls from the media.”
    “I think all their questions will be answered in the book,” she said, cryptically.
    “It’s too late for ‘no comment,’ then?”
    “I don’t think you have anything to worry about, Stone.” She turned to Holly. “I remember you from the opening of The Arrington in L.A. You’re CIA, aren’t you?” Asked as if they had never met.
    “That’s right.”
    “Congratulations on your promotion,” Kelli said. “I saw the mention in the Times .”
    “Thank you,” Holly replied.
    “I believe you had some sort of bombing incident on the East Side, didn’t you?”
    “Yes.”
    “Any significant damage?”
    “It rattled a few coffee cups—that was about it.”
    “I’ll bet that’s what you would say if the building were just a hole in the ground,” Kelli said, laughing.
    “Probably.”
    “Have you been with the Agency a long time?”
    “A fairly long time.”
    “Did you do something else before that?”
    “I was a police officer in Florida. Before that I was in the army, where I was a police officer, too.”
    “I didn’t know the Agency drew on former police as recruits.”
    “The Agency recruits from all over the place,” Holly replied. She was being careful; she didn’t often have conversations about her work with civilians, and this woman was a journalist and the subject of an investigation she herself had initiated.
    “Do you enjoy the work?”
    “It’s very gratifying, when things go well. When they don’t, less so.”
    “How did you and Stone meet?”
    “We first met when I was still working in Florida. Some years ago.”
    “Are you staying with Stone while you’re here?”
    “I have an apartment in the city,” Holly replied, offering half