17
“This is an unusual request, sir.”
“I’m an unusual man.” Drake rocked back in his chair and propped his feet on the desk drawer he always kept pulled out for that purpose.
“Seriously, sir. We don’t—”
“You do know who I am, right?” A lieutenant would have just delivered the item. The woman might be one of those ageless Eurasians, but her lapel insignia were shining birds, which said colonel and meant she was mid-forties, which he found hard to believe.
“Yes sir. You’re Four-star General Drake Nason, CJCS, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. But the NRO is not in the habit of—”
“I don’t care what the National Reconnaissance Office is in the habit of.”
“—the habit of,” Colonel Gray persisted with the stiffest spine since Christ was nailed to a cross, “providing surveillance of hi
