The Global War on Morris Read Online Free PDF

have you done?”
    â€œSir, I have marked the unmarked vehicle.”
    â€œYes, you have. Now, get your ass down here and move this vehicle, or I will have it and you both transferred to North Korea!”
    â€œYes, sir. On my way, sir.”
    To say that Agent Tom Fairbanks’s temper got the best of him was to describe his entire career in federal law enforcement. Thirty years of personnel files were splattered with similar evaluations: “A ticking time bomb”; “A grenade with the pin pulled halfway out”; “We gave him a gun?,” and “STRONGLY recommend anger management therapy” (with three red lines scrawled angrily under the word “STRONGLY”).
    Agent Fairbanks could not contain his temper, and so his temper contained him—in the Melville, Long Island, regional field office of the Department of Homeland Security’s Subagency of Intelligence and Analysis. The field office was Washington’s latest strategic doctrine in the global War on Terror: the best offense is a good flowchart. No looming attack, no catastrophic hurricane, no national emergency, was so grave that it couldn’t be handled with a good reshuffling of the bureaucracy.
    Agent Fairbanks had been shuffled and reshuffled. He was frayed and brittle and now discarded to the bottom of the deck: in Melville, Long Island. Of course, were it not for his reputation for uncontrolled rage, he might be starting his day in more challenging locales: FBI offices in Manhattan or perhaps even in Delhi or Mumbai. But his FBI days were behind him. The FBI had been a stop in his federal law enforcement career. A brief stop.
    Fairbanks entered his corner office. A small window, shielded by dented and stained aluminum blinds, offered surveillance of the immense parking lot four floors below. He separated two slats and saw Agent Russell racing back to the office, darting through the endless lanes of cars, like a rat navigating a maze.
    The office was spartan. A lonely leather chair sat caddy corner to his desk, and dark gray file cabinets were pushed up against a far wall. The walls were decorated as an afterthought. A CensusBureau map of Long Island dominated the wall opposite the window, resembling a trophy fish. Above his desk were two framed citations in cheap black frames: the Huntington Township Rotary Club “Law Enforcement Man of the Year Award” from 2003, and a Proclamation from the Town of Oyster Bay (“Whereas Agent Thomas Fairbanks has made a vital contribution to the safety of the residents of Oyster Bay . . . Whereas Agent Thomas Fairbanks represents the qualities of leadership, dedication, and sacrifice that emblify”—was that a word, Fairbanks wondered when he received it—“public service; Now, therefore, be it resolved that the citizens of Oyster Bay do hereby thank Thomas Fairbanks for his service to our Town and to the United States . . .”).
    The only evidence that Fairbanks had a life outside the department was the gold, tri-fold picture frame on his desk, displaying his three children. There was TJ (now president of his junior high school class); Trisha (who had just organized the Sweethollow Middle School Christian Conservative Kids’ Club); and Timothy (who, last summer, led his T-ball league in stolen bases, despite a league rule against stealing bases). “They are their father’s children,” people remarked when they gazed at the photographs, in the same tone they used after clucking their tongues and nodding their heads when they passed a traffic accident on the highway. The boys’ shining blond crew cuts gave them a halo effect; and their bright blue eyes sparkled with a pride and confidence that some mistook for a disturbing, possibly psychotic, arrogance. Trisha’s long blond hair fell to her shoulders. She parted it just like her favorite television star, Ann Coulter. And each child boasted what the family