Collision Read Free Page B

negotiations are done, I suspect she’ll ask you out the next time you’re in DC.”
    “Does she know I’m a widower?”
    “I told her. But not every detail. That’s up to you.”
    “E-mail me Smith’s concerns on the contract and I’ll craft our response.”
    Sam Hector was silent for a moment on the other end of the line. “Forgive me. I’m only trying to be helpful. We all worry about you . . .”
    “Sam, I’m really fine. And I’ll talk to you tomorrow morning.”
    “Take care, Ben.” Sam clicked off the phone.
    No woman had asked him out in the two years since Emily died, and he had no plans to ask out any woman. He tried to imagine how he’d react to an invitation. He had nothing to give, nothing to share, nothing to say. A slight cold terror touched his skin. He lowered the car’s window, let fresh air wash over his face as he turned off the highway toward home. He clicked on the radio: “A bizarre shooting in downtown Austin today left two dead . . . ,” the announcer said and Ben switched off the radio. He did not like to hear about shootings. Two years after his wife’s death, the very word twisted a knife in his spine, brought back the horrible memory of Emily sprawled dead on the kitchen floor, a bullet hole marring her forehead.
    Random, pointless, for no reason, some unknown idiot firing rounds at empty houses. He eased his grip on the steering wheel, tried not to remember.
    Ben lived in Tarrytown, an older and expensive neighborhood on the west side of Austin. His house was small by the neighborhood’s increasingly grandiose standards—Tarrytown had been invaded by mega-mansions, towering over the original houses on the cramped lots—but the limestone bungalow suited him. He pulled into his garage just as the simmering storm broke into soft rain. His flower beds needed springtime tending and the yard could use a mow, he thought.
    Ben went inside his house and set his duffel bag on the kitchen floor. He grabbed a soda from the refrigerator and headed back into his office. He cracked open the laptop and downloaded five days’ worth of e-mail. Most of his clients knew he was gone this week so there was less than normal. He saw an encrypted note containing the specifics of Sam’s hot UK deal. He frowned at a couple of messages: a request from a business magazine reporter to respond to allegations of security contractor malfeasance involving a company he’d never worked with; three e-mails from people he didn’t know, protesting the use of private security forces in Iraq and Afghanistan; and e-mails from six people with military and security backgrounds, looking for work with Hector, asking him for advice and help.
    Where there were millions at stake, and guns involved, controversy always loomed. He understood people’s concerns about private contractors being used in war, but the reality was that the government was offering big-dollar contracts, and people of both dubious and high integrity went after them. Hector Global was one of three hundred private companies offering security and training services in Iraq alone. Ben was careful to work only with the contractors with good records and highly professional staffs. Many of them, other than his biggest client, were new, staffed by former soldiers and unused to navigating government deals. His guidance made it easier for them to win favorable terms.
    There were well over a hundred thousand private security contractors on the ground in Iraq, training security forces and police, protecting facilities and dignitaries. The money was excellent. Ben had helped Sam Hector grow his company into a three-thousand-employee behemoth in the security world, with thousands more independent contractors on call, to provide everything from security to computer expertise to food services.
    A soft red 6 glowed on his answering machine’s readout. He decided to deal with the rest of the real world after he took a shower. Technically, he was still on his alone