Early Warning by Michael Walsh Page A
Authors: Michael Walsh
Tags: United States, Fiction, thriller, Suspense, Thrillers, American Mystery & Suspense Fiction, Suspense fiction, Intelligence Officers, Political, Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945), Mystery And Suspense Fiction, Terrorism, Fiction - Espionage, General & Literary Fiction, Prevention, Officials and employees, Cyberterrorism - Prevention, National Security Agency
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director’s orders. In no time, he and Maryam would be fully up to speed and, if possible, already fighting back. There were contingency plans for something like this, but plans went out the window as soon as the first shots were fired, and from the looks of this…
No matter. He was doing what he was born to do. He was himself again.
He was Devlin.
C HAPTER F IVE
Los Angeles
Jake Sinclair had a choice: to stay sober or to get drunk?
Not just drunk, but, like Elmer Gantry, eloquently drunk, lovingly drunk. Elmer Gantry was one of his favorite characters in literature—not that he had ever read the novel, but he had seen the movie many times over, and he loved Burt Lancaster’s performance, even if the movie left out most of the novel. He loved it so much that he owned a print of it—not a DVD, but an honest-to-God movie print—and had it shown in the screening room at his house in Loughlin Park whenever he wished. It was easy; he owned the studio.
From his custom-built, body-contoured easy chair, Sinclair looked longingly across the room at the built-in wet bar, a relict of a time when real men not only drank but also smoked.
Loughlin Park was the Beverly Hills of Los Feliz. Sinclair was very proud of himself for living in Los Feliz. Los Angeles had moved as far west as it could go without actually trying to build houses in the Pacific Ocean—although there were more than a few movie industry types of his acquaintance who were convinced they could walk on water—so now the smart money had begun to move back east, or at least as far east as Griffith Park Boulevard, where houses that might go for twenty million dollars in the bird streets above Beverly Hills could be snapped up for two or three, and yet you were still dozens of blocks away from the nearest Mexicans. Now that was what he called smart shopping.
Now, about that drink…after all, it was always five o’clock somewhere.
The house had been built by W. C. Fields when he decided to follow Hollywood’s path westward and move in next door to Cecil B. DeMille. Although Sinclair had “modernized” the place, Mrs. Sinclair had insisted on sparing a few of the period touches, and so the wet bar still stood, its hidden refrigerators filled with designer waters like Saint-Géron, which was supposed to be a prophylactic against anemia. Mrs. Sinclair was enamored of the distinctive long-necked Alberto Bali–designed bottles. But there was no booze in the wet bar, nor anywhere else in the house, in keeping with Hollywood’s new, healthy, raw-foods-and-Brita-filtered-water lifestyle. Thank God tennis and sportfucking were still allowed.
The reason Sinclair wished he was drunk had to do with business. Almost everything in his life had to do with business, including the current Mrs. Sinclair. She was, of course, not the first Mrs. Sinclair; Jake Sinclair eagerly subscribed to the Hollywood custom in which every man of significance is or was married to some other man of significance’s wife, and every man owned, at one time or another, a house that had formerly belonged to one of his rivals, colleagues, or mortal enemies, and then either totally remodeled it or tore down. As the saying went: Hollywood is a relationship business. And, as far as relationships went, he’d had quite a few.
Luckily, the current, although soon-to-be-ex Mrs. Sinclair was Jennifer, just like the first Mrs. Sinclair, which is why he thought of her as Jennifer II or Jenny the Second. Like some arranged marriage between European potentates in the 16th century, she had come to him as a kind of reverse dowry. Jennifer Gailliard was the daughter of one of the biggest investors in the country, an investor Sinclair had been wooing with even greater ardor than he would later woo the man’s daughter. The three-day celebration of their marriage on the island of Corfu was in all the gossip magazines—the photo rights alone went for more than $2 million to People —and it was quickly
No matter. He was doing what he was born to do. He was himself again.
He was Devlin.
C HAPTER F IVE
Los Angeles
Jake Sinclair had a choice: to stay sober or to get drunk?
Not just drunk, but, like Elmer Gantry, eloquently drunk, lovingly drunk. Elmer Gantry was one of his favorite characters in literature—not that he had ever read the novel, but he had seen the movie many times over, and he loved Burt Lancaster’s performance, even if the movie left out most of the novel. He loved it so much that he owned a print of it—not a DVD, but an honest-to-God movie print—and had it shown in the screening room at his house in Loughlin Park whenever he wished. It was easy; he owned the studio.
From his custom-built, body-contoured easy chair, Sinclair looked longingly across the room at the built-in wet bar, a relict of a time when real men not only drank but also smoked.
Loughlin Park was the Beverly Hills of Los Feliz. Sinclair was very proud of himself for living in Los Feliz. Los Angeles had moved as far west as it could go without actually trying to build houses in the Pacific Ocean—although there were more than a few movie industry types of his acquaintance who were convinced they could walk on water—so now the smart money had begun to move back east, or at least as far east as Griffith Park Boulevard, where houses that might go for twenty million dollars in the bird streets above Beverly Hills could be snapped up for two or three, and yet you were still dozens of blocks away from the nearest Mexicans. Now that was what he called smart shopping.
Now, about that drink…after all, it was always five o’clock somewhere.
The house had been built by W. C. Fields when he decided to follow Hollywood’s path westward and move in next door to Cecil B. DeMille. Although Sinclair had “modernized” the place, Mrs. Sinclair had insisted on sparing a few of the period touches, and so the wet bar still stood, its hidden refrigerators filled with designer waters like Saint-Géron, which was supposed to be a prophylactic against anemia. Mrs. Sinclair was enamored of the distinctive long-necked Alberto Bali–designed bottles. But there was no booze in the wet bar, nor anywhere else in the house, in keeping with Hollywood’s new, healthy, raw-foods-and-Brita-filtered-water lifestyle. Thank God tennis and sportfucking were still allowed.
The reason Sinclair wished he was drunk had to do with business. Almost everything in his life had to do with business, including the current Mrs. Sinclair. She was, of course, not the first Mrs. Sinclair; Jake Sinclair eagerly subscribed to the Hollywood custom in which every man of significance is or was married to some other man of significance’s wife, and every man owned, at one time or another, a house that had formerly belonged to one of his rivals, colleagues, or mortal enemies, and then either totally remodeled it or tore down. As the saying went: Hollywood is a relationship business. And, as far as relationships went, he’d had quite a few.
Luckily, the current, although soon-to-be-ex Mrs. Sinclair was Jennifer, just like the first Mrs. Sinclair, which is why he thought of her as Jennifer II or Jenny the Second. Like some arranged marriage between European potentates in the 16th century, she had come to him as a kind of reverse dowry. Jennifer Gailliard was the daughter of one of the biggest investors in the country, an investor Sinclair had been wooing with even greater ardor than he would later woo the man’s daughter. The three-day celebration of their marriage on the island of Corfu was in all the gossip magazines—the photo rights alone went for more than $2 million to People —and it was quickly
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