Once I got my wits about me...

I started thinking. I am, after all, a lawyer by trade. Or profession as all those phonies out there like to think of themselves, with the pompous "Esquire" after all their names. Even the women. Think about it: "Jane B. Doe, Esquire." I always thought of Esquire as being a gentleman. Many of the female lawyers with whom I have had the displeasure of meeting are certainly not gentlewomen. But I digress.

Before I got out of the black S.U.V. with the darkly tinted windows, I asked a few questions. "Ummm, how am I to afford this attempt to find Lipton T. Bagg?" [Or whatever the hell his name is?] That earned a scowl, but I learned that Uncle Sam would foot my entire bill. "My entire billlllllll?" "Yup." Daaaaaayaaaaammmmm.

"My F-150 has over 200,000 miles, and most of the gaskets leak fluid."

"We'll get you a car." Music to my ears.

"I may have to break a few laws to find him..."

"You have a 'get out of jail FREE' card from us!"

I hope he did not see the corner of my lip curl up just a bit when I heard that.

"I'll need some cash."

He didn't flinch. He reached into his coat pocket and took out a stack of hundies. I acted as though it was no big deal and took the stack and stuffed it awkwardly into my hip pocket.

"One more thing. Stay off my trail. To find him, I have to be left alone."

That did not set too well. These alpha males did not appear to be the types to want to let me have free reign during my search for LTB. But I am not dumb. I was holding all the cards. Or at least these bozos thought that I was. They all nodded in agreement.

"Ugh, one last, stupid question..."

"What!?" This time it was the driver, whom I had never heard utter a word before.

Nonplussed, I replied: "Does Lipton get the same considerations that I get?" I saw that my question was not understood. "Does he get an unlimited supply of money when he is performing his special tasks for America?"

I swear they all looked at me as if I were a fucking imbecile. I took that as a yes.

So the first thing that I did once they were gone, I got on my bug-infested lap top and Map-quested the distance to certain locations from the location of the dive where Lipton had been seen. "This is gonna be easy" I thought to myself. Can you tell where this is going?

HOLD YOUR BREATH IN ANTICIPATION! MORE IS COMING!!!

John "I'm a Secret Agent Now" Doe