heat of Rebecca’s disdain had evaporated whatever confidence Brian had felt. She was probably right. He couldn’t have seen what no one else had.
“I mess up somehow?”
Reynolds didn’t answer, just nodded, Come with me. He led Brian at race-walk speed down a fire staircase to a basement corridor that Brian hadn’t known existed, swiped his badge to unlock a thick steel door. Down a hallway to a conference room, where a man and woman sat on one side of a table. On the other side, an empty chair, obviously meant for him.
Brian sat. Reynolds stayed standing.
“Can you walk us through your thought process on the challenge?”
Guess we won’t be introducing ourselves. Brian hoped the truth didn’t make him sound like an idiot. “I didn’t see how I could beat the encryption directly. An end-around seemed like the best option.”
“Did you have any outside help?” the woman asked.
“No.” He shook his head for emphasis.
“Your boss came by.” This from the guy.
“Only to dump water on me.” Brian started to laugh, then stopped when no one else did. “Really.”
“Someone from TAO tipped you,” the woman said. Not a question this time.
“I don’t even know anyone from TAO.”
“You have ten minutes,” Reynolds said. “Walk us through how you got from X to Y.”
So Brian did. They listened, no questions. When he was done, Reynolds looked at him. “You’d be okay taking a polygraph to confirm this.”
“This is getting weird.” Though he knew the NSA loved the box. He’d already taken one before he was hired.
“Yes or no to the poly?”
“Yes, sure.”
Reynolds looked at the other two. “Okay, you’ve met him. Any problems?”
They shook their heads.
“Okay,” Reynolds said, and extended a hand. “Welcome to TAO. Assuming you pass the poly.”
“Holy shit,” Brian said.
* * *
Three days later Brian was officially part of Tailored Access. Over coffee, Reynolds explained the job, and why he’d hired Brian:
“We need some coders who think like you, who see cracks in the architecture, exploitable holes. I mean, a lot of the time it’s not going to work, and I gotta warn you that some of the hard-core guys may not take you seriously. But it doesn’t matter, we run a pretty open shop. I want you to feel free to ask questions. I’ve got enough tanks. I need some snipers. Make sense?”
“Sure does.” What could be better than having the chance to think of himself as a sniper?
He didn’t realize at the time that—like his marriage—his new job would never again be as good as it was in those early days. Be careful what you wish for.
* * *
But for a while all was well. Reynolds was as good as his word. The internal walls were low, and the coders encouraged to collaborate. Sure, some of the PhDs made clear they thought his Ender’s Game win was a fluke. But so what? If he had to eat a little crap, so be it. He had plenty of experience with that at home.
And as for home… not much changed.
Sure, their money problems improved now that he was working, and he got a raise once he joined Tailored Access. They made progress on their credit card bills. But Brian couldn’t see how they’d ever pay for college for the kids. Of course, he could live with them not going to college. Not his first choice, but he hadn’t gone and his life had worked out. But he knew he couldn’t even mention the possibility to Becks. She’d freak.
Worse, Becks still didn’t treat him as an equal. Brian thought sometimes it was like she didn’t believe he worked for Tailored Access.
What did she want from him? Now he had a real job, and she still didn’t take him seriously. Maybe she was so used to thinking of him as her lovable loser husband that she couldn’t look at him any other way.
Maybe she liked thinking about him that way, maybe she always had.
But he was done trying to prove himself to his wife.
Now that he had a few bucks to spare, he started hitting the strip clubs again. He didn’t like the ones in D.C. as much as Houston—those strippers had been the best part of living down there. But they did the trick, especially one club called the Peppermint, just inside the D.C.-Maryland border, about a half hour from Fort Meade. After the club he’d usually hit the gym on the way home. Gave him an excuse to take a shower.
He had no problem making sure Rebecca didn’t find out. The