Formerly Fingerman by Joe Nelms Read Free Book Online Page B

pizzazz. Why was it so hard for these people to come up with something clever? How was he supposed to attach himself to The Domino Theory ? It didn’t exactly scream nickname-friendly. The Ace of The Domino Theory ? No. The Big Daddy of The Domino Theory . Sorry. The Dominator of the . . . oh why bother?
    Eventually, in the tried-and-true manner of an oversized bureaucracy, it was decided by the higher ups that the Mafia-catching budget would be split equally among the various factions. Essentially giving the green light to any and all agents who came up with an idea. All they had to do was convince their supervisors.
    Brittany didn’t have a catchy name for her plan. It was the one omission of her pitch. Not that she hadn’t tried to come up with something clever— Operation I Spy Wise Guy , The Badfellas Commission , The Godfather IV: Uncle Sam’s Revenge . Nothing sounded right. She knew it was important to Anfernee and was hoping to overcome this obvious shortcoming by adding plenty of drama to her presentation, perhaps crying if necessary.
    â€œAnfernee, Carmine Mastramouro is ‘the guy.’ Frank’s going to kill him.”
    â€œYou think?”
    â€œTrust me. I’ve been watching Fortunato. I’ve got audio of his meetings. I’ve got pictures of his associates. I’ve established motives. All I need now is permission to pull the trigger and I’ll destroy this guy.”
    Anfernee considered her for a second.
    â€œDo you have a name for this mission?”
    Brittany had chosen her bulky sweater today for just such an emergency. Who needed flop sweat staining their pits as their brain thumbed through possible name files, grasping for anything that would pull this one out of the burner—puns, movie titles, names of old boyfriends and pets, anything. And suddenly, like a TMZ reporter on deadline, it just appeared in front of her eyes.
    â€œ Project Fancypants .”
    It was so easy she had overlooked it for the last two weeks. And now it came out of her mouth as if she had been sitting on it forever, just waiting for the right time to drop this brilliant bomb.
    Anfernee silently considered the name. Project Fancypants. It was bold enough that the brass would be impressed with his team’s brazen determination, but vague enough that he could claim it was a simple surveillance mission that went out of control in the hands of a renegade agent who was definitely not him. And he already had the perfect nickname in the case of success—“The Tailor of Project Fancypants .” Bingo.
    Anfernee nodded. Just a nod. Not a notarized approval letter. Later, Anfernee could plausibly be able to say he had merely stretched or yawned and had been misinterpreted. Unless she actually caught Frank Fortunato. Then his nod would take on an entirely different meaning.
    Brittany quickly scooped up her presentation materials and headed out to start work as Anfernee sat silent and still, wary of giving any further indications of his thoughts.
    â€œThank you, Anfernee! You won’t regret this.”

The Interview
    â€œAnd then you were at Overthink for three years. Nice company.”
    The heat in Geoff Pedretti’s sunlit corner office was on the verge of aggressively uncomfortable. Geoff had apologized for the temperature earlier, but a suspicious person might wonder if it weren’t some sort of bizarre test to weed out the weaker candidates. Of course, compared to doing time in a synthetic chicken suit on a city street in a globally warmed September, it was practically cool. Brad waited patiently as the CEO and chief creative officer of Red Light District Advertising perused his résumé again, as if there were some secret code hidden within the meticulously designed piece.
    Sitting in this office, Brad felt like he had been granted a temporary visa back to his New York. The New York he knew and loved and missed so desperately. Mmmmm, New York