The Devil You Don't

By Ron Whittington

Short Story: When businessman-turned-spy Parker Glynn is assigned to attend a dinner party to make points with the new French Ambassador to the U.S., he finds the high-brow sophistication of Miami’s uber-wealthy can sometimes be deceiving.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ron Whittington
• Release date: Nov 23, 2012
• ISBN: 9781301975426

Ron Whittington

Over the last 20 years, Ron Whittington has worked as a ghostwriter on two national best-selling books and his freelance writing has appeared in Texas Business, Texas Monthly, Water's Edge, Jacksonville Magazine, Beson Publications, and The Florida Times-Union. A native of Atlanta, Whittington started his career as a journalist with CNN Radio and the Dallas-Fort Worth Business Journal before going into the public relations profession. He has served as the media spokesman for the Dallas Chamber of Commerce, Dallas Area Rapid Transit, the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority and Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games, JEA (Jacksonville Florida’s municipal utility) in addition to work as an independent public relations consultant. He is currently a senior account executive for the southeast U.S. regional office of London-based Mulberry Marketing Communications.

Book preview

The Devil You Don’t

A Short Story by

Ron P. Whittington

This is a fictional story. Use or mention of historical events, places, or names of public figures is done solely for the purpose of placing the story within a time frame or geographic region. Any similarity of the story line to actual events is coincidental.

THE DEVIL YOU DON’T. Copyright © 2011 by Ron P. Whittington

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Published by Smashwords

Visit our website at www.rpwhittington.com

First Edition: May 2011

ISBN: 978-1-3019-7542-6

The Devil You Don’t

By Ron P. Whittington

A formal dinner party was the last place Parker Glynn wanted to be, especially one that took place within sight of an ocean.

He had seen enough of the sea for a lifetime. Rest was what Glynn needed most.

He had been through an exhausting month, most of it spent on, and in, the waters of the Caribbean.

The tortuous, two-month assignment was finally over and Glynn was ready to see home.

And that’s where he was headed on an early Saturday morning, preparing to board the last leg of his flight from Atlanta to Dallas, when he felt the vibration on his hip and his phone began to beep. Instead of ignoring it, which is what his gut initially told him to do, Glynn instinctively pulled his cell phone from its leather cover. In an automatic fluid motion, he drew it from his belt like a gun and was staring at the phone’s screen before he knew it.

The text message was a nine-digit number followed by the capital letters ‘C.I.’ – which meant Contact Immediately – and ‘H.S.’

It was his contact at Homeland Security. The phone number was never the same, but the final initials contained the true intent of the caller.

Glynn left the boarding area to find a relatively quiet spot at an adjacent gate and punched in the number. As it began to ring, he watched from a distance as the other passengers began to move through the ticket gate and into the enclosed corridor that led to his departing jet. Some of them were heading home, but not Glynn...not today. He longed to get into the bed at his condo, escape to his hideaway in Turtle Creek near downtown Dallas, and just sleep...take a few weeks to let his body recuperate.

But, once he was on the phone, it was apparent to him that wasn’t going to happen today.

Back in D.C., someone (probably in the State Department) had discovered Glynn knew French Ambassador Étienne Jambon...and that same certain someone apparently had a contact in Homeland who could be called to pull a string or two.

Jambon was being honored at an early evening reception later that day, just a few hours after he would