Kate Devereaux is a freelance agent for MI5.
The time frame for her activities is nearing the mid-70s; the location is, obviously, England. The line of work she performs for the Security Service id ... well, sex might not be actually part of any official listing of her duties but from virtually every single page of her recorded adventures, sex plays a major - if not only - role. Our introduction to Devereaux is while she is wearing a major-league form-fitting basque (corset-ish underwear, apparently) about to engage in her own form of intense interrogation - though she finds she gets so into her work she sort of forgets to ask the questions she meant to pose. Luckily her subject is a chatty fellow so she inadvertently gets what she wants from him after he had gotten what he wanted from her.
As stated, Devereaux works for MI5 on a freelance basis. This means that while they can, and do, call her into the Leconfield House headquarters for briefs and debriefs, she is not allowed to wander their halls without an escort. This also means that she finds herself having to sit and wait for people for what to her is almost interminable periods - waiting is not something the Devereaux does well. But she puts up with it because as she tells us, "freelance work was feast or famine. And recently, the famine had been longer than normal". She tries hard to not think about the pile of bills she has back at her flat; luckily thinking about sex, something she does a lot, does help take her mind off her debts.
Devereaux works for the very daunting Mrs. Kenton, a no-nonsense woman with an extreme distaste for freelancers like Devereaux; she would never have chosen to ever use such personnel if they were not so annoyingly useful at doing things MI5 would not want to admit they ever sanctioned. Again, the word 'sex' is applicable though Mrs. Kenton would be loathe to ever say it. Devereaux does experience some amusement when, after showing the stern taskmaster the photos take of her latest interrogatee, very explicit pics to be sure, the payment chit that Kenton passes to Devereaux clearly states for "services rendered".
Good Lines:
- Speaking of a very grungy room picked for a sexual triste, "Depraved thoughts made manifest in a deprived room".