Raymond Lister, the Weavers’ next-door neighbor, whom they found tied to his bed and gagged. The journalist writing the story did not learn what Mr. Lister had shared with the agents before he was bundled off in a government SUV, because the head of the Homeland Security team, Special Agent Janet Simmons, cut him off with a “national security” excuse.
Francisco and Jan had not missed Tina and Stephanie Weaver’s kidnappers, because, before their arrival, they had not left the building.
She woke Alexandra in the guest room to share this information, but it didn’t tell them much more than they already knew.
They had coffee together in the morning, and Erika offered to bring her into the office. “If you don’t mind,” Alexandra said, “I’d rather stay here. Is your place wired?”
Erika shook her head. “Not that I know of.”
“Then I’ll stay, and we can compare notes at noon, and again at five. Is this agreeable?”
A lawyer, Erika remembered. She spoke just like a lawyer.
Just before noon on Friday, Oskar walked into her office. She was already on the phone with Berlin, dealing with one of her agent’s deaths in Paris. France had sent the body back but was growing irate at what it saw as a territorial infringement. In seven different ways, Erika could only assure the BND president that the man had been on leave. “Are we not allowed to take foreign vacations anymore?”
She tried to wave Oskar away, but he drew an index finger across his neck to get her to hang up. When she didn’t respond immediately, he held up a printed CCTV image of Milo Weaver staring directly up at the camera, holding out a paper towel with a note written across it in English, beginning,
To Erika Schwartz, BND-Pullach
As the president said, “The problem, in their eyes, is-” she hung up and said to Oskar, “Where?”
“Frankfurt Airport. Right now.”
She took the printout from him and read the brief note again, then looked up at Oskar. “He really is quite mad, isn’t he?”
5
What she saw when she stepped out of that bathroom surprised her. It had been… four? No, five years. She’d come to New York for a Berg amp; DeBurgh corporate retreat, and one of the American lawyers, a loudmouth named Patrick Hardemann, had over drinks mentioned his daughter, Stephanie, and miserably admitted that “of course she doesn’t carry the Hardemann name; she goes by her stepbastard’s name- Weaver. ” Intrigued, Alexandra quietly fished for the stepdad’s given name, then asked where they were living-Park Slope, Brooklyn.
She’d found him easily enough and called to suggest they meet for dinner. “I’d love to see your wife and daughter. Really, Milo, we are family.” Instead, he’d come alone to the restaurant and after minutes of evasion finally admitted the truth: His wife and daughter didn’t know that he had a sister, not even a half sister. They didn’t know about Yevgeny. They knew nothing about his Russian side.
She took the hint and later decided that the world had not become a smaller place because of this, not really, for she hadn’t had him in her life to begin with. After leaving for college, Milo Weaver had for all purposes dropped out of the Primakov clan. She convinced herself that she was satisfied to find him relatively happy and healthy-that would have to be enough. Besides, there was a certain poetry to it. For years Yevgeny had kept him a secret from his wife and daughters, and now Milo was keeping them a secret from his own wife and daughter.
Now, here he was again. He’d gotten himself involved in something, and whatever he’d done had killed their father.
What surprised her was that Yevgeny had ever considered giving him the reins to the Library. Who was this anxious-looking man with gaunt cheeks and flakes of gray? The one who had said to Erika’s assistant, If you can’t find them, I want you to have me killed, and meant it? This was the kind of man you used in order to get at someone worthy; a man like this was never the final goal.
Yet it was he, her brother, Yevgeny’s “holy terror.”
He’s very easy to underestimate, Erika had said.
“Alexandra,” Milo said, his voice breaking.
She walked up to him. This was the reason Yevgeny was dead. She thought she might cry, for she hadn’t cried yet, so to stop herself she said, “You’d better talk, Milo. Or I swear I’m going to kill you myself.”
His hands had already started to move forward, perhaps for an embrace, but now he pulled them back, palms out. “Okay.” He retreated a step. “Wait. What are you doing here? Don’t assume you can trust these people.”
It was an odd thing to say, but then, Yevgeny wouldn’t have told Milo what her job was these days. “I’m here on my own,” she told him. “They’re assisting me.”
He blinked. “Jesus. You worked with him?”
“If by him you mean our father, then yes. Now, speak.”
Milo rubbed his forehead. “He was there-in Brooklyn-to take care of my family.”
Christ, he was slow-witted. “I know that, Milo. Remember, I’ve been talking to Erika Schwartz.”
“No names, ” Oskar said, irritated.
They both ignored him. Milo nodded, thinking. “Right. I hadn’t known he’d brought her into it.”
“Sounds like there’s a lot you don’t know.”
Again, he nodded some silent agreement, then frowned. “It’s about Alan Drummond.”
“ Mein Gott,” said Oskar.
“And Xin Zhu,” she said. “But your precious CIA is really at the core, isn’t it? Look, Milo, maybe you don’t know what happens at this point in the story, so I’ll explain. This is where you tell us exactly what they’re up to.”
“I can tell you what I’ve seen, but I don’t know why they’re doing it all.”
“They want revenge against the Chinese.”
“Apparently not,” Milo said, checking his watch. “This has to be quick.”
“Then talk.”
He sat on the edge of the bed, where Oskar had stationed himself before, and told her in a quick, efficient manner what he knew and how he knew it. It was a story he’d obviously repeated to himself endlessly, pruned of extraneous details, and she imagined that he’d been working it over in order to better understand it himself. Did it make her more sympathetic, knowing how Xin Zhu had threatened him? Not really. When he finished, she said, “You’ve got to have some opinion by this point.”
“The only thing that makes me think this is not a revenge operation is what I was told during one conversation with Irwin and Collingwood. Maybe that was only for my benefit. Maybe they know I’m being run by the Chinese, or perhaps they suspected the safe house was bugged. All I know for sure is that what I’m doing with Leticia is a ruse to distract the Chinese from something else. Leticia thinks it’s another attack, but they’re not keeping her in the loop.”
“Where is Alan Drummond?” she asked as Oskar’s phone rang. He answered it.
“No one knows,” said Milo. “That’s what I’ve been told.”
Oskar said, “Jones is heading for the elevators.”
Milo stood but didn’t leave. He seemed to be waiting for something, so she said, “I talked to Drummond,” then wondered if she should have said anything.
Milo looked at her, frowning again.
“Before,” she said, “when he disappeared. He told me very little, but he did say that your family would be safe. He’d made sure of it.”
Milo’s eyes grew but then relaxed, the light gone from them. “Everyone makes mistakes,” he said and walked to the door. Before leaving, he turned back and spoke to Oskar. “An attempt. Try an attempted kill. That would help clear me with Jones. And if you slip and accidentally get me here,” he said, tapping the center of his forehead, “then no hard feelings.”
Before either of them could answer, Milo was gone.
“What do you think?” she asked.
