FROM ACROSS the street, Rachel watched the lunch crowd of government employees entering and exiting Fogo de Chão, the Brazilian steakhouse only a block away from the Hoover Building. There were cameras, she knew, which was why she’d gone for a light disguise of sunglasses and a scarf she picked up during the four-hour drive from Montclair. She looked like an old woman.
She had hoped that the report released by Headquarters would shed new light on their situation, but after hours in Bill and Gina’s house, all of them scouring each line, it became clear that the report was a careful construction built to support a particular narrative by choosing certain facts and ignoring lines of inquiry. There was no mention of the Brigade’s funding sources, and no established reasoning for the assassinations of July 4. The death of Bishop was firmly blamed on Ben Mittag, a move to take over the Brigade, while the deaths of Mittag and his Watertown comrades were blamed on gun-happy followers who gave the Bureau SWAT team no choice but to return fire. That this was patently untrue was something only Rachel and a handful of others knew, and she suspected those others had signed away their rights to speak. Perhaps some of them, like her, had refused to sign the draconian nondisclosure agreement; perhaps they, too, were running for their lives.
It was just after one when Ashley arrived for lunch, a bounce in her step, but she wasn’t alone. A young man, probably from Erin Lynch’s department, walked with her, and they were holding hands. That surprised her—but what, really, did she know about Ashley? She’d never invested in a friendship with the accountant, and as a result she didn’t even know where she lived; too bad, because a meeting at her apartment would have been far safer than this.
When they entered, Rachel deliberated, wondering if Ashley’s lover would be the type to report her presence later. Was Lynch’s department even aware that Owen Jakes was looking for her? Was anybody? Though she’d visited internet cafés and scoured the Seattle newspapers, there had been no mention of the dead man in her apartment with his anonymous clothes. Johnson and Vale, or someone who specialized in it, had cleaned the place up.
She finally crossed the road and stepped into the restaurant that smelled of post-lunch Ashley. A rough-cheeked maître d’ asked if she had a reservation. She scanned the crowd and, finding no one familiar, removed her scarf and told him she was meeting a friend. With a smile she pushed on, through the assortment of tables and diners’ backs, past the huge food bar, and toward the rear, where Ashley, back toward her, sat with her young man drinking bottled water.
“Ash?” she said, and the man looked up first, big eyes and crew cut. Ashley turned, looking up, and gaped.
“Rachel? What are you doing here?” Then, to her date: “Tom, this is—”
“Rachel Proulx,” he said, sticking out a hand and half rising. “I recognized you from your photo.”
“Photo?”
“In the paper. Some write-up this morning in the Post. About the report.”
She suddenly felt very exposed; she’d had no idea her face was out there again. Who had approved it? Jakes? Of course—a famous face is hard to hide. But she gave them a smile. “I hope it was flattering.”
“Sit down,” Tom said, looking around. “Let me find you a chair.”
“No, thanks. I can’t stay.” She touched Ashley’s shoulder. “Can I borrow this one a moment?”
Tom gave no sign of resistance, so Ashley got up and followed Rachel to the front of the restaurant, whispering, “Where have you been? They’ve been asking me about you.”
“Who?”
“Erin, Lou Barnes. Jakes. What are you doing off the grid? You can take off those sunglasses, you know.”
Knowing now that her picture had been disseminated in the city’s largest paper, taking off her glasses didn’t feel like an option. “Did you read the report?”
Ashley’s expression flatlined, but she arched a significant brow. They both knew it was a whitewash. “What do you need?” Ashley asked.
Rachel took a Post-it note from her purse. On it was a phone number with a Wisconsin area code. This had been Kevin’s idea, and he’d called Janet Fordham to ask for the number he’d called her from last summer. Rachel said, “This is the number of the phone Mittag was using during his last days. Can you get records?”
Ashley frowned at the number, then at Rachel. “How much trouble are you in?”
“Hard to say. But if you could make sure Tom…”
“He won’t say a word,” Ashley assured her, raising a pinkie. “He’s firmly wrapped around this.”
“Thanks.”
Then Ashley brightened. “Wait—you remember Magellan Holdings?”
“Tell me.”
“When you asked me about it the other day, I started thinking about a different approach. I’d been focused on the direct route, not the indirect one.”
“What are you saying?”
“I went back to Magellan’s original paperwork. Though it was registered in the Bahamas, the paperwork was faxed in from a number in Bilbao, Spain.”
“Spain?” said Rachel, not wanting to admit what she already knew about Spain. Because the next question would be: Who told you that? “Great work,” she said.
“You think that’s good?” said Ashley. “How much would you like to know the name of the lawyer who filed the papers?”
Rachel returned her smile. “Very. That’s how much.”