IT WAS after 11:00 P.M. when Kevin landed at London’s Stansted Airport, and he took a black cab into town. His Jamaican driver pretended not to notice that Kevin had no bags with him, and instead quizzed him about life in America. “You got riots, I hear. Bad time to be American, innit?”
“Not so bad,” Kevin told him.
“Well, black American.”
“That’s always bad.” He leaned forward, so he could look at the road ahead of them. “You know a place a guy can get a bed for the night without a lot of paperwork?”
The driver looked at him in the rearview. “You got some problems, brother?”
“Who doesn’t have problems?”
He brought Kevin to a small street in Croydon, south of the city center, where he introduced him to Mattie, an old woman from the Turks and Caicos who ran an off-the-books bed-and-breakfast. She was round, with rough gray hair in a bun, and after looking Kevin up and down she said to the driver, “He’ll do, Elijah.”
Kevin slept hard and woke after eight to the smell of baking. His room was a Spartan affair—a mattress and two boxes that served as dressers—but the window was covered in sheer fabric that diffused the light from the morning sun. Downstairs, Mattie served him a plate of coconut flour pancakes and watched him eat. “What you doing here?” she asked suddenly. “How come you not at the DoubleTree?”
He took a bite, chewing thoughtfully. “I’m here to see someone.”
“You runnin’ away from a wife? That why you stay with Mattie?”
He shook his head. “Nothing like that. I need to go to Blackfriars Road. Number 203.”
“That’s Southwark. You take the Tube to London Bridge, walk over to Blackfriars.”
“You got the whole city in your head?”
She smiled, her eyes twinkling as she got up. “You’re a charmer, sir.”
He bought a ticket, and after a half-hour subway ride he found himself right in the center of everything, the full congestion of the city. He smoked a cigarette as he walked westward, parallel to the Thames, all the way to Blackfriars Road. At number 203, he found a glass-fronted building that looked like it was from the fifties. Above the entry was a green logo, like a broken infinity symbol, for the ODI, Overseas Development Institute.
Inside, a pretty desk clerk smiled up at him. He tried to look as if he’d been here before.
“Good morning,” she said.
“Hello. I’m looking for Alexandra Primakov. I’ve just gotten in from New York.”
“Certainly,” she said, setting up her fingers over her keyboard. “Which office, please?”
All Rachel had given him was a name—Alexandra Primakov—and the slimmest of bios: “lawyer, formerly with Berg & DeBurgh, she also came up as a former UNHCR adviser—don’t know her connection to refugees. Keeps a desk at the London office of the Overseas Development Institute, a policy think tank.”
“I’m not sure exactly,” he told the clerk. “My assistant set up this meeting, and he…” Kevin rocked his head. “Let’s just say he’s new.”
She smiled, then began to type. “Well, I should be able to…” She frowned at the screen, then nodded. “Yes. There we are.” She reached for her desk phone. “Who may I say is calling?”
“Martin Bishop,” he said.
Unfazed, the clerk called and explained who was here to see Ms. Primakov. She hesitated, glancing up at Kevin, then lowered her voice and talked more. He’d considered using his real name, but depending on how busy Alexandra Primakov was she might not come down. He didn’t want to sit waiting in that lobby all day.
Finally, the clerk hung up and pointed to the corridor. “Elevator’s at the end. Third floor. She’s waiting for you.”
The elevator was slow, and it gave him just enough time to put on his game face. Then the doors opened to reveal a striking white woman, forty maybe, in high heels. Her arms were crossed, and her dark, bruised eyes glared at him so forcefully that he considered staying in place until the doors closed again. Instead, he took two steps forward and held out his hand. “Ms. Primakov.”
With just a hint of a Russian accent she said, “Kevin Moore,” and he felt the blood drain from him as she turned and walked off with long strides. Eventually, he followed.
Her office reminded him of Mattie’s rooms—just the essentials. There was nothing personal here, no photos, no life-affirming mottos on the wall. Just a desk and a couple of chairs and a closed laptop that he guessed she packed with her to take home each evening. She took her chair behind the desk and nodded for him to sit, too.
“How do you know my name?” he asked, since it was the question he was expected to ask.
She opened her computer. “It doesn’t matter. The question that matters is: Why are you here?”
She was wrong—his question did matter—but he wasn’t in a position to push the issue. “In 2009, you filed the paperwork for a company called Magellan Holdings LLC. That company proceeded to funnel money to Martin Bishop and the Massive Brigade. It’s likely that you did this for one or both of two people: James Sullivan and Sebastián Vivas.”
Her computer was awake by then, and she typed a line, then looked up. “The Massive Brigade is history.”
“Then I guess I’m a historian.”
“And I never discuss the details of my clients’ business.”
“But in this case, your clients funded a recognized terrorist organization. Look, you’re not in trouble, but—”
“Oh, I know I’m not in trouble,” she cut in. “You, though.” She squinted at the screen. “The Americans and the Germans are seeking you for questioning. Did you know that?”
He didn’t. Fay Levinson had obviously gotten through to Jakes, and he was lucky to have flown out of Berlin as early as he had. “Good thing I’m in England,” he said.
“Brexit hasn’t happened yet,” Primakov told him. “The borders are open, and extradition treaties are still in force. I make one phone call, and there’ll be a lot of boys with guns waiting for you outside.”
She could have been making all that up, but it didn’t matter: He was dead in the water. “I’m just trying to find out what happened,” he said. “I worked undercover for months against the Massive Brigade. It ended with a lot of unanswered questions.”
She took a moment to look at him, and he thought he saw her features soften, but that might have been a mirage. She said, “Have you read the report the FBI released?”
“Yes.”
“And that doesn’t answer your questions?”
“Did it answer all of your questions?” he asked.
She leaned back, non committal.
He looked around the barren room. “I’m a little confused. What does someone working in the Overseas Development Institute’s worst office space have to do with underground political movements in the United States? Is that what you call overseas development? Funding agitators and terrorists?”
“I rent this space,” she told him quietly. “The ODI has nothing to do with me.”
“Can’t you just help me out?” he asked, opening his hands. “Who do you work for?”
“I’m sorry,” she said, shaking her head. “My client list is confidential, and unless you come with a warrant issued by the British government, then I can’t help you.”
He closed his eyes, knowing that she wouldn’t budge. Then he stood to leave.
“And you?” she asked. “Who do you work for?”
He just looked at her.
“Owen Jakes? Yes?”
“No.”
“How about Rachel Proulx?”
He said nothing, but his expression said it all.
“She disappeared a week ago. Is she all right?”
“Who are you?”
She stared a few seconds, as if she might answer, but instead lifted her cell phone. “Go on, Mr. Moore. I don’t want to have to make the call.”