Almost Home: A Novel

by Pam Jenoff

  “Letter?” Sarah interrupts. “What letter?”

  “Your letter, silly.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “The one you sent to me about a week before I came over. You said that it would be really great to see me and—” I stop midsentence. Sarah’s face is blank and for a minute I wonder if her medicines are interfering with her memory. But her eyes are clear. “You mean you didn’t send me a letter?”

  She holds up her right arm limply. “Me write a letter, with this hand?”

  “It was typed.”

  “Impossible. My printer has been broken for months.”

  “But I still have—” I stop. Sarah’s letter is gone, of course, in the explosion at the flat with everything else I owned.

  “Jordie, you know I love you. But I never would have asked.”

  She is right, of course. My stomach drops. Sarah did not write to ask me to come. The letter was a hoax. “Oh, no.”

  “You’re saying that someone impersonated me to get you here?” she asks. I nod. “Who?”

  “I don’t know. But I’m going to find out.”

  My mind races. Someone set me up, got me to come to England, but who? Not long ago, I might have said Chris. Was Sebastian somehow involved? I need to talk to Mo, I realize. If I leave now, I can still catch her at work. I look over at Sarah, who sits with her half-eaten dinner in front of her. “I need to run out for a little while,” I say. “Will you be all right here?”

  She waves her left land. “I’ll be fine. Just be careful. Don’t go getting in any more scrapes.”

  “I promise.” I carry my plate to the sink, then grab my jacket and head out the door. On the street, I pull my cell phone from my bag and start to dial Mo. Then I close it again. This is a conversation that needs to be had in person.

  Half an hour later, I walk through the lobby of the embassy, take the elevator to the fifth floor. The outer door of Maureen’s office is unlocked and the reception area deserted. Amelia is gone for the day, chair pushed in behind a perfectly organized desktop. I walk to Maureen’s door, knocking once before turning the handle. “Mo?”

  There is no answer. I step inside, looking up at the clock on the wall. Six-thirty. Mo usually works this late. I walk to her desk. To anyone else it looks like chaos, but I have no doubt that she knows where every piece of paper is located. The documents are routine, cables to and from Washington, invitations to social occasions. “Reception at seven,” reads the paper calendar she still insists on keeping, notes in her bold scrawl. She must have left already. I slump against the edge of her desk. I’ll have to ask her tomorrow.

  I scan the office. Who faked Sarah’s letter to get me here? Had Mo known?

  My eyes stop on a file cabinet that sits in the far right corner of the room. Do I dare open it? Housekeeping, or someone else, could come in at any second. I walk to the cabinet, studying the dial lock. What would the combination be? I know from needing access to Mo’s files during various assignments over the years that it is always something related to the twins. I turn to the twins’ birthday numbers: 3-17-87. But the lock doesn’t open. Hurriedly, I invert the numbers, still without success. What else could it be? The date she officially adopted them in Vietnam: July 4, 1987. I remember her telling the story of an Independence Day spent in a squalid Hanoi hotel room with two sick infants, wondering what on earth she had just done. Impulsively, I invert the date, twist to the numbers. There is a split-second pause, followed by a sharp click that seems to echo across the office, breaking the silence.

  I pause, guilt rising within me. I am about to cross a line. I’ve done almost everything in my ten years in the Foreign Service—been shot at, killed a man. But I have never broken the trust of a fellow officer or superior, much less one who is also a friend. I started down this path the day I agreed with Sebastian and Sophie to continue investigating Infodyne behind Maureen’s back, I realize. A thread, once picked, that could not be stopped from unraveling. Then I see Maureen’s face in the Bubble earlier this afternoon, the conflict in her eyes when I questioned why I was brought here. I do not want to believe she had anything to do with this. But I have to know.

  Taking a deep breath I open the drawer slowly. Inside, there are personnel files, arranged alphabetically. The top drawer goes only through the N’s. I close it and open the next drawer, thumbing to the W’s. I find my file and I pull it out, then hesitate. What is the penalty for accessing one’s personnel file without permission? But I have gone too far now to turn back.

  I open the folder. Inside is a copy of my dossier, similar to the one I’d seen in the Director’s office the day I requested the transfer. This file has more documents, though, which seems odd since I’ve only been here a week. I turn the page. There is a photograph of a group of college students, standing in front of the Rijksmuseum. My own face, third from the right stares back at me. The charity hitch to Amsterdam, I remember. There are other pictures of me at Cambridge, too. One in the boat during a race, another standing beside Jared at a party. I am not entirely surprised; the Department investigated me thoroughly before granting my security clearance, including—perhaps especially—my time overseas. But these photos should be in my official file back in Washington. How did Maureen get them?

  I turn to the left side of the file, which contains my personnel actions, the pink carbon copies still used by the Department to note transfers, salary increases, promotions. They are held in place by a two-hole punch clip, the most recent action filed on top. I scan the first sheet, the order transferring me from Washington to London. It is routine: cost codes for my travel, the Director’s signature scrawled at the bottom, authorizing for my hastily booked plane ticket.

  I flip the page. The next sheet should be my orders assigning me to Washington for a year after Liberia. But instead, it is another transfer order for London. It must be an extra carbon copy, I decide, scanning the page. But this order is printed in a smaller font. I flip back to the first page, comparing. The preprinted requisition numbers are different, one ending in a 3, the other in a 7. No, they are not the same orders. I turn back to the second page that is missing the Director’s signature, scanning it quickly. The order is dated April 14—a full week before I walked into the Director’s office to ask for London.

  I stare at the paper in disbelief. I was assigned to London before I even requested it. Someone knew I would ask even before I did. Because they sent me the one thing they knew would prompt me to request the transfer—a forged letter from Sarah, asking me to come to her.

  My eyes drop to the bottom of the paper and at the sight of the familiar scribble on the approval line, my heart stops: M. Martindale.

  “Ahem,” a voice behind me says suddenly. I jump, dropping the file. There, standing in the doorway to the office, is Maureen.

  “M-mo,” I manage. “I came to see you, but your calendar said you were going to a reception.”

  “I was. I forgot something. It’s a little late for a social call, don’t you think?”

  “I was just…” I falter, searching for an explanation and finding none.

  “Snooping through my files?”

  “Looking for answers.” Anger replaces my nervousness as I pick up the file. “You did it, didn’t you? Forged the letter from Sarah to get me to come to England?”

  Mo shifts, then looks away. “Not personally. But I was aware of it.”

  So there were others involved. “I don’t understand.”

  “We knew you would never come back to this place, not without a very good reason. And we desperately needed your help.” She walks to her desk. “Look, Jordan. What I told you in the Bubble was true: Jared and Duncan tried to come to the government years ago and no one listened. Much later, we realized we needed the information they had found. Your background, your connections to both of them, made you a natural fit.”

  “But why didn’t you just ask me? I mean, this is my job, for Christ’s sake!”

  “Woul
d you have done it? We ignored Jared, and look what happened. Part of you has to blame us for that. So we thought we would bring you here and assign you to the investigation, have you get the materials from Duncan and be done with it. We never counted on Sebastian turning on us, or your friend Chris digging around.”

  I sink down into one of the chairs in front of Mo’s desk, the realization sinking in: she set me up. “Let it go, Jordan,” she says. “It’s over. You found the information and even as we speak, agents are en route to confiscate the funds. The mob’s operations will be seriously crippled because of what you did. You can leave London now. I’ll see that you get assigned anywhere in the world you want to go, and send Sarah to get the very best care available.”

  I look down at the file again, considering what she has said. Just leave London again. If only it were that easy. Didn’t she know that even if I got on a plane right now and never came back, I would never really be able to leave?

  I begin to page further down in the file, not caring if Mo will object, wanting to see if there is anything else. Toward the bottom, a corner of a manila envelope juts out from beneath the other papers. I pull it out. Addenbrooke’s Hospital, the return address reads. The envelope, neatly slit open, addressed to me. Dr. Peng’s report, I realize. “When did this arrive?”

  “Yesterday morning.”

  I swear inwardly as I slide out the contents. Inside is a folder containing the same report we saw at Dr. Peng’s office. There are two additional sheets, though, each containing a single grainy black-and-white copy of a photograph, blown up to full-page size. I lift the first sheet closer to get a better look. It is an image of the front of a torso, up close, bloated and thick from the water. My stomach turns. The image cuts off at the neck, I note, relieved. I do not want to see Jared’s face, not like this.

  I start to close the file. Then slowly I reopen it, turning to the final sheet. The photograph this time is of Jared’s torso from behind. But the image was taken slightly higher than the last and I can see the wisps of his dark hair, matted against the back of his neck. I trace my finger along the hairline, letting my mind go places I never had. My vision blurs. What was his last thought? Did he see the waters rise up around him or was he already gone? Was there pain, enough time to be afraid?

  I blink studying the photograph once more. My eyes reach Jared’s shoulder, lock in. Something about the picture is wrong. My pulse pounds hard against my temples. I turn to the final page, nearly tearing it in my haste, staring at the image of Jared’s back. The skin is smooth, unbroken. It cannot be.

  Suddenly I am in the tattoo parlor the night of the Tideway, holding Jared’s hand as the needle dug into his back and the blood ran. His shoulder was not unmarked when he died; it bore the swan tattoo of the Eight. I know then that the man in the picture is not Jared. Whoever was buried that day was someone else.

  I look up at Mo, struggling to speak. “This isn’t Jared.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she replies evenly. But something on her face, beneath all of her makeup, betrays her.

  “You’re lying,” I say.

  She takes a step backward, flinching as though she has been hit. “Jordan Weiss, you and I are friends. I would never—”

  “Never what, lie to me? That’s funny. Tell me everything, Mo. Otherwise I’m going to pick up that phone and call the Director. He’d love to have your head and you know it. Unless he’s in on it, too.”

  “No, he’s not.” She exhales sharply, defeated. “What do you want to know?” But her face is still guarded, and I know I will have to ask the right questions to get anything out of her.

  “Is Jared alive?” I demand.

  She does not answer for several seconds. “I don’t know. Maybe. At least we think he was at some point. We believe that after he tried to tell the government about the Nazi funds and was threatened, he faked his own death somehow, and disappeared.”

  No, a voice inside me screams. Jared never would have deceived me like that, left without saying good-bye. He had plane tickets for both of us. Then I remember his protectiveness, his distance at the end. Something must have happened to convince him that it wasn’t safe to take me with him. So he simply left.

  “Faked his own death? But how? There was a body and…” I turn to her. “How long have you known?”

  “For years it was assumed that the Albanians found him and killed him. But then several weeks ago when your friend Chris started nosing around, we realized that he might still be alive. The British government had his body, that is, the body that was placed in his grave, exhumed, which confirmed our suspicions: it isn’t Jared.”

  My mind whirls. “He would have had to have help.”

  She nods. “Someone who could get to the accident site before anyone else. Identify the body. Arrange for a burial, pay off a coroner to substitute an unclaimed corpse for Jared’s.”

  Lord Colbert. I remember then his defensiveness at the dinner, his insistence that we leave the past alone. He wasn’t trying to protect the college, or Infodyne or even himself. He was protecting Jared.

  So the grave had been dug up after all. But something about her explanation still does not make sense. If the government was only interested in the information Jared had discovered, why go to the trouble of exhuming the body to confirm he was dead? If it was really only the KLA-Nazi fund that the government was after, they could have used any operative to get close to Duncan. They would not have needed me. No, I realize suddenly. This was never just about more than Jared’s information; this was about Jared himself. Someone knew, or suspected, that he was alive, even before the body was checked. And whoever it was wanted to find him, draw him out of hiding to silence him once and for all. I remember then Sebastian’s words beneath Embankment before he killed himself, his scorn at the notion that the Albanians had done this.

  “Who was Sebastian really working for?” I ask quietly. She shakes her head. I reach for the phone on her desk. “Mo, it’s the middle of the afternoon in Washington. The Director is surely at his desk and he’d love to hear about all this. I don’t want to call, but I will if you don’t tell me everything, now.”

  She blinks, surprised. I have never spoken to her like this before. But she can tell from my tone and expression that I am serious. Her shoulders slump.

  “Raines.”

  “Raines?” I picture the paunchy ambassador. “What does he have to do with this?”

  “Sebastian was working for him. Or was, before he went rogue and tried to steal the forty-six million dollars for himself.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Raines used to be CEO of Dynan Industries. It’s a defense firm.” And a sister company of Infodyne, I think, remembering the corporate records Sebastian showed me. “In the nineties, Dynan had a number of large contracts in the Kosovo region, providing services to the U.N. forces there. But they had to kiss some rings in order to get in.”

  “So you’re saying the company was in bed with the Albanians?” She nods. “What was it—arms, money?”

  She shrugs. “Maybe both and then some. I’ve never been privy to the details. Anyway, when Jared came forward with the information about the Nazi-KLA fund in the mid-nineties, Raines panicked because the account Jared had found contained transactions that conclusively linked Dynan to the KLA. And the KLA didn’t want to be publicly affiliated with the Third Reich just when it was waging a public relations battle for the goodwill of the West. Together they pressured Jared and Duncan to be quiet and turn over what they had found. Duncan acquiesced—he even took a position with Infodyne in exchange for his silence. And Jared was killed, or so most people thought.”

  “And then everything was quiet, right?”

  “Until now. A few months ago, the British government opens this investigation into money laundering for the Albanian mob, surfaces Infodyne as one of the suspect companies. And Raines is Ambassador now.”

  “Not to mention the presumptive nominee as the nex
t secretary of defense.”

  “Right. Given the close connection between the KLA and the mob, Raines was terrified about his company’s activities in Kosovo coming out if the account information Jared found ever surfaced. And then your friend Chris starts digging around and we find that the body isn’t Jared’s and—”

  Raines wanted Jared dead, to shut him up for good, I finish silently. Mo walks to me. “Jordan, you have to believe I didn’t know. Raines lied to me, said it was just about putting you on the team to get the information Jared and Duncan found. I didn’t know how far he planned to take this, that he planted Sebastian on the team to do his dirty work. I started getting suspicious after we were pulled off Infodyne, but by then it was too late. Sophie was dead.”

  And Vance and nearly Sarah, too. “But why?”

  “You were getting too close, it seems, to the information linking Raines to the KLA. Sebastian, in his eagerness to get to the money, fed you clues that brought things too close to the Ambassador. We think that Sophie may have made the connection, and that she was trying to tell you the day she was killed.” I swallow over my guilt.

  Mo continues: “Anyway, I confronted Raines, but my name was on the orders transferring you. He said that if we were exposed, both of our careers would be over. But if I kept quiet…” She stops midsentence and in that moment I understand. Raines must have promised Mo something in exchange for her cooperation, and knowing Mo, it wasn’t money.

  “He said would help you become an ambassador, isn’t that right?”

  She looks away. “I thought that if we could stop the Albanians at the same time…the good I could do would justify it in the end.”

  “Jesus.” Suddenly the pieces in my mind all fit.

  “I know. It spiraled out of control.” She slumps against her desk. “So what now?”

  I lean against the desk, uncertain. I could call the Director, turn Raines and Mo in. There would be a huge investigation, months of endless bureaucracy. I turn back to Mo. “You said Jared is alive. Where?”