by Eva Hudson
“You need to turn back.” Brewster was agitated. He looked at Ingrid for an explanation. “Where are we going?”
Ingrid met the driver’s gaze in the rearview mirror. His eyes were smiling. “Heavy traffic on Marylebone Road,” the driver said. “Taking a detour.”
Ingrid knew the area well—they weren’t far from her own hotel—and she could see the driver was taking them on a very long detour. He accelerated, moving them quickly south down Edgware Road.
“What’s going on?” Brewster demanded.
The driver said nothing.
“Answer me!”
The car came to a halt at a set of traffic lights. “Sorry.” The driver turned round. “There’s been some kind of incident. I need to take you the long way round.”
“What sort of incident?” Ingrid asked.
The driver shrugged. “Think a truck has tipped over. Whole road’s blocked. Probably take another ten minutes.”
The road ahead hadn’t looked blocked. The traffic hadn’t been grinding to a halt.
The lights changed and the driver carried on south, quickly reaching the Marble Arch oneway system. Ingrid was familiar with the route: it was one of her regular runs into the embassy. When the driver didn’t turn left onto Oxford Street, she got suspicious. She hadn’t checked him out. She’d just assumed the embassy had approved him. She swallowed hard. Her skin shivered. They had just spent the entire journey laying out their plan. Shit. She hadn’t even considered the driver might be the one to try to get the password. She got out her phone surreptitiously, ready to call the police and report a kidnapping, when the limousine turned sharply off Park Lane and into the back streets of Mayfair. They passed the Shelbournes’ hotel at speed then swung right into the street running along the rear entrance of the embassy. The barriers lifted and the car descended urgently into the embassy’s underground parking lot.
Brewster turned to Ingrid. “What the hell?”
She didn’t know what to tell him.
The car screeched to a stop and the rear doors of the limousine were yanked open. Sol Franklin bent down and introduced himself.
“Sidney Joseph Baxter, you are in the US Embassy. That means you are officially on American soil, and as a federal officer I am arresting you on suspicion of selling privileged information given to you by the Department of Defense. Will you please step out of the car?”
Brewster didn’t know what to do. Behind Sol was a marine. An armed marine.
“Sir,” Sol said, “please step out of the car.”
Dumbfounded, Ingrid turned to see that Amy Louden was holding open the door on her side. “Do you want to come with me, Ingrid? I think we need to have a little chat.”
42
Deputy Chief Louden took Ingrid straight to her office, asking her assistant to make sure they weren’t disturbed. Louden gestured to a couch facing a coffee table and indicated Ingrid take a seat.
“So much for ‘desk duties,’ eh?” Louden said.
Ingrid eased herself onto the couch. She still had no idea what was going on. “Am I in trouble?”
Louden sat on the couch opposite. “Good grief, no! Gosh, you’ve not been thinking that the whole way up here, have you?”
“You said we needed to talk privately.”
“Well, I’m sorry you got that impression.” Louden smoothed down her skirt. “I thought you deserved a proper explanation.”
Ingrid was disoriented at the turn of events and chose careful silence instead of the nervous small talk she often ended up spewing in situations like these.
“Yesterday, when we were sitting in this office, you said you’d found out Greg Brewster was an alias for Sidney Baxter. You also said you had been informed this wasn’t the first time Brewster’s property had been stolen.” Louden paused. “I’m sorry, I didn’t offer you a drink, did I? Would you like a coffee?”
“No, thank you.”
“I need to ask you how you found out that Brewster and Baxter were the same person.”
Ingrid held her gaze and snapped her brain out of the disbelief she was experiencing to come up with an answer. When she remembered, she felt a stone fall from her throat to her stomach. “I cannot tell you that.”
Louden stiffened. “Why not?”
Ingrid thought about the anonymous call in Grosvenor Square, five minutes after Marshall had instructed her to leave the office. “I received that information from an anonymous informer.”
Louden’s chest heaved as she inhaled sharply. “I see. Do you mean anonymous to you? Or is that you are not prepared to reveal their identity?”
Ingrid scratched her forearms, a nervous tic. “Anonymous to me. Why are you asking me this?”
Louden stretched her fingers, then curled them into fists. “That is rather delicate, I’m afraid. If your source was anonymous, what reasons did you have for thinking he or she was a credible source of information?”
Ingrid looked down at her hands, trying to avoid Louden’s scrutiny. She had to keep Marshall’s name out of the conversation. She couldn’t recall any other time he had put himself out for her, and their relationship was on shaky ground at the moment. Revealing his role had the potential to… well, she wasn’t prepared to consider the consequences. Ingrid ran through what she was about to say in her head and, reckoning it stacked up, gave her response. “I’d put out a few feelers, asked around for background—”
“From who?”
“Oh, um.” Ingrid’s train of thought had been interrupted. “Contacts in the Met, here in the building, associates elsewhere in the Bureau.” Damn. She’d said too much.
Louden looked at her intensely. “And then what happened?”
“My phone rang. Out of the blue. It was a short conversation.” Ingrid’s discomfort was mounting. She couldn’t just sit there and take the inquisition. “You told me I haven’t done anything wrong, which I appreciate, but I would like to know what is going on.”
Louden paced over to the window. “You will have gathered, from what Sol said when he arrested Baxter, he is believed to have sold defense secrets.”
Ingrid had indeed worked out that much.
“It is suspected”—Louden adjusted the wooden slats of the window shade—“one of the intermediaries he used was…”
Yes? Ingrid willed her to tell her.
“And this is completely confidential.”
“Yes.”
“Never to be repeated outside this room.”
“Of course.”
“Dennis Mulroony.” Louden turned to check Ingrid’s reaction.
Ingrid felt a little dizzy. “My predecessor?”
“Which makes sense of why I was getting pressure from above to keep asking you about the Brewster case.”
Ingrid’s thoughts spiraled. It also explained the hostility Ingrid had gotten from other agents and CIA officers since her move to London. “And you thought, what, that I was… what? Going to take Mulroony’s place?”
“There was a possibility Baxter would have tried to recruit you—”
“He wouldn’t have stood a chance.”
Louden almost laughed. “I think we know that now, Ingrid. You’ve been here for four months, maybe five, and we’re all getting to understand your tenacity and dedication. You’re gaining a lot of fans here, Ingrid, both among the London police and your colleagues at the embassy.”
Ingrid wasn’t used to flattery. “Thank you.”
“I suppose it was a test of your loyalty.” Louden perched herself on the arm of the couch Ingrid was sitting on. “Am I right in thinking your mother is a Russian national?”
Ingrid blinked: she had not been expecting that. “My mother is a US citizen. She defected from the Soviet Union in 1976.”
Louden nodded. “I’ve read your personnel file, Ingrid. After she competed at the Montreal Olympics, am I right?”
“Yes.” What the hell was going on?
“And I can see nothing in your career that would explain the scrutiny you’ve
been under since you arrived in London.” Louden grimaced slightly. “Mulroony’s behavior got everyone nervous about double agents.”
Ingrid felt a fire burn in her chest. “And because my mom grew up in Russia—”
“I think it’s more likely to do with the fact that you speak Russian, fluently, I believe.”
Ingrid had joined the FBI as a languages expert. French, Italian and Russian. She was too mad to speak any of them right at that moment.
“I mention it as something to keep in mind. You probably haven’t had this sort of… oversight… before. But now that you’re working overseas… Well, I wanted to give you a heads-up.”
“What? That I’ve been earmarked as a potential traitor?” Ingrid needed to rein in her fury.
Louden got to her feet. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
Ingrid wasn’t upset, she was angry.
“I may be completely wrong, but I sense that someone, somewhere, was setting a trap for you with this Brewster thing.” Louden walked over to the door. “And I wanted to alert you to that fact.”
Louden opened the door. The meeting was suddenly over. Ingrid wriggled forward and pushed herself painfully to standing. “Thank you, ma’am.”
“For the record,” Louden said as Ingrid approached, “I think you’re a real asset to the team here. I’m sorry the actions of your predecessor have impacted on you in this way.”
“Thank you.”
“And your behavior with Brewster… Baxter this afternoon has been exemplary. I’ll be letting that be known.”
“Thank you again.”
“But”—Louden stopped Ingrid as she was leaving—“I will have to report something about ignoring doctors’ orders. Desk duties, remember?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Please,” Louden said, holding out her hand, “call me Amy.”
When Ingrid got back to her office, she was relieved Jennifer wasn’t around. She needed to process what she’d just heard. Her predecessor, of whom almost all records had been destroyed, was some kind of double agent? And her bosses way up the food chain, higher than Louden, had potentially set a deliberate trap for her? She felt blindsided, hollowed out, stunned. Her head slumped into her hands.
“Hey there!” Jen was as bright and breezy as ever. “Looked what I picked up for you.”
Wearily, Ingrid lifted her head to see Jen deposit a copy of the lunchtime edition of the Evening News on her desk.
“Thought you’d like to see it.”
Ingrid stared at the headline. It was something to do with a delay to a new underground line being built. “I don’t get it,” she said to Jen. “What am I missing?”
Jen put down her take-out coffee and donut and pointed to a strap line printed above the newspaper’s masthead. ‘College scandal: prize-winning professor arrested. Turn to Page 5’. “That’s your investigation, isn’t it?”
Ingrid turned to page five, eager to see what Angela Tate had written. She scanned it quickly. It didn’t even mention Stuart Younger by name. It said nothing about Lauren Shelbourne. It was all about his close relationship with a drug dealer who was referred to as ‘a Dutch national now in custody.’ Ingrid checked again. There was no mention of his experiments either. And certainly no mention of Lauren’s phone being used within a fifty-meter radius of his house? What was Tate playing at?
“Damn.”
“You need help?” Jen asked, now beavering away at her desk.
“No. Thank you.”
If Younger’s arrest was in the papers, she really had to speak to the Shelbournes. They shouldn’t be getting their updates from the Evening News.
“Well, actually, maybe,” Ingrid said. “Could you get me the number for the hotel the Shelbournes are staying at?”
“I have it right here.”
Jen was efficient, but that was ridiculous. “How come?”
“Sol asked me for it a couple of hours ago. Said he wanted to update them on the investigation.”
“Oh.” Ingrid knew it should have been her to make the call, but she was grateful—and a little embarrassed—that Sol had stepped up.
“Still need it?”
“I guess not.”
However, there was still someone else who needed an update: Madison Faber. Ingrid guessed the girl would know by now Timo Klaason was in custody and not likely to walk free for several years. But now that Younger was being questioned, Ingrid thought Faber might feel free to say more about the egotistical professor. Ingrid dialed her number. Voicemail.
“Hello, Madison, Ingrid Skyberg here from the embassy. Just checking up on you. Am assuming you’ve heard the news that Stuart Younger has been arrested, but as far as I know, he is only being questioned in relation to the distribution of methamphetamine, not Lauren. If I hear any more, I’ll let you know. In the meantime, you have my number if you have any questions.” Ingrid ended the call and instantly relaxed. She exhaled loud enough for Jen to check over her shoulder and make sure she was OK. Why had leaving a message for Faber got her so tense? Her body was sending her a message and she needed to pay attention.
Ingrid picked up a pen and flicked it between her fingers. Something had been bothering her about Faber for some time. The girl’s focus changed every time they met. First she was worried about Lauren’s parents, then about Klaason, then about Stuart Younger. Particularly about Younger. She only had Faber’s word that Lauren had been sleeping with the professor, and she only had sixteen-year-old Alex Shelbourne’s word that Lauren and Faber were dating the same man. Ingrid had cut Faber a lot of slack—she was a young woman living through a horrific trauma without a support system—but it was definitely time she did a bit of digging on the mercurial Madison Faber. If Ingrid was limited to desk duties, she was going to use her time wisely.
Her initial search for a criminal record for Madison Faber drew no results: Faber was completely clean. Ingrid then searched the alumni records for the major colleges in the US. Luckily, there was only one Madison Faber of the right age listed. The search returned results for two colleges. The first in upstate New York and the second just outside Boston. Faber had excelled academically, finishing top of her year in both institutions. A disappointingly blemish-free record. Ingrid trawled further back to Faber’s school career.
And things got a lot more interesting.
According to the records, from the age of sixteen, Faber was homeschooled. Given both her parents, lawyers with major firms in New York, had hectic work schedules, Ingrid supposed she must have been tutored by someone other than her mother or father. Homeschooling was an unusual choice. Not something she expected. She trawled back a few more years and found out why.
Madison Faber had been forced to leave her private school just a few days after her sixteenth birthday. Three weeks before that she had made a complaint about a member of the faculty that led to the teacher’s dismissal. She made a note to find out exactly what became of him after she’d finished looking into Faber’s past. According to a teenage Madison Faber, her chemistry teacher, a young man fresh out of college himself, had kept her late after school one day, trapping her in the lab technician’s room—the only room with a lock on its door—and sexually assaulted her. As soon as she reported the assault, he was suspended from duties awaiting criminal investigation. He was never reinstated even though just a week after Faber made her initial complaint, she withdrew it. Along with the statement she’d given to the NYPD.
Ingrid sat very still, trying hard to shut out the sound of Jen’s eighty-word-a-minute typing frenzy.
Ingrid went over the reports again, trying to work out what motivations Faber would have for withdrawing her claim. She had been fifteen when she made the complaint against the teacher, and it was entirely possible the school put pressure on her, eager not to have their otherwise excellent reputation tarnished. But would Faber’s parents have allowed that to happen? Another trawl revealed that the chairman of the board of trustees of the exclusive school was none other than Faber�
��s father.
Now Ingrid didn’t know what to think. Was Faber an innocent student forced to back down because of school board politics? Or the instigator of a nasty lie that had caught up with her?
43
The next morning, Ingrid lasted till midday before she felt compelled to abandon her desk duties and headed to Loriners. She wanted to test how many of Faber’s outrageous claims stacked up to a little investigation. Still not strong enough to handle the bike, she made her way to southeast London on public transport. Her phone rang when she was on a surprisingly packed lunchtime train. It was DC Ralph Mills. Just seeing his name on her phone made her smile.
“Was wondering if I could buy you a drink? Got something you might like to hear.”
When she told him she would shortly be in what he called ‘his manor,’ Mills sounded childishly excited and said he would meet her at the train when it arrived at New Cross. He was holding two paper cups of coffee, a bag of sandwiches from a local shop and a Clark Swanson smile.
“I guessed you took it black?”
She took the cup from him. “You guessed correctly.” Eye contact was a little more difficult than it ought to be.
“So what brings you to the hood?” he asked, leading her out of New Cross station and into the sunshine.
“Still have a few loose ends to tie up.”
“Relating to?”
There was a chance her plan would do more than ruffle feathers at Lewisham police station. “Just getting some answers for Lauren Shelbourne’s parents.” It was bland and opaque, but it was true. She changed the subject. “You made it seem pretty intriguing on the phone,” she said. “I didn’t realize you were letting me in on state secrets.” They came to a pedestrian crossing—for some unfathomable reason the Brits called them ‘pelican crossings’—and she pressed the button that started a countdown to the traffic lights changing color.
Mills took a sip of coffee and licked his lips. “The boss has given me the OK, but you have to understand she’s sticking her neck out for you.”
“Tell Natasha I appreciate it.”
