by Estelle Ryan
“At least they’re not revealing too much.” Vinnie hadn’t taken his eyes off the television. “Only the flight number, how many people and when it lost contact.”
“You guys are really worried.” Nikki gave Pink another hug, stepped away from him and looked at Francine. “Especially you. Why?”
I was becoming used to the pride that welled up in me when Nikki proved to be observant, sensitive and mature. I also turned to look at Francine and saw the same fear I had observed earlier. She nodded towards the dining room. “I’d better show you.”
“Do you need me to be there?” Nikki rubbed the side of her pregnant belly, something she did when the baby was pushing or kicking.
“No, doll.” Francine shook her head. “You go and have a nice long bath. If we need you, we’ll call.”
“Good.” Nikki grunted. “Today has been one of those days when it feels like I haven’t slept in seven years.”
“That’s physically not possible.” My shoulders dropped slightly. “You’re exaggerating again. That means you’re not feeling very bad.”
“Only like I could sleep for like three years.” She winked at me and turned to her room. “Go find Daniel, Doc G. Bring him home.”
I watched her walk to her room before I followed Francine to the dining room table. I sat down in my usual seat, Colin next to me. He’d been very quiet since we’d arrived home. I could easily see his attempt to hide his deep concern. Even though his body appeared relaxed as he leaned back in his seat, the constant contractions of the orbicularis oculi muscles around his eyes and the depressor anguli oris muscles pulling the corners of his mouth down revealed his inner turmoil.
Francine sat down heavily in her chair and pointed to her laptop monitor. “The logical first place I looked was Daniel’s emails. Like most people he has his work and two private email addresses.”
“I don’t have two private email addresses.” What was the point?
“Yeah, but you’re not like everyone else, girlfriend.” Francine winked at me, yet her usual playfulness was not present. She looked back at her laptop monitor. “Daniel received an email sent to his work address and one of his lesser-used private addresses yesterday.”
“What kind of email, supermodel?” Manny asked when Francine didn’t continue.
“A threat.”
“What the hell?” Pink rushed to her side and looked at the monitor. The longer he read what was on the screen, the wider his eyes became. His lips parted in an expression of breathless shock. “This... this can’t be true.”
“Speak. Now.” The worry in Manny’s voice was more pronounced than his annoyance.
Pink looked up, his eyes wide in disbelief. “This email says that the sender will reveal all the payments Dan received from Isabelle Godard. They knew that he got money from the president’s wife to hide evidence of certain crimes and to plant evidence in selected crime scenes. All this to help advance President Godard’s career.”
“Dan would never do this.” Vinnie picked up a dining room chair and for a moment I thought he was going to throw it across the room. He didn’t. With visible control, he turned the chair and straddled it. “He wouldn’t. Not Daniel.”
“I concur.” I felt comfortable in my assessment of Daniel’s character. He had shown honesty and integrity time and again. “I’ve been meeting Isabelle for the last two years and it would also be completely out of character for her to be complicit in something like this. She wouldn’t jeopardise all the work she’s done to establish her charities and help the president by committing such atrocious crimes to supposedly advance his career.”
“They have evidence.” Francine’s voice sounded broken. “It’s here in the attachment.”
“Fucking hell.” Manny walked to the kitchen, stood stiffly in front of the coffee machine for a few seconds and walked back. “What evidence?”
Francine clicked a few times and turned her computer to Pink. She didn’t want to speak.
“Bank statements.” Pink leaned closer and scratched his head. “It looks legit.”
“It’s not.” There was no doubt in Vinnie’s tone or on his face.
“Show me.” I needed to see this evidence. Someone needed to look at this objectively and judging by the distress on all the faces around the table, I was the only person capable of putting my emotions aside.
Pink turned Francine’s computer around and pushed it across the table to me. I lifted it and placed it exactly parallel to the edge of the wooden table. Only when I was pleased with its placement did I look at the monitor. I was looking at the first of a series of screenshots. These were online bank statements and I agreed with Pink that they looked real.
But since I’d started investigating insurance fraud and later art crimes, I had learned how very easy it was to forge any document, online or not. I scrutinised each screenshot before I went to the next one. Francine opened the screenshots on another computer to show Manny and Vinnie. Colin was quiet next to me, but I knew he was also looking for the smallest detail that could lead us to where this had originated.
A few lines were highlighted on each of the statements. Those were the alleged payments Daniel had received from Isabelle. And each of those looked authentic. I was sure Francine was already looking into the account that had sent those payments.
I went back to the first screenshot and inspected all the other transactions. There were the usual monthly payments to Daniel’s mobile phone service provider, transfers to pay his utilities, his car payment, a magazine subscription and his mortgage. Other transactions showed his preference for a specific café close to the GIPN offices, the odd new piece of clothing and numerous online payments for e-books. He seemed to read a lot of science fiction and action thrillers.
“Can we get into Daniel’s bank account?” I needed to see more.
“Um.” Francine looked at Manny, then at Pink, back at Manny, then at me. “Yes?”
I stared at her. “Why are you asking me? Can you or can’t you access his bank records?”
“It’s not legal, Doc.” For once Manny didn’t show any disapproval. He was merely making a statement.
“I know. That wasn’t my question.”
“Then I can do it.” Francine immediately got to work on her second computer. It didn’t take long. “There will be no trace of this hack.”
“Good.” Manny took her computer and held it out to me. “Until we have no other option, everything we learn about Daniel stays in this room.”
“Please, God.” Pink closed his eyes for a second. When he opened them, his internal struggle for control over his emotions almost appeared to cause him physical pain. “He can hate me forever, but right now I don’t care about his privacy. As long as none of this ever leaves this room.”
Colin took the computer Manny held to me. He moved Francine’s computer with the emails and put this one in its place. I took a moment to align it precisely, but this time I didn’t waste time on it. I needed this data. While the others discussed the many ways Daniel would never betray his country, his morals and the trust of his friends, I carefully went through his bank account, examining each transaction.
It took me only eleven minutes to come to a conclusion. “Francine, could someone have hacked his account like you just did?”
“Of course. This bank’s security is good, but not really hard to bypass.”
“Could Emad or Fradkov have done this?”
“I don’t know if their skills are up to it, but Joe Pasquier definitely could’ve done this.” She shuddered when she talked about the hacker who had sent the man who’d been assassinated at our lunch table. She took a deep breath and held out her hand for her computer. “Give me a moment with my computer. I have an idea.”
While she typed on her computer, biting her lower lip, I went back to Daniel’s emails. I found only that one email he had received. “This was sent during the time his phone would’ve been switched off.”
“What do you mean, love?”
“Unless they have wireless on the plane.” Pink immediately shook his head. “They didn’t. We checked that when we looked into the possibility of the plane being hacked. This is an older plane and doesn’t have those features.”
I thought about this for a short while. There were many loose pieces of information I suspected were all connected. Our job now was to find the links between Aleksei Volyntsev’s death by polonium-210 poisoning, Fradkov, Emad, the exhibition, the missing plane, Daniel, the apparent payoffs from the president’s wife and the paintings on the plane.
That gave me pause. There was no conceivable way to categorise as a coincidence Daniel’s presence on a plane with paintings that in some way were connected to Fradkov and Emad.
Before I could follow that thought, Francine gasped. “Ooh, you’re so right. The bastards! They hacked Daniel’s account. And guess what? Huh? Guess.”
“Supermodel.”
“The transfers into Daniel’s account comes from an account in the name of Isabelle Godard. And this account is from a bank in”—she paused dramatically—“St Kitts and Nevis. I told you Fradkov had accounts there.”
I frowned. “I don’t understand. Is this Isabelle’s account or Fradkov’s?”
“Isabelle’s. Or at least it is in her name.” She straightened and lifted her chin. “I’m willing to stake my shoe collection that Fradkov has an account at the same bank and that he opened this one.”
“Can you find out when this account was opened?” Colin asked.
“Of course I can.” She winked at Manny. “I’ll do it when this handsome man isn’t glowering at me. But I’m sure it is recent. Why, you may ask? Because all the transfers to Daniel’s account was added yesterday. They were backdated to make it look like it’s been over time, but it’s all from yesterday.”
“That’s why he wouldn’t have noticed it.” Pink’s lips were in a thin line. “Like most people, he almost never checks his bank account. Only when he pays stuff once a month does he go online. He definitely wouldn’t have checked when he was packing and getting ready for his trip to Belarus.”
“Can you see what time they hacked it?” I needed to make sense of the timeline.
“It was done early this morning. Before Otto was assassinated.” Francine tapped her chin with a manicured finger. “Why target Daniel?”
“Hmm.” Manny scratched his jaw. “So the email was sent at a time Daniel would not have been able to open it. The transfers were done at a time he would not have noticed it. They knew he was going to be on that flight.”
I read the email again. “This is very vague. If Emad or Fradkov wanted to blackmail Daniel, what is it that they wanted? The sender is threatening to show everyone the proof that Daniel’s been receiving payoffs from Isabelle, but doesn’t make any demands.”
“Check his spam box,” Colin said. “Maybe they sent another email and it went to Daniel’s spam folder.”
No sooner had Colin said that than I opened the folder. There were eighteen unopened emails, the very top one sent from the same email address as the threat. “It’s here. It was sent four hours before the other one.”
“Well? Read it, Doc.”
I opened the email and started reading it. Manny threw his hands in the air and Colin put his hand on my forearm. “I think Millard wanted you to read it out loud, love.”
“Oh.” I glanced at Manny’s irate expression and started reading. “‘You took away from me everything that was important in my life. Now I will take away what’s important in your life. I’ve been watching you, Daniel Cassel. I know how you value your precious integrity, your moral codes, your honesty. I will strip you of all that you treasure. I will annihilate everything you are. You will be nothing. You will have nothing. No one will respect you, care for you, support you or help you. You will no longer exist. In the end, I will win.’”
“Motherfucker!” Vinnie got up and grabbed the back of his chair until his knuckled turned white. He let go of the chair and walked to the kitchen. Halfway there he turned around. “This is Emad. It has to be. He thinks Daniel killed Claude and wants revenge. That motherfucker has to die.”
“Take a breath, big guy.” Manny watched Vinnie through narrowed eyes. “We’re not in the business of killing people, remember? We’re the good guys.”
“You’re a good guy. I’m not.” Vinnie thumped his chest with one fist. “I’ve never claimed to be a good guy. And I’ll be very happy to get rid of this evil motherfu—”
“You’re right.” Nikki’s soft admission stopped Vinnie. He hadn’t noticed her come into the kitchen. She walked right up to him and cuddled under his arm. “You’re not a good guy. You’re one of the best people I’ve ever met.” She took his hand and put it on her round stomach. “This baby will be so lucky to have you as an uncle. From your example, Eric will learn loyalty, friendship, honesty and love. And I know he will be the safest baby in the world.”
“Aw, fuck, Nikki.” Vinnie closed his eyes and clenched his teeth so hard, the masseter muscles in his jaw bulged. Slowly he relaxed and opened his eyes on a sigh. He kissed the top of her head and whispered, “Thank you.”
“Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to make some hot chocolate.” She winked at Vinnie. “The baby needs chocolate.”
“I’ll make it.” Vinnie tapped her on the nose with his index finger and walked to the fridge.
“I’ll be in my room.” Nikki looked at me and waited. When I didn’t react, she rolled her eyes. “Are you okay? Do you need me to stay?”
“I’m well. I don’t need you.”
“Of course you do. You all do. You’re all lost without me. I’m the sand to your beach, the froth to your cappuccino, the violin to your Mozart.” Her words had no meaning to me, but the infectious smile she was trying hard to hold back affected me. She whooped and pointed at my face. “You smiled. I saw it. You did. Woo-hoo!”
“Go to your room, young lady.” Vinnie took her by the shoulders and pushed her out the kitchen. “We’ve got some ass-kicking to plan.”
“Don’t forget my hot chocolate!” she called over her shoulder as she walked to her room.
I was grateful for the lightness Nikki had brought with her. Especially since I hadn’t finished reading the email I’d found in Daniel’s spam box. “There’s more to this email.”
Manny slumped deeper into his chair. “Read the rest, Doc.”
I cleared my throat and read. “‘This is going to be fun. I’m the puppet master and you are the most insignificant of my puppets. My other puppets are important, more important than you’ll ever dream of being. Maybe not as honourable as you, but with thousands of years of history behind them and one of the biggest powers in the world, who cares about being honourable? Soon you will be like them. No honour. Stripped to the bone.’” I cleared my throat again. “This is everything. And there’s no other email from this email address.”
“Shit.” Pink had his hand over his mouth, his eyes wide. “Who do you think this superpower is?”
“It has to be Russia,” Francine said. “If you think about the most powerful countries in the world, Russia is the only one that makes sense.”
“How do you figure that?” Vinnie put a tray with steaming mugs of coffee in the centre of the table. He took a mug and walked towards Nikki’s room.
“The United States has no connection to any part of this case, to Fradkov or to Emad.” I stopped when I realised I’d answered a question aimed at Francine. She waved her hand for me to continue and I nodded. “Neither does China, Great Britain, Germany or any other country. France has significance to Emad because this is where his brother died.”
“And to Fradkov?” Manny asked.
“From the information Justine shared about Fradkov and also from my own analysis, I truly don’t think
there is a country that offers Fradkov any emotional value. People, and in this case countries, only have value to him if they benefit Fradkov is some way.” I thought about it some more. “Fradkov has an obvious connection to Russia, with both his parents originating from there. This could be the closest to an emotional connection he has to a country. Knowing his history, it would be befitting that he would include Russia in some scheme to overthrow a government or change the political landscape in some form.”
“But how does Madame Godard fit into all of this?” Manny asked. “I need to brief Privott, but I don’t know what the hell to tell him.”
“I’ll ask her.” I took my phone from my handbag and dialled the seventh last number in my call history. Isabelle was one of the few people not on my team I called.
“It’s close to midnight, missy.” Manny tapped on his empty wrist. “You can’t phone her now.”
“Genevieve?” Isabelle sounded awake, but confused. “What a surprise.”
Suddenly, I didn’t know what to say.
“Genevieve? Is everything okay?” Now she sounded worried.
“No.” My voice cracked and I realised that I had come to value her more than just a person to share lunch with. “Your reputation is about to be destroyed and I don’t know why I’m feeling so distressed about it.”
“Holy Mary and the saints!” Manny got up just as Isabelle gasped in my ear. He grabbed the phone from my hand and gave it to Francine. “You speak to her.”
Francine took the phone and swiped the screen. “Isabelle, it’s Francine. I’ve got you on speakerphone. Manny, Vinnie, Colin, Genevieve and Pink are here.”
“Francine? What’s going on? Do I need to call Raymond?”
Francine looked at Manny, but he had his back turned to her. She blinked a few times. “Um, maybe we don’t have to involve the president yet.”
“Okay.” There was a short pause and it sounded like Isabelle took a deep breath. “Tell me.”
“This is a long story, but let me first ask you this. Do you have a bank account in St Kitts and Nevis?”
