Above Temptation

by Karin Kallmaker

  She wished she could tell Tam that the papers were here, that they were secure. She could only imagine how worried Tam must be.

  “What about Langhorn?”

  “Well, I am hopeful that your embassy staff will ask him to assist with inquiries.”

  Kip had always known she would have to turn herself in. “And they’ll likewise want to talk to Tam—Ms. Sterling—and me as well.”

  Robert put a gentlemanly hand at the small of her back as they walked up the stairs to the main lobby. “I believe they consider that a priority, yes. I am quite sorry about that, but I have no choice if I wish to preserve a good relationship with your embassy.”

  “I understand,” Kip said. Like Tam, she would soon have a locked door between her and the world. Well, it wasn’t as if she hadn’t known that was coming.

  “The doors are just opening now. Clients are arriving,” the manager said. “Can I leave this to you, Robert? So much to do this morning…” He signed the sleeve and handed it to Robert before making his stately way in the direction of his office.

  They were standing in an alcove at one end of the large marble and plush carpet interior. Bank staff were arriving at their desks and windows, meticulously groomed, all moving at a measured, graceful pace. It had been a long time since Kip had been in a bank that was so…bank-like. There was a hush like a library and even the arrival of customers didn’t add much to the noise level.

  Kip shrank back when she picked out the top of Ted Langhorn’s sandy-haired head. His lanky frame wasn’t quite as relaxed as she’d last seen it, and he appeared to be looking for someone—probably Robert. To his left was his wife, as carefully coiffed and ostentatiously elegant as one of the Real Housewives. The body and tan were flawless. Kip was sure the ankle-wrapping high heels had cost a small fortune, and she wasn’t thinking the jewelry was fake, either.

  “He’ll recognize me,” she murmured to Robert. “And probably cause a scene.”

  She didn’t know if Robert heard her, though, because he strode forward to greet Langhorn and his wife with a jovial but restrained air. “Ted Langhorn, what a surprise to see you this morning. And Mrs. Langhorn as well.”

  Ted began to speak, but Robert continued talking in the same congenial manner. “I must make introductions.” He gestured to the men now assembled right behind the Langhorns. “Martin LeRoi, this is Ted and Nadia Langhorn. I spoke to you about them just a few minutes ago. Mr. and Mrs. Langhorn, these are members of the United States Embassy staff. They have inquiries and believe you can assist them.”

  Kip had the satisfaction of seeing Ted Langhorn turn as pale as the uniforms the embassy officers wore. For the first time since she’d taken on the case, all her instincts screamed that she was looking at someone guilty of something.

  Ted blustered, and Kip turned her study to Nadia Langhorn, who hadn’t moved. She gave the impression of unshakable composure.

  The officers moved forward as Robert invited everyone to his office. Ted fell into step, but there was a small amount of jostling. Nadia gave a little cry, stumbling on her high heels. Several arms shot out to keep her from falling, then she was back on her feet, offering smiles and apologies.

  From where she was Kip saw something in Nadia’s hand she hadn’t had before, and she was slipping it into her oversized designer bag. She glanced at Robert, who was patting his pockets and looking down at the floor as if he’d dropped something.

  Kip gave up her hiding place, but had no sooner started forward than Nadia simply dashed for the nearest doors.

  Nothing for it but to make a scene, Kip thought. She thanked her sensible sandals for plenty of traction on the marble floor as she sprinted forward to yell, “Nadia!” Her mind flicked through the thousands of papers she’d reviewed and zeroed in—more loudly, she yelled, “Rachel!”

  Nadia skidded to a stop, pivoted in place, eyes wide.

  Everyone in the bank stopped what they were doing, except Kip.

  With a sudden gasp, Nadia shook herself into motion again. She scrambled toward the door, elegant heels finding poor purchase on the polished marble. She was reaching to push the doors open when Kip clamped her hand around one diamond-adorned wrist.

  So she couldn’t pull the trigger on a woman and child. She had far more practical skills. How much of a challenge could pampered Nadia Langhorn be?

  The elbow strike to the side of her head told her, and left her ears ringing. The price of overconfidence, she told herself. She clung to Nadia’s other wrist, ducked another strike and went for the basics, sinking one hand into Nadia’s very expensive hairdo while tangling the woman’s arms in her own designer bag. Nadia let go of Kip in an attempt to free her hair. They twisted against each other until Kip hooked one of her sandals around Nadia’s ankles and they both went down with Kip’s elbow in Nadia’s solar plexus.

  From the gasp, she was pretty sure Nadia’s stomach felt like her head.

  She rolled back to her feet and the embassy officers were around them. One quickly handcuffed the still struggling Nadia. Kip was dazedly trying to keep her balance and realized, too late, that handcuffs were also being ratcheted around her own wrists.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Tam rose when the door opened. She had expected something to have transpired, but was still taken considerably aback by the sight of Ted and Nadia Langhorn in handcuffs along with a half-dozen white-uniformed guards. Nadia looked somewhat the worse for wear with a heel broken on one shoe and her hair lopsided.

  Robert looked both disconcerted and satisfied, though his tone sounded as if everyone was concluding an ordinary transaction. “Let’s just settle our paperwork, shall we?”

  Finally, dwarfed by the embassy muscle, she caught sight of Kip—wrists cuffed in front of her and something strangely wispy and yellow in her hands. Kip gave her a wan but encouraging smile. The papers were secure maybe?

  Kip cleared her throat and handed the blonde wad of hair to Nadia. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to ruin your weave. I was hoping it was your real hair.”

  Tam managed not to laugh. She ought to have been worried sick but right then all she could think was that she wanted Kip there always to make her laugh, to make life less of a grim business. How had she ever thought her humorless?

  “Ms. Sterling?” One of the embassy officers had stepped forward. “With the permission of the government of the Bahamas, I’m detaining you on behalf of the United States of America. We’ll transfer you to U.S. soil in a few minutes.”

  Tam held out her wrists—it was a first.

  Handcuffs were heavier than they looked. She supposed she should argue that being detained didn’t mean she should be manacled, but it was only a minor detail at that moment.

  “I have the paperwork.” Robert pulled a crumpled document sleeve from a large purple bag—had to be Nadia’s. “I know Mrs. Langhorn was eager to get rid of it, but it’s here.” He held it up. “Your mark Miss Barrett?”

  Kip eased her way past her escorts. “Yes, that’s my mark. Those are the papers you removed from your files downstairs.”

  With a huge sigh of relief, Robert handed the document sleeve to Martin LeRoi. “Please take charge of this. It’s vital evidence. All the other copies you requested will be made as soon as possible and carried up to you. Of course, I’ll be available for any deposition you may wish to take from me. That’s all our business, I believe.”

  Before Tam could point out that there was one more matter to resolve there was a knock at the door. A wide-eyed clerk stepped into the room, a printout in one hand.

  “I need a signature for these transfers, Mr. Manna.”

  Robert glowered. “I think it can wait.”

  “No,” Tam said. “It can’t. You should sign off on them. All of them.”

  Robert gave Tam his attention. Without the least bit of surprise, he asked, “Why Tamara, have you been using my computer?”

  Behind her Tam heard Kip stifle a laugh.

  “I’m so sorry. I did borrow it.
”

  “Nearly seven million dollars? How enterprising.” Robert initialed the paper and then asked the clerk to bring back a copy right away. “That’s adds to the considerable sum that arrived on Friday.”

  Tam hadn’t yet been able to meet either Ted’s or Nadia’s gazes, but she steeled herself for it. What else was there to say but, “I don’t understand why. You didn’t even get the money.”

  Ted looked guilty but not the least bit chagrined. “It was never about the money.”

  “It was about making sure I wasn’t credible for Markoff’s trial.”

  “At first.” Ted looked not the least cowed or worried. In fact, he looked every inch like he had the world by the short and curlies. “Nadia is the one who saw the bigger opportunity when Markoff’s people approached her.”

  Nadia shrugged and said nothing.

  “You told Ted to tamper with my immigration record, my passport verification… I think out of everything, that surprised me the most.”

  She gave Tam a direct look, with none of her usual coy evasions. “That’s how they got to me. I don’t know how they found out. They offered me papers, contracts, faked adoption records—they had copies of everything. They thought I would do anything to keep the past a secret when they’d just handed me all the evidence I’d never been able to piece together about my grandparents. The ones who farmed me out like the accidental mongrel offspring of their thoroughbred son. I agreed to facilitate a crisis for you in exchange for the box of documents. I knew what Ted could do with a little focus. And I knew what a little well-placed gossip could do.”

  “Why Wren Cantu?”

  Nadia looked like she wanted to ignore Kip, but her satisfaction with her own handiwork kept her talking. “She was supposed to be one of the big headliners at the New York Public Library benefit. She shows up an hour late and spends the night being rude to everyone and with a spoon up her nose. But she can get an invite to any party in that town. I spent the last five years doing all those fundraisers, all that charity work. I watched porn stars and politicians’ mistresses trump me and realized I was going about it all wrong. If I can’t have celebrity, I’ll take notoriety. It’s a bigger paycheck in the end.”

  Now that they were talking, Ted had the air of a professor propounding on a pet theory. “You just don’t get the new world order, and you were never going to. Our whole business model is a relic. Rich enough, big enough, you can’t fail today. You can steal anything, ruin a natural wonder, profess ignorance as wisdom, and go on getting richer and richer. All you have to do is blame anything and everything except a corporation for oil on beaches, cancer clusters in school kids, whatever the crime. Toss the public a villain and protect big business and you can be rich, famous and respected.”

  “You’ve been rehearsing that speech,” Tam said, her numbness finally giving way to anger. “Did it take you long to believe it?”

  “You can be pissed all you want. But Nadia and I are going to be thanking you all the way to the bank. I knew you’d catch us. You were incredibly predictable. You even brought in a staffer. Barrett was one of four I had already identified. Only time you surprised me was running for it on Friday morning. I thought the Feds would wind you up enough to keep you in town. Instead, you dropped off the planet. Still, I was pretty sure you’d get here this morning.”

  “You’re going to prison.” Kip sounded about as angry as Tam felt.

  Nadia favored her with a pitying look. “We’re heading for minimum security and with good behavior, ankle bracelets. It’ll give me a chance work through those documents they gave me and write my exposé of my father’s cult and how his parents covered it up. How much do you think his family would pay me not to publish it? I’m betting there’s a house on Star Island in it for me.”

  Tam didn’t know what Robert and the embassy agents were making of the conversation but she had been aware of Martin LeRoi’s discreet voice recorder from the beginning. Tam said, “So this really was about money. I was just collateral damage.”

  Ted laughed. “It’s always about money. All it takes is being wildly successful, and I just was. I hacked six banks and embarrassed the premier fraud detection company in the country. Once my book hits the shelves I’ll be doing commentary about corporate hijinks and the failures of big government, and making more in a week than I do in a year now. Life on the Dark Side: One Man’s Corruption by the System. Catchy, isn’t it? And I have the other necessary ingredient—a smokin’ hot wife with brains.”

  Tam shifted her gaze to Nadia. She wasn’t serious when she asked, “And you get your own reality show?”

  Nadia’s reply was dead serious. “Or a talk show, or my own column at the big blog sites where I get to decide who’s hot and what’s news. We’ll have many friends, and they’ll respect our resourcefulness. We’ll be welcome at Martha’s Vineyard.”

  My respect, obviously, means nothing, Tam thought. “The people you worked for—did they know you expected to fail?”

  “Those people, they’re not the forgiving type,” Kip added. “They expected results for their money.”

  They both shrugged, with a shared, half-amused glance between them. Ted answered, “Here’s the ironic part—Vernon Markoff doesn’t know anything about it. We were brought on by one of the sons trying to score points with Daddy. This works, he’s a hero. It doesn’t work, Daddy never knows he’s a failure.”

  So much for hoping that this mess would further incriminate Markoff and give him more time in jail. “But you’re going to tell the world all the details so you can get famous.”

  Nadia rolled her eyes. “Why on earth would we tell the whole truth? It’s Ted’s book. He’s not under oath.”

  Tam couldn’t help the glance she shot at Kip. She shrugged in defeat—she would never understand people who could exist in such a moral vacuum. Sadly, she considered that they could be right about where they ended up. Maybe she could preempt some of their notoriety with an exclusive interview for that sleazy reporter. The very thought repelled her.

  Robert had been watching their exchange with a weary smile. Apparently, the Langhorn point of view was nothing new to him. Nevertheless, his understanding nod at Tam helped her feel that the world hadn’t completely turned night into day. To Martin LeRoi he said, “I believe we’ve complied with your urgent information request. I’ll be sending over the additional details.”

  “You’ve been more than helpful, and the United States thanks you,” LeRoi responded.

  All the courtesies observed, they were urged to their feet. Though their escort was not even touching them, there was no way to walk through the bank discreetly. Handcuffed ducks in a row, they drew raised eyebrows from the bank staff and outright gawks from the customers. Tam hoped nobody had a cell phone camera.

  They were all separated during transport, each of them in a separate car. Tam’s was last and she was relieved to see all three ahead of her pass through the embassy’s tall wrought iron gates. She had only the briefest glimpse of the colonial portico of the main building, brilliant in whitewash and choked with crimson bougainvillea. Her head was spinning—Ted and Nadia were utter strangers to her. How could they believe they lost nothing if they took the path to wealth through notorious crime and false, public penance?

  They were marched—firmly but not discourteously—into a small side building behind the main structure. Tam suspected it was a holding area for U.S. citizens waiting to leave the country by diplomatic escort, and she wasn’t wrong. Nadia and Ted went directly into separate rooms of their own. It was satisfying to hear the locks click into place.

  Expecting the same treatment, Tam was surprised instead by the interjection of a middle-aged man in a suit that said he’d arrived from a colder climate and hadn’t had time to change.

  “Elliot Druckerman,” he said. “I’m counsel for Ms. Sterling and Ms. Barrett.” He looked like he’d been on a very, very early morning flight.

  Martin LeRoi was very reasonable, immediately offering the
m a private place to confer. He said to Kip, almost apologetically, “I need to search your belongings first.”

  Kip eagerly said, “Go right ahead. The sooner this is over the better.”

  Tam also gave permission and wasn’t surprised when LeRoi found and confiscated their identification as Pippa Merrit and Pamela Curling.

  “Are these the papers you used to enter the Bahamas?”

  Druckerman said, “You don’t have to answer,” but hardly got that out before Kip and Tam in stereo said, “Yes.”

  Kip added, “That’s the only thing we used them for—to book the passage on the cruise ship so we could get here.”

  Druckerman sighed. “Let’s confer before my clients make any more spontaneous confessions.”

  “That’s all there is,” Kip said. “We sent all the evidence we gathered to Tam’s assistant. She’ll have it tomorrow, or know where it is, and will I’m sure happily surrender it.”

  Elliot Druckerman sighed again.

  Tam shrugged. “She speaks for both of us.”

  LeRoi didn’t smile, but he lost some of his stern glare. Whatever FBI request he’d been given to fulfill, it hadn’t included treating them like criminals. Tam could only hope that the only order he’d been given was to detain them if found.

  In no time at all she and Kip were in a private room with Druckerman, who had successfully argued to have their handcuffs removed after LeRoi confirmed that indeed, there were no charges filed against either of them, at least not yet.

  Once the door closed, without any further preamble, Druckerman said, “I have a message for you from Mercedes Houston. She says this is what happens when you keep secrets from her.”