The Whole Truth (23 page)
Frank nodded glumly. “You’re just going to see Anna’s body, right? You’re not going anywhere near where it happened. Right?”
“I’ll see you later.”
“Damn it, Shaw, you are not to go anywhere near The Phoenix Group. Do you hear me?”
“I’ll make a deal with you, Frank. A deal so good you can’t refuse. Wanta hear it?”
Frank looked at him suspiciously. “I don’t know, do I?”
“You let me poke around The Phoenix Group.”
“Shaw,” Frank began, but Shaw kept talking over him.
“You let me do that, I’ll work with this MI5 guy Royce on the Russian piece.”
“I don’t think that’s—”
Shaw interrupted. “And I’ll sweeten the pot. You sign off on it, and I’ll keep working for you until I drop.”
Frank was silent for a long moment, then slowly said, “But what about retiring?”
Shaw gave him a look that somehow contained both helplessness and menace. “Retiring to what, Frank? Is it a deal?”
Frank hesitated. “Yeah, sure.”
Frank started to say something else but with a squeal of tires, Shaw was gone.
Frank turned and walked down the street to find a bar and a drink.
A
WISP OF RISING SUNLIGHT
managed to slip by the window blinds, creep across the floor, and end up briefly settling on the bare calf that poked out from under the sheet. Later it traveled ruler-straight across the bed and slid to the floor where it glanced off the empty blue gin bottle lying there, causing beads of swirling, reflected light to kaleidoscope off the ceiling.
The demons had finally caught up to Katie James. The last few days were lost to her in a drunken binge of such mammoth proportions that the only thing she remembered later was the feeling of deep shame.
And
the worst hangover she’d ever had.
In the throes of some nightmare she kicked off the sheet and lay there in a long-sleeved T-shirt and baggy gym shorts, perspiration rising through her pores and moistening her clothes. Her breathing became normal and she finally grew still, the slight lift of her chest and her pink flesh the only real evidence that she was still alive.
She never heard the front bell, the accompanying knock, the pounding on the door, or the call of her name. She never heard the front door open, or the footsteps traversing the small living room, or the bedroom door swinging wide. She never felt the other person’s presence in the room, never felt anything when the intruder lifted the sheet off the floor and covered her with it.
The slight creak of the bedsprings as the visitor sat down didn’t arouse her either. The quiet call of her name? Oblivious. The gentle shake of her shoulder? No response.
However, the glass of water thrown in her face? Now
that
got the lady’s attention.
She sat up sputtering, rubbing at her eyes and nose.
“What the—” she began angrily until her eyes focused on Shaw sitting there holding the empty glass and staring at her.
She let out one more gag as the rest of the water that had made its way into her windpipe went down hard. “How did you get in?”
“I rang the bell, pounded on the door, called out your name. I did the same thing when I got in. You never let out a peep. I didn’t think anyone was here until, well, I actually saw you lying in this bed.”
She rubbed at her throbbing temples. “I . . . I’m a heavy sleeper.”
Shaw picked up an empty bottle of gin. “You’re a heavy something.” He hooked a second empty bottle and then a third and then a fourth.
“You mix gin, bourbon, and scotch?”
“When in Scotland, you know.”
“We’re in
France
,” he said, frowning.
She ran a hand through her tangles of blonde hair and yawned. “Oh, right, Paris,” she said absently. Then something seemed to strike right through the clouds of alcoholic stupor. “Oh my God,
right
.” She hastily sat up straighter.
“Shaw, I am so sorry. For everything. For the stupid cell phone, for lying to you.” She paused. “And about Anna.”
Shaw took his time lining up the empty bottles on a bureau set against one wall. “I actually wanted to thank you for coming to see how I was.”
Katie seemed surprised by this. “You didn’t have to do that. Especially after yesterday at the hospital. It was yesterday, right?”
“Actually, it was five days ago.”
She looked stunned. “Five days! You’re joking?”
He glanced over at the line of bottles. “Does your head
feel
like I’m joking?”
She stared at him, then at the bottles, and sat back on the bed. “I hadn’t touched a drop in over six months, can you believe that?”
He glanced at the line of bottles. “No, I can’t.”
She let out a deep groan. “Well, it’s true. I . . . I can’t believe I did this. I can’t believe I fell off the wagon.”
Shaw looked at the line of bottles again. “It wasn’t a wagon, it was a
cliff
. I’ll wait in the next room. Get showered and dressed. Then I’ll buy you some breakfast.” He headed to the door.
“Wait a minute, what are you doing out of the hospital?”
“I’m done with hospitals.”
“You really think so?” she said doubtfully, eyeing the bulge under his left jacket sleeve.
“I’m heading to London later today on the Chunnel. But first I wanted to talk to you about Anna.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Why someone would have wanted to kill her.”
Katie stared at him blankly. “But I don’t know anything about that.”
“You might think you don’t. But you also might have seen or heard something when you visited her that could help me.”
“Shaw, do you really think you’re well enough to take this on?”
He turned and fixed his eyes on her, eyes that were so blue and potent that Katie found herself holding her breath, digging her fingernails nervously into her palms like a schoolkid in serious trouble.
He said quietly, “My life is over, Katie. But whoever did this to Anna is going to die. And soon.”
Every hair on the back of Katie’s neck stood straight up and her skin actually goose-pimpled for the first time in years. Her head was pounding and her stomach gave a sudden disquieting lurch.
“Now get dressed. Please.”
As soon as he left the room she sprinted to the bathroom and threw up five days’ worth of liquid hell.
T
HEY ATE OUTSIDE
at a small brasserie that had partial views of the Seine across Quai de Gesvres. If Katie craned her neck just a bit she could glimpse the spires of Notre Dame Cathedral in the middle of the famous river. The Louvre was less than half a mile to their west, the Bastille a little farther than that to the east.
The coffee was strong, the bread hot, the simple egg dish as delicious as only the French seem to be able to accomplish.
“You met her in London,” Shaw said. “At her office? Her flat?”
“We first met at a café, then we moved on to her office.”
“Anything strike you as out of the ordinary when you got there?”
Katie shrugged as she delicately took a forkful of eggs while her stomach continued to do little flip-flops. “It seemed ordinary and extraordinary at the same time. A beautiful old row house on a quiet street in the heart of London filled with a bunch of scholars who write things no one reads, or at least that last part was Anna’s description.” She glanced over at him. “Have you ever been there?”
Shaw nodded. “And just for the hell of it about a year ago I checked the real estate records to see how valuable that building was. Care to guess?” Katie shook her head and bit into a piece of toast as she stared at him curiously. “Sixteen million pounds.”
The toast nearly fell out of Katie’s mouth. “That’s over thirty million dollars.”
“That’s right. And that was just the
purchase price
ten years ago. It’s obviously worth a lot more now.”
“How long had Anna worked there?”
“Five years. She was a senior analyst, one of the best they had.”
“I’m sure. She told me basically what they do there. But who owns the Phoenix Group?”
“She said once. Some rich American recluse living in Arizona, hence the name. Although she also told me she thought it came from the mythical bird, the phoenix.”
“The one that never dies,” Katie said, and then her face reddened when she found Shaw staring at her.
“Didn’t turn out to be a very apt name, did it?” he noted.
Katie said quickly, “But there must be more to The Phoenix Group than people knew. So we really need to nail down who or what it is.”
“No,
I
need to do that.”
“I thought we were working this together.”
“You thought wrong.”
“I want to find out what happened to Anna too.”
Shaw just shook his head. “What else can you tell me?”
“Why should I tell you anything now?”
“Because I asked you politely.”
His eyes locked on her again and Katie felt herself quivering under their burn.
“Well, when I was about to leave I noticed she had all this research on her desk.”
“She always did. That was her job.”
“No, I mean it was about one thing, the so-called Red Menace.”
Shaw sat forward. “Did you ask her about it? Was she working on it for The Phoenix Group?”
She shook her head. “Anna said she was just curious. That it was just something she was working on in I suppose her spare time.”
“When we were in Dublin she was very interested about this R.I.C. organization. She went online trying to dig up some stuff but didn’t find much.”
“Well, it seemed like she was still very curious.” She looked thoughtful for a moment. “You don’t think her employer had anything to do with any of that? I mean trying to find out who was behind the Red Menace? And maybe they did and that would explain the shooting?”
Shaw slipped a business card out of his pocket and looked at it. Edward Royce, MI5. The man Frank had wanted him to team with on the Red Menace investigation. He was based in London. Shaw didn’t believe for an instant that The Phoenix Group had been investigating the Red Menace and that was the reason for the slaughter. Yet Royce probably had the connections to get Shaw at least into the building if Shaw agreed to help him on the Red Menace situation.
“Anna would’ve told me if she were working on it for them.”
Katie licked her lips and said nervously, “Take this in the spirit in which it’s offered.”
Shaw looked up from the card. “What?”
“Could Anna have been keeping things from you, I mean about what she really did?” She added quickly as his features turned grim, “Look, you weren’t exactly truthful with her. It’s just a thought.”
“It
is
a thought. I’ll keep it in mind. Thanks.”
“So when do you leave?”
“Soon.”
Shaw’s BlackBerry vibrated. He had some difficulty getting it out of his coat pocket so Katie helped him pull it out. “Do you want me to bring up your messages?” She asked this as she watched him struggling with the device basically one-handed.
“I can manage,” he said, perhaps suspecting that this was a ploy on Katie’s part to read his mail. He glanced at the screen. He had a first-class ticket on the Eurostar out of Gare du Nord station to St. Pancras in London. He’d be staying at the recently reopened Savoy. At least Frank didn’t do things on the cheap. It was partial compensation for a job that involved the potential of violent death on a minute-by-minute basis.
“Will you at least call and let me know what you find out?”
He stood after dropping some euros on the table to pay for the meal. “Sorry, I can’t do that.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want to. That explanation cover it for you?”
It took Katie a moment to realize he was merely throwing her own words back at her, when he’d quizzed her about not getting plastic surgery done on the scar on her arm.
“No, but I guess I don’t have a choice.”
“Thanks for your help. Now go back home and get on with your life.”
“Oh, yeah, great,” she exclaimed in mock delight. “I hear the
New York Times
needs a new managing editor. Or maybe I can take over Christiane Amanpour’s slot on CNN. I’ve always wanted to cross over to TV. I’ll make millions. I have no idea why I didn’t do it years ago.”
“Take care of yourself, Katie. And lay off the drink.”
He left her sitting there at the table, her head pounding. Five minutes passed and she hadn’t moved, just sat staring at nothing, because that’s apparently all she had left, nothing. Her ringing phone jolted her. It was a stateside number she didn’t recognize.
“Hello?”
“Katie James?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Kevin Gallagher, features editor at
Scribe
. We’re a fairly new daily based in the U.S.”
“I’ve read some of your stuff. You’ve got some good reporters.”
“Quite a compliment coming from a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner. Look, I’m sure you’re busy, but I got your number from a buddy at the
Trib
. I understand you’re no longer there.”
“That’s right,” Katie said, then quickly added, “Irreconcilable differences. Why are you calling?”
“Hey, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that a reporter at your level doesn’t become available all that often. I’d like to hire you to cover the story for the paper.”
“
The
story?”
Gallagher chuckled. “At least the only story anyone cares about right now.”
“The Red Menace?”
“Nope.” He said. “We’ve already got a team on that. I meant the London Massacre.”
Katie’s heartbeat quickened.
“Katie, you still there?”
“Yeah, yeah. How would we work it?”
“We can’t pay what you’re used to at the
Trib
. But we’ll pay you per story at the going rate for somebody like you plus reasonable expenses. You break anything big I can go back for more. You have free rein on how to get the story. How’s that sound?”
“Sounds like exactly what I’ve been looking for. I happen to be in Europe right now as a matter of fact.”
“I call that a kickass coincidence.”