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“Put your head between your knees,” he was saying, and she did. It helped, and the men around her sipped their Scotch and their wine, and Frankie massaged her shoulders. The world, in scintillas, began to reform. She heard Rory’s voice.
“Orlov was very good at what he did,” he was saying. “But he’s not the only one who can take out the trash. We need team players, not guys who want to play us.”
“I never met him,” she mumbled.
“I know. When he was in Dubai on another job—eliminating a guy at a crypto conference who tried to hack our farm in Cambodia—we learned all kinds of shit about him. A woman in Emirates intelligence who’s on our payroll clued us in. His background had some holes.”
“He’s an assassin?” she asked.
“Was an assassin. Very good. Among the best. And even though GEI was just a cover, he was actually an excellent lobbyist. Top drawer! Got to be good friends with Erika Schweiker for us, because of all that GEI nonsense. Anyway, we learned from Dubai that the feds had dirt on him—and turned him. Richie Morley had been their mole, which is kind of ironic, since we had Orlov whack him. I don’t think Artie ever knew.”
“But Artie…” she started to say, the thought embryonic.
“When Artie refused to cave, Orlov took care of him, too.”
The dizziness was gone, but she still felt flushed and there was a faint ringing in her ears.
“Look, Orlov was going to wear a wire,” Rory was saying. “We couldn’t allow that. Hell, he knew too much to live, no matter what. He even wanted the FBI to meet with Crissy, and see if she’d wear a wire—maybe even try and be you. So, we thought, instead of letting them use her to be you, let’s use you to be her. Get Orlov out to Red Rocks for a ‘meeting,’ and point the investigation into his death away from us.”
Her mind was reeling as she tried to parse how they had used her to set up her sister, and how they had no compunction with a body count that was now at least four. Hit men. Assassins. She felt soiled, surrounded and scared, her umwelt void of the experience to help her absorb the duplicity and violence that these people saw as unremarkable.
“Tell us everything Crissy told you,” Frankie said. “We need to know.”
Everything.
What did that mean?
She didn’t give a damn about self-preservation now, not after what she had done, except for one thing. Marisa. She had a daughter to care for. For the sake of the girl, she couldn’t screw this up. She had to keep that child safe.
Then, when she was out of here, she would determine what she needed to do to protect Crissy.
So, what was everything? Or, what was enough?
“Betsy?” It was Frankie, his voice concerned.
She gathered herself and told them that two detectives had been to her sister’s suite at the Buckingham Palace. She admitted there was a chance that Crissy was going to tell the police about her and Frankie and even Cleo Dionne, whom Crissy had learned about while researching Futurium.
Frankie took one of her hands in both of his and massaged the soft spot where the base of her thumb met the base of her index finger.
“That’s what we wanted,” Rory said. “The cops heading over to the BP.”
“It’s okay that Crissy told them about Futurium. And about my friend Cleo,” Frankie went on. “Cleo’s death was a tragedy.”
“Get over it, Frankie. Get over her,” Rory told him. “Orlov made sure she felt no pain. None.”
“I know…”
Was that heartache on Frankie’s face? Betsy thought it was. It gutted her.
“We have the right friends at the LVPD,” Damon was saying.
“I’m done,” she murmured. “No more.” She wasn’t sure who she was talking to. It was a general appeal into the air.
“Done?’
“No more looking like Crissy, no more Diana.”
“Frankie?” It was Rory and he was leaning forward. “Would you tell her that’s not possible? Not quite yet? Tomorrow night is the cocktail party at that other dunghill of a casino: Fort Knocks. The meet and greet with the other tribute show performers. We need her for the senator.”
