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ChapterTwenty-Seven
Reese
Now
Anatoly asks to meet at a McDonald’s on the rougher side of Baltimore, half an hour outside of DC.
Sheridan is silent during the drive. He’s hunched in the seat with his elbows on his knees and his face buried in his palms. I try to read the quiver in his shoulders, the line of tension running down his spine.
Is your world collapsing, Sheridan? Are your lies closing in around you?
I didn’t think Sheridan would be the man who broke my heart, but here we are. I can feel the cracks forming.
When we arrive, Anatoly is already parked in a corner, next to the dumpster. I pull up beside him and roll down my window. “What do you want?”
He rolls his eyes and hauls himself out of his Lexus. “Get out. We talk face-to-face.”
I’ve got no time for moody Russians, and I almost throw the SUV into reverse and leave him choking on my fumes. But I need to know Konstantin’s role in all this. I turn off the engine and pocket the keys.
An hour ago, I wouldn’t have thought twice about leaving them in the car with Sheridan.
Sheridan follows me out, slamming his door. I eyeball him as he comes around the hood.
Anatoly’s gaze snaps from me to him.
“Talk. You’ve got three minutes,” I bark. “We’re going to charge Konstantin in federal court in an hour.” I’m bluffing, but Anatoly doesn’t know that. “We’ve got him for assaulting a federal agent. Breaking and entering. Conspiracy.”
“You think he was somewhere yesterday? That’s what these made-up charges are all about?”
“Sometime between ten a.m. yesterday and this morning, yes. He left a print during a break-in at a Secret Service agent’s home.”
Anatoly’s eyes narrow. “Does this have anything to do with the car crash in Rock Creek Park last night? Or how the Secret Service rushed to respond? Almost like…” He lets his implication hang between us, his eyebrows raised.
I say nothing. Sheridan grinds his heel against a weed.
“Konstantin has an alibi for all of yesterday.”
“How convenient.”
“Maybe, but it’s the truth.” Anatoly pulls out a phone. Video surveillance from the Russian embassy is preloaded on his screen, with the date and time stamp in the upper corner. Yesterday morning, eight a.m. “Watch. You will see Konstantin enter the embassy. He was meeting me.”
Sure enough, there’s Konstantin striding through the front doors and greeting Anatoly in the lobby with a hug and kisses to each cheek. The men amble out of the frame, heading deeper into the embassy. They’re not in a hurry.
“He did not leave until the afternoon. Again, with me.” A new video plays, this time showing Konstantin and Anatoly leaving the embassy in the company of three other men. They’re relaxed, laughing with each other, sharing jokes. An outside camera picks up the recording as they move out of the lobby frame. The five men climb into Anatoly’s car.
“We went to dinner. We were discussing business with these men. They were here from out of town.”
“And who are they?”
Anatoly glares at me and doesn’t answer. “Here is the video surveillance from the restaurant.”
Somehow, he has the surveillance tapes from the St. Regis. They ate at Alhambra inside the hotel. If this is legit.The video looks like it’s from the St. Regis, though. I’ve pulled their surveillance tapes a hundred times. The time stamp, the date, their logo in the corner. Anatoly drives up in his Lexus, and the same men climb out. A valet takes the car as Anatoly and Konstantin usher the men inside at 3:21 p.m. yesterday.
“We stayed for five hours.”
“Long dinner.”
“Unlike you Americans, we know how to savor experiences.”
