Chapter 17 #2
“Next up, a video recording,” Schneider said, opening a laptop and pressing a few keys.
He spun the screen to where they could all see it.
“The street outside the safehouse. This was taken a few hours before you left Moscow. You see there,” he said, pausing the playback, “a man arriving at the safehouse. Do you recognize this man, Mr. Beck?”
“Looks to me like the station chief.”
“For the sake of expediency, I’ll fast-forward,” Schneider said, jumping ahead on the recording. “Twenty minutes later, we see a woman ringing the bell and being let in. Can you identify her?”
“I’m sure you don’t need my assistance with that.” Carter’s head was beginning to throb, but that was well down his list of problems. It was obviously Nika, down to her red stilettos. The same ones she turned up to the train station in.
“Fast-forwarding again,” Schneider said, choosing another point along the progress bar. “Here, at around thirty-five minutes, the same woman exits the apartment.”
Carter watched, focusing on keeping his breath steady as the door opened.
Nika appeared, clutching a large envelope.
The footage glitched but Carter could see the fear in her posture, in the way she checked left and right and skittered down the steps.
She hesitated and looked back at the open door.
After a moment, she ran back up the steps and shut it.
As she disappeared down the footpath, the interview room remained silent.
“You say you know her well,” Schneider said, after leaving it to sink in. “What do you make of her demeanor?”
“She’s in a hurry, obviously,” Carter said carefully. “As to her state of mind, I’m guessing you’ll ask her about that. I do know she had a train to catch.”
“I’m no expert in running in stilettos, but I’m thinking you’d avoid going jogging in them whenever possible.” He directed the comment at Silvia.
“What are you looking at me for?” she said frostily.
Schneider turned back to Carter, who made a point of calming and meeting his gaze. “Can’t say I’ve ever run in stilettos, but Nika wears them most days, so if anyone can…”
Schneider shrugged. “Just building a picture.” He slid another photo across. “Next we have a still from a security camera captured down the street from the safehouse, around the back of a newsstand kiosk, a few minutes later. Looks like the same woman cleaning her shoes, don’t you think?”
“Another question for her. I assume the politsiya supplied this footage? Not usually a trusted source for us.”
“You’ll see the still is timecoded,” Schneider said, ignoring the query. “Where were you at that time, out of interest?”
Carter narrowed his eyes at the numbers. “That would have been the folk dance show with my tour group. Check the itinerary.”
“We have. We’ve also checked with some of your tour group, and they say you weren’t sitting in the theater with them.”
“I’ve seen that show twenty times. I took a taxi to the little office we keep in Moscow to take care of some paperwork—CIA paperwork. Given that I’d just lost my best agent, I had some things to take care of.”
“Anything to confirm you were there?” Silvia said, sounding hopeful. “Anyone see you? Security camera footage?”
“We don’t make it obvious when we’re coming and going.”
“The people in the tour group—they said you and Elena were obviously a couple.”
He shrugged.
“Next we have a photo of a pistol, fitted with a silencer,” Schneider said, slapping another photo onto the growing pile in front of Carter. “Do you recognize this?”
“A P96—commonly used in the police and security firms in Russia.”
“To your knowledge, did Elena own or have access to a weapon like this?”
“Far as I know, she’s never even fired a weapon. In Russia, regular people rarely own guns. If she was caught with one, it could have blown her cover, and she would have known that.”
“So if I told you that this was found in her apartment?”
“Are you telling me that?”
Schneider exhaled impatiently. “Local police found this very weapon in Elena’s apartment. Same caliber as the bullets and casings at the crime scene. Russian forensics will be able to tell us in the next few days if they’re an exact match.”
“We’re relying on Russian forensics now?”
“By necessity, our embassy is working closely with local authorities. Of course, officially the deceased was a public affairs officer with the embassy, and not CIA, and we’ve had to suggest to the police that it’s a love affair gone sour, but even so, the murder of a U.S.
diplomat is a big deal. Lot of people having a lot of meetings. ”
“You think the Russians suspect there’s more to it? That’s if they weren’t involved.”
“Of course they suspect. Our guys have said they have no idea of the identity of the mystery woman, but it’s a matter of time before they figure out who she is. We just gotta hope they believe that her motive was, uh, personal.”
“So you’re misdirecting them? Gonna make it hard for them to catch the real killer, if they even want to.”
“Are we though?” Schneider waved at the laptop screen, which was now dark. “Looks pretty open and shut.”
“Because you’re making it look like that. There are a dozen other possibilities.”
“And only one person caught on camera, and only one weapon found.”
“Any prints on the weapon?”
“Wiped clean.”
“If it was her weapon, in her apartment, why would she wipe it clean? I wouldn’t trust the word of the politsiya, and even if this was found in her apartment, you can’t rule out the possibility it was planted.
I mean, who shoots someone and keeps the murder weapon?
Hypothetically speaking—I have no personal experience of murdering anyone. ”
“You have plenty of experience with weapons.”
“As do most military veterans. Was there a question there?”
“Next,” Schneider said, pulling the laptop toward him, “we have a copy of transactions of Elena’s U.S.
bank account. You’ll see a substantial sum of money was deposited in the last week, and not by the CIA.
The transaction was made in Moscow, but beyond that it appears to be untraceable. What do you know about this?”
“Nothing at all. Maybe she transferred her own money, knowing she was moving here.”
“A lot of money for a travel agent.”
“She has a wealthy family.”
Schneider shut the laptop screen and studied Carter. “Is it safe to say there’s a lot more going on here than you were aware of?”
Carter took his time answering. “That is a safe assumption, yes.”
“Are you still confident enough to vouch for her innocence?”
“None of this sounds like the Elena I know.”
“And yet, here we are. Next, we have a copy of what I understand to be a marriage certificate,” he said, pulling a sheet of paper from the file. “I don’t read Russian, but you recognize the names and date on this?”
Carter ran his gaze down it. “Elena’s real name and my Moscow alias, written in Cyrillic. The date is the day we left Moscow.”
“And you were unaware of this so-called marriage.”
“We had discussed it before she arrived at the station.”
“But you hadn’t agreed to it.”
“I was willing to do it, if it kept her safe. She was marrying my alias—she did marry my alias—not the real me. What’s with the raised eyebrow?”
Schneider grimaced. “Deputy Chief Maldonado, would you like to enlighten Mr. Beck?”
Silvia paused as if to collect her thoughts.
“Okay, so this is complicated,” she began.
“Fact is, your alias is a real person, according to Russian law, so apparently it’s a legal marriage.
And because the U.S. recognizes Russian marriages…
Well, it will take some time for our legal department to sort through it.
It’s not a situation we’ve faced before.
Obviously, we can’t tell the Russians that you were there under an alias, so Elena’s marriage is legitimate, even if yours isn’t.
Crazy, huh? However—and I know you’ll be relieved to hear this, given your personal history—there is an easy way to resolve it. ”
“Which is?”
“By law,” Schneider said, talking over Silvia, “in Russia, a marriage can be annulled if it was entered into involuntarily, or if it was registered without a genuine intent to create a family. Under the circumstances, our diplomatic staff in Moscow can make this happen fairly smoothly and get it expedited through the courts. We just need you to sign a statement to that effect. Our legal department has already drafted one, which I have here.” He pulled another document from the file and slid it across the table, followed by a pen.
“If you’d like to look it over and sign it, that will at least clear up that minor distraction so we can focus on the bigger picture. ”
“And then what happens to Elena?”
Schneider shrugged. He and Silvia were making an effort to be nonchalant.
“Nothing that wouldn’t happen to her anyway.
She’ll face the consequences of her actions, whatever they may or may not be.
But it gives you a little protection from being charged as an accessory, or something more serious. And it just makes things neater.”
“If I sign it, it’ll invalidate her spousal visa, and you’ll send her back.”
“That’s a decision for Immigration.” Schneider directed his words to the document, not Carter.
“Do you have anything else to suggest that her documents are fraudulent?”
Schneider glanced at Silvia, whose expression remained impassive. “Uh.”
“I take that as a ‘no.’ They were all legally issued, legally expedited, yeah? And I assume she hasn’t confessed to any of this?”
“This is not a forum for you to ask questions.”
“Again, a no,” Carter said, leaning forward. “So, this marriage certificate is the only link in this chain that you can easily break. Otherwise, it’s going to be a bitch to try to deport someone who’s come here legally, isn’t it?”
Schneider’s face was growing increasingly jowly, like gravity was getting stronger. “There are plenty of avenues, like the fact that your alias doesn’t exist.”
“Which you don’t want the Russians to know.”
“You’d just be delaying the inevitable. And while we investigate, we have every cause to hold her in custody.”
“That’s arguable, when she hasn’t been proven to have done anything wrong.
You know what’ll happen if we send her back.
They’ll figure it all out, if they haven’t already.
She won’t just be set up for this murder—she’ll be exposed as a spy.
You know what Russia does to spies. She risked her life for us every day for four years. ”
“She did it for her own purposes, like every agent we recruit. This is a woman who has lied to you, possibly throughout your entire relationship—working or otherwise.”
“You think she had this planned from the beginning? And then what—she bided her time for four years? That’s a long time and a lot of risk for an outcome that was never certain.”
“Are you telling me you’re willing to let this marriage stand?”
Carter didn’t know what the hell was going on. But the one thing he knew was that he had to buy Nika time. Get her an immigration lawyer—or whatever the hell kind of lawyer might be useful in this batshit scenario. He eyeballed Schneider. “Yes, I am.”
Schneider slowly shook his head. “Despite everything we’ve shown you today, despite everything she’s failed to tell you, despite the legal jeopardy this could put you in?”
“Don’t forget,” Silvia added in a warning tone, “you just confirmed that there was no relationship until last night.”
“I confirmed that there was no sexual relationship. You have witnesses who say we were a couple prior to that. And you yourselves could give evidence that the marriage has been consummated, if called upon. Though I can’t imagine you’ll be in a hurry to present the video of this interview as evidence in a Russian court. ”
Schneider leaned forward, so he and Carter were pretty much head-to-head. “Now Mr. Beck, if you think for a second—”
“Let’s take some of the heat out of this conversation, shall we?
” Silvia interrupted, staring pointedly at Schneider until he relaxed back into his chair.
“There’s one key matter we haven’t discussed, and that’s what’s to become of you, Mr. Beck.
A cloud is hanging over your record, and unless you can distance yourself from this scandal, I can’t see you having any future that involves the CIA. ”
The room seemed to get a little smaller. “You’re threatening to fire me?”
“It’s not a threat; it’s a reality. I’m not the type to deal in blackmail.”
“Everyone who’s served in the field deals in blackmail. You’re threatening to fire me unless I sign this document? Just clarifying, for the interview tape.”
“It’s more a question of cooperation,” Silvia said, choosing her words carefully.
“If you don’t do everything in your power to work with us on this, you leave me powerless to save your career.
And you know the way this works—we would not be able to confirm to a future employer that you’d ever worked for us.
This isn’t me laying down the law—you know the rules, I damn well taught them to you.
I don’t need to tell you that until this incident, you’ve been on our radar as one of the best operatives out there.
We’d have to assess how far you’ve been compromised, but beyond that, if you cooperate, you’d get your pick of assignments.
You could go to the ends of the earth for however long you damn please.
And I know how you like to stay occupied. ”
“Not at the cost of a woman’s life.”
“Mr. Beck,” began Schneider. “There is already plenty of evidence pointing to Elena as the perpetrator, and more is likely to come in the next few days. If you want to avoid getting embroiled, I suggest you sign the document now.” There was a knock at the door, but he continued.
“The situation is changing hourly, so I don’t know if we can make the same offer tomorrow, or if we can provide the same level of assistance if criminal charges were to be laid against you, alongside the—”
Another knock, and the door opened. “Apologies for the interruption,” said a woman in an FBI jacket—one of the agents who’d stormed the hotel room. “Assistant Director Schneider, I have a note for you.”
Schneider stood, scraping the chair behind him, took a piece of paper from her, unfolded it, and read it. “You got to be kidding me,” he said under his breath.
He passed it to Silvia, who read it, her eyes widening. She looked up at Schneider. “What the hell?”
“What’s going on?” Carter said, trying to get a read on their faces beyond the obvious shock.
Schneider glanced at his watch. “Interview ended 3:36 p.m.,” he said. Without another word, he and Silvia left.