The still was taken from an elevated position, but not so high that the faces were unrecognizable. It was an outside shot of a stone walkway that was either along a lake, or, given that it was apparently taken in Yalta, the Black Sea. Dozens of people were walking by in either direction, but the focus of the shot was a couple standing near the edge. The woman was wearing a conservative dress that went almost all the way to the ground. A scarf was wrapped her head and covered most of her face. Not quite a hijab but the effect was similar, leaving Alex with no way to tell who she was.
She had no such problem recognizing the man. He looked older than the last time she’d seen him, but it was definitely her father. The thing that struck her as oddest was his hair. It was so long. For her entire life, he’d kept it cropped tight to his scalp, but now it looked a little wild and unkempt, and some of the gray was turning white.
The hazards of being on the run.
Alex had to check herself to keep from reaching out and touching the photograph. It really was him. “This was taken a week ago?”
“Yes,” McElroy said.
“So this woman was who he was meeting?”
“Correct.”
“Who is she?”
McElroy reached into his briefcase again and pulled out a file. “That’s a good question. She goes by a number of names.” He set the file down, opened it, and one by one, pulled out more photographs of her. The outfits changed from shot to shot, but there was always a head scarf that covered all but her eyes. Most of the time they were hidden behind sunglasses. “She’s currently using the name Fadilah El-Hashim.”
“And what were they meeting about?”
“We’re not sure. El-Hashim is associated with a group that launders money for, among others, several terrorist organizations. Not only do they hide the money, but from what we’ve been able to gather, they’re also shrewd investors. Quite shrewd, in fact.”
Alex was trying to connect the dots. “So you think she’s helping my father hide money?”
“Like I said, we don’t know why they were meeting. This image came from a surveillance camera. We only found it and a few others after we learned El-Hashim had met with someone there. What we didn’t expect to find was Colonel Poe.”
As Alex studied her father’s features, all the grief she had held in check came flooding back. He looked tired, and thinner.
Why did you go, Dad?
That was the question she could never answer, one she’d promised herself would be the first out of her mouth if she ever saw him again. Over the years, however, she sensed the possibility of that happening becoming smaller and smaller, and had sometimes wondered if he was alive at all.
Why, Dad?
She raised her head, locking gazes with McElroy. “Okay,” she said. “What does any of this have to do with me?”
McElroy started to smile, then stopped. “I’m with special operations at Stonewell. The fugitive retrieval division.”
It took her only a split second to see where he was going.
“Whoa,” she said, “wait a minute. Is that what this is about?” She pushed away from the table. “You want me to help you find my father and bring him in?” She rose to her feet again. “Thanks for the show-and-tell, asshole, but I think I’ll say goodbye.”
McElroy hopped back up and grabbed her arm as she tried to walk away. “You completely misunderstand me.”
Alex stiffened, her teeth clenching. “Let go.”
“I’m not asking you to help me get your father. He’s not even on our list.”
“Bullshit.” She wrenched her arm free.
“It’s the woman,” he said quickly. “We want to bring her in. She has intel that will help the US government shut down the whole operation she’s involved in.”
Alex stared at him. “If I wouldn’t help you with my father, why would I even consider helping you with this woman?”
“Because of your father, of course,” McElroy said.
“Meaning what?”
Cooper, the only one still sitting, said in a calmer voice, “El-Hashim is the last person he was seen with. Maybe she knows how to contact him.”
“Exactly,” McElroy said. “You see now? If you help us retrieve her, you’ll have a chance to find out what she knows.”
Alex balked. “And pass the info on to you, so you can go after him? I don’t think so.”
“I told you, he’s not even on our list. Stonewell is not a charity. It’s a commercial entity. If it’s something we haven’t been hired to do, we don’t do it.”
Alex looked at Cooper.
He shrugged. “Hey, it’s up to you. But it is a chance to maybe find out a little more about him. I’m sure you’re curious. I mean, I would be if I were you.”
He had nailed it of course, and knew it. She was curious. Hell, she was more than curious. She was borderline desperate. Her father had gone AWOL less than a year after her mother’s death. Her desire to know why he had left her and her brother behind had dulled as the years passed, but it hadn’t gone away. And now, faced with this potential connection to him, her feelings of wonder and anger and loneliness came rushing back like a hundred-foot tsunami.
She stepped back to the table, and picked up the photo without sitting down.
“Do you at least know where this woman is?”
“Still in Ukraine.”
“It’s a big country.”
“We can pinpoint her position to within a dozen feet or so.”
Alex raised an eyebrow. “You seem pretty sure about that.”
“I am.”
“Okay, but what about tomorrow? Or the next day? Or whenever it is we go after her?”
“She’s not going anywhere.”
“Where exactly is she?”
“I’m afraid I can’t tell you that unless you sign on to help.”
Alex looked at the image again. This time, it wasn’t an older, weary man she saw, but the father she last remembered, grimly holding her hand as they visited her mother’s grave. He would be gone the following day, but she hadn’t known that then. All she’d known was that he was sadder than she’d ever seen him.
When they had knelt on the grass next to the grave, her father had leaned down and kissed the headstone. Alex had stared at him in surprise. He’d never been one to display much emotion, yet there he was, tears running down his cheeks, and the imprint of his lips gracing the stone next to her mother’s name.
“I’m sorry,” McElroy said. “Apparently we made a mistake.”
He scooped up the file on El-Hashim and returned it to his briefcase. He then held out his hand to Alex for the photo. “I’ll make sure no one at Stonewell bothers you again.”
She closed her eyes, still grasping the picture. “Hold on.”
There was silence, no one moving. When she opened her eyes again, McElroy and Cooper were staring back at her.
“If I say yes,” she said, wondering if she was making a mistake, “my rate’s a thousand dollars a day, plus expenses, full insurance rider, medical and life. And you hire Deuce, too, at the same rate.”
“Deuce?”
Cooper, on his feet now, whispered something into McElroy’s ear.
“Oh, right,” McElroy said. “Your partner.”
“Package deal.”
A hesitation, then, “Fine.”
He placed his briefcase on the table and opened it back up. From inside, he pulled out a file and removed the sheet of paper it was holding.
“I take it the bump in pay won’t be an issue,” he said.
Alex took the document from him. It was a one-page, freelance-hire agreement, listing her daily rate at fifteen hundred, plus the requested insurance.
“You’re pretty confident,” she said.
“Confident, no. Prepared, yes.”