It was around three in the afternoon when they finally made it to the outskirts of Novi Pazar. It was a larger commercial center of red roofs and white stucco houses clustered in the pit of a green, sloping valley. Spring flowers were just starting to bloom. The city was built on both sides of the narrow Raska River. Hauck got off and followed the GPS through narrow boulevards crowded with modern stores and Western brands to the city center. They were staying at the Vrbak, a drab four-story hotel, built in a style somewhere between quaint and industrial, that was probably the best in town. It straddled both sides of the flowing river.
It was late afternoon by the time they reached the hotel and settled into adjoining rooms on the fourth floor. Too late to do anything. Hauck asked if she wanted to meet later for dinner.
Naomi wasn’t sure if she was up to it. “I may just hang and make some calls, if that’s okay.”
“Sure, that’s fine.”
He went inside. Hauck’s room was sixties modern and spartan, a minimalist style. It had a flat teak platform bed and a down bedspread with a matching teak desk and chair. Drab local art hung on the walls.
He went to the window and opened the curtains. The red roofs of the town sprawled out, and in the distance there were green, rolling hills. Everything was quaint and friendly, but fifteen years ago, in this town set near the Kosovar border, the tensions between the Serbs and Muslims would have been running high.
Every family might have had a Dani Thibault in it. And would do whatever they could to protect him.
He looked out at the hills in the gray, dissolving light. He felt wired, too wound up to rest. Maybe he’d go for a run, try to locate the AstraBanca, which was near the city center. Or find the address they had for Maria Radisovic.
His blood rushed with anticipation, like the river running below.
He felt something, something in himself he recognized, like a familiar face. Something he hadn’t felt in months.
Alive.
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
The next day Hauck was having breakfast around seven in the dining room overlooking the river when Naomi came in, in a tight tank and black running leggings, sweaty from a run.
“Hey.” Hauck pushed out a chair for her. “I knocked on your door.”
“Morning,” Naomi said, taking a seat. “I was up. Went out for an early run.”
“You sleep okay?”
“A little restless,” she admitted. She shook out her short ponytail. “I was up in the night doing some work.” She took out a city map from a fanny pack and unfolded it. “I checked out Market Street. Where the AstraBanca branch is. Then I was wired. I figured what the hell. I kept on going to Zinak Street.” Maria Radisovic’s street.
“Small apartment house. Interior courtyard. Butcher across the street.”
Naomi widened her eyes.
Hauck grinned. “I did the same route last night. Pretty good distance.” He nodded admiringly. “Four miles.”
“Usually get in six,” Naomi snapped defensively, as if trying not to be outdone.
Hauck couldn’t help but notice that she looked pretty tight in her heather-gray T-back Under Armour top. On her right shoulder he spotted a small tattoo. A sword with a lightning bolt running through it. Underneath, the initial “J.”
The logo of her brother’s unit-the Special Forces Airborne.
Music theory… Hauck laughed to himself. No telling how tough this gal is.
“C’mon, have something to eat,” he said, prodding her. “It’s going to be a long day. My tab.”
“Accepted.” Naomi smiled. She dropped an orange file on the tablecloth.
A waitress came up and Naomi ordered a yogurt and some cereal. “I printed out some e-mails I received during the night. You want to hear?”
Hauck nodded. “Of course.”
“I have people trying to trace the history of the money going in and out of Thibault’s bank accounts. The payments to James Donovan’s Cayman Islands account came from something called the VRV Development Trust. It was a payment for a real estate sale on a property Donovan had bought just thirty days before on the island of Antigua. Three weeks later he flipped it-to VRV-for five times the price.”
“Not a bad rate of return,” Hauck mused cynically.
“I guess. VRV turns out to be a shell company based out of the Bahamas. It was set up about a year ago. The principals are all a bunch of local functionaries, lawyers, local officials, designed to shield what it does. Block anyone checking into who controls the funds.”
Hauck had had some experience with this kind of hocus-pocus while trying to track money flows in the Grand Central bombing case.
“But the Antiguan government is cooperating. There’s a new banking transparency around the world.” She pulled another page out. A corporate document. VRV letterhead. “This is one of the articles of incorporation. It’s a power of attorney. Granted to an Edwin Cahill, Esq., a lawyer there. Check out the grantee…”
Hauck took the document. The signature was scratchy at the bottom. But it clearly read Dieter Thibault. “So that’s how he paid him. Donovan.”
Naomi’s eyes shone in confirmation. “I suspect we’ll find a similar pattern when we dig into the affairs of Marc Glassman. But right now we don’t have the time.”
“So how do we find out where the eight mil originated from?”
“Here’s a start.” She placed another photocopy out on the tablecloth. “According to the Caribe Sun Trust, it came by way of wire from the Bank of Nova Scotia in Canada. A firm named Crescent Bay Partners. Crescent Bay is a real estate holding company, investing in plush resort properties-you know, these partial-ownership franchises. It has properties in Mexico, Costa Rica, all throughout the Caribbean. Legitimate properties. Just the kind of thing Dani Thibault looked to put together.
“On the surface, it looks like a standard real estate investment-except at five times the price. Its financing is pretty murky. It seems to come from a variety of sources, some rich Europeans, also some investment funds out of the Middle East. The funds in question seem to have been filtered through the KronenBank in Lichtenstein.”
Hauck raised his eyes. “KronenBank. Didn’t Thibault work there for a stint?”
“He did,” Naomi said, nodding, “and this is where it starts to get good. You remember I told you about the Bahraini businessman that investment manager in London was overheard talking to? Hassani?”
Hauck nodded. “Yeah.”
“Well, he has his own investment portfolio as well. A private partnership out of Dubai. It’s a large source of funding to private equity groups-here in the U.S. and in London. Ascot Capital.”
Naomi slid a fastened document across the table to Hauck. He put down his coffee. It was photocopies of a marketing brochure for Ascot. The first pages listed Hassan ibn Hassani among the many company directors. Others were recognizable names from finance and business, even an ex-U.S. president.
On a separate page, listed among the many companies Ascot maintained investments in, was Crescent Bay Partners.
Naomi’s face seemed to glow with pride. “I can’t quite prove Donovan’s specific eight million came from there, but it ties Thibault to Hassani and thereby to al-Bashir in London. We’re onto something here, Ty…” She tapped her finger on the pamphlet. “We tie what went in to what went out, we have a plot that leads straight to a conspiracy. One way is to pierce this transfer of funds all the way back through Lichtenstein.”
Hauck let out a breath. “Which would take time.”
“And having to show cause,” she added skeptically, “when we don’t know anything right now. And that gets the rest of the whole frigging world involved. Not to mention the bankers in Dubai and Lichtenstein would just say our issue is with those back in Canada or the U.S., not them.