Max could see it now: Pavlenco and Burgess couldn’t care less about the death of the twenty-three Roma. They were solely interested in catching this high-profile criminal who’d been avoiding Interpol for years.
Josée was speechless, stunned by what she’d just heard.
“Your brother may not be guilty of this tragedy,” Burgess continued, “but he’s got something to hide. That much is clear. If we don’t get him for the murder and the fire, we’ll get him on other charges, no doubt about it.” She let silence fill the room, probably as an intimidation tactic. Then she added, “And if he gives us O’Brien, that’ll be a start.”
In the corridor, as Max headed toward the exit, Josée grabbed him by the arm. “What’s all this about? Why did you never mention the robbery? Does Caroline know?”
“A youthful mistake.”
“And what about this fraud business? You knew about that, too?”
“No, I swear I’ve never heard a word about it.”
Josée peered at Max for a long moment, as if to make sure he wasn’t lying. For Max, lying was second nature. He held her stare.
She added, “Anything else you’ve been hiding from me? Anything else I should know before I put my reputation as a lawyer at stake?”
Back at the hotel, Max finally got a hold of Caroline in Montreal. There had been dark days after Sacha’s death, but she had gradually recovered and come back to herself. In the midst of her deepest pain, she’d often ended up at Refuge Sainte-Catherine to help others. There, the director had asked her to write a newsletter, which they distributed to donors and volunteers three times a year. Caroline had thrown herself into the project, hoping it would distract her from her grief. But no, this simple act of writing reminded her too much of her career as a journalist and her old life, when she’d been happy and carefree, when her son was alive. Volunteering, yes. She was ready and able to serve warm soup to runaways and give clean syringes to drug addicts, but there was no way she’d go back to journalism, even for a newsletter.
Max had been through Montreal a year ago and had taken the time to visit her. He hadn’t seen her since the Saqawigan tragedy. Without attracting attention, he’d watched her sort through old clothes that other volunteers would give to the homeless once night fell, their hands frozen, standing shivering behind paper cups of black coffee. The beautiful, irresistible young woman he’d met in that gym in Tribeca was little more than a memory now. Caroline’s hair, which had been so magnificent before, was cut short, a dense tuft of hair framing — highlighting, really — the bones prominent under almost translucent skin. Only her eyes were the same. Those penetrating eyes.
To the runaway teenagers and the homeless, she was simply Caro, the woman who handed them a bowl of soup or a used blanket in exchange for nothing at all. The young people had watched Max suspiciously, as if he were a cop. Or a journalist looking for a story on the urban jungle. They’d scanned the space behind him for a photographer, the obligatory appendix, but Max travelled light.
A volunteer had replaced Caroline, who left her post to join Max. The cafeteria was closed; it wouldn’t open until the afternoon. Another volunteer mopped the floor, his thoughts elsewhere. The whole room smelled like industrial detergent, though it wasn’t enough to convince anyone for a second that the place was clean.
“Why don’t we go out for coffee?” Max had suggested, ill at ease.
As they trudged toward the Second Cup together, kids standing at street corners with squeegees and water bottles waved or spoke a few words to her. Even some cops, both in and out of uniform, stopped her in the street to ask her about a runaway whose parents were worried, or a john who’d turned violent on a prostitute.
Caroline, transformed into Mother Teresa. The former journalist with a promising, bright future, the elegant Caroline with the devastating smile, had become queen of Montreal’s gutters.
Once outside the slums she’d come to know so well, her confidence disappeared. It was all a show.
“You’re married, Robert? Finally hitched?”
In New York, Max had spoken of Pascale and their relationship, which had ended so abruptly. Caroline had scolded him: what was the point of staying tied to the past, to a memory, no matter how beautiful it was? You had to move forward, start fresh. Of course, that was before Sacha’s death. Today Caroline lectured no one at all.
At a nearby table a man and woman sat facing each other in silence, chain-smoking in front of a full ashtray. They weren’t exactly homeless, but they were close enough. Caroline watched them from the corner of her eye.
“I was like them,” she said. “I spent two years wandering the streets, trying to convince myself I was the only one who’d ever suffered. That my pain was unique, one of a kind.” She smiled. “Vanity. Even in my wretched state.”
Over the phone from Bucharest, Caroline’s voice seemed thin, used, as if she hadn’t slept since the news broke about the accusations against Kevin.
“Everything they’re saying about him, Caroline, it’s all a lie.”
At the other end of the world, radio silence.
Max asked, “Do you know what Kevin was doing in Romania? Did he talk to you before he left?”
“Yes.” She hesitated. “He was acting strange, like restless, you know? We talked about all sorts of things, but I felt like he was hiding something from me.”
Kevin might have been working an angle, as the cops were saying. Max could remember the mood he’d get in before an operation: like an actor about to walk onstage. A mix of nervousness and excitement.
Stage fright.
“Do you remember anything out of the ordinary?”
Caroline hesitated again, then said, “He just hugged me hard, that’s all. Like he hadn’t done in a long time. I felt all … strange.” She muffled a sob. “I felt like he was saying goodbye.”
7
New York, June 18, 1995
Jack Straub, Bill Collington, Jiri Schiller, Larry Walberg, and the Kiwi Tom Farraday. Kevin became the newest member of the talented team Max had gathered around himself over the years. The group had since dissolved; gone were the heady days of operation after operation. Each was on his own path now, each following his own way. Back then, when Max called, they answered, even if they were running their own jobs on the side. They were the best: all specialists, all discreet, all terrifyingly efficient.
Max got Ted Duvall to train Kevin. Ted was a Franco-Ontarian with a loud voice and rolling gait. He usually worked on his own but always collaborated with Max when the latter required his services. Duvall knew every cop from Toronto to New York and could impersonate any one of them. He was the one to play the police officer when a job needed an authority figure or a representative of the law. Duvall clearly enjoyed this role, which he’d gotten down to a fine art over the years. He shared with Kevin all the tricks of the trade without hesitation, believing Kevin to be a promising young man — those were his own words. If you could be a convincing lumberjack in Midtown Manhattan, surely you were born to play any role.
Kevin fit in with the group easily. He was cautious, careful, and most important, he followed orders. He never put the safety of the rest of his team at risk. Fraud was a crime committed in the light of day and amid formidable banality. Kevin understood that right away.
Max and Ted built Kevin a new identity, one that would deceive Caroline. Kevin had just signed with a new sponsor, which meant he could now train without any financial worries, allowing him to quit his job with New York City’s Parks and Recreation. A masquerade, a perpetual lie that Caroline believed hook, line, and sinker, despite being an investigative journalist. Thanks to the lawyer Max had hired for Kevin, he’d be able to stay in the country following the seizure of his work permit. Life could