with Lucy.”
“Unwise. I have no baggage with her to slow me. I am worried enough if you are emotionally stable for this, knowing she is a crazy loser bitch.”
“I won’t hesitate if need be.”
“The words ‘if need be’ are hesitation,” she said, and she was right.
“I want to talk to her.”
“The child. Forgive me. I mean no cruelty. But you don’t even know if she had the baby, Sam. You have no proof the child is alive.”
“I don’t think she’s lying about this.”
“She’s lied to you every second of the day for the past three years. Now she tells the truth?” Mila made a disgusted snort. The tires lost their hold on the road, hissed wetly as they grappled for the grip. I eased up, and the car regained its footing as we sliced through an intersection.
“She could have killed me. Why would she spare me and lie to me?”
“A thousand reasons. She wanted you found, alive, with all those dead people. Again, you alive is a distraction for the Company. You attract blame and investigation. She wanted to feed you false information. She is cruel and she toys with you. Leave her to me.”
“You don’t touch her, Mila,” I said. “You do not touch her. I want to know where my kid is. She knows.”
Then Mila said the truest thing I’d heard in months: “Your wife has made herself bulletproof to you with that lie, Sam. You do not know that there is a baby anymore. Or that it is even yours.”
“It’s mine,” I said.
“She lied about everything else. Perhaps she and this Edward were lovers here in London.”
“Thank you for the head screw.” Then I made my words bricks: slow and steadily added, building a wall. “I have considered all these options, long before you did,” I said. “I knew maybe she’d fooled me, maybe she was a traitor when I saw the evidence. But it was all circumstantial. She saved me then, she saved me now. She knows where my child is. It’s the ultimate insurance policy and she wouldn’t give that advantage away.”
“It’s only insurance if you believe her. You cannot properly interrogate her. I will. I will get to the truth.” Mila set her mouth in a firm line. “You are not much use to me if you are distracted by this loose end of your kid.”
Loose end. I wondered what forge had formed Mila, that she could think such a way. I was afraid to know. I thought of her solicitude for the captured Moldovan women back in Amsterdam. She could be kind. She could be cruel. I thought Piet might have suffered mightily at her hands. She might also be right. Lucy would dance a dance with me; she would play on our past, on the embers of my feelings for her, on the obvious wish that I had that she had loved me. Mila would not dance. I almost felt a tremble of fear for Lucy—misplaced and ill-advised—thinking of her at Mila’s mercy.
Unleashing Mila might be the quickest path to my child.
My child. I didn’t want to think about what Mila was saying. I had to know. I couldn’t walk away from the possibility of my child, lost in the world, or worse, being raised by a woman like Lucy Capra. Lucy and Mila were both willing to use my child to reach their goals; I was willing to let them think they could use me, but I would use them. It’s an ugly world when we fight over children.
I veered the Jaguar into a parking garage. We were here.
79
ST. PANCRAS IS A HUGE RAIL and underground station. It has undergone a serious, high-cost beautification process in recent years: massive, pale blue steel arches sweep against original brickwork. Glass ceilings lend an air of openness in the concourse. High-end shops and restaurants fill the walkways. A sign advertises the world’s longest champagne bar. Thousands of commuters and travelers moved through the station, but I walked through St. Pancras alone.
Mila stayed with the netbook in the car; I had a microphone nestled in my ear. She was watching Bahjat Zaid on the video feed, having hacked into St. Pancras’s security system. We were running a big risk; the security system might notice it was being invaded, and a security team might decide to investigate if they discovered the hack was occurring so close to the station. Security was naturally heavy—if not obvious—at such a critical travel hub.
“Found him. He’s waiting at the champagne