by Sydney Bauer
‘I want to begin with an apology,’ said Sienna Walker.
Their client was sitting across the conference table from them. She had been released from custody not long after the incident at the airport. Judge Stein, after a long and highly confidential conversation with Leo King, had dismissed the jury and dropped the charge against her. Stein had also released a short statement saying that new information regarding the events that led to Eliza Walker's murder had come to light but that no further details would be available until the police and District Attorney's Office had had the chance to examine the implications of this new evidence. When asked if the recent events at Logan Airport were linked to this new information, the Judge gave a definitive ‘no comment’ and stressed that any further queries should be directed to the FBI and the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office. And despite it all the very thought had made David smile, knowing that as soon as he and King came to some sort of agreement regarding the public face they were putting on this investigation, Roger Katz would be back-pedalling from here to China.
‘I am sorry for everything from start to finish,’ she said, ‘for involving you and Sara and Joe in this thing from the outset, for lying to you, betraying your trust.’ She took a breath. ‘I may have come into this thing as blind as the three of you, but … I did so by choice, and you were, well … I am afraid we played your hand for you.’
She glanced quickly at King and then at Carlson beside her.
David took a breath. ‘You're together,’ he said of Sienna and Carlson. They had not told him this officially, but he knew what her answer would be.
‘Yes,’ replied Sienna.
‘But your husband …?’ said Sara.
‘I was in love with Jim, or at least I was in love with the idea of him.’
‘So you married him not knowing who he was?’ asked Sara.
‘Jim was hard to resist. He courted me attentively. He was interested, enthusiastic, smart, charming.’
Sara went to ask another question, but then shook her head. ‘I'm sorry, it's hard to know where to start here.’
‘I understand,’ said Sienna as she cast her eyes toward Simba.
David knew that the FBI Chief had drawn some sort of line prior to David, Sara and Joe entering the room and he did not want the other three to cross it. But David was having none of it.
‘We need to know everything,’ he said, addressing King from the outset. ‘We need to know every little detail – when and how this thing started and, more importantly, why in hell it all got so out of control.’
Simba sat forward in his seat and went to answer but Sienna interrupted him. ‘Special Agent,’ she said. ‘Please.’
Simba hesitated, before sitting back again.
Sienna exhaled. ‘It will take some telling,’ she said.
‘The FBI have held our lives hostage for the past six months, Sienna. It will take as long as it takes.’
She nodded before turning to the older woman sitting next to Leo. ‘Perhaps you should start, Senior Officer?’ she said to the woman David knew as Esther Wallace.
The woman looked at Leo. ‘If I may, Special Agent,’ she said in the crispest of British accents.
David was getting sick of all this hierarchical posturing.
Leo looked down the table at David, Sara and Joe. ‘None of this leaves this room,’ he said.
‘None of this should have left your organisation in the first place, Simba,’ said Joe, his voice low and tight and determined.
Leo blinked before turning to the older woman once again. ‘Go ahead,’ he said, his tone somewhere between uneasy and resolved.
And so ‘Esther Wallace’ sat up a little higher in her seat and cleared her throat before asking her audience of three to travel back in time with her – to the year 2006.
*
‘Yes, Prime Minister,’ the woman – who had finally introduced herself as Serious Organised Crime Agency Senior Officer Catherine Loxley – explained she had told former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
‘I would be honoured, of course. I assume you are aware that the Director General consulted me when you established SOCA earlier in the year,’ she had continued, outlining exactly what had transpired in the secret meeting involving herself, Blair and her then boss, the Director General of MI5. ‘I knew from the outset that the establishment of our own federal bureau to fight organised crime was long overdue and well … your asking me to play this significant role, as I said, I am honoured.’
‘So SOCA is the UK's version of the FBI?’ asked Sara, the first of a myriad of questions she, David and Joe were determined to learn the answer to before they left this room.
Loxley's cool green eyes fell on Sara. ‘Yes. SOCA was the result of the merging of the National Crime Squad, the National Criminal Intelligence Service, the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit, sections of Revenue and Customs and the Immigration responsibilities for organised international crime. As such, one of the Agency's priorities was to set up a UK Human Trafficking Centre, and when the Prime Minister asked me to set up and lead this unit, well, as I explained, I was honoured.’
‘So what were your responsibilities at MI5?’ asked David, needing to take this step by step. ‘I'm assuming you had experience with people smuggling?’
‘Yes. I had considerable experience in investigating cartels involved in white slavery, international abduction rings and so on. The abuse of innocent individuals by the creatures who prey on and profit from them, and the planning and execution of operations that brought these criminals to justice – it had always been a special interest of mine.
‘People smugglers are, however, incredibly hard to track down. They move in the shadows, disguise themselves as legitimate businesspeople. The industry generates an estimated thirty billion dollars per year so as you can see, we are up against it.’
David nodded. The figure surprised him, disgusted him – especially because his daughter almost became part of that statistic. ‘So this particular investigation … I am assuming it started in the UK?’
‘Yes,’ replied Loxley.
‘And it involved … what? Scrutiny of birth records, hospital documentation, adoption papers?’
‘Oh no, Mr Cavanaugh, at least not initially. To begin with, all it involved was luck.’
‘Luck?’ said Sara.
‘Indeed. SOCA came across the illegal activities of the men you know as Jim Walker and Richard Davenport accidentally.’
David shook his head. ‘Okay, first up, I am assuming you're telling us that Walker and Davenport were not their real names.’
Loxley nodded. ‘Their real names are James Winter and Richard Cameron.’
David wasn't surprised really. Men like Walker and Davenport no doubt depended on swift changes of identity to move their business from continent to continent. ‘Okay, and what of this accident? What did it involve?’
‘The swine flu of 2009.’
David held up his hands in frustration. ‘I'm sorry, Senior Officer Loxley … I may be slow but …?’
‘No, I'm sorry,’ said Loxley, who was obviously accustomed to the ‘less is more’ approach to sharing intelligence. ‘In early 2009 Winter was based in London. He was working for a high-profile international banking house known as Glo-Corp. His friend Cameron – Davenport – had a thriving fertility practice in South Kensington and their business in the capital, much as it was here in Boston, involved Winter finding the clients and Cameron supplying the product.’
‘Genetically gifted children, for either infertile couples or those who simply wanted intellectually superior offspring,’ confirmed Sara.
‘Yes,’ replied Loxley. ‘Winter was Oxford educated. He was a mathematical genius. He graduated Oxford law – on a scholarship – with honours. His background may have been middle class but he was smart and ambitious and determined to get ahead. He met Davenport – or should I say the Yale-educated Cameron – at, of all places, an American Ivy League rowing invitational. The two got on, and
kept in touch, Winter eventually putting his proposal to his American friend.
‘So to the swine flu of 2009,’ she said, taking them back to where she had started. ‘If you recall, the early months of that year represented a time when the flu was on the cusp of becoming an international epidemic. People were nervous, they started to wear face masks in confined spaces, hospitals were on alert, airports started to screen for passengers with raised temperatures.’ Loxley took a breath. ‘In February of that year there was such a check conducted at Heathrow, on a five-week-old baby boy. The child had a temperature and was prevented from flying to Germany. His passport was checked and a discrepancy picked up. When a police sergeant found further anomalies in documents relating to his date and place of birth, he contacted SOCA, and that is how I first became involved in an investigation that would reach across the Atlantic … when I first became aware of James Winter and his fertility expert friend.’
‘So the child was taken into protective custody?’ asked Sara. Loxley nodded.
‘Which would mean Walker and Davenport – I mean Winter and Cameron – I assume they feared that at that point, their business might have been in danger of …?’
‘Exposure?’ finished Loxley. ‘You're correct, Ms Davis. The pair must have known we were on to them, or that we were, at the very least, on the verge of digging where they did not want us to dig. They could not risk it, you see – their UK-based operation being compromised. So they up and left. They changed their identities and set up shop in a fresh market – in a city filled with opportunity. Boston was small enough to keep their business “boutique” but unique enough to provide them with the genetic raw materials base and the clientele who had the money to acquire it. But that was when our problems started, considering SOCA had no jurisdiction in the US.’
‘Hold up,’ said David. ‘How did you track them to Boston?’
‘We sent out a classified information data file on the pair and their suspected activities to a number of significant global law enforcement agencies including the FBI. We asked them to keep an eye out for the establishment of new, upmarket fertility practices, and Special Agent in Charge King ran a local check and came up with Davenport's clinic in Beacon Hill. Further subtle enquiries linked Davenport to his friend Jim Walker and the connection was made.’
Loxley looked at Leo before continuing. ‘Of course at this stage we had no evidence of any criminal activity so we knew a discreet investigation had to be put in place. But the trick was how to go about this, given the interest from our end and our restrictions when it came to jurisdiction.’
Loxley shifted in her seat, and David sensed she had reached a line Leo King had drawn for her. No matter which way you played it, SOCA's authority as a legitimate law enforcement agency stopped at the boundaries of the British Isles – and David knew the flouting of such restrictions was part of the reason why he and Sara and Joe had been drawn into this mess in the first place. And the look on Leo's face told David he knew David knew it too.
‘All right,’ said Simba. ‘What I say stays here,’ he stressed. ‘You repeat it, we deny it. The only way this will work is if we are all on the same page.’
But David was shaking his head.
‘I know, I know,’ said Simba. ‘Sacrifices have been made. But we didn't have any other option. We crossed a line, but our motivation was always the desire to bring these two criminals to justice. When things began to …’ Simba paused as if deciding on the safest way to describe it, ‘… grow beyond our immediate control, we understood that despite the risks involved, bringing you in was our only way of removing ourselves while maintaining quasi control of the investigation.’
‘In other words, you used us as an investigatory laundry,’ said David.
Leo hesitated before nodding. ‘Your investigation was clean and ours was dirty, for a number of reasons which – to our credit – we are willing to explain. We did everything we could to maintain legitimate control, but cases like these are inherently unpredictable and –’
‘What a goddamned croc of shit.’ It was the so-far silent Joe. ‘To your credit? Jesus.’
David knew this was coming and to be honest he was grateful for it. David was angry about how they had been played, but he suspected Joe was equally as outraged. David knew he and Sara and Lauren were like family to Joe, and that Leo's subterfuge had compromised what Joe saw as his personal responsibility to protect them. Worse still, Joe considered Simba a professional ally and friend, and as such perhaps considered his part in this set-up as somewhat of a betrayal.
Leo's hands were up at the ready. ‘I know you're pissed, Joe, and rightly so, but the fact that we're here, sharing highly confidential details …? At the very least you owe us –’
‘We owe you?’ bit Joe. He massaged his right temple with his fingers.
‘You think I'm proud of the way this played out?’
‘I think you and your friends at the Federal Bureau of Bullshit have no regard for the extent of the collateral damage you inflict on the people who unwittingly get drawn into your monumental fuck-ups.’
‘Okay,’ Leo's hands pushed out at the air in front of him, ‘like I said, I get that you're pissed, but bottom line, Joe, I can't take back what happened. What I can do, if you'll let me, is give you as much information as I can as to why. I'm breaking orders by even being here. If my superiors knew I was talking they'd have me on the first bus to Little Rock or Albuquerque or some other godforsaken hole in the ground. But I'm here because I know we owe you, I'm here out of respect, and no matter what else, that has to count for something.’
Joe hesitated.
‘I have one hour tops, Joe, before the brass from Washington arrive for their final debrief. They'll get what they need to put this case to bed and you'll get the truth.’
Another pause.
‘Joe,’ said David, indicating that it was okay – or perhaps that at this point they had no choice but to hear Simba out.
‘You fall short you'll regret it, Leo,’ said Joe.
‘You have my word,’ said Simba.
And finally Joe nodded for Simba to go on.
*
‘As soon as we made the link between Davenport and the man SOCA knew as Richard Cameron, I flew to London to be briefed by Special Officer Loxley and the team she had assigned to the investigation,’ Leo continued. ‘Our problem from the outset was that we had no proof they were doing what we suspected they were doing, or what they were planning in regards to the Boston end of their business given it was still in its infancy. So we decided to work this thing from the ground up, to infiltrate their operation early, a strategy SOCA were excited about given their entry into the pair's UK business came way too late.’
‘So you formed some sort of covert alliance?’ said David.
Leo's brow furrowed. ‘It wasn't …’
David suspected Leo was about to say the word ‘covert’, but then he obviously decided such a denial might be hard to argue.
‘It wasn't an alliance,’ Leo took another route. ‘At least not exactly. Winter and Cameron were on US soil and as such it was an FBI investigation.’
David heard Joe scoff.
‘But then how did you get permission for a SOCA officer to work on an operation tens of thousands of miles from her own patch of grass?’ asked David referring to Loxley.
‘We opened a temporary window for SOCA to assist in what was fundamentally an FBI initiative. It has been done before – it falls under a loophole created by Interpol involving sharing of relevant information in relation to a case of international significance.’
David looked at Joe, who was again shaking his head at Leo's ‘company line’ explanations. There was no doubt everyone in the room knew that Simba had been fudging this case from the outset. He and Loxley had struck some legally dubious deal in the hope that the end would justify the means, which was how this case got so screwed up in the first place.
‘You overstepped, Leo,’ said David.
&nb
sp; Leo did not answer.
‘You knew the risks,’ said Joe.
‘Maybe, but I truly believed we could make this work,’ replied Leo, now turning to Joe. ‘You've worked with me long enough to know I have never been driven by some egotistical need to carve notches in my belt, Joe. True this case was a big one – it crossed international borders – and granted that if it had gone to plan then maybe the Bureau would have benefited from its success. But,’ Leo swallowed, ‘we were talking about manufacturing kids here, Joe, and while I have always prided myself on my ability to separate my personal views from my professional judgment, maybe I fell short, maybe this time the lines got blurred, maybe I wanted these guys a little more than I should have.’
David looked at Joe. It was not like either of them had never gone down a similar road before.
‘So how did it start?’ asked Joe after a pause. ‘With Special Officer Loxley here becoming the secretary Esther Wallace – or with Carlson posing as Hunt?’
‘It was a two-pronged approach,’ offered Loxley then. ‘And in order to give us any chance of success it had to be. We needed to infiltrate their operation from both ends – victim and client – or should I say those being tricked into providing their genetic material for profit and those willing to pay a premium to receive it.’
‘So you covered Davenport's end while Agent Carlson went after Walker,’ said Sara.
‘That was the general idea,’ replied Loxley. ‘And while Agent Carlson managed some success when it came to sourcing said buyers from Jim Walker's client list, we hit a wall when it came to building concrete evidence on Davenport's specific activities. He was careful, his patient list cleverly manipulated. To the naked eye it looked exactly as any IVF specialist's patient list should look.’