As she turned the corner, the mouth of the tunnel appeared: a black hole in the ink-blue darkness. Zoe took a deep breath and slammed on the brakes. The car skidded, the rear of it flying outward, toward the edge of the cliff. Zoe shut her eyes, bracing herself for impact. The car had no airbags; the seat belts were threadbare and rusted at the clip. If she miscalculated, this would be it.
She flew forward as the car’s front fender smashed against the rim of the tunnel. Her arms went up just in time, protecting her forehead from hitting the steering wheel. The force of the collision thrust the tail of the car backward, so that the car now sat perpendicular to the road, blocking the tunnel’s entrance. Zoe’s head turned right and her eyes widened as she saw the car behind her barreling toward her. The headlights were blinding. She shut her eyes. A second later, the deafening sound of metal hitting rock exploded all around her. Zoe screamed.
A few minutes passed before Zoe’s arms dropped from around her head. She lifted her forehead from the steering wheel. The first thing she noticed was the gentle sound of the rain against the windshield. Other than that, the world was quiet.
She opened her hands and flexed her fingers. Her shoulders dropped from around her ears. She moved her neck from right to left. Besides a dull ache in her shoulder, she was unhurt.
As if in a dream, Zoe unclicked her seat belt and opened the car door. She stepped out into the cold night air. Within seconds, her hair was slick against her scalp and her feet squished inside her boots. Her nostrils filled with the scent of umbrella pines soaking up the rain. She tucked her arms across her chest as she made her way around the car to the edge of the road.
There was a hole in the low stone wall that separated the D942 from the gorge. It was clean, no rubble around it, just the absence of stone. Like the spot where a tooth had been pulled from the gum, Zoe thought. She bent down and ran her hand along the gap.
Beyond it was nothing. A black abyss. Zoe leaned over the wall as far as she dared. Even though she couldn’t see anything in the darkness, her body was shot through with chills, the way it had been when she’d first looked over this wall as a child. As though her body remembered this place, Zoe noticed the faintest spot of light deep inside the gorge. Two lights. Facing up toward the heavens, like stars that had fallen from the sky. His headlights. Zoe wondered if Julian was alive down there, trapped within the mangled metal body of the car. Perhaps he was unconscious, blood oozing from his head, his breath labored. Or maybe he had felt nothing at all. Maybe his heart had burst in the air, as she hoped Matthew’s had when he realized his plane was going to crash. Maybe in those final seconds before his inevitable death, Julian had felt only a momentary weightlessness followed by a still, enveloping darkness.
Zoe walked back to her car. The key was in the ignition, the parking brake on. The engine hummed as it had before, and the red light blinked, indicating that she still had no gas. This fact no longer bothered her. As she slumped over the steering wheel, she felt a wave of relief well up inside her, and she began to sob. Julian was dead. For the moment, she was safe. Someone else would come for her again, and soon. But she would make it out of these mountains alive, and for tonight, that felt like enough.
Marina
It was dark by the time Marina arrived in the Adams Morgan section of Washington, DC. The cab pulled up to the curb of a quiet, tree-lined section of Kalorama Road, and Marina stepped out. Hunter Morse lived in a polite, redbricked Victorian town house that looked like all the other houses on the block. It had a well-tended patch of grass out front and a wrought iron fence, the gate of which was open. As Marina ascended the steps to the front door, she noticed a pile of packages on the porch. It had not, until this moment, occurred to her that Hunter Morse might be out of town. Marina’s heart sank. She rang the bell anyway, hoping for a miracle.
Marina heard the scuffle of footsteps. She waited, wondering if she should ring again. As her hand moved toward the bell, there was a whirring of locks. The front door swung open. Behind it stood a pale, slim brunette. She looked not much older than Marina. Though it was early evening, she wore a bathrobe over black pajamas. Dark circles ringed her large, watchful eyes.
This woman wasn’t his wife. Marina had done some research on Hunter Morse on her way down to DC, and as far as she could tell, Morse wasn’t married. He had no social media presence. He had never written an article or given an interview. In fact, the only two places she saw his name were in an alumni bulletin for Columbia Law School and on a website devoted to amateur poker.
“What do you want?” the woman said, from behind the screen door.
“Does Hunter Morse live here? I was hoping I might speak to him for a few minutes.” Marina smiled pleasantly. “Apologies for dropping by during dinnertime.”
The woman frowned. “How do you know Hunter?”
“I don’t. He was a friend of a friend. My friend passed away a few weeks ago.”
“Sorry to hear that.”
“Duncan was supposed to see Hunter the day after he died.”
The brunette paused. “Duncan Sander?”
“Yes.”
“And you are?”
“Marina Tourneau. I worked with Duncan for almost ten years. He was a very close friend.”
The brunette opened the door all the way. “Come in,” she said, waving Marina inside.
“You have some mail and—”
“Just leave it.”
Marina stepped into the house. The foyer was dark. The shades were drawn. As Marina followed the woman down the hall past the kitchen, she noticed a foot-high stack of mail on the counter.
“Is Hunter here?” she said, unable to control her curiosity.
The woman stopped and turned. Even in the semidark of the hallway, Marina could sense the woman’s fear. She pressed a finger to her lips, and then nodded her head toward the back door. “Outside,” she said, her voice low.
Marina nodded. She followed the woman onto a small brick patio with an even smaller plot of grass beyond it. The woman took a seat at a wooden picnic table. She dug a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket and lit one. Marina approached, unsure of whether to sit. The woman took a deep inhale and blew smoke in her direction. Then she gestured at the bench across from her.
“Smoke?” she offered, holding up the pack.
“Sure. Thanks.” Marina took one, placed it between her lips. She leaned in, letting the woman light it for her. “Sorry, I didn’t get your name.”
“Agnes. I work with Hunter.” She stared down at her hands. “I’m also his girlfriend. As you can probably tell since I’m wearing his bathrobe.”
“Do you live here? It’s such a lovely house.”
“No. It’s Hunter’s. I just stay here.”
“Is he—”
“He’s gone. Went missing four days ago.”
“Missing?”
“Yes, missing. Went for a run. Never came back.” Agnes flicked her cigarette over a plastic cup that was evidently serving as an ashtray.
“Have you gone to the police?”
Tight-lipped, Agnes shook her head.
“Is it possible—”
Agnes let out a harsh laugh. “That he ran away?”
“No, I didn’t mean that. Maybe he’s hurt or something. Shouldn’t someone be looking for him?”
Agnes shot her a look of annoyance. “You tell me. What happened to your journalist friend? He’s dead, right?”
“Yes.”
“Home invasion? That’s what they’re saying?”
“Yes. So far, anyway.”
“You think that’s what happened to him?”
Marina bit her lip. “No,” she said quietly. “I don’t.”
“Yeah, well, Hunter didn’t get mugged in Rock Creek Park, okay? They killed him. Just like they killed your friend. So.”
“When you say ‘
they’ . . .”
Agnes sighed, annoyed. “That bank. Swiss United. All the trouble started when Hunter started investigating them. He didn’t want to, by the way. It was a case that he inherited. From a colleague who decided to retire at the age of forty-five and move to the Cayman Islands. Amazing coincidence, right? How everyone who investigates them disappears?”
“When did that start? The investigation?”
“About a year ago. At first, Hunter wasn’t going to pursue it. All of us at DOJ have plenty on our plates. Inherited investigations end up going by the wayside most of the time. But then, on a whim, Hunt ran the numbers.”
“The numbers?”
“Yeah. How many billions of dollars are stored in offshore accounts. Except it wasn’t billions. It was a lot more than that.”
“Thirty-two trillion.”
Agnes looked up, surprised. “Exactly.”
“So the lost tax revenue is substantial.”
“To say the least.”
“So he decided it was worth pursuing.”
“Right. So he starts poking around and realizes that an alum of his law school now works at Swiss United.”
“Matthew Werner.”
“Yes. You know about Matthew?”
“I know that he’s dead.”
“Plane crash.” Agnes rolled her eyes, as if to say, Another accident. Right.
“Did Hunter get Matthew to talk?”
Agnes sighed. She stubbed out her cigarette and lit another one. “I think so. I don’t really know. I know he went to New York to meet with him.”
“When was that?”
“About three months ago. After that, Hunter started getting really quiet about his work. At first, I thought he was breaking up with me.” She snorted. “That sounds so stupid in retrospect, doesn’t it?”
“He was trying to protect you.”
Agnes shrugged. “I like to think so. Hunter wasn’t perfect, though, you know?”
“What do you mean by that?”
“He had his stuff. He liked to gamble. It got him into trouble. We fought about it a lot.”
“Was he in debt?”
“Yeah. Up to his ears.”
“This is a pretty nice place.”
“It was his mom’s place. He inherited it after she died. I wanted him to sell it. Both of us are on government salaries. The upkeep on a house like this . . .” She shook her head. “But we were talking about having a family. So that made him want to keep it. He said maybe he’d look for a job at a firm. He went to Columbia, you know? So he could have been making a lot more in the private sector.”
“Why didn’t he?”
“He cared about his job. I do, too.”
Marina nodded. “I get it. I’m the same. Journalists aren’t exactly in it for the money.”
“About a month ago, Hunter said he had a solution to the debt.”
“Did he tell you what it was?”
“No. But I knew. James Ellis. That was his solution.”
Marina swallowed hard. “The presidential candidate?”
“Yeah. He’s a client of Swiss United.”
“You’re sure?”
Agnes nodded. “Hunter told me. He was disappointed. He was a fan of Ellis. As a candidate, I mean. He was worried that if it came out that Ellis had money stashed offshore, it would ruin his chances of winning.”
“Okay. So you think James Ellis paid him to keep the investigation under wraps? Is that what you mean?”
“Not James directly.”
“Someone who works for him?”
“His son.”
Marina sat completely still. She could hear the traffic on Kalorama, and the neighbor’s porch door creaking. Someone was grilling outside. The heady scent of crisping beef filled her nostrils, and above her head, the paper-brown leaves turned in the wind.
“His son?”
“Grant Ellis. I thought Hunter was leaving me, right? So I went on his computer. I have his passwords and everything. I know that sounds terrible, but I really just wanted to know if he was cheating on me. Does that make me sound insane?”
“No. I’ve done it, too.”
Agnes’s forehead relaxed. “Right? I feel like we all have.”
“So what did you find out? About Grant Ellis, I mean.”
“He flew down here and had lunch with Hunter. A week later, a quarter million appeared in Hunter’s bank account.”
“Are you sure the money came from the Ellis family?” Marina said each word slowly and carefully. There could be no misunderstandings now.
“Yes. From an LLC registered to Grant. Offshore, of course.”
“Did you ask Hunter about it?”
“Hunter told me an old acquaintance had offered him a side job. Some kind of consulting gig. He didn’t tell me who it was. He didn’t know I’d looked at his calendar. And, you know, at his bank records.”
“Maybe it was a legitimate consulting job, though. Right? Isn’t that possible?”
Agnes raised her eyebrows. “Two hundred fifty grand? That’s four times what Hunter makes in a year.”
“Maybe it was for the campaign?” Marina could hear the desperation in her voice. “Or maybe Grant was hiring him for his company? They need tax experts.”
Agnes frowned. “Hunter had an inside source at Swiss United. He knew that Ellis had money there. Then Ellis pays him and a week later the source is dead? That doesn’t sound like a consulting job to me. It sounds like Grant Ellis paid a government employee to tell him who his informant was.”
“And then Duncan comes poking around, asking questions.”
Agnes’s lip quivered. “That’s the part I hate. Hunter wasn’t a bad person. I really don’t think he intended for anyone to get killed. I think maybe . . . maybe he just thought they wanted him to drop the investigation. That was all.”
“I know,” Marina said quietly. “It’s okay. I understand.”
Agnes’s eyes welled up with tears. “He’s dead, isn’t he? They killed him, too.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Everyone else who’s gotten within ten feet of this investigation is dead.”
“Maybe he got scared. Maybe he’s hiding out.”
“Hiding out? What’s he waiting for? Ellis isn’t going away. He’s going to be the goddamn president of the United States. He’s going to get away with all of it. And you know what? The only person who knows—the only person who could destroy him—is Hunter. Of course they killed him. Wouldn’t you?”
“Not the only person. Do you still have access to his computer? His bank accounts and everything?”
Agnes wiped tears away with the back of her hand. “So what? Do I go to the police? I don’t trust the police.”
“Neither do I. That’s why I want to publish all of this. Once this information goes public, Ellis will be arrested. So will the bankers at Swiss United. It’s the only way we’ll ever be safe.”
“If Hunter’s alive, they’ll arrest him, too.”
Marina nodded. “Yes. They probably will. But arrested is better than dead.”
Agnes paused. “Can you protect me?”
“I will try.”
“How? Why should I trust you?”
“Because of this.” Marina pulled the USB out of her purse. “Duncan Sander had an informant inside a law firm called Schmit & Muller. The lawyers for Swiss United. Before he died, I met his informant in Paris. And he gave me this. I can show it to you, if you’d like. It’s financial information from inside the bank.”
“So you’re as dead as I am.”
“Basically, yes.”
“What do you need?”
“I need everything. His emails. Phone records. Calendars. And his bank statements. And I need it all now.”
Zoe
<
br /> The red light was wrong. Though it blinked the whole way, Zoe made it out of the mountains without needing gas. The engine began to sputter as she approached Lyon. She pulled into a BP station off the A7, which, but for the man behind the register, was empty. Still, Zoe’s heart thumped wildly as she stepped out of the car. Though the road had been clear since the mountains, she couldn’t shake the feeling she was still being followed.
He’s dead, she told herself. You watched Julian White die.
But there were others. There would always be others. Jonas Klauser had eyes everywhere. When she first started at Swiss United, the other assistants whispered about it; it was their version of an urban myth or fairy tale. Corporate spies, Jacqueline, the girl who sat in the cube across from her, had called them. Watchers, Matthew had said. Zoe imagined them to be men in ski masks who tapped phone lines, snapped pictures with telephoto lenses. Now she realized they were just everyday people. Your landlord. Your ex-boyfriend. Your roommate. The bank teller who, just moments earlier, allowed you to transfer the contents of your checking account to a bank in the Cayman Islands. For a price, anyone could be bought. And Swiss United had endless reserves, enough to pay that price without a second thought.
Zoe paid for her gas in cash. The waitressing job had been good for that. She’d been paid under the table, in small-denomination bills that she hadn’t deposited in a bank account, but rather kept stashed in a duffel bag under her bed with the rest of her money. Over the past six months, she’d been slowly draining her bank account. A two-hundred-euro withdrawal here, a thousand there. Arthur had told her to do this. At first it had seemed paranoid, unnecessary. But now she was grateful. When she left Geneva, only eight hundred euros remained in her checking account. She could live without that eight hundred euros.
The guy behind the register was staring at her. Zoe felt his beady eyes lingering as she counted out the price of gas. Though it was cold inside the store, he was sweating through his shirt. Behind her head, a television channel was tuned to a local news station. A news anchor was saying something about a car accident, a hit-and-run. A child was dead. She glanced out of the glass storefront. The dent on the front of her Peugeot was clearly visible. She felt the man’s eyes on her eyes, her cheekbones, the line of her nose. Maybe he was admiring her. Maybe he was checking to see whether she matched the description on the television. A few months ago, she would have dismissed it; men stared at her all the time. Now she couldn’t afford to dismiss anything. The last thing she needed was for this guy to call the cops. She slid the cash across the counter without raising her eyes. She felt his fingertips brush hers as he took the money, and it sent an electric charge down her spine.
The Banker’s Wife Page 24