“And the DA’s Office was assigned the case and started investigating him.”
“Things started snowballing from there. Sokolov slipped up when he made that comment to you, and I’d bet anything he knows it. Then you discovered the brothel’s phone number in the senator’s records, and on the heels of that you found Sokolov’s phone tap. He realized he needed to silence you before you could dig any deeper into the senator’s extracurricular activities, but he didn’t want to kill you so soon after you’d seen an FBI tech about the tap because that might arouse curiosity. Instead he saw a perfect opportunity to kill two birds with one stone: he’d use you as a decoy to exact revenge on an old enemy, and then you’d meet with an unfortunate road accident while traveling abroad. Everything would be tied up with a neat red bow.”
Leah’s fingers trembled with anger. “It’s ironic that I dashed off to aid a Russian spy when the only way he could convince me to go in the first place was to appeal to my sense of patriotic duty with that bullshit CIA story.”
Ian patted her knee, but no matter how often he told her Sokolov had fooled all of them at one time or another, she still hated that she hadn’t seen through him.
“So he was monitoring the DA’s investigation in case the Russians had to mow down anything that cropped up relating to Roth’s relations with them.” She paused as she mentally checked off boxes. “But I don’t understand the TD Bank papers that Sokolov planted in my apartment. Where do those fit in?”
Ian shrugged. “Credibility. Let’s say you figured out what Roth was doing and alerted your boss. All Sokolov had to do was make a few phone calls and the statements would be discovered in your apartment. I suspect Dag will be able to trace the deposits to a country that is currently at political odds with Russia. The conclusion would be that you were paid by one of Russia’s enemies to link Roth to Russia in an effort to strain U.S. and Russian relations, thus effectively voiding any of your findings.”
“Oh my God.” Leah pressed her fingers into her eyes. “Sokolov wasn’t just keeping tabs on the domestic violence case; he was weaving an entire web of protection around Roth.”
“The Russians don’t go through that kind of trouble for someone who isn’t a valuable asset.”
Leah stabbed her finger in the air. “He won’t be valuable by the time I’m done with him. I’m going to make sure Roth’s photo is splashed across every single newspaper in America with a caption in huge block letters that says: TRAITOR.”
A ghost of a smile crossed Ian’s lips. “Hence why Sokolov wants you dead.”
She ignored that. “What about the guy in Svein’s trunk? What’s his role?”
“I don’t know yet.” Ian’s eyes fell to the phone vibrating in his lap. When they’d pulled over he’d texted Svein that they needed a moment. “It’s Svein. He wants to know how much longer we’re going to be. His passenger is making a ruckus in the trunk and it’s beginning to irritate him.”
They climbed out of the truck and met Svein at the tailgate. Ian filled him in on what they’d just unraveled, and it wasn’t long before the two of them were concocting plans without any input from Leah. She snuffed out their eagerness with a single three-letter word. “We need to call the FBI.”
Svein and Ian stopped talking and stared at her, appalled. She smothered a sigh. It didn’t matter if it was Norway, the U.S., or Russia, there was something about collaborating with other agencies that made the players involved tighten up faster than drawstring bags.
“Why?” Svein asked, genuinely mystified.
“Because Sokolov is on the FBI’s Most Wanted list.” They looked unconvinced, so she tried again. “Think of the resources the Feds can bring to the table: snipers, listening devices, warrants, backup. We need them in on this.”
“No,” Ian said firmly, “we don’t. They’ll just screw it up.”
His contempt for bureaucracy was obvious, and she couldn’t help but silently agree that the more fingers in the pie the more likely any operation was to get caught up in red tape. But there was something more important at play than catching Sokolov, and that was taking down Senator Roth. In leaking congressional intelligence and doing God knew what else for Russia, Roth had done and was capable of doing far more damage than Sokolov ever had.
“We need to expose Senator Roth, and we need to do it legally,” she insisted.
Ian crossed his arms over his chest. “Senator Roth isn’t my chief concern. Keeping you safe is.”
At that Svein slid Ian a sideways glance. She knew he was wondering what exactly their relationship was considering the last he’d known she was Sokolov’s idiot girlfriend, and now Ian was suggesting an international incident was preferable to her being harmed.
“Of course Senator Roth isn’t your concern, you live in Norway,” she shot back. “But he’s betraying my country and I’m going to do something about it whether you help me or not.”
Splitting the charged atmosphere, Svein said, “Answers from our friend in the trunk might help.”
A muscle in Ian’s jaw flexed. “He might not even know who hired him.”
Even if the hired gun did know who his employer was, Leah didn’t think they had the time to pry the answers out of him. Now that they were seeing the larger picture, it was clear they were in a race against the Russians: could she expose their mole before they silenced her?
Leah crossed her arms, mimicking Ian’s stubborn stance and said again, “We call the FBI. If we expose Roth then Sokolov will no longer have any reason to come after me.”
Ten feet away the trunk of the silver sedan jittered upward and the assassin inside gave a muffled yell. Svein rolled his eyes, at the assassin or at her assessment she wasn’t sure. “I hate to say it man, but she has a point.”
Ian’s mouth was set in a scowl that she was sure had made men larger than herself think twice before tangling with him, but she didn’t back down. Leah stared back at him and the standoff grew tenser with every ticking second. After a minute he must have come to some sort of internal reconciliation with the logic, because he gave a terse nod and pulled his phone from his pocket.
“There will be conditions if we work with the FBI,” he said.
“Like what?”
“For starters, we work with them. I’m not sitting on the sidelines while they call the shots. Sokolov is ours, and if they can’t play nice we won’t play at all. You said you had a contact at the FBI?”
“The agent who had the Wanted poster in his office. His name is Ashill. I don’t know his number though, so you’ll have to call the D.C. FBI headquarters and ask for him by name.”
Since Ian had a dumb phone he had to call Mia and have her search for the number. She gave them the number along with Ashill’s extension in under a minute.
Once Ian had dialed Leah held out her palm. “I’ll talk to him.”
He lifted a brow but passed the phone to her without comment. The line rang four times before a gravelly, smoker’s voice answered with a curt, “Agent Ashill.”
“Agent, this is Leah Parker with the D.C. Attorney’s office. We met not too long ago about the Daniels case.”
“You nail him?”
“Yes, but that’s not why I’m calling. You know the Wanted poster of Alexei Sokolov in your office?”
Taut silence stretched across the line. Then, “Yes?”
“What if I told you Sokolov is alive and well, and until recently has been living in the United States under the assumed name of Vincente Barry?”
She knew she had his attention because his lungs seized and he coughed for a full thirty seconds before grinding out, “You jerking my chain, Parker?”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
She spent the next ten minutes summarizing what had taken place since she left his office the week before: the discovery of the phone tap, Sokolov’s claim to be CIA, meeting Ian, the shooting at the airport, and Ian’s fight with the American mercenary. When she got to the part about Senator Roth he stopped her.
>
“You’re telling me that the head of the Congressional Intelligence Committee is actually a Russian informant?”
“Yes.”
“Based on what evidence?”
“I just told you.”
“Everything you just told me is circumstantial at best. It wouldn’t hold up in a clown court, much less an American court of law.” It was true and Leah knew it, but it galled her all the same. Agent Ashill sighed. “Girl, I’m too old and too skeptical to be taking on a political giant without sufficient evidence.”
Ian, who was listening to the agent on speakerphone, appeared delighted to hear this.
But Leah hadn’t just survived two assassination attempts and a showdown with Ian to be blown off by the FBI. “Listen here, Agent Ashill.” Her tone could have chiseled ice. “I will expose Roth for what he is with or without your help. This was simply a courtesy call. The truth is that Northern Wolf Services is more than happy to—”
Agent Ashill interrupted. “Northern Wolf Services?” The question had been spoken with something akin to awe, and if Leah hadn’t heard it herself she wouldn’t have believed the seasoned agent capable of being impressed by anyone. “This Ian you mentioned, his last name wouldn’t happen to be Haugen, would it?”
Leah lifted her brows at Ian. “Yeah, it is.”
“The man who recovered the kidnapped Luxembourg princess six years ago?”
So that was the high profile case that had kickstarted Northern Wolf Services. At her questioning look Ian nodded in affirmation, so she said, “Yes, that’s him. He’s here listening; would you like to speak with him?”
Ian frowned, but he addressed the agent as requested. It took only a few minutes, but in that span of time he managed to convince Agent Ashill of the probability that Senator Roth was colluding with the Russians. That Ashill listened to Ian instead of her frustrated Leah to no end, but she closed her eyes and told herself Ian had a reputation in the international intelligence community that lent credence to his judgments, and she did not.
Agent Ashill wanted to confer with his superiors and call them back, but Ian shut him down with a clipped, “We do it now or we do it my way.”
She could tell Ian’s tone chafed the agent, but he also must have known Ian was serious about conducting a non-government sanctioned mission on American soil, because he hastily agreed.
The plan Agent Ashill laid out was straight forward, but when he got to Leah’s role Ian put his foot down. “Have someone else do it. Leah doesn’t need to be involved.”
“She does if you want Roth to believe it.”
“No.”
Leah could tell by the set of his jaw that Ian wasn’t going to budge. “Agent, will you give us a moment?” she asked. Without waiting for his response she hit the mute button on Ian’s phone.
Svein pulled his phone from his pocket and said, “Oh look at that, I need to make a phone call in my car.” Winking at Ian he said, “Let me know when she’s worn you down.”
Ian glared after him. As soon as Svein was in the sedan Leah said, “Ian, I understand that this isn’t what you had in mind, but it’s our best option. This is the only way to expose Roth and eliminate Sokolov’s motive to kill me.”
“I don’t believe that. And I don’t trust it to go as neatly as the FBI says it will.” He leaned against the tailgate of the truck. “I don’t want you caught up in the shitstorm when it hits.”
She closed the space between them and cupped his cheek with her hand. “You’ll be there to protect me.”
He wrapped his hand around her wrist. “If I had my way you’d be locked up in a cabin in the middle of the arctic.” And because Svein was out of earshot he said with a masculine glint in his eye, “Better yet, I’d have you tied up in my bed.”
Her toes curled at the mere suggestion of being tied up and vulnerable to Ian’s greedy, relentless mouth and hands. He caught the hitch in her breathing and his eyes flared with desire. If they weren’t in the middle of the road with an FBI agent on hold and Svein in the car behind them policing a trussed assassin, Leah knew Ian would have her stripped and splayed on the bed of his truck faster than she could beg please.
Ian sighed and dropped his hand from her wrist. “It’s against my better judgment, but it seems I’ve been out-voted. Let’s tell that goddamn married know-it-all Svein that he was right and get going. We have a lot to put into place before we fly to D.C.”
Chapter 42
Leah was fidgety as she boarded the flight from Orland, Norway to D.C. It was her first time flying in a private jet, an expense the U.S. government was happy to foot in exchange for the opportunity to confirm the allegations against Senator Roth, so she should have felt relaxed. Yet all she could think about was what waited for her at the other end of the ocean.
The flight was a luxury beyond anything she could have imagined. At the airport there had been no security, no waiting in lines, no checking bags. That had been the point of course, along with the fact that the charter company wasn’t a stickler for matching faces with passports.
The only people on the airplane were her, Ian, the pilot, and a flight attendant. The flight attendant was a gorgeous redhead who, in Leah’s opinion, paid far too much attention to Ian. Before takeoff she asked him what he wanted to drink, leaning close enough that his face was nearly smothered in her cleavage. Ian’s response had been so cold the woman had actually flinched, and from that point forward she’d treated him with wary courtesy.
The airplane seats were stitched beige leather and the vases of flowers on the tables were crystal. There was an interior cabin at the back of the fuselage that came complete with a full-sized bed and a private bathroom with a walk-in shower. The plane even smelled expensive, like cologne from a high-end designer store, and Leah wondered if they pumped it through the vents along with the oxygen.
After they’d completed their ascent into the skies the flight attendant returned with bottled water for Ian and a glass of red wine for Leah.
“Do you drink?” Leah asked after taking a sip of the wine, deciding it was damned good, and setting the glass on the gleaming wood table between them.
Ian stretched out his long legs and crossed his booted feet. “Sure I do. But never when I’m working.”
“So only when you’re on vacation.”
“Pretty much.”
“When was your last vacation?”
“It was . . . ” His brows drew together. “I don’t know. It’s been years.”
She tasted the wine again. “Don’t you ever get tired of this?” She waved her hand in the air. “Of being on the hunt?”
“No. I’m good at what I do.”
In short, Leah thought, there was no way in hell he was giving it up anytime soon. She’d known he loved his job, but there had been a small part of her that had hoped he would be interested in trying a new career, possibly one based in the U.S. She shook her head in self-deprecation. She’d known going into the affair there would be no happy ending for them.
To divert her thoughts from Ian, she focused on what she had to do when they landed in D.C. She couldn’t get past her nervousness about the plan going awry. What if they were wrong about Roth? If she accused a man as powerful and revered as Senator Roth of being a Russian spy and it turned out he wasn’t, Roth would actually blackball her. She’d be so thoroughly disgraced she would never work in law again, maybe never work anywhere again. She’d have to learn how to farm and grow corn just to feed herself when even McDonald’s wouldn’t hire her.
It reassured her that Ian and Svein were convinced of Roth’s involvement, and when pressed, even Agent Ashill had alluded to the FBI’s growing interest in Roth’s international travels. As was typical when it came to powerful government officials, the FBI had been treading lightly around the topic, even in their internal inquiries. Like Leah, they knew that if they got on the wrong side of the senator there would be hell to pay.
Leah’s leg jiggled with impatience as the pilot came over the i
ntercom and informed them the weather was fine and they were expected to land on schedule . . . in ten hours.
“Why don’t you watch a movie?” Ian suggested.
She did just that, choosing Finding Dory to play over the flat screen facing her armchair. While she watched Dory swim through the ocean, abandoned and lost, Ian spread a street map of D.C. over the conference table and began committing the layout to memory.
Try as she might, Leah couldn’t focus on the film. Her thoughts kept returning to Svein, who’d stayed behind to work on cracking the would-be-assassin even though Agent Ashill had assured them Jeremy Walker, real name Alan Bowdin, was an ex-pat who’d recently made his way onto the U.S. Terror Watch List thanks to unsavory activities in South America, and had certainly not been sent by the Americans. Ian suspected Walker was Russian contracted, perhaps by an agency other than the GRU.
Leah jumped when Ian’s hand came down on her shoulder. “You’re not relaxing.”
“I can’t. I have too much going through my mind.”
He smiled wolfishly as he pulled her to her feet. “I can think of something that will help.” He buzzed the flight attendant and told her they would be sleeping in the bedroom and didn’t want to be disturbed until it was time to land. By the look in the flight attendant’s eye, Leah knew the other woman was aware there would be more going on in the cabin than sleeping.
As soon the cabin’s panel door closed behind them Ian spun Leah so that her back was to the door. He pressed his lips to the spot below her ear and said, “Ready to join the mile high club?”
The whispered words made her pulse trip with anticipation. She wouldn’t need much foreplay; memories of him inside of her, thick and steadily driving her over the edge flashed hotly across her skin. But instead of immediately succumbing to him, Leah fought back her impulses and said coyly, “How do you know I’m not already a member?”
Finding Lies Page 21