Unintended Consequences (5 page)

“The Farm.”

“That’s the place. I learned enough new skills there to make a very fine living as a burglar, a safecracker, a con man, or an assassin, and then I found myself in Africa, never mind where. I loved it. Four years of that, then two Middle Eastern postings, where my Arabic was an advantage, then I think they decided I was getting a little too wild and woolly, so they sent me here to get me civilized. One of the things they’d been after me about was clothes, so I appreciate your guidance this morning. I think I could learn a lot from you.”

“I’m at your disposal while I’m in Paris,” Stone said. “In the daytime, anyway.”

Rick fished his smartphone from his pocket and read an e-mail. “Your Amanda Hurley is interesting,” he said, then his eyes flicked at the mirror behind Stone. “What’s that passage to my left?”

Stone looked at it. “Men’s room,” he said.

“My man just went in there, and I don’t want to be here when he gets back. Thanks for a terrific lunch.” He got up and started out.

“Hey, wait a minute,” Stone called after him. “What about Ms. Hurley?”

“Later,” Rick said, and he was gone.

9

S
tone arrived at Lasserre at eight sharp, was taken up in an elevator to the dining room and seated at a table for two. The other chair was empty. He looked around and admired the room, as he had on his earlier visit some years before.

It was essentially square with a sunken center, and the seating was arranged so that everyone could see everyone else. The decor was simply beautiful, and overhead was a frescoed ceiling. As he watched, it slid open to reveal a rose arbor and the night sky. That happened periodically, he recalled; it let out hot air and, in the old days, French cigarette smoke. A pianist played old tunes.

A waiter was taking his drink order when he looked up to see the maître d’ leading in an attractive woman. Stone stood to receive her. “Good evening, Amanda,” he said as the maître d’ seated her. “Would you like a drink?”

“Champagne fraise des bois, please,” she replied.

“Two,” Stone said, and they were left alone with the menus and each other. She was a slender, attractive woman with chestnut hair and beautiful skin. She wore an Armani dress—black, since that seemed to be about all Armani sold.

“How nice to see you again,” she said.

“Indeed. How have you occupied yourself since you arrived in Paris?”

“Museums and galleries, mostly.”

“Is art your business?”

“I have degrees in art history,” she said, “and I work as the curator for a couple of corporate collections in New York. I come to Paris to refresh my eye and to buy for my clients.”

“Sounds like interesting work.”

“I learned on the airplane that you are a lawyer, but then you passed out—and after only one drink. Does alcohol disagree with you?”

“Alcohol and I normally get along very nicely, thank you, and don’t take it personally—I assure you, it wasn’t the company. I suppose I must have been very tired.”

“What kind of law?”

“Over the years, a bit of everything. Currently, mostly corporate work.”

“Is it enough to keep the mind alive?”

“Quite enough.”

“Actually, I know a good deal about you,” she said.

“How?”

“I read the book.”

“Book?”

“
Golden Couple
,” she said, “by someone called Kelli Keane?”

Stone took a quick breath. “God, is that out?”

“Didn’t you know? I picked it up in the airport bookstore.”

“I knew it was coming—the pub date must have slipped my mind.” Now he had at least one reason for leaving New York for Paris: so no one could find him.

“My condolences on the death of your wife.”

“Thank you.”

“Did you duck out of town because of the book’s publication?”

“That may have had something to do with it.”

“It got a very good write-up in
The New York Times Book Review
,
Wall Street Journal
, too.”

“Well, that means that everybody I know has read or is reading it.”

“And a great many other people, too—looks like it’s going to be a bestseller.”

“Ah, fame.”

“Are you upset about this?”

“Not exactly—after all, I cooperated with the author. I wanted to be certain she had her facts straight.”

“If it matters, she treated you sympathetically.”

“I suppose that’s better than getting slammed.”

“At all times. Did you have a publicist representing you?”

“No.”

“How many times did you speak with her?”

“Four or five, I suppose, an hour or two at a time.”

“You were lucky to get out with your skin. One should always have representation in such situations.”

“Sounds like you’ve had some experience.”

“Not personally, I’ve seen friends go through it. They didn’t always fare as well as you, especially the ones without professional help.”

“I hope that by the time I get home people will have forgotten about it.”

“I wouldn’t count on that.”

They ordered, and Stone redirected the conversation away from him. “Give me your concise bio,” he said.

“All right. Born in a small town in Georgia called Delano—you’ve never heard of it.”

He had, but he let it pass.

“Moved to Atlanta as a child, did well in school, scholarship to Harvard, where I stretched the experience to three degrees. I loved it there. Got an entry-level job at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, left there for Sotheby’s, worked as a freelance adviser to people with a lot of money and no taste, got a corporate client, then another, and here I am.”

“Ever married?”

“Once, foolishly. The divorce was more fun.”

“Where do you live?”

“At Park and Sixty-third. I bought a little co-op with a big commission on an important sale. I do quite well, actually.”

“Congratulations.”

“Tell me, since your wife’s death have you been attracting flies?”

“Flies?” He was baffled.

“Young things with ambitions to marrying money without benefit of prenup.”

“Oh, those. No, not really.”

“Things will change in that regard because of the book.”

“I’ll have to get some bug spray.”

“Yes, you will.”

“What else did we talk about on the airplane before I dozed off?”

“Not all that much. You asked me to dinner and told me where you were staying. I was just across the aisle, and after you slipped into the land of nod, I read the book. I was first off the airplane, so I didn’t see you again.”

“Question: who served me the drink?”

She looked at him oddly. “A stewardess, I guess. Excuse me, flight attendant. I don’t know why they’d rather be called that.”

“Neither do I. Did the, ah, flight attendant pay special attention to me?”

“You’re an attractive man, Stone, what do you think?”

“Was there anything about her that caught your attention?”

“Like what?”

“Like anything unusual?”

She cocked her head and gazed at him. “Are you asking me if she put something in your glass besides bourbon?”

“I suppose I am.” He returned her level gaze. “The second choice seems to be you.”

Her mouth fell open. “Do you really think you were drugged?”

“I’m certain of it.”

“And you think
I
drugged you?”

“From your own account, it had to be the attendant or you. Or was there another alternative?”

She furrowed her brow. “There was that woman.”

“What woman?”

“She came down the aisle, looking a little drunk, a glass in her hand. She seemed to spill her drink on your arm and apologized profusely. You were dabbing at your shirtsleeve with a handkerchief, and she was bending over you.”

“Describe her.”

Amanda closed her eyes. “Fiftyish, but she’d had work done, so she could have been sixty, fashionably dressed: Chanel pantsuit, hair so good it might have been a wig, bright red lipstick.” She opened her eyes. “That’s all I remember.”

“That was very good,” Stone said. “I apologize, I don’t really think you drugged me.”

“But somebody did?”

“I have no recollection of even being on the airplane, I don’t know why I’m in Paris, and I don’t remember meeting you.”

“Then why . . . ?”

“Because I thought you might tell me something. And you have. I’m grateful to you.”

“Then I’m no longer under suspicion?”

“You’re off the hook.”

She clinked her glass against his. “Then let’s start over.”

10

B
y the time they were on dessert, most of the previous tension between them had passed, and they were chatting amiably.

“Tell me,” Stone said, “why did you buy the book?”

“I’d read something about it on Page Six of the
Post
.” She held up a hand as if to ward him off. “Yes, I confess, I’m a regular reader. I didn’t know I would be sitting across the aisle from one of the subjects, not until I opened the book and saw the photographs.”

“There are photographs?”

“Quite a few, including some taken at the Virginia house where . . .”

“Where Arrington was murdered.”

“Yes. It’s a very beautiful house. Do you still own it?”

“No. After a feature about the house appeared in
Architectural Digest
, it began attracting interest. I accepted an offer on behalf of my son’s trust a few months later.”

“Your son’s story was the one part of the book that wasn’t very clear.”

“It’s best that way. I don’t want him bothered.”

“Where is he now?”

“At the Yale School of Drama. He’ll be graduating this winter.”

“Winter?”

“He’s on an accelerated course, ahead of most of his class. He and two friends are on a parallel track, and they’ll graduate with him.”

“Is one of them his girlfriend, the pianist?”

“Yes, she’s studying composition. The other is his friend Ben Bacchetti, who’s majoring in theater production and business.”

“Do they all have plans together?”

“They do. They want to make films together—Peter writing and directing, Ben producing, and Hattie scoring.”

“Sounds like quite a team. Do you think they’ll get anything produced?”

Stone smiled. “You’ll recall from the book that Peter’s stepfather was the actor Vance Calder. As a result, Peter’s trust is the largest stockholder in Centurion Studios.”

She laughed. “Well, I guess they’ll get produced.”

“Yes, and they’ll make their artistic home at Centurion.”

Stone paid the bill and they left the restaurant. “Is it too cold out, or would you like to walk a bit?” he asked.

“Let’s do that.”

They wandered down the Avenue Franklin Delano Roosevelt, took a right, and strolled aimlessly into a neighborhood of small shops and houses.

“Tell me,” Stone said, “is there anything mysterious about your life?”

“Mysterious?”

“Enigmatic, surreptitious, cloaked.”

“That’s an odd question,” she said. “Why did you ask it?”

“Why didn’t you answer it?”

“I asked you first.”

“All right: a man in a car has been following us with his headlights off since we left Lasserre. Don’t look back, check the reflection in the shop window coming up.”

She did so. “And you think he’s following me?”

“Tell me what you think.”

“I don’t know what to think.”

“Do you have any reason to fear for your safety?”

“Not until just a moment ago. I see the car now.”

“Anyone you know?”

“I can’t see the driver—glare on the windscreen.”

“Do you think we should run for it?”

“I’ve a better idea: my hotel, the San Régis, is a few yards ahead. You can drop me there and take your chances with the assassin, if that’s what he is.”

“You would deny me shelter from an assassin?”

“I would deny you my bed, at least for the moment. I have a prejudice against first-date performances. You can wait in the lobby until he moves on.”

They reached the hotel. “Good night,” he said. “I hope to live to see you again.”

She laughed. “Somehow, I think you’ll manage.” She pecked him on the cheek and went inside.

Stone left the hotel and walked back in the direction he had come. The car sat idling, its lights off. Stone grasped the front passenger door handle, opened the door, and got in. “You’re a very clumsy surveillant,” he said to Rick LaRose. “Your trainers at the Farm would be ashamed of you.”

“Promise not to tell them,” Rick replied, putting the car in gear and driving away.

“Why are you following me?”

“What makes you think I’m following
you
?” Rick asked.

“Is there something about Ms. Hurley that I don’t know?”

“A great deal,” Rick replied. “Almost everything, in fact.”

“Tell me.”

“Tell me what she told you.”

“Small-town girl, Harvard, the Met, Sotheby’s, art world, curator.”

“That’s all true, as far as it goes.”

“What did she leave out?”

“The part about her recruitment in college, her extensive training, her clandestine service in the art worlds of London and Paris.”

“Recruitment by whom?”

“Us.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, oh. If she didn’t mention that, then she certainly didn’t mention the suspicions that arose about her—that she was fucking a member of the opposition and might have been turned.”

“Was she booted out of the Agency?”

“You might say she resigned under a cloud after failing two polygraphs. Charges were never brought, either administrative or criminal. She is, however, on the watch list of every airport security team and major intelligence service in the world, and she will never again go anywhere or do anything that a lot of people won’t know about.”

“Is she dangerous?”

“Only to your reputation.”

“Is she
in
danger?”

“Only from you.”

“Why from me?”

“Because we’re not the only ones keeping track of you. Twice I’ve spotted a tail. And you will have made them interested in her.”