Naked Greed

32

Fred showed Felicity into the study and took her luggage up to the master suite, as instructed.

Stone embraced her. “You look very beautiful,” he said.

“A great weight has been lifted from me,” she said. “That sort of relief, rare as it is, tends to knock off about ten years.” She accepted a martini. “Cheers. How was your day?”

“Surreal,” Stone replied. “I received a phone call from the Dahai ambassador to the UN, a fellow named Abdul-Aziz, asking me to come see him.”

“I know of the man. He is a brother of the sultan of Dahai. Why on earth would he want to see you?”

“He wanted to retain me as his attorney to file a lawsuit in New York.”

“How would he even know of you?”

“That, like most of everything else he said, was shrouded in secrecy.”

“Whom did he wish to sue?”

“Ian Rattle.”

Her mouth fell open; she closed it. “Don’t make me pull this out of you, Stone.”

“He said that Ian was responsible for the deaths of the twins, who were the sultan’s sons; another man, who was his nephew; and two pilots of the Dahai air force. He wanted me to file a wrongful death suit, seeking five hundred and fifty million dollars for their families and the cost of the airplane.”

Felicity clasped her breast. “I am staggered. Did he actually know you know Ian?”

“I don’t believe so. In any case I feigned ignorance.”

“And how did you respond to his request?”

“I told him that he had no grounds for a suit and that, given his lack of evidence, I would rather represent the defendant than the complainant.”

Felicity burst out laughing. “And how did he respond to that?”

“He invited me to leave.”

“I expect so.”

“He attributed nearly all his answers to my questions to a confidential source.”

“Did he give any hint as to who that might be?”

“He did not. I’m sorry I didn’t do a better job of getting it out of him, but I was so flabbergasted that my mind wasn’t working properly.”

His cell phone rang, and he glanced at it. “Excuse me for a moment, it’s Dino. Hello?”

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“I thought you’d like to know that we rousted Gene Ryan a few minutes ago. We found him at home.”

“Did he have a motorcycle and a shoulder wound?”

“We didn’t have enough for a search warrant to look for the bike, and short of slapping him on the back, we couldn’t search him for a wound, either. He was sitting in his living room, having a beer and watching the news, like a normal person. He denied everything, of course.”

“What do you need for a search warrant?”

“Pretty much an eyewitness. That could be Fred, of course, but he didn’t see enough to be of much help. You want dinner tonight?”

“I’d love to, but I’m plying a dinner guest with liquor as we speak.” He smirked at Felicity.

“That would be Dame Felicity Devonshire of MI6, would it not?”

“I will neither confirm nor deny that.”

“You can hide nothing from me. See you later.” Dino hung up.

“And how is Dino?” Felicity asked.

“Just fine. He guessed you were here.”

“I guessed he would.”

“How is Ian coming along?”

“He was discharged early this afternoon and is resting in his new flat in the embassy residence.”

“A pity I couldn’t worm the name of your mole out of Abdul-Aziz, then he could go home.”

“I needed some new blood in New York, anyway.”

He cocked his head and looked at her. “You seem awfully relaxed about the mole.”

“Relax is all I can do, until we’ve worked through our investigation.”

“And how long is that going to take?”

“As long as it takes.”

“And Ian has to live with that for the duration?”

“He’ll be pretty much under wraps in New York. It’s not like he’s going to be making public appearances.”

Stone looked at his watch. “The Four Seasons?”

She smiled. “You know how I love that place.”