I’m just clicking SHUT DOWN when the mail sound beeps and a mini-window opens in the upper right corner of the third of Rachel’s screens.

Source: UNKNOWN.

Message:

THIS WHAT YOU’RE LOOKING FOR?

A link.

I click it.

Up comes a video.

A smartphone selfie with a time and date code from four years ago.

The video is of a man and a woman in a shower.

Soap on the lens.

Man and woman laughing.

The woman’s in front, close to the lens, facing it. Giggling continues. The woman wipes the lens.

It’s Rachel.

A man’s soapy hands cup her breasts from behind.

Rachel responds erotically.

The man nuzzles her neck.

It’s Instancer.

MANNING

Sonofabitch.

Rachel, her hair wet and shampoo-y, turns back within Instancer’s arms.

They kiss, deep and passionate.

Rachel’s arms wrap around Instancer’s neck.

ME

What the fuck?

A new message comes in. More links.

I click the first.

Rachel and Instancer humping on some beach.

The second: Rachel and Instancer in desert shorts and hats on an archaeological dig.

The rest: more of the same.

I’m backtracing frantically, though I know the sending source is another burner.

MANNING

Stop.

He signs to me to button up the vehicle.

We kill our Maglites.

We dismount.

MANNING

Gimme your phone.

Manning takes it, punches a number.

Someone answers.

Manning speaks for fifteen seconds, then closes the call and tosses me the phone.

MANNING

You hungry?

Twenty minutes later Manning is ordering espressos and plates of angel wings in a window booth at an all-night dive called Café Dacha under the El in Little Russia. Time is 0330.

Across from Manning sits Yoo-hoo Petracek.

One of Manning’s mantras is:

Ask the question that’s so obvious no one thinks to ask it.

MANNING

(to Yoo-hoo)

You were in Moscow the night Alexsandr Golokoff was murdered. But you didn’t do it. Who did?

Scary and creepy as the Bratva assassin is, I must confess I have a soft spot for him. He has no bullshit. He is what he is, and it’s all out front.

YOO-HOO

Gleason burned you?

MANNING

Not officially. Not yet.

YOO-HOO

But you’re toast.

MANNING

Crisp on both sides.

Our espressos and pastries arrive. Café Dacha is the only place on Brighton Beach Avenue open despite the flooding. The counter and half the tables are occupied by fire and emergency crews. Yoo-hoo waits till the waiter, who appears to be the owner as well, chats for a moment and moves off.

YOO-HOO

I never knew the target’s name. I had the address and a photo and the security code.

Yoo-hoo glances to a pair of patrol officers entering, then turns back to Manning.

YOO-HOO

Your buddy Gleason wasn’t wrong.

Yoo-hoo confirms that he flew to Moscow to “perform a professional service.” He proceeded to the victim’s residence. He gained entrance. He was advancing upon the prey.

YOO-HOO