No other passengers appreciated the notoriety of this brand, no other passengers were aware of the ways the bottle had been used in Kabul – the fear that label created in the minds of prisoners awaiting interrogation. Here, in New York, it was a sugar drink, a symbol of frivolity and fun, and no more. Staring at this advertisement, Leo felt like a visitor from another world.

A fellow passenger was reading a newspaper, bags of shopping sagging by his feet. Another man was standingeven though there were seats available, hanging from the bar, lost in thought as the train emerged from under the city. A mother sat with her young daughter whose legs dangled over the edge of the seat, not reaching the floor of the carriage. Leo was reminded of the daughters he’d left behind in Russia. There wasn’t a day, or even an hour, that passed when he didn’t think about them. He hadn’t seen them in eight years and he had no idea when he’d see them again. The price for this investigation had been high. The idea that Elena and Zoya did not even know that he was alive made him ache. He couldn’t contact them. He couldn’t risk the Soviet government finding out that he was alive. If that happened, the girls would surely be targeted. Just as he found it impossible to believe that he would not solve Raisa’s murder, he found it impossible to accept that he would not see Elena and Zoya again even if he couldn’t rationalize when or how that might happen.

Advertisements aside, Leo found the subway the one place where life in Moscow and life in New York were not so dissimilar. Commuting served as a great leveller of men. He would always watch with interest as the doors opened and a new wave of passengers boarded. The subtle flirtations flickering between passengers were faint echoes of the chance encounter between him and Raisa on the Moscow metro. Far from the memory upsetting him, he’d wonder whether the strangers would part ways, never to see each other again, or try to turn that chance connection into something more.