NCIC had nothing to say about Doreen Fredd. Neither did DMV, Social Security, any other port in cyberspace.

“Still a phantom.” Milo logged off. “And Sister Ricki gets all squirrelly about ‘something political.’ This is starting to smell real bad, Alex.”

Turning to his phone, he punched numbers so hard the apparatus jumped. “Hal, this is Milo. For the third time. Is it my breath or are you on some sort of overpriced taxpayer junket and can’t be bothered to help the locals? I’ve got a name for my Jane Doe, no thanks to you. Doreen Fredd.” Spelling it with exquisite, enraged enunciation. “And guess what, Hal, even with that, she’s a ghost, not even an SSN. So now I’m thinking your not calling back isn’t negligence, it’s proactive deception. Which is bullshit, Hal. You owe me big-time on that Aeromexico thing and I need you to come through. All in the name of God, Country, and my ready access to the chief, Hal. Who will not be happy to learn that no good deed has, yet again, gone unpunished.”

Slam. He slumped. “Ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille.”

I said, “Ready access to the chief?”

“The federal government understands entitlement. Ends justifies the means. Political … the obvious link is Teddy but what the hell would a newly graduated architect have to do with Sranil?”

“Maybe he had a previous life.”

“As what, a super-spy?”

“As something political,” I said. “Or maybe, given his libido, he’d partied with Teddy’s alleged victim, whom he met through Doreen. The two of them cooked up the blackmail scheme, leaned too hard and paid for it.”

“Pretty damn stupid to think they could go up against someone that powerful.”

“How much of your job revolves around smart people, Big Guy? And Backer being involved could explain how Brig—Doreen ended up at Masterson. Teddy’s name doesn’t appear on any of the Borodi paperwork, but that design journal listed the firm’s involvement in a ‘pied-à-terre’ for a foreign owner. Backer was an architect, that’s his type of reading material.”

“He does background, Doreen worms her way in to get the details. The two of them somehow send a message to Tariq or the sultan, one of them makes a call and a local pro is hired.”

“Or even someone flown in for the job.”

“Morons,” he said. “Thinking they could play in that league. Then they have the nerve to go up there again for fun under the stars. Fouling the rich bastard’s nest in the process. Freud’s probably got a name for that, huh?”

“Der payback.”

Tight lips parted slightly, emitting something close to a smile. He pressed psychic delete and turned grim again. “Desi and Doreen, hugging a tree. P-L-O-T-T-I-N-G.”

CHAPTER

18

At six twenty, just as we were leaving for dinner, John Nguyen dropped in.