She shrugged. “It couldn’t be more unpleasant than what I’ve already told you about myself.”

“Don’t be too sure. It’s always the unexpected that trips us.” He took a sip of his tea. “I’ll start at the beginning as you did. I never knew my parents. They evidently didn’t like the idea of having a kid and left me behind in an apartment in Brooklyn when they were evicted. I was two then, and I spent the next few years in a series of foster homes until I lost the cute factor. Then I was tossed in an orphanage, which I much preferred because I could get my hands on books—for me the Holy Grail. It also gave me time to explore ways to trade what I had to offer to get what I wanted from the world.”

“What you had to offer?”

“I had a talent for numbers. I had to learn how to use it on the streets and then in the boardrooms in ways that wouldn’t get me beaten up or dead.” He smiled. “And I did. The rest is history. Satisfied? Even Mallory doesn’t know about the Brooklyn days.”

She shook her head. “Too brief. But I guess you kept your promise. What’s your question?”

He was silent a moment. “Maxim, the piano teacher: Did you know he was going to be killed that day? And if you did, why didn’t you try to stop it?”

She stiffened in shock. “You knew about Maxim? How?”

“We got the base story from Lara. The rest was just clearing away the lies and working out the truth. But I need the entire truth, Maria. It might be important.”

“The hell it would. So that you could tell Lara? She doesn’t have to know, dammit. It would only hurt her.”

“No, I won’t mention anything about Maxim to Lara. I just want to be prepared for an answer if she ever admits to herself that there was something wrong about the story she was told.”

“She wouldn’t go to you. She’d come to me.”

“Not if she thought it would hurt you.” He paused. “It might not be a problem, but it’s the only thing I think might get in my way.”

“Heaven forbid that the job might not go as smoothly as you’d like,” she said bitterly.

“I promise that she won’t be told unless I don’t have a choice,” he said. “But I won’t lie to her. It means too much to her. I have to know the truth.”

“The truth?” She looked away from him. “I didn’t know it was going to happen. But everything was so bad that day that I was afraid, and I went to Anton and tried to get answers. It took me a little while, but he finally got impatient and told me to be quiet about it. He said by now Volkov would have already taken care of Maxim. I ran to the village, but it was too late. Volkov had already killed him and was disposing of the body. He saw me and he smiled. He told me not to be upset, that he’d see that Lara would have no use for a piano teacher from now on.” She looked back at Tanner and added bitterly, “Was I supposed to tell her that?”