The alley appeared deserted. There was a Dumpster nearby that reeked of popcorn oil, and several cars parked against old brick buildings beneath a latticework of fire escapes. Darlene stepped out into the glow of a single hooded bulb at the end of a metal pole protruding from the theater. There were several similar lights spaced along the alley.

“Hello?” she called out in a strained whisper. “Are you here?”

Silence, and then, “I’m here.”

It took several unsettling seconds to locate the source of the voice. A tall man, six-foot-one or so, with broad, powerful shoulders, approached her from behind a parked car. He wore a baseball cap and glasses with a thick black frame, and had a neatly trimmed full beard. He was probably good-looking, but in the gloom, with the glasses and the beard, it was hard to tell. Darlene guessed him to be about forty. He was wearing a patterned blazer, blue oxford shirt, and crisply pressed pants.

A man of the outdoors, she decided.

He remained a couple of yards away, his eyes never leaving hers.

“Kim and I call you Double M for ‘Mystery Man,’” she said.

He held an electrolarynx against his throat, making his speech eerily robotic—and not identifiable. “Good nickname,” he said.

“You can come closer. I’m not afraid of you.”

Double M closed the gap between them by half, but declined taking Darlene’s extended hand.

“My name is Alex,” he said.

“That’s not your real name, is it?” Darlene said.

“No, but that doesn’t matter.”

His electronic voice was creepy, especially given the setting, but Darlene was determined not to react. “Okay, then, Double M Alex,” she said, “you want this to be our level of trust, that’s up to you.”

“I would be in great danger if my identity became known.”

“Well, we don’t have much time. What are we doing here?”

“Trying to save lives.” He studied Darlene as though she were an equation to be solved.

A professor or a scientist, she guessed. “Go on,” she said.

“First of all, you need to know that the recording you heard was real.”

“I believed it was. Otherwise I would not have risked so much for this meeting.”

“You may have to risk even more.”

“Who was on that recording?” asked Darlene. “Who was the girl? The other man speaking? What happened to her?”

Behind his lenses, Double M’s eyes narrowed. “At this point, I can’t reveal who is involved in that tape.”

Darlene was beginning to feel exasperated with the man’s paranoia. “What is it you want from me … Alex?”

Double M sucked in a nervous breath. “You must use your influence to get your husband to reinstate Secretary Evans.”

Darlene tensed. “Is Evans behind this?” she asked.

“I don’t even know the man.”