Andrew Gross - Reckless

As Hassani admired the view, a private door to one side opened. Peter Simons stepped in.

Simons was tall, lanky, raw boned, slightly graying. He was fifty-six, but with his still light-brown hair and fit, trained body, he looked much younger. He came over and hugged Hassani with open arms. “Hanni!”

“Peter.” The two embraced, kissing each other on each cheek in the Middle Eastern fashion. “It’s very good to see you again, my friend.”

Simons patted the Bahraini warmly on the back. “I’m glad you could be here.”

There was much to talk about before their meeting, but first the Reynolds Reid CEO leaned close to Hassani’s ear and said, his voice no louder than a whisper, “One thing… That little matter in London, which so concerned us…It’s been taken care of, I presume?”

“Completely taken care of, my friend.” Hassani gave a pat to the CEO’s back. “Let us get on to other things.”

Hauck flew back to New York on Sunday. Eight A.M. Monday, he was back at his desk.

The plane ride back was the first time he’d been able to think about what Steve Chrisafoulis had shared with him, the connection between Talon and Sonny Merced, the man who’d attacked Jared at the rink. He recalled how Foley had tried to put the brakes on his investigation into Thibault, citing the firm’s “other” interests with Reynolds Reid.

It also worried him how someone was always one step ahead of them in Serbia and London. Only a handful of people in the world knew about Thibault. Or al-Bashir’s connection to Hassani.

Was it possible he and Naomi were being played?

Around ten, one of the partners transferred in a call from Tom Foley. “Glad you’re back,” his boss said with seeming enthusiasm. “Ready to go forward?”

“Totally ready,” Hauck said, looking to deflect any questions on where he had been.

“Good. I want you in on a lunch meeting Skip Haley is holding up there around noon on Landmark Communication…”

Landmark owned television stations and was looking to make an Internet acquisition. Hauck told him he’d sit in.

Naomi had remained an extra day in the UK, to check with some contacts there and see if they could pin Hassani in Switzerland on the date of the supposed meeting in Gstaad.

They knew the date in question, June 26, a year ago, from Thibault’s lift ticket. If they could pin Hassani there, coupled with the flow of funds from Ascot through Thibault to James Donovan’s account in the Caymans, that might be enough to restart their investigation. Something had brought both al-Bashir and Thibault to the Swiss resort. Hauck began to wonder could there have been others? Others they didn’t know about. Something al-Bashir had said before he stepped into the car: It was never about terrorism…This was much larger than terrorism.

A thought occurred to him. He took out his BlackBerry and searched through the contact files for a name from years before, when he worked for the Department of Information at the NYPD.

Marcus Hird was a criminal inspector from Kantonspolizei in Zurich. They had gotten to know each other at a conference they both attended in DC and later, Hauck had done a favor for him, actually for his cousin who had moved to Greenwich to work for UBS; the cousin’s son had been caught with some beers behind the wheel. Hauck had gotten the boy off with a suspended license and probation.

Hauck located the number. It was four P.M. over there. The overseas call went through and connected with the usual short beeps.

“Bitte, Hird,” the inspector answered officiously.

“Marcus,” Hauck said. “It’s Ty Hauck. From Greenwich. In the States.”

“Ty!” the Swiss inspector exclaimed, switching to almost perfect English. “It’s been a long time.”

“It has,” Hauck agreed. They exchanged a few pleasantries about work; Hird’s cousin, who was now back home; and the man’s son, who was now a student at the local polytechnic college. Hauck then got to why he was calling: “Marcus, there may be something you can do for me.”

“Always happy to assist the local police there in any way I can,” the Swiss detective said politely.

“I’m afraid I’m not exactly with the local police any longer,” Hauck admitted. He explained what he was doing now, then why he had called, keeping the reason vague. “Do you ski?”

“Sure. I’m Swiss, Ty. I grew up in a village near Davos. In younger days I was quite the racer.”

“Good. I need some information from another of your resorts. From Gstaad.”

“Gesh-staad,” the Swiss said, drawing out the German pronunciation. “Beautiful place there. What is it you need?”

“I want you to look at only the five-star hotels there for me. Just the very top echelon.”

“Understood,” the Swiss said. “The Grand Hotel Park. The Grand Hotel Bellevue. The Gstaad Palace. Do you need a booking, Ty? If so, I recommend you call the Ministry of Tourism, not me.”

Hauck laughed politely. “No, not a booking, Marcus, sorry. I’m going to give you a date. On or around June twenty-sixth of last year. I’m also going to give you a series of names…”

“The twenty-sixth of June, only the top hotels…Go ahead. What is it you’re looking for, Ty?”

“I’d rather not go into it, if that’s okay. It’s part of a private investigation. You understand.”

“I understand perfectly,” the inspector said without argument. “You may have heard, we Swiss are used to matters of privacy. So tell me, what it is that you need?”

“The hotel guest lists for those days,” Hauck said. “All of them, if you can.”

Naomi flew back to Washington that Monday afternoon and went straight to her office across from the Treasury.

She threw herself behind her desk, which was submerged under piles of memos and security reports that had stacked up in her absence. So far there was still no word on the Mercedes. She tried to convince herself over and over that it was al-Bashir, not her, like Ty had said, who had put his family in danger. But still, she couldn’t shake the sting of feeling responsible. The boy’s panicked face, peering out the back window, had haunted her all the way home. She sank back wearily in her chair under the weight of never having lost anyone before.

She logged on to her computer and scanned for a message from her contact at the Swiss Federal Office of Police’s financial crimes division. With Thibault and al-Bashir gone, there was only one course left-to try to prove Hassani was in Gstaad at the same time as the others. That some kind of conspiracy had been hatched there.

Then there was the added worry of just how to proceed. Ty’s concern was real. Someone always seemed one step ahead of them. There were only a handful of people on the inside who knew, and she had grown to understand, as Ty said, this was no longer something she could go on managing in the usual way.

She was scanning through her e-mails and calls, sipping a latte to fight the jet lag, when her boss, Rob Whyte, appeared with a knock at the door.

“Talia said you were back.”

Naomi straightened up, surprised. She cleared her throat. “Just got in now.”

“I’m sorry,” Whyte said, coming in, “about what happened, Naomi.” He pulled out a chair across from her desk. “Still no word?”

She shook her head. “I think we’ve got to proceed as if they’re gone.”

Her boss nodded. “You realize, Naomi, there’ll have to be a review of this. How it all went down.”

“I understand.”

“I know how it must make you feel. You had him.”

“Thanks,” she said, growing suspicious that he was buttering her up for something.