Enigma (FBI Thriller #21)(95)
Savich waited for him to continue, but he didn’t, merely rolled the glass of whiskey in his palms. “Mr. Hainny, we know his father, Boris Petrov, and his Transvolga investment firm were sanctioned by presidential executive order and lost hundreds of millions of dollars, and that most of what was left was frozen. That’s what he wanted of you, wasn’t it? To arrange to overturn that order, and, in return, he would give you the evidence against Saxon, the evidence in this box.”
Hainny drew a deep breath. “I don’t know how you found out about it, and so quickly, but yes, that’s what he wanted. As you know, these sanctions were retaliation for the Russian invasion of Crimea and the Ukraine. They worked admirably. Not only did they cause great damage to the Russian economy, they drained billions of dollars, bringing capital investment to a standstill. Of course, the sanctions levied against specific individuals, their banks and financial assets, were designed to hit Putin directly in his pocketbook, to pressure him to withdraw from Crimea and the Ukraine. Will Putin withdraw? Or at least keep a lid on the hostilities?” Hainny shrugged. “Things are very bad in Russia but only time will tell.
“When Petrov told me he wanted the sanctions removed from his father and the Transvolga Group, that he wanted billions of dollars unfrozen, I told him I didn’t have that power, he should have picked a ranking official in the Treasury Department. They were the ones who set the sanctions, they would be the ones to remove them. And technically, that’s true. But he laughed at me. He said my talents are well-known and that I had one week to make progress on lifting the sanctions or my son would find himself on trial for murder.”
He fell silent again, then said in surprise, “Petrov is Russian, but do you know, he’s perfectly fluent, speaks with a British accent? And now he’s dead.” He raised his whiskey and toasted Savich. “Will you tell me what happened?”
“When FBI agents went to his home to arrest him, he and another man opened fire. They were both killed. Mr. Hainny, you said Petrov gave you a week. You could have called us then, but you didn’t. Did you arrange anything on Petrov’s behalf?”
“No, I didn’t consider that an option at first. Actually he called me a couple of days later for a progress report and I lied to him, told him I’d spoken to the undersecretary for financial intelligence, that a review was under way, but it would take more time. I believed I could handle the—situation—myself and I almost succeeded, until everything went sideways.” He drew a deep breath. “But of course you already know what happened.”
Savich said, “You acted, you hired Manta Ray to steal the safe-deposit box from the Second National Bank of Alexandria. How did you know the evidence against Saxon was there?”
“Petrov would have preferred to stay anonymous, but of course he couldn’t, he had to give me his father’s name and the name of his firm if I was going to act on the sanctions. It was easy for me to find out that Petrov’s son was in the United States. The father couldn’t be, naturally, since the sanctions banned him from traveling here or to Europe.”
Hainny rolled the whiskey glass around between his palms out of habit. “I realized Mia Prevost had been working for Petrov, that it had all been a setup. I decided I wouldn’t tell Saxon. I’m a man with considerable power, Agent Savich, and I used some of it to neutralize this man. I knew he wouldn’t have the items at his house, he’d have to know I could locate that quickly enough, and of course I did. He has no ties to the Russian Embassy, so he couldn’t use their premises to hide the blackmail items.
“I decided a bank deposit box was an intelligent choice, perhaps one it would be hard to trace to him. But if so, which bank? I had an analyst whose name I cannot tell you investigate Sergei Petrov, his activities, his connections. He found Elena Orlov for me quickly, Petrov’s closest contact. He even unearthed the name Cortina Alvarez, the alias she uses when it suits her. A search of her bank records showed me she had opened a safe-deposit box at her bank, the Second National Bank of Alexandria, the day after Mia Prevost was murdered. I didn’t know for sure, but that safe-deposit box seemed the only way forward.
“I hired Liam Hennessey through an intermediary, an acquaintance from twenty years back, a man far enough removed so he wouldn’t be linked to me. I paid him fifty thousand dollars to remove Cortina Alvarez’s safe-deposit box and five other boxes around it, to confuse the issue. That’s when it all went sideways.
“As you know, Hennessey’s partner—a man he hired without telling my intermediary—killed a bank teller, and Hennessey got himself shot and ended up caught in a deserted warehouse in Alexandria. It was a tragedy, that poor woman murdered, and it was my fault, I was culpable.” He raised incredibly weary eyes to Savich’s face. “I was prepared to admit everything to President Gilbert when the FBI reported they couldn’t find the contents of the safe-deposit boxes, that somehow Liam Hennessey, even grievously wounded, had managed to hide them before the FBI found him. Perhaps if he’d died or didn’t tell them, there was still a chance for Saxon.” He gave a laugh. “And for me.”
“When Hennessey survived, I didn’t dare contact him to arrange a deal for the whereabouts of Cortina Alvarez’s safe-deposit box. I would have had to borrow a great deal of money, and it might have exposed me. When it came down to it, it didn’t matter because Petrov outbid me. I’m sure he offered this criminal more than I ever could have, and he managed to pull off an amazing escape for him.