The Flight Attendant(46)

“Did you find out anything more about her?”

“Like does she really work with Alex or does she or her family really have money in this magical fund?” asked Ani.

“Yes.”

“Unisphere Asset Management has easily six or seven hundred employees in New York, Washington, Moscow, and Dubai. None of them are named Miranda.”

“You checked?”

“My investigator did, yes.”

“Can he find out if she’s an investor?”

“Maybe. But I’m not confident.”

“Is it possible she made up the name?”

“If she killed him? Absolutely,” said Ani, her tone decisive. Then: “You should call back Frank Hammond. Then call me back. Let’s plan on meeting tomorrow, regardless of whether he wants to see you again.”

Tomorrow was Friday. She had something on Friday. Maybe. She flipped through the calendar in her mind, trying to recall what it was. Then it came to her: Rosemary. Her nephew and niece. She needed to call Rosemary back because her sister and her family were coming to New York. Her sister had said something about the zoo on Saturday, so she guessed she wasn’t going to see them tomorrow.

“Sure,” she told Ani. “What time?”

“Come by my office around twelve fifteen. There’s a really good falafel cart around the corner on Fifty-Third Street, and it’s supposed to be a beautiful day. Do you like falafel? We could eat al fresco.”

“That’s fine,” she said, not really answering the question.

“Okay. But call me after you talk to the FBI.”



* * *



? ?

“The air marshal on the flight said you and Sokolov were talking a lot. He noticed,” Frank Hammond was saying on the phone.

“I don’t remember,” Cassie said, as she opened her suitcase and started unpacking. A part of her knew that she shouldn’t be multitasking: all her attention should be on the FBI agent. But the unpacking was calming her.

“And the other crew members said he was your guy.”

“My guy?”

“Your section.”

“Yes, that’s true.”

“And you two had a lot of interaction.”

“I doubt I had any more ‘interaction’ with him than I did with any other passengers I was serving,” she said. It was a lie, but interaction struck her as a vague, ridiculous word that was impossible to quantify. She wondered whether the flight crew was volunteering her name so enthusiastically or whether it was only the air marshal. She guessed it was also possible that Hammond had phrased his sentence this way because he was bluffing: he was trying to frighten her into believing that he knew more than he did.

“You know what I mean,” he said. “You chatted. A lot. It wasn’t just about the wine list.”

“I was polite. He was polite.”

“You were flirting. He was flirting.”

“Maybe he flirted with me a little,” she said. “But passengers flirt. They’re bored. They flirt with all of us when it’s a long flight.”

“Got it. Anyway, that’s why I’d like you to come in and chat. I want to see if Sokolov might have said something that can help us help the authorities in Dubai. That’s all.”

“May I bring a lawyer?” she asked. She wished instantly that she hadn’t inquired. What if he said no? But he didn’t. She dropped a dirty blouse into the hamper.

“That’s your right,” he answered simply.

“Okay, let me find out when my lawyer is free.”

“But we want to see you tomorrow.”

There wasn’t precisely an edge to his voice, but for the first time he hadn’t sounded quite so casual. Quite so laid back. It suddenly felt a lot less like this was busywork to him. And so she called back Ani and then she called back the agent, and they agreed to meet the next day at the FBI offices downtown at Broadway and Worth. She said that she’d be there at two o’clock sharp.



* * *



? ?

She read the obituary in the newspaper, matching the man recalled in the story with the one who had made love to her in Dubai:


CHARLOTTESVILLE, Alexander Peter Sokolov, 32, died July 27, 2018, while traveling for business in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates. He was born March 15, 1986, in Alexandria, Virginia. Alex, as he liked to be called, graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Virginia, double majoring in mathematics and foreign affairs, and then earned a Master of Quantitative Management at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. He helped run the Stalwarts Fund for Unisphere Asset Management out of their Manhattan office. He loved his job because he loved data, but he also loved the fact that his work took him often to Russia, the Middle East, and the Far East. He was fearless, whether he was playing his beloved squash or exploring the world. But he was also a kind and generous friend and son. He loved movies and books, especially Russian literature, but most of all he loved anything surprising and new. He leaves behind a grieving father and mother, Gregory and Harper, as well as an extended family of aunts and uncles and cousins who will miss him dearly.



The funeral was the day after tomorrow, Saturday, at a Presbyterian church in Charlottesville. She imagined it crowded with Alex’s classmates from the University of Virginia, his childhood friends, and at least some of the employees he worked with at Unisphere. A part of her wanted to go, but she knew that she shouldn’t. She wouldn’t.