The Flight Attendant(53)

Cassie watched a plane flying silently high overhead. Even now, despite her years at thirty-five thousand feet, the miracle of flight continued to move her. “Won’t you be sitting next me?”

“Probably. But I don’t care if they see me coaching you. That doesn’t matter. Good God, if necessary, I will jump in for you and say you’re taking the Fifth. The thing is…” Ani’s voice trailed off.

“Go on.”

“I wanted to tell you this in person. You may not be extraditable for murder, but you aren’t out of the woods. There are other reasons why you could be prosecuted in the U.S. for Sokolov’s death. Terrorism, for instance.”

“What?”

“It’s unlikely. But here’s the chain. The Department of Justice and the OVT: the Office of Justice for Victims of Overseas Terrorism. The OVT reports to National Security. The OVT director meets weekly with the folks in counterterrorism and counterespionage. Alex Sokolov is an American citizen who was murdered abroad, and his death could be handed over to them—especially if he was someone important to the government.”

“That’s absurd. Once in a while I may drink too much, but I’m not a terrorist.”

“I get it. I just want to be sure you understand the stakes before we go downtown. Now, you should eat. You really should. If you don’t like falafel, don’t be polite. Tell me. We’ll find you something else. I want to coach you for a few minutes, and I want to be sure you have some sustenance inside you before we meet with the FBI.”

She nodded and started to eat, and tried to pay attention. Suddenly, she was feeling like a victim herself, and that only made her feel worse. It shamed her to feel that way. After all, she wasn’t the body left behind in the bed.



* * *



? ?

Cassie rarely got to Wall Street, but when she did, she was always struck by how narrow the streets were compared to Murray Hill and midtown Manhattan. The FBI was in a skyscraper on Broadway, but Broadway this far downtown, this close to the Brooklyn Bridge, was the slender tip of the funnel. Federal Plaza was a little more squat than the Seagram Building, but what made it feel so different was the Wall Street claustrophobia induced by the combination of tall edifices and thin streets. Outside the building was a small park with three tall, dark columns, a sculpture called the Sentinel, and some trees that she guessed were a kind of willow. On the side streets around the plaza were manned guardhouses and black-and-yellow striped metal barricades that police officers raised or lowered to allow select vehicles in and out of the parking garage. She thought of the Fearless Girl standing tall against the Bull a few blocks to the south. Cassie understood that there was nothing heroic about who she was, nothing courageous about what she was doing; she was here because she drank too much and a decade and a half of bad decisions—especially one night in Dubai—was catching up to her. But she thought of that bronze little girl with a ponytail, her hands on her hips and her chest out, facing off against the much larger bull. Cassie wanted now to be just that plucky and do the right thing.

Whatever that was.

“Ready?” Ani asked. They hadn’t spoken since they had gotten out of the cab a minute ago and paused in front of the Sentinel.

Cassie shook her head. “No. But I really don’t have a choice now, do I?”

Ani looked her in the eye. “You’ll be fine. Just remember: whatever you do, don’t lie.”



* * *



? ?

The room was windowless and Cassie didn’t care. She was struck by the shiny, fake veneer of the rectangular table, and how the chairs were covered in an orange shade of Naugahyde that belonged only on pumpkins. Once again Frank Hammond was interviewing her and James Washburn was taking the notes.

“Glad you could make it this afternoon,” Hammond said after Cassie had introduced Ani to the two agents and everyone was seated. “I really am grateful. I know it’s an inconvenience, but we want to help the Emirates and put this part of the investigation to bed. We want to move on.”

“Of course,” she agreed.

“I just hate to have busywork hanging over my head over the weekend—especially a summer weekend.”

“It’s fine.”

He smiled. She was struck once more by how world weary he seemed for a guy who couldn’t have been more than forty or forty-one. Once again she noted Washburn’s unblemished skin and rimless eyeglasses, and wondered if he was ever allowed outside. “When do you fly out again?” he asked.

“Sunday.”

“Back to Dubai?”

“Rome. I have Rome this month.”

“I love Italy.”

“I do, too.”

He shook his head wistfully and she presumed he was recalling a moment in a beautiful piazza in a Tuscan village or a perfect, endless meal in Florence. “Of course, I’ve never been there. But I hope to get there someday,” he said. “So: I guess I really just love the idea of Italy.”

For a moment she was taken aback, but quickly she gathered herself. “I hope you get there, too,” she said. “It’s beautiful. It lives up to its reputation. It’s one of the prettiest places in the world, I think.”

“And you’ve seen a lot of the world.”

“I guess.”