Jeremy was whisked away to the hospital. The bullet was removed safely from his shoulder. I heard from Sergio five hours later that Jeremy had been allowed to go home and sleep in his own bed. I assured him we would visit later.
“He’s wide-awake and surrounded by our friends,” Sergio told me, and I could hear the relief in his voice. “He can’t wait to read the reviews of his performance in tomorrow’s papers.”
“Send him our love,” I said, and was laughing when I hung up. But the good humor faded fast.
Robin, Derek, and I had been stuck at FBI headquarters for the last five hours, answering a battery of questions, first from the local police, then the FBI, and then a few shadowy government characters Derek seemed to know pretty well.
The local police gave us the most grief. Inspector Lee seemed to take it personally that we hadn’t told her about the flash drive and the book.
“Here I was carrying on about a stupid turf war,” she griped, “and you all were playing The Spy Who Shagged Me. Not fair, Wainwright.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, mostly meaning it. “I barely knew what was going on.”
“Yeah, I’ll believe that when pigs fly out my ass.”
So I guess this meant she wouldn’t be coming over for wine anytime soon. But I liked her and refused to give up on her now. I’d allow her a few weeks to sulk, then invite her again.
Shiva, meanwhile, had already made a deal with the feds to reveal everything she knew in exchange for immunity. Given her special status with the United Nations, the authorities agreed rather than risk international embarrassment. Now she was singing like a birdie.
Thanks to Derek’s spooky contacts, more of the story was emerging. All those years when Shiva was traveling for so-called humanitarian causes, she had been a spy for the U.S. government. For the most part, anyway. Once in a while, her loose scruples allowed her to play for the other team.
When Robin heard that, she whispered, “No,” and I felt her shudder at the news. It wasn’t every day that you found out your mother was a scumbag double agent playing fast and loose with your own life.
“It’s all right, sweetie,” I said, hugging her as she began to cry. I watched Derek get up and find a box of tissues for her to use. My hero. I grabbed a few myself.
When Derek sat down again, he took the chair next to Robin. Both of us held her hands as his Interpol buddies spilled the rest of the background they’d collected on her mother.
Recently, Shiva had come into possession of information so inflammatory that its disclosure could embarrass and topple the Russian government. She’d worked with Galina, the Ukrainian agent, before, so she devised a scheme to sell the volatile information to Galina and rake in millions.
Knowing the Ukrainians were positioning themselves to barter a new oil deal with Russia, Shiva knew Galina’s people would want to get their hands on the information. Shiva figured she’d make enough money to retire to an island off the coast of India and live in splendor for the rest of her life.
She placed all the particulars—racy phone call transcripts between high-level married diplomats, incriminating e-mail, texts, and a number of documents—onto a tiny flash drive that she stuck inside a miniature brass elephant, and then she sewed the brass doodad into the old scarf. She called Galina and asked for four million dollars in exchange for details of when the flash drive would be carried into the United States via her daughter, Robin.
The money was deposited into her account while Robin was visiting her. Talk about convenient timing. Robin shuddered when she heard that.
But once Robin got back to San Francisco, things went very wrong. It seemed to Galina that either the Russians or the Americans were thwarting the Ukrainians at every turn. Alex, who’d been Galina’s superior as well as her part-time lover, was dead now. Galina had managed to track down the big Russian man, and when he admitted to killing Alex, she shot him. Then she dropped him off in front of Brooklyn’s apartment, where she knew Robin was staying. She hoped the police would accuse Robin of killing the man, but didn’t realize that Robin was already out of the city.
Shiva had admitted that Galina wasn’t the brightest crayon in the box, but the young operative had her uses. But then Galina contacted Shiva in Varanasi to complain about the screwups. She was furious that Alex had been killed and blamed Robin. She accused Robin of paying the Russian to kill Alex as a way to double-cross her mother.
That was when Shiva decided she’d better get on a plane to the Bay Area and take charge of the operation. While she was there, she would spend time consoling her daughter, Robin. And, if necessary, she would rough up a few of her friends.
Chapter 18