Younger (33 page)

“You heard everything? The wire never came loose completely?”

“I could hear you until David here chivalrously jumped up and ran out and I had to call for reinforcements and hope not to blow the whole op or have you both killed. I can understand his impulsiveness in trying to rescue you, but I’d like to hear your explanation for the little charade you planned unbeknownst to us, Anna.”

She took a long swallow of her wine. Her mouth was like cotton. What torture it had been avoiding the Campari and soda she’d been so sure Marina had poisoned. “Once I realized yesterday that she’d killed Olga, the pieces started falling into place. I figured she’d have to kill me at some point. I was a liability, wasn’t I?” She shrugged.

“But I knew damned well that if I didn’t do something, she might be the one waltzing out of here since you’d be in a great big hurry to grab Komarov,” she said, not defiantly but not apologetically, either. “That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it? Getting him for Pierre’s murder so you could take your nemesis out of the field? He did kill the Rusakovs, I suppose?”

Barnes frowned, but, like the pro he was, he swallowed his bitter medicine with good grace. “I’d say certain but hard to prove. In the car, I heard Pierre tell Marina you thought you’d been followed. We found Galina and Pavel and monitored their hotel room. I doubt they had a clue Marina had killed Olga, either. But she was a link to exploit, so they threatened to go to the police about Olga’s death. They wanted the formula, of course. Galina called Marina to arrange a meeting for what would turn out to be the day after their deaths. Odds are Marina got her old buddy Grigoriy on it, faked murder-suicides being a Komarov specialty. Then, once Pierre had destroyed the formula and products, Grigoriy was superfluous. Marina seized the opportunity to throw him under the bus for Pierre’s killing while she got the remains of your products. Or perhaps she had that in mind all along.”

“Would Marina have gotten away with it if I hadn’t figured out she was the killer?”

“It would depend on how sharp that CCTV photo of her birthmark is and how good an attorney she got. We slipped up by not studying the police tapes more closely before. Yes, we had them. And now we have her admissions on tape. None of which makes me look particularly good. I don’t approve of the way you did it, Anna, but”—he nodded abruptly—“nice work.”

“And now?” David asked. “If this were my film, I’d close with a tracking shot of Komarov walking merrily out of the piazza, then zoom in slowly on the precious Boots bag.”

Barnes chuckled humorlessly. “Filled with remnants of actual Boots the Chemist skincare products. Poor Grigoriy. A black mark against one of the espionage game’s top pros. He really should have known better.”

This was, Anna saw, how Barnes would console himself, with the fact that his enemy had at least tarnished his reputation. “Same old story, isn’t it?” she said. “Komarov’s lust for
YOU
NGER blinded him to reason. Barton was right, you know. He wasn’t the type to play God. He died for nothing in the long run. They all did, didn’t they? There is no
YOU
NGER now, and no one will know there ever was. Those thousands upon thousands of women who would have bought it will never have a clue how close they were to their dream.”

“I wouldn’t worry about them,” David said thoughtfully. “They’re going to go on as they were before, just as you’re going to go on, and Andrew is, and I am. That’s life, isn’t it? Getting older day by day and learning to live with it. Not so bad considering the alternative, I’d say.”

She reached over and, smiling, took his hand. “Not bad at all.”

Epilogue

Six Months Later

Anna Wallingham agreed to a hefty payout of £500,000 upon the dissolution of her contract with BarPharm. The payout was signed off on by her good friend Marie Héloise Barton. Madame Barton took over Barton Pharmaceuticals when her former daughter-in-law was charged with the murder of Pierre, who had died from ingesting one of several toxins British intelligence had long suspected Sybyska Chemicals of dealing in illegally. Madame Barton paid the other Mrs. Barton a fire-sale price for her shares. Moscow is in continuing negotiations with the UK as they seek extradition of their loyal citizen. Marina Sybyska Barton is awaiting the result from her cell in England. She rarely asks about her children.

A week after Marina’s arrest, Becca Symonds and Chas Power received postcards from New York at their office in central London. The writer apologized for her sudden disappearance. “It’s a long story,” each read. “Shorter version: I was scared. I’m fine now and just wanted to say how great it was working with you. xox, Tanya.” There was no return address.

Anna Wallingham currently resides in her house in Studio City, California, where, having decided it was time to live up to the fiction she’d created and falling back upon her skills as a copywriter, she is hard at work finishing the rough draft of her first novel, the one she kept telling people she was going to write. Her old friends all tell her that her long holiday took ten years off her looks; her new friends tell her they’re sorry it took so long for them to get to know one another. Anna spends a great deal of her time with those she loves best, Allie Moyes and Richard Myerson. The former was recently promoted to full partner at Creativity Management while the latter is vice president and general manager of Coscom USA, where he reports to president and major stockholder Clive Madden.

After a surprise arrest, George Berger was found guilty of having hired two men whom he’d flown from Los Angeles to London for the purpose of killing his wife, Jan, in a hit-and-run. The demand for his backlisted novels increased enough for all of them to be republished; this earned his agent, Allie, a very nice bonus.

David Wainwright is directing the second season of his new television series in London. He spends most of his free time with his son, Nick, to whom he’s a devoted father. He calls Anna Wallingham often, as she calls him. Neither is behaving impetuously. They have set a date to meet, in just one more month, in Paris. When they talk, Anna can tell David is as nervous as she is. Can it all work out? This time, she’s sure he wants it to as much as she does. She hopes they have both changed enough and that their love is strong enough for them to find a way to be a couple. She also knows that no matter what happens, she has laid to rest her demons and will no longer confuse independence with fear of letting someone in.

A month after Berger’s trial ended, Anna received a postcard of her own, this one from Moscow.

Cui bono?
Who profits? He who gains is always the obvious suspect: now you know who killed your friend. And he with access is always the obvious thief: that’s how I know who has the
YOU
NGER formula. And if you think about it, so shall you, clever Anna. I look forward to our meeting again. I have no doubt that we will.

The obvious thief? It struck her like lightning, and she couldn’t believe that she’d missed it. In her mind’s eye, the window of a big blue car smoothly slid partly down and a chauffeur’s hand emerged, holding a small, plain brown kraft-paper tote bag. That hand had baited a trap not with cheese but with Anna Wallingham. Had Andrew done it from greed or for country? She might never know but had faith that patriotism was the sole motivation and that
YOU
NGER would, in the end, help those who needed it to accomplish something worthwhile.

She couldn’t help but smile at the impudence of the message sent by the man who had once planned to kill her. When she turned the card over, she wasn’t surprised to see Lucian Freud’s self-portrait, that searing study of the dissolution of the flesh caused by time.

Acknowledgments

Writing a novel is a solitary effort enriched by the kindness of others. I’m grateful for all those who offered their time, opinions, ideas, and support. The tireless reading and astute comments of Michele Thyne, Julie Logan, Alice Jay, Paul Mungo, and Kathy Kirkland helped immeasurably, as did the suggestions and enthusiasm of Jeremy Poole, Michael Oliver, Sally O’Sullivan, Dermot Keating, Josef and Ingrid Brunner, Frank and Gaie Burnet, Brendan O’Donnell, Max Grünig, Robert Yates, Vince Cappa, Mary Atherton, Elizabeth Wholey, Cara Robin, Ivan Teobaldelli, and Ruth Allen. Special thanks to Dianna Whitley for her photography as well as her valued story suggestions.

If not for Victoria Sanders, Bernadette Baker-Baughman, and the entire staff at Victoria Sanders & Associates, who believed in this book from the moment they read it, the pages might have ended up in a drawer in Berlin, where I did most of the writing. For making it all happen, I thank both Kjersti Egerdahl at Thomas & Mercer for acquiring the manuscript and Nancy Brandwein for her diligent editing: these last steps made a dream reality.

And, finally, I want to thank the professional beauty industry in which I worked and acquired Anna’s skincare and marketing expertise, and the town of Città di Castello, Italy, repository of a cultural and creative spirit that never ceased to inspire me in the eight years I lived within its walls.

About the Author

Photo © 2014 Dianna Whitley

Suzanne Munshower is a former waitress, short-order cook, go-go girl, movie extra, celebrity interviewer, journalist, fashion columnist, advertising copywriter, and beauty industry publicist. The author of numerous fiction and nonfiction books, she’s lived in New York, Los Angeles, San Juan, St. Thomas, London, Berlin, and Città di Castello, Italy. She currently resides in Las Vegas. For more about Suzanne Munshower and
Younger
, go to
www.suzannemunshower.com
.