Burying the Dead

Chapter 2-1

Chapter 2

Catherine Darlington wasn’t the only one who had taken note of Dimitri Orlov at the Citi Open. Mitch Abramson was another “Dimi disciple,” as they were known on the men’s tour. All week, Mitch had been playing hooky, sort of—leaving the office early, praying that nothing would come up that would require his attention so that he could catch part of the afternoon or early evening matches when Dimi was playing. Mitch prided himself on his own game. He was a champion at the Country Club of Fairfax, Virginia, and once defeated two college players with his doubles partner, playing with a broken index finger. But that paled in comparison to the wizardry of the Dimi Orlovs of the world.

Here was someone whose game had no discernible weakness—an all-court, all-surface player with the best return of serve this side of Ken Rosewall, Andre Agassi, and Novak Djokovic, whose play Mitch studied on YouTube. But there was something else. This was a scrappy, scrambling kid—a volleying raw nerve from his black Nike sneakers to his sealskin-sleek, spiky black brush cut—who was taking the ball and the world on the rise. Watching him, Mitch thought, was what crossing the Granicus River with Alexander the Great must’ve been like: You were on the verge of something momentous.

The Monday after the Citi Open championship, Mitch woke early to savor the moment—stretching luxuriously, a smile wreathing his face as he anticipated a lazy summer day at work spent poring over accounts of the match and scouring the web for the best deal on tickets to the US Open in late August. Who knows? he thought. Maybe he could persuade his wife, Laura, to accompany him to the tournament, enticing her with the prospect of shopping or pampering at one of New York’s many spas. Not likely.

“I don’t know how you or those players stand it, Mitch,” she had sniffed, “staying out in all that sun. It’s so bad for the skin.”

Laura lived for nothing else but to preserve her thirty-five-year-old skin and size four figure. Even volunteering at the local soup kitchen had been too much until she realized that she could raise funds for various causes by organizing Nights of Beauty at the stores where her purchasing prowess was legendary. Now she stirred beside Mitch—her blond pageboy falling over the delicate bones of her face, her thin, white lace nightie exposing a lightly freckled décolletage, as Mitch’s iPhone on the mahogany night table vibrated with a text alert: Zagrev dead.

Fuck, Mitch thought—springing from the bed, frantically pulling on exercise shorts, a T-shirt, and sneaks and gathering various iPhones, iPads, iMacs, iWhatever, while also cramming loafers, fresh undies, socks, and his toiletries into a duffel and scrambling to stuff crisp khakis, a cream polo, and a navy sports jacket into a garment bag. Laura woke and brushed the hair from her face as she tried to focus on the pink Murano glass alarm clock on the mahogany nightstand by her side of the bed. “Good God,” she muttered, “what time is it?”

“Early, very, very early, my love, I am so sorry, but I just got a text. IT crisis at the office. Gotta go.”

He kissed her moist lips—there wasn’t a part of Laura that wasn’t well-hydrated and moisturized—and continued to search for the power cords and cables that mostly hung about his neck. Laura propped herself up on one elbow, a derisive smile at play on those freshly-bussed lips as she considered him.

“You know, standing there with all those cables dangling from you, you look like a digital Jacob Marlowe, the guy in A Christmas Carol, wearing the chains he forged in life.”

“Marley,” Mitch said coolly. “The character’s name was Jacob Marley. ‘Marley was dead to begin with. There was no doubt whatever about that,’” Mitch began quoting. But Laura had collapsed back on the bed into a dead sleep, snoring.

“Whatever,” Mitch said aloud as he eased “Nicky,” the nickname he had given his red Tesla roadster, out of the garage of their Fairfax townhouse. He had been one of the first to order the more affordable Model 3. “Mitch and his toys,” Laura would say to her mother, Louise, and sister, Linda, shaking her head indulgently.

“Laura and her cosmetic products,” Mitch said to Nicky as they merged onto Interstate 66. The good news was that at this godawful hour, 66 would be only slightly less of a son of a b***h than it usually was at every moment of its tortuous, torturous life. The bad news was that Zagrev, Shmagrev, he was not going into the office without his traditional morning workout at a gym on the way, even if he had to abbreviate it. (After all, that was the great thing about death, he thought. The dead were no less dead an hour later.)

Only then, freshly shaved, showered, and dressed, would he pull Nicky into a parking spot on the restricted 258-acre campus in Langley that was the George Bush Center for Intelligence—the official name of the Central Intelligence Agency’s six-story headquarters—grab a venti decaf and oatmeal from the in-house Starbucks, and head to the Directorate of Operations, the division where he worked.

“Nice of you to join us, Abramson,” his boss, Joe Bowman, said as Mitch slipped into the conference room. “As I was saying, Anatoli Zagrev was found dead in his suite at The Hay-Adams earlier this morning of a possible heart attack. Who here thinks Zagrev actually died of natural causes?”

Mitch looked around at a room of unraised hands. “Good,” Bowman said. “At least that’s a start in the right direction. Frankly, I personally don’t give a rat’s ass that Zagrev was murdered. Indeed, I’d like to pin a medal on whoever did it, as there is now one less pustule on the face of Mother Earth. I mean, between Zagrev’s competence as an arms dealer and his incompetence as an oil tycoon, spewing that stuff all over the Gulf of Mexico and elsewhere, not to mention his rape of that woman in New York years ago, the guy was a triple threat. So, let’s not shed any tears. I do, however, care very much if a certain former superpower offed him here on our turf on our watch.”

But, Bow,” agent Mark Lawlor interrupted. “Isn’t it possible the guy just keeled over? Look at him. He was no gym rat. Maybe he had one too many blini.”

“Or maybe the last blin had a little something extra,” Bowman countered. “No, ladies and gentlemen, life is not about possibilities but probabilities. And the probability that Zagrev was taken out by one of his countrymen is very high in my book. That the Russians chose to take out Zagrev on American soil has added significance. This is war, ladies and gentlemen. This is gesture politics meant for more than Zagrev, who, regrettably for him, is no longer around to absorb the larger ramifications of the moment. How and why he is no longer around is what we’re going to discover.”

Bowman locked eyes with Mitch, who shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

“Now, the Metropolitan Police—alias the Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight—has already got its mitts on this one. To its credit, it is in no hurry to release the body to the Russians, who are champing at the bit over at their embassy. And you can bet the FBI wants a piece of this one,” Bowman added. “We already have a team inside the morgue looking to collect tissue samples, so we’re one step ahead of our friends at the Bureau. Poison is the likely suspect. And poisoning nowadays is difficult to prove. Knowing the kind of poison will tell us much about the how and the larger why. Let’s get to work.”

Mitch went back to his desk and began working the usual and not-so-usual channels, but there was little chatter. The international terrorist class must be on summer vacation, he thought grimly. So much for a quiet day of surfing Sportin’ Life’s website and others for analyses of Orlov’s triumph. That guilty pleasure would have to wait until later.

“Hey, Mitch, see that match yesterday?” It was Lawlor, no fan of his. The feeling was mutual.

“I was there.”

“Yeah, I figured you were. You go for that kind of stuff.” Lawlor said “stuff” as if it were gay porn.

“It’s a great sport,” Mitch said.

Lawlor shrugged. “I don’t know, all those guys in shorts.” He rolled his eyes. “It’s no football.”

Mitch smiled. Yes, he thought, it’s hardly a sport in which men bend over, touching each other intimately. Time for that tennis fix, he thought. He went on the Association of Tennis Professionals’ website. Up popped a photograph of Dimi with a woman and a child on the site’s Fanspeak blog. It was captioned Elena Cortrubas and mom Nina pose with Dimitri Orlov at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center. Dimi took in the Tesla exhibit there before upsetting Ryan Kovacs at the Citi Open, a US Open tune-up. Way to go, Dimi.

That’s nice, Mitch thought, keeping it real with the fans. And clearly an aficionado of Tesla, as in the car, and Tesla, as in the man. Cool.

Then his heart skipped a beat and he broke out into a cold sweat as his pinball machine of a mind began pinging and he remembered something. He switched screens and the words “Zagrev,” “lecture” and “World Energy Engineering Congress” popped out at him. And he knew. He just knew. “He knew without knowing.”

Mitch remembered a classics professor using those words to describe how Alexander the Great intuited that his mother had engineered his father’s death. That was it: Mitch knew that Dimi was somehow involved in Zagrev’s murder, and it sickened him. He wanted to run. He wanted to vomit. It was as if he had discovered that his mother was a child molester or his father was a rapist. Fans invested so much emotional capital in athletes. What was it all for? Then again, what did Dimitri Orlov owe him or any fan but a great match? Mitch didn’t know him. There was no connection—except the one in Mitch’s mind.

There had to be an explanation. Zagrev was one bad dude. Perhaps there were other bad dudes. Methodically, meticulously, Mitch began to look at the correlation between Dimi’s matches and certain kinds of world events—bombings, shootings, suspected poisonings. In at least five cases, there was no more than a three-day differential. Worse, some of the events went back as far as his first year on the men’s tour.

“My God,” Mitch said aloud. He printed out his findings, signed off his computer and took a deep breath as he knocked on Bowman’s door. His hands were shaking.

“What you got?” Bowman asked, motioning Mitch to a hard-backed chair.

“I think there’s a connection between Zagrev’s death, certain other suspected Russian activities, and Dimitri Orlov,” Mitch said.

Bowman shook his head. “Dimitri Orlov? Is this some new player on the international scene I’m hearing about for the first time?”

“Funny you should use the word ‘player.’ He is a player, literally, a tennis player.”

“A tennis player?” Bowman laughed. “I think someone’s been watching too much cable.”

“No, hear me out,” Mitch said, spreading out his research like a full house and growing more passionate as he always did when he had an argument to make. “There was the death of an Islamic terrorist in Abu Dhabi, a bombing in Shanghai, a murder in a Paris hotel, a hit-and-run in London. And that’s just for starters. What do you think all those places have in common?”

Bowman shrugged.

“They’re all cities on the ATP tour, that’s the men’s tour,” Mitch added, “and, in each case, the incident occurred within a day or two of Orlov playing there. Zagrev was at the WEEC at the convention center yesterday. So was Dimi Orlov.”

“But that’s like saying because we’ve visited Ford’s Theatre, we were in cahoots with John Wilkes Booth to assassinate Abraham Lincoln,” Bowman countered. “You drive a Tesla. Did you go to the Tesla show at the convention center?”

“Yes, but—”

“And you know who was at the Tesla exhibit earlier in the week with some inner-city campers who are part of her pet STEAM project? The first lady herself.”

“Okay, but—”

“Were you at the tennis match yesterday? You know who else was at the match? The first lady.”

“Yes, I know. I saw her present the trophy to Orlov,” Mitch said impatiently, irritably.

“So, based on your reasoning, the first lady, the STEAM students, Tesla up from the grave, you, and this Dimitri Orlov were all part of a vast conspiracy to kill Anatoli Zagrev and maybe a whole bunch of other people. You see how crazy this is?”

“I’m telling you—”

“Please, Mitch, more to the point. Look at your own evidence.” Bowman held up the photo of a smiling Dimi and the little girl. “So, let me get this straight: Orlov goes to the convention center, ostensibly to see the Tesla display—that’s his cover—but really to assassinate Zagrev with, I don’t know, some kind of poison. And then, he’s so Joe Cool that when he’s approached for a fan photo, he has time for not one but two and then goes off to beat the second-ranked player in the world yesterday. Is that what you’re saying? Because, man, he’d have to be some kind of sociopath or gambler or something to pull that off.”

Mitch stilled and steeled himself. He wasn’t going to let this go. He knew he was right. He knew that what he said next was going to determine the course of something extraordinary.

“He’s not a sociopath or psychopath,” he said quietly. “Of that I’m sure. And he is that good. I’ve seen him make extraordinary shots and come back from two sets down to rally for the win. He’s terrific under pressure. He’s tremendously agile. He’s got phenomenal hand-eye coordination. He has every international city at his feet. I’m telling you there is something there. And it’s just the beginning. It’s as if these other events and now Zagrev, right in our backyard, were tune-ups for the main show. I know it, and tennis is the key.”

Bowman looked hard at Mitch. “You’ve always been good at connecting the dots,” he said. “Even your enemies have to give you that.”

Wait, I have enemies? Mitch wondered. Lawlor, he thought. He was right not to trust that snake in the grass.

“Where’s this men’s tour now?” Bowman asked.

“Cincinnati for the Western & Southern Open before the US Open. Then there’s the Davis Cup semifinals and the indoor season, before the grand finale in London and the Davis Cup finals. They break for Christmas before it starts all over again—Doha, Abu Dhabi, Melbourne—”

“Enough. I’m exhausted just hearing the schedule,” Bowman said. He exhaled long and hard before he spoke next. “Okay, this is how we’re going to play this. You’re going to be taking a little vacation, watch a little tennis, see what you can find immediately. You’ll work this angle in addition to your usual duties and anything else that comes up. I’ll keep you apprised of what develops. And Mitch, for now, we’ll keep this on the down-low, okay?”

When Mitch got home, he found Laura making her favorite dinner—takeout. “I’ll be going to Cincinnati,” he told her. “Big IT problems there, and you know how it’s my job to shore up the satellite offices.”

He had cheated on Laura with the CIA for so long now that he did it smoothly. She made it easy. For one thing, she had no interest in discussing his “IT job.”

“My idea of a machine is the washer, the dryer, or the dishwasher. You put stuff in and walk away. Our washer even sings when it’s finished.”

“For the money we paid for it, it should sing the entire score of Mozart’s ‘Don Giovanni,’” Mitch offered.

Laura sighed. “At least it’s not like the computer. God, that’s like some addled-brain person. You have to stand there and handhold it. No thank you.”

Mitch, however, had just the ticket to distract her. “You’ve been working so hard on your Nights of Beauty for the hungry and homeless,” Mitch managed to say with a straight face. “You need a little R and R. Why don’t you, Mom, and Linda head down to that spa you like at The Omni Homestead Resort in Hot Springs, my treat?”

“Oh, Pumpkin, you are the best husband in the world,” she said, throwing her arms around him, perhaps the most physical contact they’d had in weeks. “I’ll make the reservations and call Mother right now.”

She didn’t make any pretense of disguising her feelings. “Mother, isn’t he the best?” he could hear her say on the phone. “What do you mean? Of course, he’s going away for work. Why would he cheat on me? Who would have him? Listen, he’s lucky he has me. Why do you always take his part? You’re my mother. Just call Linda. And tell her not to bring those hideous wide-legged shorts. We’ll get her some new things and see if we can prevail on her to lose a few pounds.”

It came as no surprise to Mitch, then, that he felt more emotion leaving Nicky for a week or so. “You be a good boy,” he said to his car. “Daddy’ll see you soon.” Mitch wondered if maybe Nicky was going to be throwing a party for the other cars in the development once Laura lost no time sallying forth the next morning.

Mitch, too, left quickly, Ubering up to D.C. to Old Ebbitt Grill for an early lunch before heading to Cincinnati. The 15th Street establishment—all Beaux Arts design with red velvet, mahogany, brass appointments, and nineteenth-century lights that looked like tulip bulbs—had been a favorite of Presidents Ulysses S. Grant, Grover Cleveland, Theodore Roosevelt, and Warren G. Harding. It still moved movers and shakers, who thronged its Oyster Bar, while the busty mermaid on the menu cover always caused a pleasurable sensation in Mitch’s groin.

Maureen—his favorite waitress, she of the auburn pixie cut offset by sapphire studs and a jewel of a personality—greeted him at a quiet booth in the back.

“Your usual lump crab cake, Arnold Palmer, and a decaf coffee afterward, Mitch?”

“Yes, but you better make that a decaf cappuccino instead, skim, of course. Let’s not go crazy. Still, I need a little boost. Headed to Cincinnati. Big IT trouble.”

“Boy, you computer guys are always dealing with these crises.”

“Yes, Maureen, and I fear this one’s not going to be so easy to unknot.”

How pathetic was it? He had more of a connection to Maureen—whose last name he barely knew—than his own wife and in-laws. But Mitch had no time for self-pity. He was on the jazz in pursuit of a big idea. And a worthy idea—well, to him that was like falling in love. Better even, because ideas were less disappointing than people.

He thought of the line from The A-Team, the 1980s series he sometimes caught on nostalgia TV: “I love it when a plan comes together.”

Like the fictitious Col. Hannibal Smith, Mitch loved it when a plan came together.

He took a sip of the tangy Arnold Palmer, fired up his laptop and, landing on Dimi’s homepage, rubbed his hands together.

“Okay, Dimitri Alexandrovich Orlov,” he said. “Let’s see you.”