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pushy, but the head of the organization you work for, this Shalom Foundation. What—”
    “I don’t actually work for them. Not on any regular basis. I’m here on a research assignment.”
    “Yes, so Jenny said. Doesn’t matter. It’s the head of the outfit who interests me.”
    “Philip J. Weinraub.”
    “That’s him. What do you know about him?”
    Annie shook her head. “Not much. He’s . . . I guess the word is insistent .”
    “Overbearing,” Geoff supplied.
    “That too.”
    “I presume you know Weinraub’s a billionaire. And that he’s deeply involved in Middle Eastern affairs, Israeli affairs to be precise. Any bearing on your research?”
    “Not exactly.”
    He smiled. “The cautious academic. I promise I’m not trying to beat you to some kind of punch.”
    “I didn’t think you were. But I’m an architectural historian. What I’m doing for Shalom concerns Tudor London. That’s my period.”
    “And that, I take it, is the connection to Jenny Franklin. All the same, your foundation is supposed to be concerned with Jewish affairs.”
    “In this instance, European Jewry,” Annie said. “Nothing to do with Israel, or Palestine as it was then.”
    “Hard to separate Jews from the so-called Holy Land,” he said stubbornly, “in any period.”
    Annie had to work to keep herself from concentrating on the cleft in his chin. It was for some reason very attractive. “Are you going to tell me why this all matters to you?”
    They had both finished their drinks. Geoff looked around. Every one of the little tables was occupied. He put a bill on the table. “Let’s get out of here.”
    ***
    “Hope you don’t mind,” he said, once they were sitting on a bench in Bloomsbury Square. “This isn’t a conversation I’d like to have overheard.”
    Annie said she didn’t mind in the least. Then she waited.
    “Yitzhak Rabin,” Geoff said. “Remember him?”
    “Of course. Prime minister of Israel during the Clinton presidency. Actively involved in the peace process.”
    “That’s the one. Assassinated in 1995 by an Israeli who despised the idea of a Palestinian homeland on the West Bank.”
    She’d been a freshman at Wellesley College in 1995. Not yet what Sidney O’Toole would call a fully fledged lush. She studied—grades were never her problem—and was reasonably aware of the world around her. But she’d also sneaked off campus to hang out with bikers. That was how she met Zak and learned to do vodka with a beer chaser. “What does Rabin have to do with Weinraub?”
    “The kind of money Weinraub has, the nature of his interests—it’s provocative.”
    “Provocative how? A great many American Jews, wealthy or not, share Weinraub’s interests.”
    “I know. I’m being vague because I don’t have proof. Usually when I set out to nail someone, I have my facts thoroughly documented.”
    “And nailing people,” Annie said, “is what you do.” She hadn’t meant it to sound accusatory, but that was how it came out.
    His reaction was matter-of-fact. “Nailing people is my job. At least my regular job. I’m on leave just now. Writing a book on the Middle East.”
    “Does Weinraub have a role in your book?”
    “He might.” Geoff hesitated, then apparently decided to trust her. “Rabin’s death was seismic in his part of the world. It left a hole that’s not been filled since. And right after he was killed, I came across a considerable number of unusual leads involving New York, Strasbourg, London, and Jerusalem, and possibly tying Philip Jeremiah Weinraub to the planning of the assassination.”
    “I take it you didn’t say so at the time.”
    “I couldn’t. I was working for the BBC back then. On the research staff. I had no show of my own and no clout. So given that I had no proof, the Weinraub story never went anywhere.”
    “Maybe there isn’t any proof. Maybe you were wrong.” His eyes, she decided, were neither gray nor blue. They were hazel. “In any event,