Don't Say A Word (37 page)

    "But I took a picture of her," Alex said sharply. "I made sure everyone knew she was there."

    Charles looked at his son, his expression one of a deep, aching regret. "I'm sorry you got involved, Alex. I never should have taken you to the square that day. I shouldn't have brought you to Moscow at all. That was selfish of me."

    Alex glanced away. "Let's focus on Julia."

    Charles turned back to her. "What else do you want to know?"

    "How did I get to the United States?" she asked.

    "Sarah brought you out with fake papers. She was supposed to put you in an established home that was set up for you, but she didn't. On the trip over, she fell in love with you, and there were other extenuating circumstances."

    "Like what?"

    He drew in a breath before continuing. "Sarah always had wanted a child, but she'd had a bad pregnancy, ending in miscarriage, and she thought it was doubtful she'd ever have a baby of her own. That fact ate away at her, making her reckless, making her want to take chances. She thought you might be her only opportunity to have a daughter. And she rationalized that she could raise you as well as any other foster home. So why not her? She knew the agency wouldn't agree. They didn't want her connected to you in any way. It would compromise other activities Sarah and I had been involved in while we were in Moscow."

    Julia was beginning to understand. "So my mother-Sarah… I have to stop calling her my mother, don't I?"

    Charles shook his head. "She was your mother. She loved you so much. Don't doubt that."

    "How can I not? Sarah faked her death, just as you did. She let her parents believe she was gone so that she could take me and disappear. She obviously had no moral boundaries. Her life was a lie. And so was mine."

    "She faked her death to protect her parents."

    "Did you cook up that reason together?" Alex asked scornfully. "Sounds like you were following the same script. Were you also having an affair? Mom certainly thought you were."

    "No. Sarah and I were just friends-always. We met in college at Northwestern. We both had an interest in the world. Sarah wanted to go to Russia because her grandmother was Russian. She actually joined the agency before I did. She was the one who suggested I might be able to help with the cover of my photography. Originally I was just supposed to take pictures, but gradually I felt compelled to do more. I met people over there who wanted to be free, and I wanted to help them," Charles said with passion in his voice. 'I know you two can't understand. You've never seen what we saw. Back then, there was no freedom. People disappeared. They died on a whim. No one was held accountable."

    "And you were going to make them accountable?" Alex demanded. "Who did you think you were? God?"

    "No, I was just one person who wanted to make a difference."

    "I thought you liked being a photographer. I thought that was your life, your sole ambition. You-told me it meant everything to you. Over and over again, you told me that," Alex said. "I grew up thinking it was the most honorable profession in the world, shedding light on the injustices in the world."

    "It was honorable, and it still is. It just wasn't enough for me." Charles took a breath, his eyes offering up an apology. "I never thought my decisions would affect you or your mother. I thought I could keep my second line of work separate. I believed I could leave the danger on the other side of the ocean. I was wrong."

    "What I don't understand," Julia said, drawing the men's attention back to her, "is why you and Sarah were in danger after the picture was published. What could be gained by going after either one of you then?"

    "The people who killed your parents now knew you were alive. They believed I had seen you because I took the picture. If they could find me, they could find you. Since Sarah had you, they could have gone through her as well, or used her parents as leverage. We had to disappear. Without us, there was no trail back to you."

    Julia thought about that. It made sense in a strange way. "All right. Let's say that's true. What about now? Why has someone broken into my apartment as well as Alex's place? Why would they want me dead now?; It's been twenty-five years, and I don't even know who I am, much less who they are."

    Charles clasped his hands together as he rested his elbows on the table. "Your parents made their plans very carefully. For two years they plotted how to leave Russia. It was rumored that they had something valuable to sell, something priceless that would provide them with enough money to live on once they were granted asylum here."

    "What was that something?"

    "I wasn't cleared for that kind of classified information, so I don't know."

    "How could my parents have had something priceless in communist Russia during the Cold War?" Julia tried to remember what she'd learned in world history in high school. "Who were they?"

    "Your mother, Natalia-"

    "Natalia? That was her name?" A distant memory flashed in Julia's head, a man calling impatiently for Natalia.

    "Yes, Natalia Markov. And your father's name was Sergei." Charles paused. "Natalia was a featured ballerina at the Bolshoi Ballet. She was the third-generation ballet dancer in the family. Natalia's grandmother, Tamara
Slovinsky
, danced for the Imperial Court before the revolution. She was in so much favor that she received many valuable presents, jewels, paintings, antiques. It was believed that Tamara managed to hang on to some of those presents, secreting them away or perhaps getting them out of the country. Tamara's husband was Ivan
Slovinsky
, a famous composer who fled to France during the revolution."

    "Oh, my God! Are you serious?" Julia asked in amazement. "I've studied Ivan
Slovinsky
. He wrote an incredible number of operas and ballets at the turn of the century. His music was powerful, awe-inspiring. He was truly gifted, and he was my…" She had to think for a moment to calculate the relationship. "He was my great-grandfather?"

    "Yes."

    "I can't believe it." She turned to Alex in excitement. "Maybe that's where I got my love of music. I've always wondered why I feel such passion for any kind of melody when no one else in my family cares even a little about it."

    Alex smiled at her. "It makes sense now."

    "What about my father?" she asked Charles, impatient to hear the rest. "Was he also in music or ballet?"

    "No, your father, Sergei Markov, was a high-ranking party member and a loyal communist until he fell in love with Natalia. Then he became disenchanted with the government. He could see that Natalia's career could be so much greater if she went to America. Apparently he had information that he was willing to share with our government if he and Natalia were granted asylum here."

    "So the Russians killed them before they could leave," Julia said slowly. "That's what happened, isn't it? Did anyone investigate?"

    "The Russian government blamed the explosion on faulty wiring. It was considered a tragic accident. They had the last word."

    "This is just mind-boggling. I can't wrap my brain around it all." She thought for a moment, trying to make sense of everything Charles had told her. "My mother was a ballerina. I thought about taking ballet once, but Mom-Sarah-wouldn't let me. She always had a reason why she couldn't sign me up."

    "Sarah didn't want you to dance," Charles interjected. "She was afraid you might grow up to be like your mother, that someone would eventually make the connection between you."

    "Which is probably why she also discouraged me from pursuing my passion for music," Julia finished.

    Sarah certainly had a lot to answer for. Only it was too late for her to give any of those answers.

    "You can't tell anyone about any of this," Charles said. "If the people who killed your parents find out you know the truth, it will be even more dangerous for you."

    "They think I have this priceless object, is that right?"

    "I suspect so."

    "This is unbelievable." Her head felt heavy with the amount of information she'd received, and she pressed a hand to her temple, feeling the ache spread across her cheekbones and around her eyes. "I don't know what to think. How am I supposed to feel? I know who my parents are, but they're dead. I can't meet them. I can't talk to them." The finality of that made her feel terribly sad. "I almost wish I'd never seen that picture of myself. I could have gone on believing I was just Julia DeMarco and not the orphan girl at the gates."

    "You're not the girl in the picture," Charles said abruptly.

    Her gaze flew to his. Her stomach did a somersault. "What do you mean? Of course I am." She silently begged him not to spin her around in another direction.

    "Of course she is," Alex echoed in surprise. "I saw her. I took her picture. I was there."

    Charles looked from Julia to Alex, then back to Julia again. His silence drew her nerves into a tight, screaming knot.

    "Just say it-whatever it is," she begged.

    "All right. I've told you this much. I might as well tell you the rest. You aren't the girl in the photograph, Julia."

    "Then who is?" she demanded.

    "You have a sister," Charles said, his voice slow and deliberate. "A twin sister. She was the one standing at the gate that day. You were inside the building."

    Shocked silence met his words. Julia didn't know what to say. It was clear Alex couldn't find words, either. The surprises just kept coming, each one bigger than the last.

    "That's impossible," she said, finally finding her voice. "Why wouldn't that have come out before, when the picture was published?"

    "No one in the general public ever connected the girl at the gates with the twin girls of Natalia and Sergei Markov, who died in an explosion. In fact, it was printed in the Russian newspaper that everyone in the house was dead, including the servants. No one ever came forward when the picture was printed to state your true identity. So if anyone recognized you, they kept it to themselves."

    She could barely comprehend his explanation. She was still thinking about the fact that she had a sister. "I would remember," she said, racking her brain for any hint of a memory, but her mind was blank. She didn't remember a sister or parents or Russia, or anything that happened before she was in the United States. Yet something teased at the back of her mind. Why couldn't she bring it forward, let it out?

    "Where is she?" Alex asked. "Where is this sister? Why didn't Sarah keep her and Julia together? Did something happen to her?"

    Julia caught her breath at his question, silently pleading that her sister wasn't dead, too.

    "It was too dangerous to keep the girls together," Charles explained. "They were taken out of the country separately."

    "Who took my sister?" She stumbled over the word sister, realizing it no longer applied just to Liz, but to another woman as well.

    "Another agent. Before you ask, I didn't know his name or anything about him. I wasn't supposed to be involved in that aspect of the operation. Stan made it clear that my job was to make the cultural exchange look authentic. Divert suspicion and attention by creating media opportunities for the theater group. The Russians wanted positive press."

    "Wait," Alex said, putting up a hand. "Stan? Did you say Stan made it clear? I thought he was just an editor."

    Charles smiled at that. "Stan was never just an editor. He was a friend. A crazy, wild friend."

    Julia didn't understand the gleam in Charles's eye. Nor had Stan Harding given her the impression of being crazy or wild. Alex appeared confused, too.

    "Are you saying Stan was involved in the operation to get the
Markovs
out of Russia?"

    "He was a ballet fanatic. He'd met Natalia a few times when she came to the States. She confided in him. He set up the defection."

    "So he lied, too," Alex said bitterly. "Big surprise."

    "Let's go back to my sister. I want to know where she went after she left Russia, and why we weren't reunited," Julia said.

    "Sarah wanted to get you back together," Charles replied. "But she had to keep you under wraps once the photo came out. Your sister had already been placed in a temporary foster home on the other side of the country. When things died down, Sarah wanted to find your sister, but she couldn't ask anyone for help. She broke all the rules when she took you. She was in hiding from everyone, including the agency. No one knew where she was. She had grown up in New York State and went to school in Chicago. Everyone was looking for her in those places. No one was looking for her here. I didn't even know she had you or where she was for over ten years. Then I saw her one day by accident down on the Wharf. I couldn't believe my eyes."

    "So she kept me from my sister, the only blood relative I had left? And she deprived me of my grandparents? What gave her the right to do any of that? I should have known about my heritage. I should have known everything," Julia declared, feeling angry and betrayed and sad all at the same time.

    "You were never supposed to know any of it. The people who killed your parents wanted the whole family dead. The only way to protect you was to keep you hidden away. If you knew who you were, Sarah was afraid you'd do what you're doing now: go looking for answers that could get you killed."