JULIAN

My phone rang at seven forty-two on a Thursday morning and the number on the screen was not a number I had in my contacts, which was itself a piece of information, because I was a man who had, over the course of a career that had required the management of a significant number of relationships across a significant number of contexts, accumulated a contact list that was both comprehensive and current, and a number that was not in it was either a mistake or an intention, and the specific quality of a seven forty-two call suggested intention.

I answered.

"Mr. Voss." The voice was the particular and measured...