“Mrs. Marino?”
“I have to go now, dear.”
She hung up.
A truck rumbled by on the road above. It was enough to send the car scuttling down the hillside. I ducked under the jutting rock even more, pulling my legs in to my chest. I was jolted as the car struck the rock above my head and then teetered for a moment a few feet away from me before plunging into the sea below.
My heart was pounding in my throat and I couldn’t breathe. I waited for the rock I was on to dislodge and follow the car. When nothing moved, I scooted to the edge and peered down. The headlights shone for a second and then went out.
I was about to call Mrs. Marino back and tell her I needed help when my phone rang. Without looking, I punched the answer button.
“Gia,” I said.
“Mrs. Santella?”
The voice was vaguely familiar.
“Yes?”
“This is Inspector Brossard. We have some new information,” He went on. “We are going to need you to come in for questioning again.”
“I won’t be able to do that,” I almost laughed as I said it.
There was a pause. “I went by the villa where you are staying.”
His voice seemed so far away. I was only half-listening. I was suddenly tired and my mind was drifting.
The sea before me, so dark that I couldn’t distinguish the horizon, was a dark mass of roiling power. It was hauntingly beautiful and yet, deadly. The menace drifted up to my rock prison. It could take a life in an instant. I suddenly felt very sleepy. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. The weight of the phone in my hand felt unusually heavy. I could hear the inspector’s voice, but it was faint, not really registering.
I opened my eyes long enough for my finger to press down on the glowing red picture of the phone and silence the tinny voice. I closed my eyes again. I began to drift off to sleep. But wasn’t that the worst thing to do with a concussion? I couldn’t remember.
The thought of sinking into oblivion suddenly seemed like the best thing ever.
My boyfriend was dead. Everyone I loved had died violently. Except Dante. It was too much.
Life was meaningless. I had nothing to live for anymore. It was a cold, hard, fact. Tragedy after tragedy had pushed me to this place, to the edge: literally the brink of a cliff and figuratively, the brink of oblivion.
What was my purpose on this earth? I couldn’t see one. Not anymore.
The night was dark. The sea below seductive. The crashing waves called to me. It would be so easy. I was not a coward. I was not afraid to die. I scooted out from under the rocky outcrop. My feet, ankles, and then my knees were suspended in the air, hanging above nothingness. I sat with my legs dangling on the edge. There was nothing between me and the rocks below. It would be painless. It would be quick.
It would erase the gut-punching pain that I couldn’t escape. Right then, the emotional agony that overwhelmed me surpassed the sharp pain in my leg, side, and head. I scooted another inch, so I was perched on the edge of the rock. I leaned my torso forward. Just a little more and I would tip the balance and tumble to the rocks below. The fall would be exhilarating. The momentary release from my pain welcome and then, at the bottom, blessed oblivion.
My vision was blurry. I swiped at my eyes and my hand came back wet. I was crying. The sounds coming from my mouth were sobs. I was gasping with sobs, trying to catch my breath. The weeping had taken me off guard.
When I finally finished crying, I lay down. I closed my eyes and curled my legs up to my chest, hugging myself. I would sleep on it. In the morning, if I hadn’t rolled off the cliff in my sleep or died from going to sleep with a concussion, then I would make plans to exact my vengeance. I fell asleep to the image of a female’s black silhouette standing in the moonlight.
Blinding sun reflecting off the sea woke me. I squinted, confused. Then scrambled back from the cliff edge. I’d make it through my own dark night of the soul.
I would live.
With a caveat. I’d decided to live for one thing and one thing only: vendetta.
But first I needed to get the hell off the cliff and get to a doctor. My head still hurt like hell. I looked at my phone. I’d missed seven calls from the cop.
The inspector was happy to hear from me.
“We were going to send out a search party.”
I explained my predicament and told him where I thought I’d gone off the road. He told me he’d call me back.
A few minutes later, my phone rang. Clicking to answer, I saw the battery was about to die.
“Help is on the way.”
35
The next day, Francesca reported back with news on Gia.
Eva was in her bedroom, a small overnight case open on the bed.
“She was in a car accident,” Francesca said.
Eva’s heart felt like it had stopped. Why did she even care? She’d never met the girl.
“She’s fine,” Francesca said. “She’s back on the Amalfi coast. The inspector wanted to question her. She and Brossard had a late lunch together.”
“Did we get a message to her?” Eva reached into a case and extracted a marble-handled dagger, then tucked it into a special slot on the custom bag.
“No. She’s already gone. Again. Checked out of the villa for good.”
Eva sighed. “Tell Brossard he’s always giving us too little and too late.”
“Will do.”
Eva looked at the clock. “The ball is tonight. I will kill Turricci and then we won’t have to worry about where Gia is anymore.”
She didn’t meet Francesca’s eyes. She already knew that she’d see disapproval in them.
“When is the next ferry to Sicily?” she asked in a brisk tone.
“One hour.”
“That’s the one I’ll take.”
“Your leather leggings will be quite a hit,” Francesca said, glancing at Eva’s outfit.
“Madonna! I have to dress up for tonight, won’t I?” Eva shot a glance at her walk-in closet. “I’m going to need a drink.”
Francesca raised an eyebrow.
“Kidding,” Eva said, but she eyed the bottle of wine on a sideboard.
Francesca knew Eva rarely drank when she was on a mission.
She’d drink later, when she had spilled Turricci’s blood.
36
After I met with Inspector Brossard, it was time to leave the villa and the haunting memories of my time there with Bobby. I wasn’t sure where to go. I supposed I still needed to visit the villa Turricci had given my mother. Maybe there I would find some clues about the elusive woman who had given birth to me.
However, on my way out of the Positano house, I found a large white box with a small envelope attached that had been delivered at some point. My name was typed on the outside of the envelope. I ignored it and lifted the lid to the box.
A silky navy blue dress lay inside. Armani. My size. And black patent leather stilettos. Also my size.
My first thought was: Dante.
The envelope contained an invitation. Gold words on a black background.
There was no description of the event. Just a time and date and location: Villa dei Fiore.
An address followed. 287 Calle dei Fiore. Sicily.
Nine tonight. In Sicily.
There was no indication of who it was from. I was about to crumble up the invitation when my phone dinged. The number was blocked. Not Dante.
“See you tonight.”
I stared at the words.
37
Eva’s bed was covered with silks and taffetas and lace as she tried on one ball gown after another. She stood in her emerald green and black lace La Perla demi-cup bra and matching tanga panties, examining the choices with a slight frown.
“For a woman who has a daily uniform of black leggings and black long-sleeve tops you have a godawful extreme number of choices for fancy attire,” Francesca said. The older woman was sitting in an ornately upholstered chair in the
corner smoking a joint. It was her only vice—every evening after dinner she smoked one marijuana cigarette mixed with tobacco. Well, her only vice besides the one she didn’t consider a vice—alcohol. The woman could outdrink a man three times her weight and still remain as sharp as a machete blade as she did so.
“It’s my one chance to dress nice,” Eva said. For a second, she felt a sharp pang in her chest. When she was a Malibu housewife and mother, she wore pastel colors exclusively. Her wardrobe had been full of color—petal pinks, soft turquoises, spring lavenders, and daffodil yellows.
Now, her bed was covered with gem-toned gowns and a few metallic-toned dresses in bronze, silver, and gold.
She picked up a sleek gold gown laced with actual metal.
“I think this one,” she held it up against her lingerie-clad body. It was heavy and luxurious at the same time.
“Ding, ding, ding,” Francesca said. “It can probably stop a bullet and a knife!”
Francesca howled with laughter. Eva smiled.
“Plus, it has the matching clutch that will hide your weapon perfectly,” Francesca said.
“You are my kind of woman, Francesca!” Eva said. “Why not make sure the clutch containing the gun you are going to use to murder a man matches your dress?”
Francesca burst out laughing again but then sobered. “Be careful, Piccolina.”
Little one. Francesca was only a few years older than Eva, but sometimes treated her like a daughter instead of a partner. Eva didn’t mind. She had been without a mother for much too long.
“It will be easy to kill him,” Eva said seriously. “It’s getting back out of the ballroom that is going to be the problem.”
She flashed back to the shooting at the Miss America pageant in Miami. She’d had no choice but to storm down the aisle at the pageant and take out the shooter, a man intent on killing the entire audience. But with the stampede the shootings caused, Eva had nowhere to flee. Within seconds a police officer had a gun to her head. She was lucky that the authorities had determined she’d acted in self-defense. She was also lucky that a Los Angeles detective had neglected (surely on purpose?) to input her fingerprints into a national database that would have shown she was wanted for murdering her husband and children. Despite taking out the real killer, authorities had not closed the case and still considered her a suspect in her own family’s slayings. Ridiculous.
The only small glimmer of hope was that she knew LA Detective Jay Collins was still trying to clear her name.
“Eva?” She’d been so lost in thought she’d missed what Francesca had said.
“I’m sorry?”
“I was just saying that it might be worth waiting for him to take a smoke break or to get him either coming or leaving than to do the shooting in the ballroom itself,” Francesca said. “It’s a sex party so the security is going to be outrageous.
“It’s a sex party?” Eva smiled. “How did I miss that?”
“Oh, didn’t I tell you? It’s basically a fucking orgy.”
“Oh my.” Eva mocked astonishment.
Francesca rolled her eyes. “All those rich perverts can’t risk the paparazzi snapping pictures of them fucking young men while their wives think they are on a business trip. They will pay more to avoid that than keeping out an assassin.”
“True,” Eva said. “If Turricci is stupid enough to drive his Lancia there, I can even hide out somewhere along the drive and step out in front of him, and that’s all she wrote.”
“Wrote?” Francesca said.
“Sorry. American expression.”
Eva felt her blood pounding imagining the scene: She steps out of the brush at the side of the road, plants herself, legs spread wide in front of the Lancia and fires away until she strikes gold and the car goes swerving off into the bushes. She then gets back into her car, conveniently hidden behind a grove of trees and drives merrily away.
But things were never that simple.
Eva draped the gold dress on an upholstered chair that matched the one Francesca was sprawled in, threw on a silky robe and sat at her white desk in the corner, flipping open her laptop.
“Blueprints of the property show that there might be an underground passageway leading into the structure, but I think you’re right. My best bet would be to confront him before or after the ball.”
“There’s a better chance he will be alone before,” Francesca had risen and was now standing over Eva’s shoulder eyeing the computer screen.
“Although he might not be the kind who takes his date home with him,” Eva said. “I have a feeling he’s the love ‘em and leave ‘em type.”
“He’s a class A bastard, that’s for sure,” Francesca said.
Eva swallowed back a wave of fury. She had told Francesca she didn’t want to know if he’d raped Chiara before killing her. At least not right then. She wanted those details after she had taken his life, but not before. Right then her main goal was to stay calm and collected so she could take off his fucking head. Too much rage and indignation could thwart her plans, make her act rashly—emotionally instead of strategically and calculatingly.
She’d learned this as a young assassin in Sicily.
A calm head was needed.
At least until she had taken her revenge.
Francesca and Eva spent the next hour reviewing Eva’s plan of attack.
Eva sat at her vanity applying makeup and fixing her hair so once she broke into the ball, all she’d have to do is change into her ball gown to be ready to go.
At the last minute, she’d decided on a silky red dress instead of the heavy gold one. She needed something filmy that could be wadded up in a small bag. She also tucked in flat gold sandals that wouldn’t show under the hem but could be easily transported and changed into once she was on the property.
Satellite images showed the mansion was situated on the edge of a cliff overlooking the Tyrhennian Sea. A massive swimming pool bordered by a small wall was practically up against the cliff edge.
The rest of the backyard was taken over by a garden with roaming paths bordered with trees and flowers and hedges. Small benches dotted the path where couples could sit in privacy.
There was a small pathway shooting off to one side of this garden that led to another, more secluded alcove where a gazebo was tucked into a wooded area.
From what Eva and Francesca could tell, the clearing with the gazebo, which was still well within the towering three walls of the garden, was the most remote spot on the perimeter of the property.
A long, low field lay on the other side of the wall at that spot. The field stretched for about a mile and then met a small side road.
The plan was for Eva to park on that road and then make her way under the cover of darkness through the field and then scale the concrete wall using special custom climbing spikes. One set was attached to gloves and the other attached to the bottom of her boots. Once she scaled the wall, she would quickly strip and don the ball gown, sandals, and matching clutch containing her weapons. She would then wander into the party from the garden where she would hunt down Turricci and shoot him between the eyes.
The blueprints of the large mansion indicated she could slip into the kitchen, run through a series of passageways, and then exit through a service door to the garden. From there she would don the gloves and boots and be back over the wall before anyone noticed. They’d all expect her to escape in a vehicle out front.
“It’s a plan,” Francesca said. “Not the best I’ve ever heard, but it should work. I’ll have some of the women on standby if I haven’t heard from you two hours after the attack.”
Francesca knew better than to try to talk Eva out of it. All she could do was attempt to prepare her for any inevitability.
“That won’t be necessary.”
“I can have someone come with you,” Francesca said. She knew Eva would argue against that and forget about the women on standby.
“I’ll go alone,” Eva said. “I refuse to risk any mor
e lives. If they come after me, I only have to worry about myself.”
“Fine,” Francesca said.
Eva left wearing her standard uniform of black leggings, a black long-sleeved shirt, and black boots but picked out a pair of boots with serious tread that would help her grip the ground as she ran across the field.
At the last minute, Francesca walked into the garage and handed her night vision goggles.
“Wear these so you don’t twist your ankle in a rut on the field,” She said. “That would foil your plans.”
Both women knew a twisted ankle was the least of her problems.
38
The circular drive of the mansion was already filled with Rolls Royces and Bentleys. Nothing with even a whiff of sporty. The vehicles all screamed stuffy, old money.
A doorman in white opened the massive wooden door. I handed him the invitation as I strode past. I was eager to see who my host was.
The hall was empty. I stood, uncertain. Then a man in a black tie appeared and handed me a black mask.
“If you will?”
I stared at him, not moving, the mask dangling from my fingers.
“Please put the mask on, and I will lead you to the others.”
Heart pounding, I slipped the mask on, immediately feeling claustrophobic even though it only covered my eyes. Somebody wanted me here, and I had no idea why. I felt naked without my gun. I hadn’t had time to try to figure out how to obtain a gun in Sicily without risking my neck again. I followed the man’s broad back down a hallway of closed doors. Then he opened one door and stepped inside.
Dim light came from red lanterns hung from the tall ceiling and red glass sconces on the black, fabric-covered walls. It took my eyes a few minutes to adjust before I could see more than just shadowy figures. Heads turned my way, and whispered murmurings filled the space. It looked like two dozen people were in the room.
Dark bouquets of what looked like red roses were scattered on a few small tables. Plush chaise lounge chairs and ottomans were pushed up against the walls. The one nearest me appeared to be upholstered in black-and-red, paisley satin.
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