by Joanne Pence
The two got into a yellow car parked nearby.
The gray car rolled toward her. Angie curled up as much as she could, practically getting under the Peugeot. The car passed by, and from the streetlights, she saw the driver.
It was Marcello.
Paavo accompanied Josie to the morgue, which was every bit as cold and depressing in the day as it was at night. Maybe more so. He asked a technician to let her view the body on a screen.
When the tech motioned to Paavo that all was ready, Josie drew in a breath and watched the monitor. It flickered and came on.
“Oh, my God!” she gasped. She stared, then moved closer, as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Color leached from her face.
Paavo took hold of her arm. “You recognize him?”
“Of course I do.” It took her a moment to find her voice enough to say, “It’s my brother.”
Chapter 29
When the restaurant closed, Cat and Angie went up to their bedroom. As soon as they were alone, Angie breathlessly described the strange meeting between Marcello and the archeologists. It appeared some money had changed hands.
“That explains everything,” Angie said. “They’ve got to be the source of the St. Peter’s chain. They must have felt it was too valuable to turn over to the Vatican, and sold it to Marcello. I wonder if he’s still paying them off.”
“It all fits,” Cat said.
Angie chattered on, but Cat ignored her, hoping she’d fall asleep soon. Cat had even more to talk to Marcello about now.
Although exhausted, instead of getting ready for bed, Cat lay atop the covers, closed her eyes, and announced that she wanted to think. Angie said she was going to relax a bit and then call Paavo. When Cat opened her eyes, it was to a dark room, quiet except for Angie’s light snores.
The meeting had been set for midnight. The fluorescent hands of the small alarm clock showed one-thirty. After lining up the pillows along her side of the bed and covering them with a blanket so that when Angie awoke in the middle of the night to use the bathroom, which she inevitably would do, she wouldn’t grow suspicious, Cat snuck out of the restaurant.
She hesitated about going without Angie, but she had things to say to Marcello best said away from little sister’s big ears. There was no reason to be frightened of Marcello, and she had to stop filling her mind with doubts. Even their mothers were once good friends. Her heart lurched at the thought of Marcello’s mother.
A short taxi ride brought her to a house to the west of Vatican city, a residential area near the Valle Aurelia metro station.
“Aspetti, per piacere,” she said to the taxicab driver, wanting to be sure she got inside before she sent him off.
She knocked twice on the door before she heard the dead bolt being released.
The door opened a crack, then wider. Marcello stood before her in light blue pajamas. The top was unbuttoned and hung open, exposing every follicle on his white, hairy chest. Even his toes were hairy.
“Uh . . . ” she said, then shut her gaping mouth.
He glanced down. “Sorry.” He started to button the top. “I’d given up on you.” His voice was husky with sleep. Something about the way he stared made her uneasy—sort of like being the last piece of chocolate on a tray when a chocoholic had just walked into the room. “Come on in.”
“It’s this late only because I had to wait until my sister was asleep.” She waved off the cab driver.
Marcello took her wrist, pulled her inside, and shut the door. “Go over to the sofa,” he ordered.
“The sofa?” Confused, she did as told.
He turned off the lamp and looked through the peephole in the door. It took a moment before her eyes adjusted. Between moonlight and the streetlights of the city, she could see well enough in the room. “Why are the lights off?”
“I’m being watched.” He sat beside her on the sofa. “This way, it’s easier for us to see them than for them to see us.”
She scooted away from him. “Marcello, you’ve got to tell me what’s happening. My husband has disappeared. We think he’s been taken hostage, and . . .” She stopped. She’d almost told him about his mother’s murder. But first she needed some answers.
“I wish I knew what was going on, Cat, but I don’t. All I can figure is that someone wants the chain of St. Peter, but I don’t know who it is, or why. Or who was killed in my own kitchen!”
“Where is Rocco?” Cat asked. “He’s got to have the answers. If he’s here in Rome, he must have contacted you. Don’t lie to me, Marcello. Not after what we’ve done.”
“I’m not lying, Trina.” He squeezed her hands in his. “Believe me, I’d never lie to you. I don’t know who’s after the chain. And Rocco hasn’t approached me. I swear it, Trina.” His hands went to her elbow.
She pulled her arms free and looked around the dark space. “Whose home is this? It’s a far cry from your place in San Francisco.”
“It belongs to a friend. I left my hotel. Too many people knew I stayed there. Who told you where I was? My mother?”
At the casual mention of his mother, Cat’s heart twisted. She couldn’t keep the truth from him any longer. All her other reasons for needing to talk to him, all her questions, were going to have to wait. Compassion for him, for the horrible news she bore, filled her, and she took his hand. “I want to assure you that I’m here for you.”
“And I am for you.” He slid closer, his arms snaking around her as he leaned forward to loom above her. “I’ve always cared about you. You’re the most beautiful, the smartest woman I’ve ever met. Surely, you know that.”
“Marcello, please!” She crawled out from under him and stood, then smoothed her jacket. How had she gotten into such a situation? “You’ve got this all wrong! I’m here because I care—”
“You care? Trina, cara, I’ve always wanted to hear that.” His voice was a deep rumble, and she felt it in the pit of her stomach as he, too, stood. His arms circled her again, like an octopus with Velcro tentacles.
She backed away, but he stayed right with her. In the dark, she backed into a table. The lamp nearly toppled over. She kept going. “Marcello!”
“Trina.” The way he said her name was heartfelt and passionate.
She wasn’t the type of woman who caused men to act this way. They were usually too intimidated, for one thing. Or too put off. If this were a normal situation, she’d give him a tongue-lashing and be done. But this wasn’t normal.
First, she was stunned by his reaction to her.
Second, she thought about Flora . . .
Get a grip! Hands to his shoulders, she dug in her heels. “Stop.”
He lightly stroked her upper arm with his knuckles. “What’s wrong, Trina? Cold feet? Although . . . you’ve got the place right.”
Over her shoulder she saw she’d backed up into his bedroom. Her mouth went dry. “I came here to tell you something. Something awful.”
“Awful?”
“It’s about your mother.”
He froze at that. She had him sit beside her on the bed, and as gently as she could, told him what had happened.
For a moment she feared he’d strike her, shouting that she was lying, that she had to be a lying, heartless bitch. He bolted up, paced, swore, cursed heaven and hell. But even as he ranted and stormed, she could see that he was slowly accepting the truth of her words. Then he sat down again and began to weep, saying it was all his fault.
She sat beside him, cradling him, telling him it wasn’t, that he had nothing to do with it. It could have been a robber, some crazed serial killer, anyone.
“No,” he said, wiping his tears. “She died because of me. They wanted to know where the chain was. She didn’t know. She didn’t know any of it.”
“Didn’t know what?” Cat asked.
Suddenly, there was a loud thud against the front door, followed immediately by another.
“Damn! They must have followed you!” Marcello shouted, jumping up, stepping into
slacks and loafers, pulling the pants over his pajamas. He grabbed a gun from his nightstand and tucked it into his waistband at the back. They heard the thud again.
Cat, on her feet now, stared hard at the gun, then from Marcello to the door, unable to move, as if frozen to that spot with fear. Her voice a mere whisper, she croaked, “Who’s out there?”
“If you ask me, marriage sucks,” Frannie said to Luis Calderon. She was sitting on the edge of his desk, her back to Bo Benson, when Paavo returned to Homicide alone.
“Here comes a man who’s happy to be getting married, the poor fool.” Calderon waved his hand in Paavo’s direction. Luis Calderon was in his late forties. His job had caused the destruction of his marriage to his childhood sweetheart, and he was trying the dating scene again, with fairly disastrous results. He was grumpy, argumentative, and at times seemed to border on depression about the state of his life and his job. It didn’t help that he was partnered with Bo Benson, a young handsome African-American who dressed like a GQ model and had women practically falling at his feet.
“More the fool,” Frannie said, then turned to Paavo and called out, “I hope you and Angie will be happy. I really do. Of course, I have my doubts, but who the hell knows? You two might make it work. Miracles do happen sometimes. Rarely.” She chuckled, but her laughter faded at the grim look on his face and the cold hardness in his eyes. He ignored her, went to his desk and picked up the phone.
“Frannie’s right,” Calderon said with a nod at her. “Marriage would be just fine if you could trust women. But since you can’t . . . ” He let his words drift, as if, What more was there to say?
“And what the hell do you mean by that?” Frannie demanded. “Everyone knows it’s men who are the shits.”
He barked a harsh laugh and shook his head. “You’re young. You don’t know yet.”
“You wouldn’t believe how much I do know!” she countered, leaning close.
The two eyed each other.
“Okay, I’ll agree that men aren’t so hot either,” he said benevolently. “Life sucks.”
“Hey, you two!” Bo Benson interjected. He was ignored.
“Life sucks?” Frannie peered hard at Calderon. “Is that a news bulletin? Jean-Paul Sartre told us that fifty years ago. No Exit. ‘Hell is other people.’”
Calderon tipped his chair back, hands behind his head. “You read that stuff?”
“Sure.” She regarded him a long moment. “I’ll bring you a book of his plays. And Camus. Do you know Camus? The Stranger? ‘Mother died today; or maybe it was yesterday,’” she quoted.
He stared at her. “I like it.”
She was surprised. “You do? The Existentialists are out of favor, but they speak to me. I love talking about them.”
Calderon glanced at Paavo, then back at Frannie. “Could you use some more coffee? Or are you going out to do more investigating?”
Frannie didn’t hesitate. “I’m finished here for the moment. Let’s go find a coffee shop. I find it exciting to be able to talk to someone who understands.” She glanced at Paavo, who was still on the phone.
Calderon’s gaze never left her as he nodded. “Me, too.”
They headed out the door.
Bo looked from the now empty doorway to Paavo, who was setting the receiver down with extra care. Bo was all too familiar with the icy, narrowed eyes. He was quite sure that Paavo wasn’t even aware of the drama that had just played out in the room. “What’s wrong?”
Paavo stared at the phone coldly. “No one’s answering the phone in the Da Vinci restaurant in Rome. Angie should be in bed now, sleeping.” A savage look of anger mixed with fear flitted across his pale blue eyes.
“Didn’t you say the phone’s downstairs in the restaurant—”
Paavo cut him off. “It’s Marcello.”
“What?” Benson blinked at the non sequitur before he recalled where Paavo had been earlier. “Shit!”
Paavo smiled mirthlessly. “That’s right. The body in the morgue is Marcello Piccoletti. The real Marcello Piccoletti.”
Chapter 30
Angie was in tears. She and Father Daniel had walked around the empty streets near Da Vinci’s and over to St. Peter’s Square, but Cat was nowhere to be seen.
When Angie woke up at 2:00 a.m. to find her sister gone, she told herself it was nothing to worry about, that Cat was downstairs using the bathroom or making a middle-of-the-night raid on the refrigerator. But she wasn’t. As time passed, Angie grew scared.
She didn’t know where to go, what to do. The police were the last people she could go to. She didn’t know how to find Luigi, Bruno, or Cosimo, and she was afraid to wander the streets alone. She told herself she should just sit and wait.
She tried it, she really did, until, frantic, she found herself ringing the bell to Father Daniel’s rooming house. The manager looked askance, but when she explained that her sister was missing, he woke up the priest. Daniel quickly dressed and met her.
As they searched, she told Father Daniel the whole story of why she and Cat were in Italy.
“Let’s go back to the restaurant,” he said when she finished. They were near the Tiber at the Castel Sant’Angelo, built by the Emperor Hadrian and sometimes used as a refuge by Popes in the Middle Ages. “I’ll make you some coffee or tea. Your sister will be all right. I suspect she contacted Marcello. There may be a lot more going on between them than you know about.”
Angie was appalled by the idea. “My sister wouldn’t run off to be with Marcello! Or . . . I don’t think she would.”
Daniel gazed at her with compassion. “Let’s wait a while. You’re probably working yourself up for nothing.”
“Now that I’ve talked it over, you might be right,” Angie said, a little sheepish, and also annoyed, as they turned toward the restaurant. She was going to give Cat a piece of her mind for scaring her this way. “I never should have awoken you. I’m sorry. I should let you go back to bed.”
“It’s all right,” he said. “I’ll wait. I haven’t had anything so interesting happen since I came to Rome. All I’ve done is study and pray. It should be enough, but it just isn’t. The longer I’m here, the more I think I’m not very good at this profession I’ve chosen.”
The tremor in his voice told her how much this admission cost him. “All I can say, Father Daniel, is that you’ve made me feel better.”
“Thanks,” he said, and gave her a wan smile.
Once again, someone or something landed hard against the door to Marcello’s house.
Cat watched, stunned, as Marcello pulled the familiar black leather box from under his mattress, thrust it into her arms, and flung open the window.
“But—But—” she sputtered, her gaze jumping incredulously from the box to Marcello.
“Go! Hurry!” he ordered. “Take it with you and hide it. I’ll find you when I can. Now, go!”
The front door opened with a crash.
He scooped her up, tossed her feet first out of the window, and slammed it shut.
It was only a short drop to the cement-covered side yard. Cat landed on her butt, and sat there shocked. Until she heard a gunshot.
Scrambling to her feet, the box clutched in both hands, she ran.
Neighbors ran out of their homes and shouted. Dogs barked.
Her legs shook and wobbled as she forced them forward, the old joke playing in her mind: “Why’d you run away from the gunman?”
“Because I couldn’t fly.”
If she could, she would, especially when she reached a chain-link fence in the backyard. It was about five feet high, covered with flowers and vines. She heaved the box over first, then hiked up her skirt and somehow managed to hoist herself up onto the top metal bar. Her plans to gently lower herself fell apart when she lost her balance and toppled into a thick patch of prickly shrubs. She crawled to the box, picked it up, and stumbled away with every muscle, joint, and bone in her pampered forty-year-old body aching. Her Bowflex machine would feel like c
hild’s play after this. Fear that whoever was trying to get at Marcello would spot her with the box and come after her spurred her on.
Someone yelled at her as she ran, and she hollered back, “Dov’é la polizia?”—Where are the police?—which she hoped would tell them that she was law-abiding.
At the sound of police sirens, though, she kept going.
When Angie and Father Daniel returned to the restaurant, she made them both a double-shot latte. “Like back in the States,” Father Daniel said with a laugh.
“Exactly.”
They talked companionably. Angie was a good listener, and soon Father Daniel opened up to her. He talked a bit about himself, his calling to the Church, his life there, and what it was that bothered him. He had a hard time articulating it—but something was missing. He didn’t know what it was. He had expected his calling to provide the answer, but it only brought more questions. He sought, but hadn’t yet found, and the lack troubled him profoundly.
They were in such deep discussion, it took them a moment to notice when Cat walked in. She stared in shock at the two of them.
“My God! Cat! Are you all right?” Angie jumped to her feet, alarmed. Cat’s clothes and hair had dirt, leaves, and twigs stuck to them, and her face and hands looked like she’d rolled in mud. Angie had never seen her pristine sister so grubby. “What happened to you?”
“Father Daniel,” Cat said in greeting, ignoring Angie’s questions. She placed the box on the table, eyeing the two of them. “What are you doing up, Angie? Did something happen?”
“What am I doing up?” Angie shrieked. “I was sitting here worrying about you, that’s what! Pillows on the bed? What do you think I am? Three years old? For one thing, if you were ever as thick and lumpy as those pillows made you look, you’d have entered a fat farm or had your stomach stapled! I was so upset I dragged poor Father Dan out of bed to help me search. Look at you! You owe us an explanation.”
“I’m all right.” Cat looked down at herself. Her eyes turned glassy and dazed as if everything she’d been through had just then hit her.
