Gun Metal Heart

by Dana Haynes

  “They were responsible for the bombing of that hotel in Florence.”

  Sylvia glared at him. “Skorpjo doesn’t operate that far west.”

  “I know. But we have good witnesses.”

  Diego held up his right arm and pointed to it. “White scorpion tattoos.”

  “You’re sure?”

  Diego lifted his stein. “Friends died there. Yeah. We’re sure.”

  John turned to him, surprised by the plural. “Friends?”

  Diego turned only slightly in his direction. “Daria, maybe no. But they found the body of my friend Vince Guzman.”

  John didn’t know how to respond, so he didn’t.

  Sylvia Rush went into the restaurant to pay.

  When she was gone, Diego muttered. “As for Daria…?” He gave a small flicker of a shrug. “Olsson got people in Slovenia, Croatia.”

  Fredrik Olsson was the Viking, but John wasn’t necessarily supposed to know so, so again he said nothing.

  Diego looked around to make sure no one could hear them. “Everyone’s looking for Daria. Haven’t found her. Been four days. Almost five.”

  “Doesn’t mean she’s dead. I told you she called me after the hotel blew up.”

  Diego finished the remains of his beer. “Said she called you under fire from them Flying Monkeys.”

  “Yeah.”

  The Indio shrugged again. “Five days. No word.”

  Sylvia emerged, her uncontrolled mass of gray hair bobbing and floating around her lined face. The men rose. Diego said, “Thank you, Ma’am.”

  John said, “Who do we see in Belgrade who can speak for Skorpjo?”

  “I don’t know. They used to be a government-backed paramilitary but not as much any more.” Sylvia pointed up and to the right. “Pretty good hotel here. Quiet enough, until the call to prayer at five. Tomorrow you should head into Sarajevo. Go see Zoran Antic. He’s a member of the Bosnia-Herzegovina Parliament. And a friend. He’ll know more about Skorpjo. I’ll call him in the morning.”

  John bent and kissed her cheek, webbed with deep, dry age lines. “Thanks. This is helpful.”

  She looked up at him with those startlingly blue eyes, eyes that didn’t seem to fit into the midsixties face. “What are you hoping to accomplish, counselor?”

  “Save a friend. Stop military tech from getting into the wrong hands.”

  She shook her head ruefully and patted him on the arm. “All these years, and you’re still naïve.”

  He frowned in surprise.

  “Military technology always gets in the wrong hands, John. That’s what military technology is destined to do.”

  Twenty-One

  The U.S. National Security Agency was the first organization to discover that Daria Gibron was still alive, due to an 85 percent match from a traffic camera on the A21 outside Turin, Italy.

  The NSA alerted the CIA.

  A disgruntled CIA employee informed former fair-haired boy and disgraced agent Owen Cain Thorson, who became the next to find out.

  Thorson’s surviving partner, Jake Kenner, had scored some morphine and patched up Thorson’s blade-rent face the best he could. The two were waiting in a sweat-stink flophouse outside Florence. Stretch bandages held not-that-clean cotton swabs against the slice Daria had taken out of Thorson’s cheek and ear. Kenner advised Thorson to stand down, but Thorson took note of the e-mail from Langley and dragged his body out of the camp cot.

  Another person at the CIA leaked the information to the office and desk of General Howard Cathcart in army intelligence. Cathcart immediately contacted Colonel Olivia Crace in Sandpoint, Idaho. From there the drone pilots alerted the truck-and-trailer rig still based in Florence to get up on the A21, westbound, and to catch the bitch.

  They had predicted she would head east from Florence, toward the Italian border with Slovenia. Their intelligence apparently had been wrong.

  Bryan Snow, chief engineer on the Hotspur and Mercutio projects, began punching in a Level 1 diagnostic for the drones into one of his consoles. His eyebrows V’d behind his Buddy Holly frames. “She was spotted near Turin?”

  One of his in-house pilots said, “According to the NSA.”

  Snow shook his head. He couldn’t help think that he’d heard the name of the town on the radio. Recently. “Why’s that familiar…?”

  Behind the backs of his pilots, he typed in the information on a secure outside communications line. That line went directly to the woman working under the pseudonym Major Arcana.

  Next to learn of Daria’s resurrection was the Italian state security agency, the Agenzia informazioni e sicurezza interna, or AISI. Intelligence agents there also began forming on the east–west highway that bisects northern Italy.

  A great deal of intelligence and firepower and anger were aimed at Daria Gibron.

  As she had anticipated.

  * * *

  Major Arcana informed the White Scorpions, but in her usual cryptic manner: “Forecast calls for Hell.”

  * * *

  Italian intelligence, or AISI, sent a request to the Carabinieri to monitor all of the closed-circuit cameras along the length of the A21 highway and throughout northwestern Italy. The notification went out at 8:00 A.M. on a Saturday.

  When the state police had not responded inside of ninety minutes, AISI contacted the Carabinieri again. The response was harried. “We hear you! We hear you! Believe me, we’ve received nothing but requests for that whole section! Goddamnit, show a little patience!”

  * * *

  Besides guarding the Italian-Slovenian border, members of Skorpjo also sent three SUVs, armed like pirate ships, across the border into Italy. If they could intercept Daria before she hit the border, all the better.

  The SUVs made it through Verona and got north of Milan before hitting temporary barricades set up by the Carabinieri. The gunhands of the White Scorpions stowed their obvious weapons, and the lead SUV coasted up to a motorcycle cop in a tunic, helmet, sunglasses, and Sam Browne belt. The driver lowered his window. He spoke Italian. “What’s going on?”

  The motorcycle cop shook his head. “You’re kidding.”

  The driver glanced back at his cohorts, then at the cop again. “What?”

  The motorcycle cop made a disparaging hand gesture. “Buy a fucking newspaper, Slav.”

  Sandpoint, Idaho

  Colonel Olivia Crace had been tasked to the unnamed and officially nonexistent U.S. Army intelligence unit assigned to procure military tech because she knew much of the science the geeks always assumed was over the heads of the military brass. She also knew to share what she knew and what she suspected only with General Cathcart.

  At the American Citadel R&D offsite complex in Idaho, Crace opted to remain in civvies. She knew she fooled no one, but it seemed a prudent precaution. Today she wore corduroy trousers and boots and a light T-shirt under a summer-weight blazer. She could actually feel the absence of a holster and the weight of a .45 on her hip.

  She stepped into the observation lounge at almost exactly midnight. It was 8:00 A.M. in Italy.

  She entered the underground observation lounge to find Todd Brevidge already there.

  “Status?”

  The PA system was active, so Bryan Snow and the pilots in the control room could communicate with the observers.

  Brevidge looked like a guy trying desperately to control his bowels while looking calm. “Hi. We’re getting into—”

  Colonel Crace spoke louder. “Mr. Snow?”

  Over the PA, Bryan Snow said, “We’re moving the truck out of Florence. It’s heading west, on an intercept for Gibron.”

  Brevidge opened his mouth to speak and Crace rode over him. “Time to intercept?”

  Snow said, “The Away Team said they’re hitting surprising traffic on the A21.”

  Crace closed her eyes. Damn it. If I’d wanted traffic and weather … She said, “Can I get a map?”

  A few seconds later one of the screens that made up the full wall of the observ
ation lounge popped to life. It showed much of northern Italy, stretching from Florence in the south, France in the west, the Alps to the north, and the Adriatic Sea in the east. Near the top of the map was a highway marked A21, which stretched along the route described by the northwest wedge of Italy and the southeast wedge of France. Between which was a serious mountain range.

  Crace said, “That’s a lot of territory.”

  Brevidge chortled. “It would be for a team of soldiers on the ground. Even for an armored platoon. But that’s the beauty of Mercutio and Hotspur.”

  The colonel turned to him.

  “If this chick is out there, then we can find her. She can’t use any telephonic communication, because we can monitor all of them, landlines and cells. She can’t pass any CCTV cameras, and European cities are busting out of their seams with closed circuit. She’s traveling by highway, right? We control the airspace above the highways!”

  Crace was impressed. The lethal reach and firepower of the micro air vehicles was becoming clearer. She was starting to be glad this Gibron woman was giving them a run for their money. She and Major Arcana might be the exact targets they needed to convince the brass to pour black-budget money into this tech.

  She started brainstorming problems, looking for the weaknesses.

  “What if Gibron gets around too many phones? Can’t she max out the Mercutio’s capacity to monitor comms?”

  Before Brevidge could answer the godlike voice of Bryan Snow rained down from the ceiling-mounted PA system. “Negative, Colonel. We know how many cell towers there are in any given metropolitan area. And we’ve written an algorithm to monitor the traffic in the towers. Landlines are easier, of course. We actually just bribed phone company personnel rather than using technology to make sure we secure all those calls.”

  Crace nodded, as if Snow and the two in-house pilots could see her. “Outstanding. So she can’t fool us by hiding among too many cell phones.”

  “Correct,” Brevidge preened a bit. “She’d have to storm … I don’t know, New York’s Thanksgiving Day Parade or something. Otherwise, her ass is ours.”

  Turin, Italy

  Paco Montoya took the steps two at a time down to the hotel exercise facility. He wore a scowl as thick as his mustache. He expected to find the youngest member of Team Tarantola warming up on a treadmill. At least, he was supposed to be on the treadmill. And if that idiot Docetti wasn’t where he was supposed to be, then God help him.

  Fortunately, he was. Gianni Docetti jogged methodically, wearing gym shorts and cross-trainers. He wore a black elastic headband to keep his long, wavy, sun-bleached hair out of his eyes. Like the rest of Team Tarantola, Docetti was long and lean, his legs much more finely defined than his upper body.

  “Docetti!” the team manager bellowed.

  The youngster stopped jogging and grinned. “Skipper! Feeling good. I got—”

  “There’s a girl.” Paco Montoya jabbed a thumb in the direction he’d come. “Up in lobby. I tell her you not available. She insist. She very insistent.”

  Docetti let a smug smile alter the planes of his face. “She pretty, skipper?”

  But Paco Montoya didn’t find his enfant terrible all that charming. “Get your ass upstairs. Sign her autograph, get your photo taken. Whatever. But…!” He stabbed a stiff finger in the younger man’s face. “No sex! You understand?”

  Docetti said, “Sure, sure. I understand.” He smiled warmly. One of the things he loved about Team Tarantola was how the skipper pretended not to like him. Docetti found it endearing.

  * * *

  Downstairs, Gianni Docetti pulled on a T-shirt with the team’s colors and whisked off the headband. His thighs were sculpted like a Greek statue, and he loved the effect they had on people, so he didn’t bother with sweatpants. He jogged easily up the stairs, feeling energized.

  In the crazily crowded and cacophonous lobby of the hotel, he wended his way between fans, support personnel, and journalists, his eyes scanning for familiar faces. He almost missed her, because she wore a boyish Hawaiian shirt over a rocker T, with a straw porkpie, the brim turned up all around. He was used to seeing her dressed much more skimpily, or not at all.

  “Gatta!”

  Docetti whipped her up, lifting her feet off the carpet, his chest and arms sweat-slick and taut. He kissed her hard. Others in the lobby laughed, and a few snapped cell phone photos.

  He broke the kiss and set her down. “You came!”

  Daria was a little breathless from the hug and the kiss. “I did.”

  “You’re here!”

  “I am.”

  The twenty-year-old couldn’t believe his fortune. “You’re my good luck charm now! I will find you the best place to watch! When my team takes—”

  Daria put both palms on his chest and kissed him quickly. When he’d shut up, she said, “I’m not here to watch.”

  His face turned quizzical. “Not watch? But everyone on earth watches!”

  Daria shook her head. “No, thanks.”

  His eyes grew round. “You are here for love? I cannot! Gatta! My heart! Okay, but quickly, and not in my room. We—”

  “I’m not here for sex, and I’m not here to watch.”

  Docetti blinked several times. “Then what?”

  “I’m here to race.”

  Twenty-Two

  Sarajevo

  John was of an age that the very mention of the Bosnian city’s name evoked a muted sense of loss and fatality, even though he had never been to this region of Central Europe. The four-year-plus siege of Sarajevo had been the longest urban assault in Europe since World War II.

  As Diego drove up from the craggy Neretva Valley into the town ringed with hills, John could envision the mortar battery placements and the snipers that made the city a living hell for more than fourteen hundred days.

  John must have been focusing intently on the morbid memories, because Diego had to ask him twice, “You okay?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Seeing ghosts?”

  They drove toward the Old Town, or Bascarsija. “Seeing roses.”

  The soft dip of his hat brim meant please explain. John waited a couple of blocks, then pointed to an odd, rose-colored crater in a sidewalk. “See that? A Sarajevo Rose. A crater in a sidewalk where pedestrians were killed by mortar fire. After the war, they left the craters but filled them in with some kind of red resin. They’re called Sarajevo Roses. To remember.”

  They began looking for parking.

  “I was Army,” the Mexican spoke softly, eyes on the traffic. “Force Recon.”

  “Yeah?”

  “My problem: I see the value in a siege. See why it makes sense.”

  John was silent.

  Diego found parking near the famed Latin Bridge. “Not saying it isn’t shitty,” he said, and opened his door. “Just saying I understand.”

  * * *

  Zoran Antic was a very small man. He was maybe five-two and cypress thin, with a sharp widow’s peak and steel-colored hair. Zoran Antic was an academic, a war veteran, and now a member of Parliament.

  He met them at a coffee shop in the Bascarsija and under the shadow of a grand mosque. John had a thimbleful of strong coffee, Turkish style. Antic ordered peppermint tea, and Diego quietly smoked, sitting a bit apart from the other two.

  John thanked the Bosnian for seeing them on short notice.

  “Sylvia is a friend of mine, a friend of Bosnia-Herzegovina.”

  “Do I call you professor? Doctor? Delegate?”

  Antic’s skin seemed stretched over a skull too large for his thin neck. He smiled. “After all these years, you know, I still stop and turn if someone shouts ‘Sergeant.’” He laughed silently, and his twiglike shoulders shook. “But it is a kindness of you to ask. Professor is nice.”

  Pedestrians passed: laughing children, beautiful European twenty-somethings, and somber older couples. Most men smoked. Some of the women, but not all of them, wore headscarves.

  “A hotel
blew up this week in Florence. Some Russians, the Serbian foreign minister, and a number of Italians were killed. You know about this?”

  Zoran Antic nodded and blew across the surface of his tea.

  John said, “Skorpjo.”

  The old man’s fluttering gestures ceased. He drew eyeglasses from a coat pocket: steel rimmed, perfectly round, and with curved earpieces. They were surprisingly antiquated, even for a man in his seventies. John had a sense that Antic used them as a prop, to buy him time to think.

  “Go on, please.”

  “Eyewitness accounts. The scorpion tattoos. They were there to steal weapon technology from an Italian aerospace designer. I don’t know why the White Scorpions were in Florence, and I don’t know what a gang with no air force wants with aerospace technology. But a friend of ours is risking her life to figure it all out. She’s asked us to meet her in Belgrade. If I’m going to help her, I need to know more about this situation.”

  As John spoke, Zoran Antic studied him.

  “Tell me about this friend.”

  “Daria Gibron. She’s been a soldier and a spy. Now she’s … I’m not sure.” John paused to think of a good word that described Daria. After a moment, he simply shrugged. “She gets involved. She’s not a mercenary or a vigilante. She simply can’t stand by and do nothing when something needs doing. I can’t explain it better than that.”

  Antic said, “She sounds heroic.”

  “And Daria would be the first to laugh in your face for saying that. Nonetheless, she lived in my country for a while, and it’s my opinion she acted heroically and wasn’t treated very well by my government. So I aim to help her.”

  Zoran Antic nodded, as if weighing all that.

  “I am a member of the Bosnian Parliament representing the Illyrian Party. Do you know of us, Mr. Broom?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Hmm. The Illyrians were here before the Greeks. Before the Romans. The earliest organized society in this part of the world was the Illyrians. My party believes in a spiritual reunification of the region but not a political or military reunification. We don’t want Yugoslavia back. But we don’t want to be at each other’s throats. You understand, yes?”