by Tom Fox
He knew this with absolute certainty, not because of a naïve overestimation of his men’s loyalty, but because of the actions of one man at the side of the ring of guards. On his screen was the image of an individual whom he knew could not possibly have sold out or been influenced toward such behavior.
There, only meters away from the Holy Father, was the crisp image of Commandant Raber himself, kneeling on the marble floor.
Christoph had been a man of devotion his whole life. He’d longed to be in the Guard since his youth; he’d trained every day in his teens. He’d obtained his parents’ blessing and signed up as soon as age permitted, and he’d served all the years since with an absolute dedication to his cause. It was the perfect marriage of honor, duty and the sacred. Something to which he was willing to give every fiber of his being. Raber was not a man of flowery piety or emotion—those elements of the Church weren’t his. But he was a man of steadfast loyalty and a love of duty, and that had served him well for many, many years.
But in all those years, through all that conviction, nothing like this had ever happened to him.
He clicked the space bar on his computer to freeze the image just as the recording caught his face rising from its reverent declension. It was like staring into the face of another man. That expression, that look. It was spellbound, reverent, captivated. He didn’t recognize these attributes in himself. That . . . awe. Where did it come from?
And where had it been his whole life?
Raber had no more explanation for his own behavior than he had for any of his men’s. He only recollected how in that moment he had not thought, had not deliberated—he had simply felt overcome and his knees had seemed the only place for him to be. And so he had knelt of his own will. He hadn’t looked to his men in either instruction or confirmation; he couldn’t even recall taking any notice of them. And yet they had all acted in the same manner, together.
Raber desperately needed to know what had caused this. The Vatican was in shutdown. The city outside working itself into a frenzy over the event to a degree that surprised even him. And yet Raber still didn’t have any idea what had happened. What is still happening, he reminded himself. The stranger is still here, within these walls. The Pope had taken him into the residence and the two hadn’t emerged since.
And I do not know who this man is who sits with the Holy Father.
He scratched at the slight stubble sandpapering his chin and clicked to a different camera angle, this time reaching out over the mass of faithful who’d gathered for divine worship but who instead stood transfixed on the strange events happening at the front of the church. Camera nine automatically panned slowly from left to right over a ten-meter-wide span of floor space on the southern side of the central nave, closest to the entrance to St. Peter’s crypt.
And then Raber’s breath stopped. He snapped forward, slamming his palm down on the keyboard and pausing the feed. The frame was blurred, and he frantically pushed at the keys to reverse the play frame by frame until it was back on the image he’d spotted.
There, in the midst of the crowd, was a face he knew. The face of a man he’d met before. The face of a man he would never, in a million years, have expected to see in a church.
18
Polizia di Stato, Monteverde XVI Station: 9:17 p.m.
“I wasn’t aware you’d been assigned to this case, Inspector Fierro.”
Gabriella always hated coming directly before her superior, especially on his own turf. Sostituto Commissario Enzo D’Antonio was an unpleasant man, rarely helpful, perched on his pedestal of power from long years of service and an adeptness at the art of political sycophancy. He’d been in charge of Gabriella’s unit since she started with the Polizia di Stato, and in all that time he’d always appeared to be covered in a thin sheen of disgusting sweat. He had the kind of hair that looked pitifully disheveled even on the days he bothered to comb what little of it remained, and in general bore the appearance of what Gabriella considered a thoroughly disgusting individual. He peered up from his desk with one of his unreadable, yet customarily displeased, glowers.
“I’m not on the case,” she answered.
“That’s right, you’re not. And the reason I know this with such perfect clarity,” Deputy Commissioner D’Antonio continued, “is because I, in fact, am. Not just on the case, but heading it.”
“You?” Gabriella’s surprise was palpable. It was unusual for a deputy commissioner to take hands-on control of an investigation in its first stages. But it did make sense of why Alexander had encountered him at the crime scene.
“I was here when the call came in and went out with our homicide team earlier this evening,” D’Antonio continued, pre-empting her obvious question. He flicked closed a red file folder on his desk, tapping it with a fat thumb. “I was there for the whole process of discovery and cataloging of the crime scene.”
“Including discussions with the man who found the body?”
“Yes, including . . . him.” The commissioner peered up suspiciously at Gabriella. “I trust by now you’ve been made aware of his identity.”
Gabriella tried to will a redness not to rise in her cheeks. “Yes.” She nodded curtly. “The reporter.”
D’Antonio huffed a laugh. “The reporter. Hell, you say it like he’s just one out of the shit-heap.” His eyes were accusing. “Don’t think I’m not aware of your past.”
Gabriella bit back a swirling mixture of embarrassment and anger and looked directly into his eyes. This was not the first occasion in her professional career she’d felt her body surge with an overwhelming desire to belt her senior officer out of his smug, arrogant superiority. But that career had gone as far as it had because she’d always been able to fend off the urge.
Even if only barely.
“Our past is irrelevant.” She attempted to imbue her words with warning. This was territory in which her superior had no business trespassing, and the pungent man knew it. “Did you interview Trecchio? Find out anything useful?”
“Something about him working on a story, intending to meet up with the victim as a potential source.” The commissioner’s tone lost intensity and retreated to a familiar sonority of disinterest. “Stumbled upon the murder scene instead.”
“You’re sure it was a stumble?”
“There’s no sign of him being the killer, if that’s what you’re asking.”
Gabriella shook her head. “It isn’t. Are you sure the murder wasn’t connected to his investigation?”
D’Antonio’s expression became momentarily curious. “Investigation? Far as I know, he’s only working on a story. For the religion column.” He emphasized the final words as if they clarified that anything published in the religious section had all the consequence of material written for a children’s storybook hour.
Gabriella persisted. “I’m curious about the possibility that his going as a reporter to meet this particular individual might have been a motivating factor in the victim being killed. It wouldn’t be the first time sources have been silenced before they could talk to the press.”
Silence, and then D’Antonio’s tone turned hard.
“Fuck me, you’ve been talking to him, haven’t you!” he snapped. “You sound like a recording of his babbles at the scene.”
The urge to lean forward and punch the senior officer squarely across the jaw was now almost overpowering. Instead, Gabriella breathed deeply, fingering the purple plastic rosary she always kept in her left pocket. It had been a gift from her grandmother more years ago than she could remember: a “little nothing” picked up at a thrift sale, but which Gabriella treasured. Its presence in her pocket usually brought a reassuring comfort.
In this instant, she wondered if it was strong enough to be used to throttle her boss.
“Alexander Trecchio contacted me,” she finally said. “He wanted to make sure the connection between his work and the murder gets examined.”
“And I told him we always explore every lead.”
/> “So you’re following up on the second disappearance? The other professor he monitored online?”
For an instant D’Antonio looked surprised, as if the existence of a second professor was news to him. But his annoyance quickly overcame any questions he might have had.
“I wasn’t born yesterday morning, Ispettore Fierro.” He leaned forward, stressing her lower rank. “There’s nothing to this case. If Alexander Trecchio were a headline reporter and our victim was about to turn over details on Mafia activities or terrorist plots, maybe he got offed before he could talk. But Crossler’s a bottom-rung university professor talking to a second-career page-eleven journalist about whether or not a hillbilly in jeans who’s walked into a church is actually an angel. Fuck sakes, Fierro, who in their right mind would care enough about this to kill a man?”
Gabriella wasn’t ready to let the deputy commissioner off the hook. D’Antonio’s smug dismissiveness was grating her the wrong way.
“There’s no way you can be so definitive. Not this early on.”
Her words came out as an angry accusation. She hadn’t really bought into Alexander Trecchio’s suspicions before this discussion—she’d agreed to take a look more to get him off the phone than from any belief in his theory. But suddenly an interest was emerging, if only due to the fact that D’Antonio was treating the case with such obvious disdain and unprofessionalism. That, and he was being a rank jackass.
“File a complaint with Internal Affairs if you want,” he said dismissively, waving a fat forearm in front of his face. “I make my own decisions around here, and I sure as hell don’t run them by you.”
“We need to be looking at all this much more closely,” Gabriella insisted. “I can help with that.” If nothing else, she could get her foot into the investigation.
“You can stay the hell out of it.” D’Antonio was suddenly leaning forward in his chair, both hands on his desk. “You aren’t assigned to this case, now or at any time in the future. Is that absolutely clear?”
She nodded, knowing that if she spoke, her anger would betray the lie in her answer. For in that moment, Gabriella had made a decision. She was going to look into this, no matter what instructions her commanding officer gave her.
D’Antonio raised a finger and pointed it at her face. When he spoke, his words were suddenly quiet and cold.
“I am going to warn you once, and only once, Inspector Fierro. Stay away from this case.”
Alexander’s apartment: 9:41 p.m.
Alexander was still sitting in his kitchen, a half-drunk beer in his grasp and the open frame of his laptop perched before him on the yellow Formica of the table. He hadn’t intended to stay engrossed in his research so late into the night, but something about the details he’d uncovered had captured his attention and wouldn’t let go. There was a gentle haze of smoke filling the kitchen from the near-constant stream of cigarettes he’d been smoking for hours. He’d only stopped when the pack was empty.
When the doorbell rang, he felt a jolt of surprise. He’d lived in this flat for four years, but he’d only heard the buzzer ring twice, maybe three times. He’d almost forgotten it existed at all.
He stepped heavily through the kitchen to the front room, and finally to the oak door that opened out into the main corridor of the apartment block’s third floor. As he swung it open, he was confronted by the unexpected figure of Inspector Gabriella Fierro. Her shoulder-length hair, the same light straw color as he remembered it, was slightly windswept and her jaw, normally elegantly sloping and soft, was hard-set.
“Mr. Trecchio, I’m sorry to disturb you at home.” There was a hint of apologetic embarrassment on her features, but it could barely be spotted beneath the intensity that gleamed in her hazel eyes.
Her language was curtly professional. Alexander fumbled to reply in kind.
“Inspector, this is a . . . surprise.” He immediately felt self-conscious, realizing in an instant that he hadn’t set eyes on her in almost two years, that his stubble from the long day was at full growth and that the suit he’d been wearing since morning desperately needed a clean.
Gabriella paid no heed to his discomfort. Instead she stepped past him, through his door and into the flat’s comfortably appointed front room.
Her professional tone evaporated.
“Alexander, we need to talk.”
19
9:49 p.m.
“What are you doing here?” Alexander asked, startled by Gabriella’s unannounced presence. “I wasn’t expecting to hear from you until the morning.” If he was truthful, he hadn’t entirely expected to hear back from her at all. He ran his fingers self-consciously through the short, gentle waves of light-brown hair atop his head, wondering whether he looked as disheveled and unkempt as he suddenly felt.
“Our schedule got bumped up a little.” Gabriella entered fully into the front room of his flat. She’d been here several times before, though almost four years ago, and looked about as though she might be able to elicit the details of Alexander’s life in the intervening period from the decor. Her nose scrunched slightly. She had never liked the scent of stale smoke.
“Your story,” she said, coming quickly to business as he closed the door and switched on more lights, “it’s already causing problems.”
“Not bad considering I haven’t written a word of it,” he replied, trying to inject some levity into the moment.
“Sometimes asking questions is enough.” Gabriella made to sit down in the blue twin-seater sofa with a kind of automatic familiarity, then caught herself mid-bend and rose back to a normal posture. She motioned toward the sofa.
“May I?”
“Make yourself at home.” Alexander waved a hand toward the seat. “Can I offer you a drink?”
“No drinks, Mr. Trecchio.” Her tone was again conspicuously businesslike. “The circumstances may have changed, but this is still a professional visit.”
“I understand.” So the going would not be entirely smooth. But it didn’t have to be entirely uncomfortable, either. We never did anything wrong, he reminded himself. I have nothing to be embarrassed about, except the way I ended it.
“Well I’m halfway through a beer,” he said, walking toward the kitchen, “if you don’t mind.”
There was a slight pause. Then, from the front room, “All right, then, bring me one as well.”
Alexander smiled, his nose in the refrigerator. “You’re not on duty?”
“My shift was up twenty minutes ago.”
Alexander handed her the beer and dropped himself into a tired brown leather recliner facing the sofa from the side of the room. He took a long swill from his own half-empty bottle. He let his teeth rattle against the glass lip, an old habit.
“What’s brought you all the way over here this late at night?”
Gabriella paused to reflect before answering, and Alexander took advantage of the moment to pass his eyes over her for the first time in what suddenly felt like far too long. Her light hair and porcelain skin were just as he remembered them, her figure slender, well-toned and hardly concealed beneath the smart professional suit she always wore. But there was something different about her now. She had gained a confidence that showed through in her demeanor. Her back was a little straighter, her shoulders pulled at just that much more authoritative an angle. She was a woman who had taken possession of herself. Something in that realization brought Alexander a sense of satisfaction. Or at least an ease of conscience. He was glad things had gone well for Gabriella Fierro.
Their introduction, four years ago, had been purely professional. He was still a priest, still in post with the Vatican curia. There had been a string of thefts of church property in local parishes in Rome, and Alexander had been asked to liaise with the police in the investigation. There he’d met her, as junior an officer in the State Police as a woman could be, and yet something had immediately flared up inside him. It wasn’t lust; it wasn’t really carnal at all. He had met this woman, he’d walked with he
r and talked and worked with her, and he’d experienced the most overwhelming desire for closeness.
Gabriella certainly couldn’t be blamed for enticing him away from the clergy. He’d had been on that outward path for quite some time before he’d met her. That loss of faith had been something deeply interior, private—something he’d only been able to share with his uncle, whose vocation as a cardinal of the Church never overpowered the closeness of their family bond. Alexander had been faltering, falling under the weight of the corruption he encountered in the institution he had been raised to love. In the end, he hadn’t been strong enough to resist that sorrow.
But even if she hadn’t drawn him away from the Church, something about Gabriella had captured him from that first encounter. She was beautiful, with her straw-like golden hair that batted at her shoulders. With eyes that always seemed to radiate warmth. But what really struck him was something far deeper. Unlike so many other people he’d met, Gabriella seemed genuinely to care. To believe. To broadcast sincerity and stability long before she ever opened her mouth.
Alexander had been captivated. He’d clumsily ensured their interactions continued as long as possible, expressing his interest with all the grace and tact of a fumbling teenager. There had been an initial phone call, the first not related to work, and then another. They’d grown longer and more personal. Then there had been a café, a restaurant, walks in parks and drives outside the city.
And then, one day, there had been Alexander’s apartment. Gabriella had looked so beautiful, arriving in a sky-blue dress, silky and form-fitting, her hair drawn back and her neck sloping beautifully. Alexander had prepared pasta, the only dish he knew how to cook, together with a decanted bottle of the finest Chianti he could afford. He’d dressed, too, for the first time, without the dog collar.
