“Slut,” she taunted, her eyes glancing at my partially unzipped dress.
“You’re here!” I shrieked, hugging her once more.
Chapter Thirty-One
I didn’t sleep much that night. It was already close to three a.m. when Charlotte arrived, and she grilled me like a prime-time news anchor as I relayed everything that happened with Craig Bernard, the boat chase, and the empty flat. Then, she updated me on her progress. She was still unable to locate the photo of Keira in the trunk. Even worse, the Boston PD removed Detective Dawkins from the case, leaving McCoy in charge—a cop I’d hated since he accused my sister of attempting suicide and magically evaporating.
Add to that, Tyson and Regina were asking if I’d be available for Back to School festivities, which only reminded me of how far I’d fallen from a normal teenage life. I didn’t know what I wanted after I found Keira. Part of me yearned for simplicity—dating, college applications, and pep rallies—while part of me already knew I surpassed the ability to meld back into that life. I was like a soldier returning stateside; my adrenaline was in such perpetual flow, could I ever be content with daily commutes and homework? Could I pretend this entire world of espionage wasn’t lurking in the shadows? And did I want to?
Charlotte eventually drifted off with jet lag, while I lay in bed, staring at the clouds of rust-colored water stains blotting the ceiling. I may have dozed for a few minutes before the sun crept through the hotel curtains in a gray morning haze. I had to get out of here, start moving, clear my head. It was five thirty when I exited the hotel, and even the front desk clerk seemed surprised to see me. Outside, the canals were motionless. Only a lone, rank-smelling trash boat passed as I veered through the walkways that led back to the building where Keira was held, like a beacon was calling. The storefronts selling colorful Venetian glass and bottles of wine were closed. The city was sleeping.
I crossed a small pedestrian bridge and spied a large church ahead—Campo dei Frari. I stepped into the familiar square. Irish-green shutters flanked every window, with sienna bricks peeking through the beige stucco façades, perfectly matching the exterior of the Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, which anchored one side.
I stared at building 3070. Supposedly, Keira had been held in apartment 302. It was time for me to go in. See it for myself.
I strode into the center of the empty square, the newsstands closed, the cafés covered with metal security protection. The only movement came from a fluttering leaf. I looked up at the smoky gray sky, reminiscent of my eyes, and a wave of defiance surged through me. I held my arms wide, turning in a loop of circles, faster and faster. If anyone were waiting for me to show, if some evil spies were tailing my every move—here I was. I’d done what they’d wanted. I walked into their trap. They could have me. Now. Just take me to my sister.
A few moments passed, my dark hair whipping my cheeks as I spun, but no one appeared. I dropped my arms with a sigh and scanned every window along the square, willing a curtain to shift, a light to flicker, a shadow to move.
But I was alone. I could feel it.
I trudged to the door of the building. It was crafted from solid wood, painted hunter green to match the shutters, though the thick layers of paint had long ago begun to chip. I placed my fist on a carved wooden panel and knocked. (Hey, you never know.) It barely rattled, and no one answered.
My eyes moved to the long, thin, rectangular windows lining the vestibule door, their glass ribbed and frosted. They looked modern, almost new, and a lot less solid than the door. If I was ever going to break the law, now was the time.
I glanced back at the nearby newsstand; sienna bricks coated with white chalky dust held a plastic tarp over its cashier window. Before I could overthink it, I darted over and grabbed a brick, its clay leaving a film on my palm as I moved back to the door. I closed my eyes, made a silent wish that buildings this old did not have alarm systems, then crashed the brick against the glass windowpane. Millions of shards clattered at my feet, and I wasted no time. I shoved my hand into the hole, trying to avoid the jagged edges as I felt for the doorknob.
It opened easily.
I slipped into the building, rushing up the stairs as quietly as possible, then stopped on the third floor. The door to flat 302 was slightly ajar, and I couldn’t help but think of the door to my apartment that fateful morning, before I found the tub, before everything changed.
I exhaled deeply and went inside. The door creaked like a horror film as the stench of garbage smacked my face. I turned and saw a stack of grease-stained pizza boxes and overflowing trash bags filling the entry. Someone had been here recently.
“Keira!” I screeched, charging into the living room. There was a lone sofa, its striped brown fabric ripped to show the dirty yellow foam beneath. Two newspapers rested on the coffee table. I picked one up. It was dated only a week ago.
“Keira!” I hollered again, my voice cracking in desperation. “Are you here?”
I looked in the small galley kitchen. There were dirty dishes leaning like the Tower of Pisa in the porcelain sink; stale-smelling bottles of Peroni beer with floating cigarettes sat on the white-tiled counter, and a couple of flies buzzed near the scraps of rotting food. I rushed toward a short hallway. There were four doors. I flung open the first to see a closet with a few bare wire hangers. I ran to the next—a bathroom, the shower curtain pulled open, no one inside. The last two doors had to be bedrooms.
“Keira,” I squeaked, my voice shaky. Whoever was here had left in a hurry.
I placed my hand on the scratched brass knob of the first door and turned. No one was inside, only two metal cots about as luxurious as those you’d expect to find in your local prison. There was a rumpled sheet on each. I tore off the bedclothes, looking for a clue, any sign that my sister had been here. But all I saw was a thin, stained mattress. I searched under the bed—clotted dust bunnies rustled about, nothing more. I opened the closet door, more metal hangers and the musty smell of dirt. I pulled the drawers on the tall dresser in the room—only a safety pin and a broken plastic button.
I headed back into the dimly lit hall and moved to the final door, my last hope. Beads of sweat dripped down my forehead as I placed my quivering hand on the knob, almost too scared to turn it. But I did.
The second the door swung open, I could instantly sense Keira. The room smelled of her.
I dashed to the bed, queen-sized with an old wooden frame covered in pink sheets and a rosy quilt that looked brand new. It was nothing like the room next door. I yanked back the covers, desperately searching for something, maybe another piece of jewelry, a lipstick, a note. I lifted a long platinum blond hair from the wrinkled white pillowcase and stretched it in my hands. If my years of experience with our shower drains were any indication, I’d bet my future life savings that this hair belonged to my sister. I held the pillow to my face. She was here. I could breathe her. I dropped the pillow back onto the mattress, and my eyes caught a small etching in the wooden bedframe, right where the pillow had rested. I ran my finger along it.
KAP.
Keira Alexandra Phoenix.
My mind skipped back to our days in Singapore, the night I wandered into the wrong hotel room and everyone thought I’d been kidnapped. They were panicked. When I finally turned up, Keira joked that if I were going to hop from bed to bed I might want to leave a trail of breadcrumbs.
“Aren’t there starving people in Africa who need that bread?” I teased.
“Okay, so carve your initials in the beds. Or leave a message in blood. Whaahhaahaa.” She faked an evil laugh.
“I think the hotel people might complain about that.”
“But think of the trail you’d leave around the world. When you’re old and have kids, you could take a scavenger hunt to find all your old initial carvings, like a real-life Gretel.”
She was only kidding when she’d said it, but as my fingers ran along the carving hidden behind the bed pillow, I knew she wasn’t kidding now.<
br />
KAP.
She was here. Maybe as recently as a week ago.
And I was too late.
No. I shook my head, pushing out the thought. There has to be something else. She has to have left a clue. It was what I would do. I would hold on to hope that someone would find it, that someone would find me.
I tore through the room, yanking open every drawer, ripping through the sheets, searching under every dresser. Finally, I crouched low and peered under the bed. That was when I found them, suspended between the bedframe and the wall, directly behind the wooden post where she’d carved her initials.
There were two photos.
I slid my hand behind the splintery column, my fingers cutting through a mess of cobwebs as I yanked the photos free. As soon as my eyes caught the first image, a gasp escaped my lips. It was of me. Actually, it was Marcus and me kissing in Cortona, on the train platform. We looked like happy young lovers. Chills rushed across my skin, raising the hairs on my neck, my arms, as I realized we had been followed. Someone was watching us as we kissed, and we were completely oblivious. Maybe it was Luis, maybe that was why he hadn’t chased us out of town—he was too busy lurking in the bushes snapping pervy pictures. And they’d shown this to Keira. She probably thought that I’d forgotten about her, that I was having a blast on vacation, that I didn’t care. They’d used me to hurt her. I was making things worse.
A sense of hollowness consumed my chest. Was there anything else I could do to fail her?
I reluctantly turned to the next photo and saw Keira. Her platinum blond hair was grown too long, her dark roots were at least two inches from her scalp, and her face was gaunt and greasy with dark purple circles under her eyes. She was holding a piece of paper, scowling for the camera. I peered closely and recognized that she was clutching what looked like a church bulletin for the basilica across the plaza. It was dated two weeks ago.
Who did they send this to? I wondered, examining the image.
It looked like proof of life, like they wanted to assure someone that Keira was alive. But I never received it. Did they send it to Allen Cross? To agents at Department D? Maybe that was why Cross said that men had raided the apartment. Surely the church bulletin would have tipped off their location. The kidnappers literally drew them a map; they wanted to be found. But why? And why didn’t Cross tell me if he received a second photo?
It didn’t make sense. A photo was taken of Keira and not sent to me—the sister who’s been searching for her, the sister who these men supposedly wanted to trap.
Unless they didn’t.
My mind considered the alternatives. Maybe this trap isn’t for me.
These guys could be luring someone else. Randolph Urban? He was the one who sent me. Maybe Urban was trying to track down the daughter of his old friends, and he fell into their clutches. Maybe something happened to him, and that was why I hadn’t heard from him. Because I couldn’t think of anyone else on the planet who would care about the lives of Keira and me.
...
I darted out of the apartment building, my sneakers crunching on the window’s broken glass as I sped across the empty plaza. I bounded up the steps of the basilica. Keira was holding a bulletin from this church—she had to have gotten it somehow. I yanked open the heavy wooden doors to the shiny marble foyer. The church, with its soaring vaulted ceiling and exposed beams, was surprisingly cool for August. I crept up the rose-and-ivory-checkered tiles of the center aisle, passing towering marble columns as I searched for a priest, a nun, or an altar boy to question. No one.
I scanned the ornate gilded alcoves and confessional booths for any signs of movement, listening for whispers, until a door slammed shut behind me. I jumped, my Converse squeaking as I spun toward a side entrance to see a young priest descend a red-carpeted ramp.
“Mi scusi, padre.” I walked toward him. “Hai un minuto?”
“You shouldn’t wear that in here,” he replied in English, eyeing my black tank top and bare shoulders.
“Mi dispiace.” I tugged at my fitted shirt. I might as well have had “American” stamped on my forehead. “I wasn’t expecting to come in this morning. I just have a few questions,” I continued in English.
“About what?” He nodded to the first pew, and we sat together. He was younger than most priests I saw back home—his shoulders were broad, and his neck was thick, and there was a little paranoid piece of me that worried he wasn’t a real clergy member. Still, I continued, summoning whatever nerve I had as I stared at the fresco before us, cherubs packed on dense clouds ascending toward heaven as worshippers reached desperately from below.
“I’m looking for someone,” I admitted, inhaling the sour stench of religious incense. “My sister, Keira. She’s been kidnapped.” I held out the photo of my tortured sister clutching a crumpled church bulletin.
His thick black eyebrows squished together, a deep wrinkle forming above his nose. “Is she all right? Have they found her?”
I shook my head. “No. That’s why I’m here. Somebody took this photograph of her. On this day.” I pointed to the date. “Which means the kidnapper had to have been in this church.”
“I conducted this mass.” His brown eyes widened.
“Do you remember anything? Did you see my sister? Anyone suspicious?” My heart leaped.
He eyed me cautiously. “Where are the polizia?”
I twisted my hands in my lap, the conversation reminding me of McFadden’s Bar. It felt so long ago. At the time, Charlotte and I were evading the police to keep ourselves in the loop. Now, I was paranoid that all government agencies were corrupt and out to get us, which didn’t seem like a rational response to elicit assistance from him.
“The evidence just came into my possession,” I admitted truthfully. “And my sister’s American. There’s a lot of red tape over whose jurisdiction this is.”
There. That sounded legitimate.
Besides, now that we had a time-stamped picture of my sister alive, the FBI, the Boston PD, the CIA, and every other agency in the world, couldn’t ignore us. Maybe we finally could get some help.
The priest nodded, seemingly satisfied. “Your sister was kidnapped in Venice?”
“No. She was taken from our home in Boston, then brought to Italy. I found that photo in an apartment across the piazza.” I pointed to the doors. “It looks like they moved her recently. Do you remember anything?” I asked hopefully, shifting toward him in our creaky pew. He stared at the photo. “There were two men holding her in building 3070. One of the men I saw in San Marcos Piazza last night. His name’s Craig Bernard. He’s in his late twenties. About six-foot-two. Dark blond wavy hair to his shoulders, raspy voice, a thick scar on his upper lip.”
The priest cleared his throat, a strange flex in his eyes, then glanced about the empty church. “I’ll look into it. I’m so sorry about your sister, but I need to get ready for mass.” He glanced at his watch as he handed back the photo.
“Should I wait? Will you ask around?”
He stood, moving toward the aisle as he offered me an all-too-familiar pity smile. “You can always stay for mass; it can only help. I promise I’ll pray for you and your sister.”
My jaw clenched. I didn’t need his prayers, I needed his help.
But I said nothing. Yelling at a man of the cloth would probably do me no favors. So I silently stewed as he walked down the massive center aisle toward the back of the church, his shoes echoing off the five-hundred-year-old marble. I would stay for mass, and I’d question every person who walked through those doors. I’d do it every day if I had to. Keira was being held across the plaza. Someone had to have seen something.
I pushed myself upright and charged toward the entrance, prepared to camp out on the front steps with the photo of my sister. I should blow it up to poster size, march back and forth like a picketer. I spied the priest in the vestibule, frantically scribbling in a bulletin, absorbed in his work. I shot him a thanks-for-nothing look and he stopped writing, hurr
ying toward me.
“Please, take a bulletin. Stay for mass.” He handed me the folded sheet of paper.
I held up my hand to refuse, but he shoved the bulletin into my palm, manually closing my finger on the pages. “I hope you find her,” he whispered, and there was something in his tone that made me pause.
I exited the church, prepared to wage a sit-in on the steps, when I finally looked down at the paper. There was a message written in elegant cursive script.
I saw a man fitting the description you gave. I remember the scar on his lip, and I remember him talking loudly on his mobile after mass. I asked him to keep it down, and he did, but I still overheard his conversation. He said that he had “her,” but that he needed to move her soon. He arranged a meeting at La Fenice Theater during tomorrow night’s symphony. I have tickets for that show, so the date stood out in my mind. If I had known your sister was in danger, I would have called the authorities. I hope you do so now. May God bless you and your sister.
I sprinted back into the basilica, heart pounding like the bass in a techno rave. My eyes darted around, but the priest was gone. The church was empty. I ran to the side entrance where he’d originally entered and heaved at the solid wooden door. It was locked.
Why didn’t he say this to me directly? Was he scared for his life? Was he worried about breaking his vows of secrecy? I had only a sketchy knowledge of religion, but even I didn’t think eavesdropping on a cell phone conversation was the same as listening to a confession.
My mind flicked to the boat chase through Venice. I could have altered Craig’s plans with our run-in; maybe the symphony meeting would be canceled now, but if not, then it meant I knew where my sister’s kidnapper would be tomorrow night. It was the same theater where Julian had met his contact. That couldn’t be a coincidence. That informant had to be in on the kidnapping, maybe Julian was in on it, too. I didn’t know who to trust, who was behind this, but it was the closest I’d gotten to Keira so far.
Proof of Lies (Anastasia Phoenix) Page 24
