The Good Thief

by Judith Leon

  It was his turn to verify. He started to punch keys in his own communicator but the driver, looking behind them, yelled, and as he fumbled to pull his gun, a hulking figure in black rushed him. The door beside her flew open and a big hand yanked her out of the car. Another grabbed Heinie. She stared into the black barrel of a Beretta semiautomatic pistol. The hulk in black slugged Heinie’s driver. He dropped to the ground. In the distance a motorcycle roared to life.

  “Du verdammten schwein,” a gray-haired old man screeched at Heinie.

  A dark-gray Daimler now blocked the Alfa Romeo. There were four of them, including the old man. She figured the old guy had to be Heinie’s granddad.

  Hellfire and damnation!

  Two of the old Nazi’s goons grabbed both tubes and her satchel. Another clubbed Heinie with the butt of his own gun. Heinie’s yowl was earsplitting and he fell to his knees.

  Clearly the old man intended to steal the painting back from his grandson. She pointed to the tube holding the original and shouted, “Sie konnen nicht mit dem Bild—”

  She was going to tell them that she had placed an incendiary in the container, and she would incinerate the picture rather than let them take it again. Not true, of course, but she’d used the ploy before to get the upper hand. The key, after she calmed everyone down, was to offer more money.

  Instead, Marko Savin, racing in a loud roar across the lawn, distracted everyone. Heinie’s driver, having regained his senses, pulled his gun and blew a hole right between the eyes of one of the old Nazi’s men.

  Chaos! The old man and his remaining two guards sprinted to their car, each clutching a tube, as Heinie staggered to his feet. Lindsey ran after them, but had to duck behind the Alfa Romeo when both goons turned and started firing.

  Marko brought the motorcycle to a sliding stop on its side with the motor still roaring. Ducking bullets, he dived behind her Fiat. The old Nazi and his goons made a U-turn, running up onto the lawn on the other side of the access road, and burned rubber as they headed toward the park’s exit. Both tubes were gone. Artemisia’s Cleopatra. Gone.

  Chapter 3

  L indsey stood dumbstruck for a second and then turned to Marko, furious. “I didn’t give you the signal.”

  “I consider drawn guns a signal.”

  “They wouldn’t have hurt me.”

  “How the hell can you know that?”

  “Later! We have to catch them. Take the bike.”

  He had the good sense not to argue. She leaped on behind him and hugged his waist. They reached the exit. No sign of the gray Daimler. They could go right, left, or straight ahead, heavy traffic in all three directions.

  “What now?” he called back to her over the motorcycle’s noise.

  She pulled out the BlackBerry, pushed three buttons, and picked up the signal from the GPS. “Left,” she said. “And hit it. Go through stops when you can.”

  Her pulse raced as he wove in and out around cars, bicycles, pedestrians and buses. They started south on the Corso Amadeo Di Savola, but soon the GPS signal indicated that the Daimler turned west. She pointed right, toward the next cross street.

  “I see them,” he called out. “Two blocks ahead.”

  For agonizing minutes, they made headway, then traffic would interfere and they’d drop behind only to gain again. After fifteen minutes they reached the section of Naples called Vomero, an elevated area filled with views in all directions where they kept up the crazy cat and mouse in a heavily commercial area with all sorts of offices and pedestrians.

  They sat waiting at a red light, the Daimler only a block ahead. “Hang on,” Marko called to her.

  He gunned the bike and they blasted straight through the cross traffic, barely avoiding a truck.

  The light turned green for the Daimler; it moved ahead. Marko skimmed the outside of their lane and then swung into oncoming traffic to go around two trucks blocking their way. She looked forward over his shoulder, right into the grill of an oncoming van whose driver was frantically honking his horn. She sucked in her breath as they zipped back into their own lane. She could hear the van’s driver cursing.

  They were within a limousine’s length of the Daimler. “I’m going to stop their car,” Marko yelled, and she sensed he’d drawn his gun.

  “It’s too dangerous for pedes—”

  She heard the shot. The Daimler’s left rear tire blew, and the car jerked left and then back to the right. Normal traffic parted to flow around it. The driver pulled the Daimler to the curb and everyone bailed out, including the old man.

  The three thieves ran into the cross street. Marko stopped the bike. Lindsey jumped off. Together they dogged the three men who suddenly veered left. The men ran past the ticket booth to the Via Toledo Funicular, and shoved their way into a car. Lindsey watched in horror as the door closed behind the three men, and the funicular began to descend. Another cable car would not arrive and then begin the steep descent, she knew, for at least ten minutes. All three men grinned back at her. One held up one of the tubes.

  We’re going to lose them! I’m going to lose the Artemisia!

  Her stomach twisted.

  “Shit!” Marko said.

  Lindsey scanned their surroundings, fighting disappointment, and saw that a long flight of stairs descended alongside the funicular. She pointed.

  “The bike,” Marco exclaimed.

  They ran back to the bike, and Marko drove them to the head of the sidewalk. “Hold on tight,” he said, stating the obvious.

  They bumped their way down the stairs, which thankfully had few people coming up. Almost all the foot traffic was heading down and Marko stayed well to the left, yelling in Italian for them to clear out of the way.

  She ignored the shocked stares of the people they passed. She accidentally bit her tongue, tasted salty blood. Too soon they had to detour to a side street, then an alley, but they didn’t lose sight of the funicular. Finally they caught up and as they passed the cable car, she took perverse pleasure in the amazed looks on the faces of the three men. She prepared herself for one hell of a fight.

  “No gun,” she said to Marko, thinking of the hordes of people who would be waiting at the bottom to board.

  Marko nodded.

  When the three thugs entered the street, Lindsey and Marko sprang after them. The old man didn’t even try to run. She singled out the smaller thug, and Marko headed for the larger one. They were, apparently, woefully out of shape. Her man turned and charged her. She landed a forward kick to his diaphragm and he went down with the follow-up chop to the back of his neck. She kicked him over onto his side and, as he gasped for air, she grabbed the tube he carried, and took his gun.

  Marko dispatched the man with the other tube, apparently with the same ease. He mounted the bike. Panting, laughing and flushed with a sense of triumph, Lindsey hopped on behind, clutched both tubes fiercely, and they took off. Hot damn, she’d done it again.

  “Ooo-rah!” she whooped as they passed a row of plump elderly women in black dresses waiting in line at the funicular.

  Given all the havoc they had left in their path, perhaps including a dead body in the park, witnesses might be describing a woman in black leather and red hair and a man also in black and looking like a criminal. The authorities might very well be watching all transport stations, so they ruled out getting onto a plane dressed as they were. She had used a fake ID and paid cash for the Fiat so she left it to the police to return it. She and Marko picked out a small, no-name store that sold men’s and women’s Levi’s jeans and sweatshirts. At another store they bought new clothes and duffel bags for their leather ones. She bought a cheap black wig and black eyebrow pencil and he bought reading glasses. At 4:30 p.m. they caught a flight back to Florence.

  On the plane, with her treasure secure in the bin overhead, Lindsey ordered that Chianti she’d missed with her pizza, and Marko joined her. She explained what she had intended to do in case of trouble—threaten to incinerate the painting if the old Nazi and hi
s gang thought they could take it from her, and offer them more money instead. “It’s worked for me before.”

  “Tell you what. I apologize. I acted from the gut when I saw the gun.”

  “Well, I admit that you saved my client any extra money.” She smiled. She liked a man who felt strong enough in his masculinity to actually apologize. She sipped the wine, thinking that Marko was earning points rapidly. He’d shown himself to be bold. Smart. Courageous. And a damn good fighter.

  “Your dad told me you were tough,” he said and then laughed, that beautiful baritone. “I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t that karate kick.”

  She shrugged with a smile. Like K-bar, he was impressed with her daring.

  “I’d like to see you again, Lindsey. Would you like to go skydiving tomorrow? I have a buddy, a hotdog instructor.”

  Her hand froze in midair. She slowly lowered the wine-glass. She’d never been skydiving. The idea was…pretty intimidating. She felt her chest tightening, a sure sign her body didn’t really like the idea. Why had he picked skydiving, for heaven’s sake?

  “According to K-bar you’re a real risk-taker,” Marko added. “Ever been skydiving?”

  She shook her head. Of course, her father would describe her as a risk-taker. Wasn’t that the image she always projected to him? Part of what he admired about her?

  “Okay. Skydiving sounds fine. Let’s do it.”

  Marko explained what she ought to wear and that he’d pick her up at 10:00. For the rest of the trip, they talked about his joining the French Foreign Legion, the action he’d seen in Afghanistan, the Ivory Coast and Kosovo.

  “Why did you join?”

  “Oh…” His jaws flexed, as if gritting his teeth. “My family background is a little on the shady side. I…wanted to break away.” He smiled with a hint of mischief. “And I wanted to see the world.”

  And he wants to keep things vague, she thought as the plane began its descent, so she asked no more questions, and he didn’t offer any more information about himself. He’d left his car, a very sexy black Maserati GranSport Spyder with a red-and-black interior, at the airport in a high security lot. Whatever he did for K-bar must pay very well, or else he’d lied about separating himself from his family background. You didn’t make that kind of money in the FFL.

  Lindsey used a motorbike or taxis for transport in Florence and had taken a taxi to the airport. Who could resist a ride with a handsome man in a fantastic car?

  They drove in quiet, comfortable silence. She also liked a man who didn’t feel that he—or she—had to talk all the time.

  It was still dusk when they stood at the door to her apartment. Her six-room spread on the top floor of a six-story building on the south side of the River Arno nestled below the hilltop where the Piazza Michelangelo offered thousands of tourists one-eighty-degree views. From her dining room window, she could see the Ponte Vecchio. She was tempted to show Marko her view.

  He hesitated, body language betraying his desire to be invited in. He looked past her at her painting hanging in the entry. “That’s quite a work of art.”

  Nice try. She smiled. “Thanks.”

  “You didn’t…did you paint it?”

  She nodded and they shared a long moment. But she wasn’t ready to take things to the next step. Not yet. “A long day,” she said, smiling. “I look forward to tomorrow.”

  He pulled her to him and kissed her, a long, delicious, hungry kiss that sent waves of heat through her body. He didn’t move his hands over her, just held her gently.

  “See you tomorrow, then.” He turned and walked away with Lindsey still savoring his kiss.

  Right. They’d be jumping out of a plane together. Was she beyond insane?

  Still thinking of Marko, she pulled some leftovers from her refrigerator and turned on the TV while finishing the last of the pasta salad. An Italian sitcom. She made a point of watching these to hone her ability to understand Italian humor. A glass of wine and more thoughts of Marko. She switched to CNN, and as she rinsed her plate in the kitchen, the television’s commentary riveted her.

  “…students from an exclusive high school near Phoenix, Arizona, AthenaAcademy , were abducted and have been missing for more than twenty-four hours.”

  Athena girls? She raced back toward the TV. The screen showed photos of two smiling teenagers. “It is now believed that the girls were taken to Colombia. The abductor hasn’t demanded any ransom, Academy principal Christine Evans reported.” And that was the end of the report.

  Christine being quoted on CNN! Dear God.

  Christine Evans had been the AthenaAcademy’s principal since the school opened. She’d accepted the position after retiring as a captain from the army, having been blinded in one eye by a training accident. She not only had the job of hiring staff and running the school; Christine was in charge of assessing the students for potential work in government security agencies after their graduation. The Academy had been partially funded from the “discretionary” (unlisted and unexplained portions) of the budget of the DoD from the beginning. One pivotal Academy founder had actually been the head of the CIA. He realized the potential value to the United States of a military-type prep academy for women. Many Athena graduates worked for various government agencies. Lindsey, herself, was now a courier for Oracle because Christine Evans had singled Lindsey out as a potential recruit.

  The news report had said Colombia. That didn’t sound like a simple kidnapping, Lindsey decided as she walked into the home office where she spent so many of her waking hours. Her computer suite offered three oversize, linked monitors. She could drag her mouse from the left, continue through the center screen and end all the way over on the right screen. One of her art projects could be going on one screen, the Internet or television on another and documents on the last.

  She immediately logged onto AA.gov. This Web site linked Athena grads to each other, ran a terrific, newsy blog and offered a host of services like links to articles on up-to-date equipment and weapons, or even where to get the best health insurance.

  The featured item on the home page offered a new video of Christine. She looked tired, making her eyelid droop a little over her blind eye. In her early sixties, she was still an attractive and healthy-looking woman, barely changed over the last ten years. Lindsey clicked on the feed and watched her former principal express her sorrow and then reveal more details of the kidnapping.

  “You all know how hard the Academy works to keep a low profile. Shannon Connor’s dogged pursuit of us on the ABS network is quite regrettable.”

  The Web site wasn’t secure. Lindsey wouldn’t learn much more there. She checked her e-mail and sure enough, she had one from Christine. The time in Phoenix, at the Academy, would be just after 10:00 a.m. “Call—private,” was all the e-mail said, the code instructions for using her secure cell phone and the secure satellite connection. Lindsey placed the call and Christine’s secretary answered.

  “We’re putting out an alert to a special list of Athena grads, Lindsey. Hold this line and I’ll transmit Christine’s message. It’s all the information we have so far.”

  “Holding,” Lindsey said. Then she listened as an obviously prerecorded message created for this secure line came on.

  “I fear,” the Athena leader said, “that there is a drastic breach of security in this kidnapping. Those of you who have followed the tragic and bizarre story of Athena graduate Lorraine ‘Rainy’ Miller Carrington and her ‘egg babies’ will understand why.”

  Lindsey had indeed followed the story of the ova that had been stolen years ago during a clandestine operation from a very young Athena student, Lorraine “Rainy” Carrington. She’d been only twelve. Much later, events revealed that a perverse scientist had genetically manipulated the stolen “eggs” in a way intended to enhance the resulting children with special talents. He’d then implanted the modified eggs in unsuspecting surrogate mothers. The insider term for these girls was “egg babies.” The full extent
and results of these experiments were still largely unknown, although the girls that were known to have resulted from them were indeed gifted with some extraordinary abilities. The genetic modification process apparently only worked on eggs with two X chromosomes.

  “The abductor,” the recorded message continued, “attempted to take three of our girls—Kayla Ryan’s daughter, Jazz, and two others, Teal Arnett and Lena Poole. Jazz is fourteen. Lena is fifteen, and Teal is seventeen. They’d gone together to the movies when someone abducted them.” For a moment Christine’s voice rose. Then, “Thank God, Jazz escaped. This is perhaps the only fortunate thing to happen so far.”

  Lindsey clicked through the Athena Academy Web site, searching out the girls’ pictures as the recording continued.

  “I’m especially concerned about the lack of a ransom demand, deeply troubled. I’ll provide updates on this secure connection as soon as possible. We’re asking you to keep your antennae tuned for any clue as to the perpetrators and the whereabouts of the captives.

  “As this kidnapping demonstrates, our days of keeping an extremely low profile may be waning. You wonderful young women are becoming a force to be reckoned with around the world. One final thought. The good guys and the bad guys are taking note of the increasing numbers of Athena alumni in positions of power and influence. Allison Gracelyn of the National Security Agency is here with us. Katie Rush, who is with the FBI and an expert on missing persons, has made extraordinary progress and is now in Colombia. Together with our ‘Athena Force,’ we’re going to get our girls back.”

  The recording ended. Lindsey hung up. She studied the faces of the three girls in their class pictures and bookmarked the sites.

  What a mess. Lindsey knew that Rainy’s eggs had been harvested in secret. They lied to her, told her that she’d had an appendectomy. She never found out, before she was killed, that she had three daughters. The scientist at Lab 33—what was his name? Aldrich something. But the “egg babies” controversy was over and done with. A year ago they shut the lab down. What in heaven’s name was going on?