40
Alessandro watched his wife follow Gabriella from the kitchen and felt adrift.
He sat at a kitchen table from his childhood. People bustled about. A group of Italian students arrived with two older nerdish men. Together they made a cold meal and tea and carried it away with them, talking about things that made absolutely no sense to Alessandro. Then two Asian women entered, followed by a man as striking as a model. He was the only person who did not treat Alessandro with courtesy. In fact, Alessandro had the impression the young man sought not to see anything or anyone.
Charlie sat across from him. Between them was a pot of fresh-brewed coffee and farm bread and crumbly cheese and mountain salami and olives. Charlie had set a bottle of wine on the table, but when the others did not drink, Alessandro decided to leave it alone. With them were the Orlando detective and a young man they introduced as Julio. The young Hispanic clearly idolized Charlie. Alessandro had the impression Irma Steeg felt just as strongly, but she had a detective’s hard-earned ability to hide almost everything.
A blonde woman entered and grabbed a plate and joined them. She was very attractive, though not in the same league as Gabriella. Charlie introduced her as Dr. Elizabeth Sayer. Another beautiful scientist, this one with the coldest eyes Alessandro had ever seen, as though she went through life poised to attack anyone who might offer her a compliment or kind word.
Charlie said to Elizabeth, “First thing tomorrow, I’d like you to go into Como with Julio and help him buy some clothes.”
Even at this, the woman bridled. “What am I now, the resident personal shopper?”
“You’re available, and you have both the moxie and the good taste required to point him in the right direction.”
“What about—”
“Gabriella and I are going to be busy preparing for the next assault.”
Elizabeth’s brittle exterior cracked momentarily. “They’re coming?”
“Almost certainly.”
“When?”
“I hope we’ll know by this evening. But I think very soon.”
Julio said, “My sweats are good enough for clothes, man.”
“Not for what I have in mind. I need a spotter.”
Irma gave Charlie a look sharpened by old combat. “Smart.”
Charlie went on, “I need you to dress like a regular Italian stud.”
“I don’t need a lady to tell me what to wear.” He turned to Elizabeth. “No offense.”
“Hey, ese, whatever rocks your boat.”
Charlie said, “This is not about buying things that suit your tastes. I need a certain look.” He addressed Elizabeth now. “We’re after a total remake. Greys and blacks and navy blues are best. Discreet and classic. Two pairs of expensive sunglasses, one set with pale lenses since it’s raining so much, then another pair with dark lenses. I need him to be able to fit into a crowd of locals and disappear in plain sight.”
The threat of attack had left her pliable. “I can do that.”
“I know you can.” He said to Julio, “Your goal is to meld into the scene, just another Italian stud hanging around the local café, spending your days eyeing the ladies.”
Julio beamed. “Bro, this is a job I was born for.”
Elizabeth asked, “What about money?”
“I’ve liberated some of Gabriella’s cash.” He passed the roll to Elizabeth, along with a slip of paper. “We also need a set of handheld radios with some extra electronics. Gabriella wrote out the Italian names for you. It’s too late to get it all done today, but it’d be good if you can be ready to roll at first light.”
She hesitated, then asked, “Will we be safe?”
“I hope to know that before you move out.” Charlie looked up as the tallest of the Italian students reappeared in the doorway. “Can you join us for a couple of minutes?”
“Of course, Charlie. We are still waiting for Milo and Jorge to finish wiring the room so we can all be guided through an ascent with the electronics. They think perhaps if we are all listening to the vibratory patterns and all receive instructions to search for danger, we can accomplish something more. Milo says they need at least another two hours, perhaps more.”
“Have a seat. Alessandro, I’d like you to meet Massimo. He’s sort of leader by default of what I guess you could call our accelerated ascenders.”
The student’s chest puffed slightly at the words.
Alessandro asked, “That means what, exactly?”
“Gabriella’s initial study had two hundred test subjects drawn from the Statale student body. Massimo and his team have managed to keep ascending, even without the external stimulus. And they’ve done some things that have the scientists reeling.”
Alessandro nodded as though he understood, then asked, “Does it hurt, this ascent?”
Massimo replied, “No pain. Only joy.”
Charlie said to him, “I need you people to understand completely the risk—”
Massimo raised his hand. “Please, Charlie. There is no need to say it all again. We know. We accept. Of course, we hope it does not happen. But we accept.”
Alessandro asked, “Accept what?”
“Since the attack, Gabriella and I have found ourselves unable to ascend again.”
“This is bad?”
Massimo had the natural exuberance of a man who was born to sing. Yet answering this question left him somber. “We could not ascend today. It is a small death.”
In that instant, Alessandro realized why he was seated there at all. It was not for a simple country meal. Charlie wanted him to understand that he was part of the team. That nothing was hidden. Alessandro understood that it was not the man’s way to speak empty words. Charlie wanted to show.
He asked Charlie, “It has also been hard for you, not ascending?”
“Worse than I could have imagined.” Charlie leaned back in his chair. “Every time I went was nicer. Even with what we were doing.”
“Which was?”
“Trying to stay one step ahead of the hunters.” Charlie looked at him but appeared to survey a realm beyond Alessandro’s imagination. “I don’t know if each time became more intense or if I just got to the point where I could realize what was happening.”
“Both, I think,” Massimo said. “We speak of this change. With the pleasures of this world, the more you take, the less joy you find. With this, it is the exact opposite.”
Alessandro’s phone began buzzing in his pocket. He pulled it out, saw who was calling, and said, “I need to take this in private.”
Charlie led him into an empty bedroom and shut the door.
Alessandro said, “Edoardo?”
“I have something for you. It arrived through normal channels two days ago. I only noticed it now because I thought I recognized the name. What was the American called who works with those scientists?”
“Irma Steeg.”
“Not the woman detective. The man. The soldier.”
“Charlie Hazard.”
“Yes, it’s him, all right.”
“Tell me.”
“I am holding an international warrant for his arrest. The charge is murder. He is considered a flight risk and extremely dangerous.”
“I do not believe it.”
“I’m only telling you what I have here. But I confess, I do not care much for this either. Shall I tell you why?”
“Please.”
“The warrant comes from Los Angeles. I phoned the homicide bureau. The death took place almost five years ago. The man I spoke with did not know the case, but he had a look on his computer. He informed me that the warrant is dated four days ago. The victim was Charlie Hazard’s wife. The detective assumed there must have been a discovery of new evidence.”
“Perhaps. But the timing is remarkable, wouldn’t you say?”
“If you want my opinion, I’d say this smells worse than the Naples sewers. I personally do not intend to act upon it.”
“Thank you, Edoardo. Please let me know if anything further arises.”
Gabriella led Carla Gavi into the upstairs chamber the group used for testing. She watched as the bailiff’s wife took in the bare plank flooring, the rough-hewn table, the lone wooden chair, the single bed.
Carla said, “Other than the electronics, this looks almost monastic.”
“We have not been here long.”
“Would you change things if you stayed?”
“A bit. Fresh paint, new bed with an adjustable headrest, definitely a nicer chair for the observer.”
“Sit here on the bed. We must speak before you begin. You need to understand, more than half the subjects who participate do not ever ascend.”
“Perhaps they do not need to do so as desperately as I.”
Gabriella found the bailiff’s wife immensely disconcerting. Usually by this point the subjects were showing initial symptoms of extreme anxiety—accelerated pulse, visible tensing, dilated pupils, compressed lips, clenched jaw and neck. They had started injecting the saline solution to counteract the fear-related stress with the suggestion of an externally generated calm. Yet all the anxiety Carla had shown downstairs was now gone. In its place was a serenity as intense as sorrow.
Gabriella found herself drawn to this woman. She said, “Very few of our subjects manage to ascend on their first attempt.”
Carla did not respond.
“Only one, in fact.”
“Was it the man Hazard?”
“I . . . should not speak of other subjects.”
Carla nodded, but not to what Gabriella had said. “Can they hear us?”
“No.”
Carla leaned forward. “The others do not see it. But he is your warrior, yes? Your knight in this arena of danger and peril.”
The shock of hearing her secrets spoken aloud by a woman she did not know left Gabriella breathless.
“My husband survived the Camorristi for over a decade. We both left Naples wounded. Not our bodies. Our souls. Do you understand?”
Gabriella nodded slowly. Once.
Carla swung around and lay upon the bed. In repose, she held the fragility of a child. Or rather, the otherworldliness of one who did not age. She said, “I think we should become friends, you and I.”
Gabriella reached for the headphones and fitted them into place. She said through the microphone, “What do you hope to gain from this?”
Carla closed her eyes. “I desperately want to find what I have lost.”
Alessandro stowed his phone away, entered the kitchen, and said, “There is something I would like to show your security team.”
Charlie, Irma, and Julio followed him out to where his Citroën was parked in the villa’s forecourt. The day was brooding and grey, but dry. The trees dotting the villa’s front garden were vague silhouettes draped in blankets of fog. Alessandro opened the rear door and flipped the blanket off the locker. “This was found in the Evidence vault.”
“It looked different in my ascent.” Charlie bent in closely to the spot that Alessandro had cleaned with his knife. “No. This is it. May I open it?”
“Be my guest.”
He eased open the top. Studied the rifles. And smiled.
“Do you know what they are?”
“Not only that,” Charlie said, “I know why we need them.”
Julio leaned in closer. “What are they?”
“Air rifles.”
Julio ran a hand down the polished barrel. “You mean, like, BB guns?”
“A little more sophisticated than that.”
Irma said, “Are those nightscopes?”
“They’re light magnifiers. As opposed to infrared. Snipers prefer them because the targets are clearer. These are excellent quality, but a couple of years out of date.”
“Four, to be precise,” Alessandro said. “At least, that’s how long the previous owner has been locked away.”
Charlie shut the locker, flipped the blanket back into place, and nodded once to Alessandro. “There is another member of my team you need to meet.”
Irma made round eyes. “You’re introducing an Italian cop to Benny?”
“Whatever. I’m sure Benny is going to be real relieved to hear it.”
Julio grinned. “Man, this is gonna be some kinda trip.”
The stables and gardeners’ hut stretched in a haphazard line between the left of the villa and the outer wall. Charlie led them back toward the rock face. There he stopped and addressed Alessandro directly. “I started a tour in Anbar Province, then got wounded.”
A voice drifted down from above. “On account of how he shielded his sergeant’s body with his own. Dumb move, you ask me.”
Charlie went on, “When the scientists were forced to hide here, I asked a buddy from the force to come give us a hand.” He pointed at a series of rocks protruding from the cliff face, rising to a ledge Alessandro had not noticed until that moment. “And he hates all cops.”
Alessandro gripped the rocks and started to climb. “Then he and I have something in common.”
The ledge was in line with the villa’s roof and opened into a cave that was shielded from view by a broad granite protrusion. Alessandro arrived at the mouth slightly giddy from the prospect of descending.
The man who awaited them reminded Alessandro of some of the veteran anti-Mafia squad he had known in Naples. The cave dweller was lean in the manner of a warrior who had lost all taste for food. He ate to fill his belly only. His senses had room for only one thing. The flavor of cordite.
Charlie settled by the man’s butane stove and motioned at Irma. “This is Irma Steeg.”
“The lady cop with the major-league swing.”
Irma remained poised by the cave’s mouth, as far from the man and his lair as she could get and stay out of the rain. “Didn’t I arrest you a while back?”
The man’s grin was a mere stretching of taut features. “If you came up against me, babe, either you’d remember or you’d be dead.”
“You children play nice.” Charlie motioned to Julio. “I believe you’ve already met the youngest member of our squad.”
The man had forgotten how to make noise. He walked over and offered Julio a soul handshake and the words, “I’m still not certain that dude needed two full doses of Taser.”
“Too much of a good thing ain’t never enough, ese.”
The man’s grin was more genuine this time. “Yeah, I believe I’ve sung that tune before.”
“And this is Alessandro.”
“Another cop.”
“Actually, good sir, I am an ufficiale giudiziario. In your language, I am called a bailiff.”
“This means something to me?”
“We need him, Benny.”
“Maybe you do, Eltee. Me, I’m feeling a double case of cop hives coming on.”
Irma said, “Could have something to do with your sanitary habits.”
“Enough,” Charlie said. “We’re here because we need to talk strategy. Everybody sit down.” When they didn’t move fast enough, Charlie snapped, “Sit!”
Benny took a seat next to Julio and said, “Hearing Eltee bark like that took me straight back to duty-ville.”
Even Irma lowered herself to a rock. “We could do this easier inside.”
“We are here because Benny saved our collective bacon. He could move like he did because as far as the rest of our team and the outside world are concerned, Benny Calfo does not exist.” Charlie’s gaze was officer hard. “Now unless you’ve got something constructive to say, keep it to yourself.”
Irma muttered tersely about how she’d stopped being a recruit forty years ago. But something shifted deep in her gaze. Alessandro had seen it happen often enough. The strong and the independent being molded into a working team by a good officer.
Charlie told Benny, “Alessandro has just delivered us four Wahlers.”
This time his grin was real. “I’m thinking serious fun and games.”
“With nightscopes. And a pair of matching pistols. They haven’t been fired in four years. I need you and Irma to lube the works and calibrate them without firing. I counted two dozen gas canisters. But we can’t be certain if they’ve kept full charges. And we won’t be getting any replacements.”
“What are we using for ammo?”
“I’m working on that. Give me your blade.”
Alessandro was staring straight at Benny Calfo and still did not see the man’s hand move. A knife simply appeared in Charlie’s hand. Charlie began drawing in the cave’s sandy floor. “This is the villa. Gatehouse. Wall. Cliff. Stables. I’m thinking they’ll use at least three teams. One by the entrance, either rearguard or decoy or both. Another over the wall here, where they can fire ropes from the stable roof to the northern balconies. And a third team rappelling down from the top of the cliff.”
Alessandro asked, “You think they’ll do this?”
“That’s right.”
“You don’t know?”
“I told you. I can’t ascend.”
“What about somebody else handling that responsibility?”
“The only other person who’s been able to look forward and determine risk is Gabriella. And she’s locked out like me. Ditto for those Italian students, who are possibly sacrificing their ability to ascend in their attempt to help us.” Charlie shook his head. “I hate that worse than anything.”
Alessandro felt the tension that had gripped his chest when he entered the cave give way entirely. Charlie Hazard was an officer. Like all good officers, he measured success by two yardsticks. Winning the objective and bringing his men back intact.
Alessandro sighed long and low. Charlie noticed. “Something the matter?”
“You already are.”
“No. Not the guns. I mean, I want to help you any way I can.”
Charlie leaned back. “Well then.”
“Tell me what you need.”
Charlie’s gaze burned in the cave’s dim light. “Give me a while to think on that.”
“As long as you’d like.” Alessandro reached in his pockets and came out with a card and pen. He scribbled, then said, “My home number and my cell phone are on the back.”
Benny said, “How about you ask the dude here for some real firepower.”
Irma said, “I hate to agree with Benny about anything. But he’s right.”
“No guns. Gabriella was firm on this. And very clear why.”
Benny snorted. “All due respect to the scientist lady, Eltee. But you know what they say about an officer who takes his orders from a civilian? Dead and deserves it.”
Irma said, “What if we can’t protect our people any other way?”
Charlie dug the knife’s tip into the sand. “Gabriella was right to say what she did. There are things at work here that go far beyond what we can see and hear. I can’t say it any better than that.”
Benny said, “You’re talking about this electro-ghost thingy again?”
“Yes.”
“Which you can’t do.”
“That’s right.”
Alessandro found Benny’s grin very frightening. The warrior almost purred, “You’ve worked up a plan. Tell me I’m wrong.”
Charlie continued to draw points of attack with the blade. “You’re not wrong.”
When he finished laying it out, Benny said, “It could work.”
Alessandro said, “This is an excellent plan, Mr. Hazard.”
“Please call me Charlie.”
“In fact, Charlie, it is better than excellent. It is devious. Are you sure you are not Italian?”
“Pure American mongrel.”
Irma said, “Timing is crucial.”
“Wouldn’t hurt us to have one of those periscope views into the future either,” Benny said.
“We’re doing all we can on that score.” Charlie rose to his feet. “Let’s get to work.”