Spokes (27 page)

They passed solemn men, some talking quietly in clumps, some hovering near their comrades. Christopher couldn't stop to tell them
I'm sorry, so sorry;
the locomotive that was the soigneur didn't stop. He wouldn't shout condolences in passage,
but he knew the shadows in their eyes. Paolo jerked him through a doorway.

Luca leaned over a chair, squeezing the back until the cords popped out in his forearms. He rocked back and forth. Christopher wanted to reach out but
stopped short. Michel Delage, the directeur sportif, rested his hand on Luca's shoulder, but what comfort could be enough for his pain?

"He was still alive. I wouldn't leave him dead in the road." Luca's hair swayed around his face, hiding it.

"I know, Luca, I know." Michel squeezed his shoulder. "I heard him talk to you."

"He told me to go!" Luca flung himself upright, whirling to pace the four steps of floor space. "He said, 'Go, you
didn't ride off a cliff.'"

"I know, Luca." Michel's hand hovered in the air where Luca had jerked away from beneath it. He slowly dropped it.
"I was there." A tear track glittered down his cheek.

Poor guy--Rolf must have died under his hands.

Luca stopped short. "Rolf wasn't alone. That was good he wasn't alone." Two steps put him at the
directeur's side, reaching up to rest his hands on the man's shoulders. "You kept him from dying alone. I should have been
there."

"No, you did what he told you. I yelled at you too. Remember?" Michel drooped. "We didn't think he'd die.
Not from a broken collarbone. But... he..." A shudder racked Delage. "The bone was poking out; it looked bad, but not
killing. He tried to get up. And then so much blood...." He sobbed once, a long expelled breath that whistled in his throat. Luca held
him, his own sorrow wracking his frame.

Christopher stayed silently where Paolo stopped them. Not daring to speak, barely daring to breathe, he stood beside the soigneur, an accidental voyeur to
their grief. He couldn't watch; instead, his eyes strayed to the two single beds in the room. One was Luca's. Which one? Because the
other had been Rolf's. An open suitcase lay across one, rumpled clothing strewn over the duvet. Rolf's?

"Out," Paolo hissed. "No press."

He wasn't press now, just a friend, but miles gaped between the crushing in his chest and what he could do to share that burden with Luca. Paolo
tugged at him, but Christopher didn't follow this time.

Luca looked up. "You're here. Good."

Paolo stopped, pulling back as if Christopher's flesh had burned him. Michel jerked upright, his eyes slitted and his teeth bared.

"Sympathetic member of press," Luca told him. Michel relaxed a fraction but remained tense. "Christopher Nye. Other man on
Zoncolan."

"I'm sorry for your loss." Christopher had to find something better than the rote words. "Rolf was a good
man." Maybe. Christopher wouldn't vouch from his own experience, but--never speak ill of the dead, and Luca had trusted him,
so...good enough.

Luca's lips moved, but his words were nearly silent. "Thank you."

Christopher wanted to spring across the room to envelope Luca in his arms, feeble shelter though he'd be against the grief. Luca didn't
move, not one twitch to say he needed that sanctuary. No, not with Michel and Paolo there.

Michel nodded acknowledgement. "He was a good man." Poor guy. He'd lost his rider, who might have been a friend, and his
hopes, all in one afternoon. Maybe he had someone to comfort him.

Turning to Luca, he said, "The hearing is in ten minutes: the officials declared the hearing would start at 6:30 in the dining room downstairs.
We need both of you there." He turned to include Christopher. "The
commissaires
wish to inquire into the assistance you provided
to Luca on the mountain, and planned to proceed whether or not you could be found."

"What?" Christopher gawped back and forth between the directeur and Luca. "That is really hostile. We weren't going
fast enough to draft."

"I know, but they inquire all the same." Michel's shoulders drooped further. "And I can't allow you to be
alone together, or they cry collusion. They might say that even with we three."

"Four." Christopher hadn't forgotten Paolo at his side. "They might argue that Luca's soigneur would say
anything to protect his rider, but he would probably also say anything to discredit me, because he disapproves of journos getting too close to riders. So I
think we can rely on him to tell the truth about this meeting."

Paolo glowered through his nod but said nothing.

"Even so, I can't let you stay. I'm sorry." Michel motioned him toward the door.

"Luca, I'm really sorry about Rolf." They'd have to drag him away before he'd leave without saying that.
He offered open hands from the doorway, all Luca could accept, and got a brief bow of the head in response.

"I see you at hearing." The flick at the corner of his mouth wasn't even cousin to a smile.

Christopher let Michel guide him out, because what else could he do?

***

"Did you assist Luca Biondi in any way on the ascent of Mont Zoncolan?" a too-familiar man in a dark suit demanded. Again.

"No, I didn't," Christopher asserted for the third time. Why wouldn't they listen? Or would they keep asking until
he told them what they wanted to hear? "I was there. He spoke to me. I spoke to him. He didn't touch me or my bike. I didn't
touch him or his bike. We were going too slow for drafting to matter. I couldn't even turn around to see him because I would have fallen off.
That's all."

What the crowds had done to keep them both moving wasn't part of this question, nor would Christopher bring it up. Neither had the officials,
perhaps because they faced unwinding years of racing results if they declared a human-assisted start unacceptable.

"Enough, Friedrich." The voice of reason spoke from beside Luca's nemesis: a fourth man with an air of power and assurance
and a much more finely tailored suit. "Please bring Signor Biondi and Signor Delage back in."

Luca slipped into the chair beside Christopher with scarcely an acknowledgement. He moved stiffly--the damages from being crushed by half the
peloton must be catching up. He had to be frozen inside--the next few sentences could change his career. A disqualification would strip him of his
stage wins in the Giro and send him on to his dreaded meat-cutting future. He clenched his hands together in his lap, making the tendons stand out.
I did my best, Luca. The truth has to be enough.

"The FIC finds that Luca Biondi exceeded the winner's time by forty-three minutes, ten seconds. His time exceeded the cut-off by eight
minutes, thirty-nine seconds, and he is therefore dropped from the race." The senior official didn't request any input from the suits
flanking him, nor did he hesitate in making his pronouncement.

But he'd said "dropped," not "disqualified," and it was for the immutable fact of time. Christopher dared
to breathe. Luca remained rigid--did he think that might yet come?

"The FIC regrets this--" A choking noise and a flinch from Friedrich said he regretted something else altogether: his superior
quelled him with a glance. "We acknowledge your valor in achieving your stage wins and your overall standing as leader. All palmares
stand."

Luca softened: he bowed his head with a soft "
Grazie
." His hands loosened across his thighs. Christopher dared not reach out to
take one.

Friedrich squirmed and grumbled and his opinion apparently didn't mean a damned thing. Whatever his problem was, he couldn't touch Luca
in any way. Probably shouldn't flip him the bird. Because of the next race.

The senior official continued. "We also acknowledge the loss of your teammate Rolf Knecht, and regret adding to your sorrow. We have reviewed all
available video and doctors' statements, and find that his death was an accident of the road." He turned to the Antano-Clark directeur.
"The FIC requests to know what your team intends to do for the remaining stages. The choice of finishing the race is yours."

What would the team do? Were they too demoralized by Rolf's death? Losing Stu had nearly pushed Christopher off the bike forever: what did the
team think? Or Luca? He'd buried friends before, he'd said. Had the bike killed them? Yet he'd struggled up Mont Zoncolan and
refused to quit.

Antano-Clark led the GC and team standings until today; would the directeur pull them for having no chance to maintain that? Or would he ask them to ride
on?

"Our remaining seven riders have asked to finish the Giro. We thank you for making that possible." Michel spoke in a whisper.

"Team Antano-Clark will be given a ceremonial lap at the end of the twenty-first stage in Milan. We would honor our dead. Signor Biondi, if you
wished to join the team for that lap, you will be permitted to ride."

Again Luca whispered, "Grazie."

He'd be there. Christopher could see him now, lined up with his friends and teammates, riding one hand or no hands, their arms linking them in a
wide line across all the lanes. It would be a slow pace, a dirge, their eyes downcast as they pedaled, or looking out into a future when they'd
have to ride beyond Rolf's death. Oh, yeah, Luca would be there. He was riding that lap right now.

***

Luca hadn't shooed him off, so Christopher went back upstairs with the other two. Michel embraced Luca with cheek kisses. "You go home,
or somewhere that you can relax. Unplanned and unwanted vacation is yours for two weeks. You rejoin us in Milan." He left Luca at his door,
calling to his team that they needed to be downstairs and on the bus in twenty minutes. "We travel to Conegliano for tomorrow's stage.
Muovetevi!
"

Luca met Christopher's eyes, one hand on the doorknob. Their bicycles stood in the hallway, spoked guardians to either side of Luca's
door. "Thank you for--today. On the mountain, you gave me strength. You gave help
commissaires
couldn't see. I finished
stage. That was important to me, not to quit."

Why did they have to be doing this in the hallway, with the bustle of packing coming through open doors? Men with suitcases, some the wiry young riders,
others older and burdened with more equipment, poured out into the hallway. All of them stopped to embrace Luca with soft words. "You rest a
while, and come to Milan." "Poor Rolf." "We need you. Rest. Heal." Others spoke words Christopher
didn't understand.

They eyed him silently, taking in his sweaty, unzipped jersey and fixed-sole shoes. He carried the curse of the mountain on him, the effort, the tragedy. A
few nodded to him; none spoke. Luca didn't explain him, but if they recognized a man they'd ridden with once, months ago and thousands
of miles away, they said nothing. His press pass hung on a lanyard around his neck; maybe that was explanation enough.

Inside the room two men waited. Open suitcases, packed and ready to be zipped, lay on the beds. Paolo searched under the beds for escaped possessions, and
another man sat in the one hard-backed chair. He rose, his arms out. "Luca."

"Damiano." Luca stepped into the Duclos-Wurth star's embrace, offering the cheek kisses Christopher still hadn't
gotten used to. They broke apart.

Damiano spoke softly in Italian, but Luca answered in English. "I don't know. No plan yet."

That got Christopher a crusty look. "Your pet journo is allowed to know when you do have plan?"

"Not a pet, and this journo knows when to be quiet. We can talk."

"Hah!" came from under the bed. A guy whose butt stuck up in perfect kicking range shouldn't be snarking. Christopher
estimated the distance.

"The kitchen at the villa is still full of all the food you didn't eat during Tour de Romandie. Use anything there: food, car,
toothbrush...." Damiano produced a ring of keys. "You go there, it's quiet. High walls to keep out his
amici
." All journalists became enemies with a toss of Damiano's head--scorn, Italian-style, was awfully pointed. Christopher
gritted his teeth.

"Keep him out too?" Luca didn't reach for the keys. "Christopher is a friend."

Damiano wrapped his fingers around the keys. Would he deny Luca refuge? "He's journo with big camera."

"Who put poison in your ear?" Luca demanded. "He saved me three times now."

Paolo had emerged from beneath the bed with a sock in his hand, but froze on his knees. What choice evils had he mentioned to Damiano? Whose side was he
on?
Should have kicked him while he was such a tempting target.

"I won't endanger your privacy, Signor." How had he become one of the paparazzi? "Or Luca's. If
I'm even there." Because Christopher should be on the train to Conegliano too. What the hell was he going to do if Luca wanted him to
come?

Unwrapping his hand, Damiano dangled the keys from one finger. "If you want him, okay. Maybe interviewing you is better than watching
race."

Not everything was an interview, damn it! The words clogged in Christopher's throat--saying so begged the next question--why
else would he be there? "Do you really think Luca should be alone right now?"

"He won't be alone." Paolo had risen to his feet. "I take care of him."

"Fine." Damiano pressed the keys into Luca's hand. "You choose who comes with you. Three bedrooms, lots of company." A horn sounded from the street in short bursts of impatience. He embraced Luca again, and Luca clung to him for a moment. "I have to
go. See you in Milan." With a backward glance for Luca and a backward glare for Christopher, Damiano disappeared.

Paolo bustled between the two beds, zipping and tucking. "We need tickets to Como. I go get them, come back for you and baggage. We take night
train, you eat, rest."

"I can't." Luca stopped Paolo in his tracks with the words. "I have to take Rolf's body home."

Chapter 25

"No!" If Paolo had knocked Luca down to keep him from the doorway, he couldn't have been clearer. "This task is not
for you!"

"Then who?" Luca threw his hands up. "He was my friend. I can't ship him home to family
like--like--like package of meat."