The Venetian Betrayal (28 page)

Stephanie stepped forward. "Cassiopeia. I don't know half of what's happening here, but I know enough to see that you're not thinking. Like you told me last fall, use your head. Let us help. What happened?"

"You, too, Stephanie. Back off. I've been waiting for these men for months. Finally, tonight, I had them in my sights. I got one. I want the other. And yes, it's Viktor. He was there when Ely died. They burned him to death. For what?" Her voice had steadily risen. "I want to know why he died."

"Then let's find out," Malone said.

Cassiopeia paced with an unsteady gait. At the moment she was trapped, nowhere to go, and she was apparently smart enough to know that neither of them was going to back off. She rested the palms of her hands on the deck rail and gathered her breath. Finally, she said, "Okay. Okay. You're right."

He wondered if they were being placated.

Cassiopeia stood still. "This one's personal. More than either of you realize." She hesitated. "It's more than Ely."

That was the second time she'd insinuated as much. "How about you tell us what's at stake?"

"How about I don't."

He wanted desperately to help her and arguing seemed pointless. So he glanced at Stephanie, who knew what his eyes were asking.

She nodded her approval.

He stepped toward the helm and powered up the engines. More police cruisers passed, heading for Torcello. He aimed the boat for Venice and the distant lights of Viktor's retreating craft.

"Don't worry about a corpse," Cassiopeia said. "There'll be nothing left of the body or that museum."

He wanted to know something. "Stephanie, any word on Naomi?"

"Nothing since yesterday. That's why I came."

"Who's Naomi?" Cassiopeia asked.

"That's my business," he said.

Cassiopeia did not challenge him. Instead she said, "Where are we going?"

He glanced at his watch. The luminous dial read 12:45 A
. M
. "Like I told you. Lots going on here, and we know exactly where Viktor's headed."

Chapter
FORTY-NINE

SAMARKAND

4:50 A
. M
.

VINCENTI'S SPINE TINGLED. TRUE, HE'D ORDERED PEOPLE KILLED, one just yesterday, but this was different. He was about to embark on a bold path. One that would not only make him the wealthiest person on the planet, but also secure him a place in history.

Dawn lay a little over an hour away. He sat in the rear of the car while O'Conner and two other men approached a house shielded behind a thicket of blooming chestnut trees and a tall iron fence, everything owned by Irina Zovastina.

O'Conner drew near to the car and Vincenti lowered the window.

"The two guards are dead. We took them out with no trouble."

"Any other security?"

"That's it. Zovastina had this place on a loose leash."

Because she thought no one cared. "Are we ready?"

"Only the woman who watches over her is inside."

"Then let's see how agreeable they are."

Vincenti entered through the front door. The two other men they'd hired for tonight held Karyn Walde's nurse, an older woman with a stern face, wearing a bathrobe and slippers. A frightened look filled her Asian features.

"I understand," he said to her, "that you care for Ms. Walde."

The woman nodded.

"And that you resent how the Supreme Minister treats her."

"She's terrible to her."

He was pleased their intelligence had been accurate. "I understand that Karyn is suffering. Her illness is progressing."

"And the minister won't let her rest."

He signaled and the two men released their hold. He stepped close and said, "I'm here to relieve her suffering. But I need your help."

Her gaze carried suspicion. "Where are the guards?"

"Dead. Wait here while I go see her." He motioned. "Down the hall?"

She nodded again.

He switched on one of the bedside lamps and gazed at the pathetic sight lying prone beneath a pale pink comforter.

Karyn Walde breathed with the help of bottled oxygen and a respirator. An intravenous bag fed one arm. He removed a hypodermic, inserted the needle into one of its IV ports, and let it dangle.

The woman's eyes opened.

"You need to wake up," he said.

She blinked a few times, trying to register what was happening. She then pushed herself up from the pillow. "Who are you?"

"I know they've been in short supply lately, but I'm a friend."

"Do I know you?"

He shook his head. "No reason why you would. But I know you. Tell me, what was it like to love Irina Zovastina?"

Surely an odd question from a stranger in the middle of the night, but she only shrugged. "Why would you care?"

"I've dealt with her many years. Never once have I ever felt any affection either from or toward her. How did you?"

"It's a question I've asked myself many times."

He glanced around at the room's decor. Elegant and expensive, like the rest of the house. "You live well."

"Small comfort."

"Yet when you became ill, knew you were HIV positive, you returned to her. Came back after several years of estrangement."

"You know a lot about me."

"To come back you must have felt something for her."

She laid herself back on the pillow. "In some ways, she's foolish."

He listened closely.

"She fashions herself Achilles to my Patroclus. Or worse, she's Alexander and thinks of me as Hephaestion. I've listened to those stories many times. You know the Iliad?"

He shook his head.

"Achilles felt responsible for Patroclus' death. He allowed his lover to lead men into battle, pretending to be him. Alexander the Great felt great guilt over Hephaestion dying."

"You know your literature and history."

"I don't know a thing. I've just listened to her ramble."

"How is she foolish?"

"She wants to save me, yet can't bring herself to say it. She comes, stares at me, chastises me, even attacks me, but always she's trying to save me. When it came to me I knew she was weak, so I returned to where I knew I'd be looked after."

"Yet you obviously hate her."

"I assure you, whoever you are, that someone in my shoes has little choice."

"You speak freely to a stranger."

"I have nothing to hide or fear. My life's about over."

"You've given up?"

"Like I have a choice."

He decided to see what else he could learn. "Zovastina is in Venice. Right now. Searching for something. Are you aware of that?"

"It doesn't surprise me. She's the great hero, on the great hero's quest. I'm the weak lover. We're not to ask or challenge the hero, just accept what's offered."

"You have listened to a lot of nonsense."

She shrugged. "She imagines herself my savior, so I allow it. Why not? Besides, tormenting her is my only pleasure. Life's choices and all that bullshit."

"Sometimes life is fickle."

He could see that she was intrigued.

"Where are the guards?"

"Dead."

"And my nurse?"

"She's fine. I believe she actually cares for you."

A slight nod. "She does."

In her prime this woman would have been formidable--able to seduce both men and women--easy to see how Zovastina would have been attracted to her. But it was also easy to see how the two women would have clashed. Both alpha-females. Both accustomed to having their way.

"I've been watching you for some time," he told her.

"There's not much to see."

"Tell me, if you could have anything in this world, what would it be?"

The gravely ill soul lying before him seemed to seriously consider his inquiry. He saw the words as they formed in her mind. He'd seen the same resolution before, in others long ago, facing similar dire consequences, clinging to little or no hope since neither science nor religion could save them.

Only a miracle.

So when she drew a breath and mouthed her answer, he was not disappointed.

"To live."

Chapter
FIFTY

VENICE

VIKTOR HUSTLED PAST THE BASILICA'S BRIGHTLY LIT WESTERN FACADE. High above, St. Mark himself stood guard in the black night above a golden lion with outstretched wings. The heart of the piazza spanned to his left, cordoned off, a multitude of police swarming the broad pavement. A crowd had gathered and he'd overheard from snippets of conversation that a shooting had occurred. He skirted the spectacle and headed for the church's north entrance, the one Zovastina had told him to use.

He was unnerved by the appearance of the woman with the bow. She should have been dead in Denmark. And if she wasn't dead, the other two problems were surely also still breathing. Things were gyrating out of control. He should have stayed and made sure she drowned in the lagoon, but Zovastina was waiting and he could not be late.

He kept seeing Rafael die.

Zovastina would not care beyond wanting to know if the death raised any suspicion. But how could it? There'd be no body to find. Just bone fragments and ashes.

Like when Ely Lund's house burned.

"You're going to kill me?" Ely asked. "What have I done?" The intruder brandished a gun. "How can I be a threat to anyone?"

Viktor stood out of sight, in an adjacent room, and listened.

"Why don't you answer me?" Ely asked, his voice rising.

"I'm not here to talk," the man said.

"Just here to shoot me?"

"I do as I'm ordered."

"And you have no idea why?"

"I don't care."

Silence filled the room.

"I wish I could have done a few more things," Ely finally said. The tone was melancholy, full of resignation, surprisingly calm. "I always thought my illness would kill me."

Viktor listened with a renewed interest.

"You are infected?" the stranger asked, some suspicion in his voice. "You don't look sick."

"No reason I should. But it's still there."

Viktor heard the distinctive click of a gun slide.

He'd stood outside and watched the house burn. Samarkand's meager fire department had done little. Eventually, the walls collapsed onto themselves and Greek fire consumed everything.

Now he knew something else.

The woman from Copenhagen had cared enough for Ely Lund to avenge his death.

He rounded the basilica and spotted the north portal. A man waited inside the open bronze doors.

Viktor grabbed his composure.

The Supreme Minister would want him focused and controlled.

ZOVASTINA HANDED THE SIGNED CONCORDAT BACK TO MICHENER. "Now leave me be for my thirty minutes."

The papal nuncio motioned and all the priests withdrew from the presbytery.

"You'll regret pressuring me," she made clear.

"You might find the Holy Father tough to challenge."

"How many armies does your pope have?"

"Many have asked that question. But armies weren't needed to bring communism to its knees. John Paul II did just fine, all by himself."

"And your pope is equally astute?"

"Cross him and you'll find out."

Michener walked away, passing through the iconostasis into the nave, disappearing toward the basilica's main entrance. "I'll be back in a half hour," he called out through the darkness.

She saw Viktor advancing through the dimness. He passed Michener, who acknowledged him with a nod. Her two other guardsmen stood off to the side.

Viktor entered the presbytery. His clothes were damp and dingy, his face smoke-streaked.

All she wanted to know was, "Do you have it?"

He handed her an elephant medallion.

"What do you think?" she asked.

"Looks authentic, but I haven't had a chance to test it."

She pocketed the coin. Later.

The open sarcophagus waited ten meters away.

That's what mattered now.

MALONE WAS THE LAST TO HOP FROM THE BOAT ONTO THE CONCRETE quay. They were back downtown, in San Marco, where the famous square ended at the lagoon. Ripples slapped moving poles and jostled gondolas tied to the docks. Still lots of police around and a multitude more spectators than an hour ago.

Stephanie motioned toward Cassiopeia, who was already shouldering through a crowded row of street vendors, toward the basilica, the bow and quiver still draped across her shoulder. "Pocahontas there needs a leash."

"Mr. Malone."

Through the crowd, he spotted a man in his late forties dressed in chinos, a long-sleeve shirt, and a cotton jacket walking their way. Cassiopeia seemed to have heard the greeting, too, as she'd stopped her advance and was headed toward where Malone and Stephanie stood.