Falling for Italy

by De Ross, Melinda

  The front door opened and heavy footsteps rushed inside.

  “Polizia! Questa è la polizia! Dove sei?”

  “Sopra!” Sonia shouted back, gritting her teeth in frustration, and her finger tightened on the trigger. “You son of a bitch, you’ll pay for this, I swear it!” she vowed to the man, and then lowered the gun, as two police officers barged into the room.

  “It’s him,” Giovanni told them in Italian, nodding to the guy he was still holding by the throat. “Secure him well.”

  After assessing the situation, two of the men—there were four now—cuffed the stranger and ushered him downstairs. Giovanni lowered his arms, feeling lightheaded with pain, effort and the loss of blood.

  Sonia hurried to his side, supporting him, telling the other two officers in rapid English, “Call an ambulance quickly, please! He’s hurt.”

  She indicated his shoulder and arm soaked with blood and the men seemed to understand her. One of them took out a cell phone from his pocket and dialed a number.

  “I need an ambulance fast, a man shot in the shoulder,” he said into the receiver, and then gave their address.

  “How badly are you hurt, signore?” he asked Giovanni after he hung up. “The ambulance is on its way.”

  Giovanni had sat on a small sofa in the study. His head was beginning to spin a bit, so he lowered it onto the sofa’s backrest. Sonia was next to him, holding his hand hard, her palm cold and damp. He looked at her and grimaced a smile. He imagined he was as pale as she. He refocused his attention on the waiting officers, remembering one of them had asked him a question.

  “I don’t know. I don’t think it’s so bad. The bullet just grazed me, I think,” he told the men in Italian, then switched to English, addressing Sonia.

  “What the hell bullet was that, I wonder? It made a hell of a wide gash.”

  Her eyes were shining with tears, but she sniffed them back. “It’s probably because he fired through the window. When the bullet went through the thick glass, the metal got deformed and expanded. If… If it had gone through a bone, it would’ve shattered it and made a hell of a mess.”

  Her voice broke and she turned her head away, burying her face in her hands, not able to contain her sobs any longer. He reached for her with his good arm, alarmed to feel her whole body trembling. He drew her to him, gathering her against his chest, whispering comfort words in her hair.

  “Don’t cry, baby, please. It’s nothing, just a scratch, that’s all. I’ll be fine in no time, I promise.”

  He stroked her head, rocking her gently, as the officers stood by the door waiting for the ambulance and probably for a commissario—which was a kind of detective, as far as he knew.

  He lifted Sonia’s face to him, though moving his left arm had become increasingly hard and painful. Tears were streaming down her beautiful face. Her voice quivered as she said through sobs, “Why couldn’t it have been me he shot? Why didn’t you let me kill the bastard? Oh, Giovanni, I’d die if anything would happen to you. What if this is really bad? What if you’ll lose your arm?”

  Her voice had increasingly lifted in desperation and he felt the terror gripping her as she spoke. He cupped her cheek in his palm.

  “Don’t ever say that, Sonia. If he’d hit you, he’d be dead. Don’t wish for that yet, because we need answers. As for my shoulder, it will be fine, I promise. Don’t you think I’d know if I had a shattered bone?” he asked, trying to sound reasonable and reassuring, although he felt a bit unsure himself. All that talk about shattered bones made him uneasy.

  The ambulance had arrived and the police officers standing by stepped outside to allow a middle-aged man and a young woman dressed in medical attire to enter the room.

  “What have we here?” the man asked. Giovanni saw his nametag, which read, Dottore G. Galliano. “Please step aside, signorina,” he addressed Sonia, who understood and moved away, making room.

  Giovanni told the doctor in a few words what had happened, as the nurse assisting him set down her medical kit and started working on untying the makeshift bandage.

  Giovanni winced when the stiff fabric clotted with dry blood came away from his skin. Or rather, his flesh, to be more exact. He saw Sonia turn away from the sight and grip the edge of the desk for support.

  “Is it that bad?” he asked the doctor, looking up at him, worry transpiring through his voice.

  “It looks ugly,” the doctor replied calmly while he examined and rebandaged the wound. “It doesn’t seem the bullet touched the bone or any major blood vessels, which is our most concern. On a first impression, I’d say you’ll be as good as new in a couple of weeks, signore Coriola. But you’ll have an ugly scar here,” he went on, adjusting his spectacles.

  Relief washed through him and he laid his head on the backrest. He felt all the tension suddenly gone from his body, as the drug the nurse had injected into his arm take effect. He didn’t care if the doctor understood English as he told Sonia, “Screw the scar! Looks like I’ll live, cara.”

  * * * *

  “He hasn’t spoken a single word,” Chief Commissioner Romano was telling them the next morning, as they sat in the small hospital room. Giovanni hadn’t wanted to stay in the hospital overnight, but Sonia and the doctor had been vehement about it.

  They had treated his wound, and given him painkillers and antibiotics to prevent infection. His condition was far from serious, but he’d lost enough blood to make the doctor order a drip for him and at least two days of hospital care.

  Sonia and Giovanni had been placed in a two-bed small room—since she’d refused to leave him alone. A nurse had given her a sedative, and both she and Giovanni had been stuffed with hospital food. Sonia was aware that having even this little privacy in a public health institution was a luxury. While she used to despise people that used their name or position to get preferential treatment, she was grateful for it now. She and Giovanni had been through a terrible ordeal and needed a night of rest, feeling relatively safe in this protected environment.

  Lucia had dropped by the past night to bring them food, clothes and toiletries. When Sonia called Paolo the day before and told him what had happened, he and his wife had immediately gone to the house and stayed there to assist the police as they proceeded with their investigation. They’d also arranged to replace the broken window, although it hadn’t been easy to find someone who would come on Christmas day. The other couple’s concern and support was moving, comforting, making Sonia feel they were not alone.

  Now she was holding Giovanni’s hand while he lay in bed and listened to the news the chief of police brought. Romano went on, speaking in accented English—no doubt for her benefit.

  “His fingerprints are burnt. We’re working with the Interpol in identifying him by his face. We also contacted Commissario Alberto in Rome to see if we can link this incident to the break-in you had at the hotel. Alberto sent us the images caught on the security cameras in the Sontuoso. We matched them against this guy’s profile and the bone structure is similar, even though he might have been wearing a disguise when he broke into your suite there. The probability that it’s the same individual is high. The ballistic report confirms the bullet was fired with the Beretta rifle found in his possession. He used 223 Rem FMJ ammunition—one that has very high speed and a smaller deforming factor. The bullet we extracted from the wall had deformed when penetrating the window. That’s why your shoulder wound is so wide, despite the fact that the bullet only grazed you,” he addressed Giovanni. “If it touched an artery or bone, the damage would have been utterly extensive.”

  Sonia listened quietly to the Commissioner’s detailed report, feeling herself go pale at his last statement. She’d been so close to losing the person whom she loved most in her life, she thought, her stomach tightening even more in anxiety. And why? Who was this mysterious man and why did he want to hurt them?

  She was about to voice those questions to Romano, when he spoke again in his authoritarian, matter-of-fact tone. She
sat quietly and listened to him, studying his square jaw and gray hair. His dark coat was too short for his tall, bulky frame, and his blue eyes looked like they could break steel.

  “At this point, there’s no proof the man didn’t act on his own. I could try to arrange for permanent police protection for you and Miss Galsworthy, but since we have the guy in custody…”

  He left the sentence unfinished, shrugging his massive shoulders almost apologetically.

  Giovanni shifted in his bed, turning on one side to favor his bandaged shoulder.

  “No worries,” he told Romano. “I’ll hire private security.”

  “The man is either a professional or a fanatic. For now, he’s keeping silent. Hasn’t even told us his name. But we’ll break him sooner or later, I have no doubt,” Romano went on, and something in his eyes told Sonia he would, by any means—fair or foul. “My guess would be that he’s got some special training, probably military. In any case, this isn’t an ordinary guy. The fact that you caught him was great luck on your side and unexpected sloppiness on his.”

  The attacker had defiled not only their life and intimacy, but also their home and their sense of security. That, Sonia would not forgive. She’d been dead serious when she’d told Giovanni she wanted to kill the guy. But if she had, they would never know the truth, never feel safe again. To live under constant supervision and protection was hell, the worst faith she could imagine. They had to know the truth.

  “How long do you think it will take you to find out who he is, or to make him talk?” she asked Romano, still holding Giovanni’s hand, sitting on the edge of his bed.

  “That depends. It may take hours, days, even weeks, Miss Galsworthy. If he is indeed a professional, he hid his traces well. But as long as he exists, he has to be registered somewhere, in some database. If we can’t fingerprint him, at least we have his face, his DNA. Sooner or later we’ll identify him. I’m going to interview him personally again today, and try to get something out of him.”

  He hesitated, and then stood.

  “I’m sorry I don’t have yet more to give you, signore Coriola. We have a guard here at the door. Please, when you go home, arrange immediately for private security, 24/7. Then call me and give me the details.”

  “I will. Thank you, Commissario,” Giovanni said and shook the man’s hand. “Call us as soon as you know anything else, even if it seems insignificant.”

  “Of course. Have a quick recovery. Miss Galsworthy.” With a short nod to Sonia, he turned and left the room.

  Sonia supported her elbow on her knees, plowing her fingers through her hair. Fatigue and a night of restless sleep interrupted by frequent pauses had left her eyes gritty. All her muscles ached, but she couldn’t complain. It was a minor discomfort compared to what her lover had gone through and was still fighting.

  She turned her head to look at him, still overcome by so many fears and emotions. She couldn’t imagine how she’d managed to react so swiftly yesterday, to stay on her feet and steel herself to bandage his wound, to face their attacker. Then followed the trip to the hospital, the questioning, the paperwork.

  She could have lost him, she told herself again, looking at his scruffy face. He wasn’t so pale now, but wasn’t looking quite fit either. His eyes were shadowed and his lips were slightly cracked, dried during the night, probably from the medication.

  She reached out to touch them and he took her hand, kissing her fingertips, his dark gaze locked on hers.

  “You’re the bravest and strongest woman I know, cara, you know that?” he said, pulling her down next to him on the small bed, making her curl against his chest. He was dressed in a silly hospital thing, which left his arms bare.

  They’d taken out his drip, but she knew she would always have that image in her head—his soft flesh pierced by the needle through which liquid dripped into his veins. Her phobia for doctors and hospitals had taken new dimensions last night. It had been a nightmare to lie in that bed, when she knew across from her Giovanni was fighting pain. Every second spent in this place was agony, but she wouldn’t leave him here alone. She would die first.

  Even as she thought this, she snorted out a humorless laugh.

  “Brave? Strong?” she said in derision. “I feel like falling apart every time I look at you, Giovanni. Every time I remember what happened, I just…”

  “But you didn’t fall apart. You pulled yourself together, patched me up and got right back on your feet.”

  “Yeah, hiding behind the desk. You’ve no idea how much I loathe myself for doing that,” she told him, not realizing until now just how much that fact gnawed at her.

  Giovanni took her chin in firm fingers and angled her head back so she would look at him.

  “That, Sonia, was perhaps the first time in your life when you obeyed me—your man. Is that what’s bothering you?”

  “Hell no! I hid like a coward, that’s what’s bothering me!”

  “You hid like a smart woman who laid a trap, because I told you to do it. If you hadn’t listened to me, we would probably both be dead right now. Would that have been smarter and braver?”

  “No,” she admitted reluctantly. But—”

  “No but,” he interrupted, smoothing the frown-line between her eyebrows. “I know it’s hard, baby, but stop thinking back to what happened. Let’s just think forward.”

  “That’s even more depressing,” she said, resting her head on his chest again, hearing the desperation in her own voice. “What are we going to do? Live with armed bodyguards for the rest of our lives? Look over our shoulders forever, in case a mad man is still hunting us? I don’t understand!” she exploded in frustration. “Who is this man? What does he want from us? Whom did we piss off so badly they would want to kill us, Giovanni?”

  “I don’t know, cara,” he replied on a sigh, his eyes fixed on the ceiling. “But I swear to you we will find out. This won’t be finished until we have all the answers, and whoever has started it will pay.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Two days before New Year’s Eve, Giovanni sat in the study at his desk. The floor had been cleaned, as had the entire house, but the memories would not be wiped as easily as the blood on the carpet. Nor would his wound be patched up as quickly as the bullet hole in the living room, where Paolo had done a great job covering it. It still pained him a lot and his shoulder was still stiff and sore.

  What bothered him the most was the fact that there still hadn’t been any breaks in the investigation. The man who’d attempted to kill him and probably Sonia was still in police custody, but hadn’t spoken a word. They hadn’t yet managed to identify him. On top of that, due to the holidays, things were moving even slower than usual.

  So the bastard had managed not only to compromise their peace and safety, but had even spoiled their first holiday season together. One more thing he will have to pay for, Giovanni thought, putting down the phone after his discouragingly brief conversation with Romano. In so many words, they had zilch.

  He’d hired the same security firm he’d contracted for his office building. Ten guards took day and night shifts, patrolling the entire perimeter of their property, making sure they were safe every minute and no intruder was in sight.

  Despite all this, he felt only marginally safe. There was something unfinished in this whole business. Something that gave him an eerie feeling, which raised the hair on the back of his neck whenever he stopped to think about it. And it wasn’t his own safety he was worried about, but Sonia’s.

  The changes in her were visible, making it obvious how affected she was by the situation, although she tried to hide it. But she had nightmares, and in the night she clung to him haunted by dreams, sometimes releasing the cries trapped in her throat. He had brought her here, to Italy. And even though he knew it was stupid, he blamed himself for the danger she’d been placed in.

  If someone had a grudge against him, he could have dealt with it. But when he thought of the woman he loved being threatened, terrified and
traumatized, a murderous rage boiled in his blood. The need to act, combined with the incapacity to do anything, drove him mad with frustration and impatience.

  He stood, looking out the window, gently rolling his injured shoulder. Sonia was pushing painkillers on him every time she remembered. Behind her back, he tried to dodge the pills at every turn, because they made his head muzzy and he couldn’t think clearly.

  He spotted two of the guards walking around the backyard. He caught sight of another one, hidden among the trees. They were all armed and alert—men with special training, whom he had requested personally.

  That made him feel only marginally better though. He simply couldn’t stand this situation any longer. It felt like a house arrest.

  He turned away from the window and crossed the room, looking down at the place where, only days ago, he and Sonia had literally crawled for their lives. Even if his blood wasn’t still on the carpet and wooden floor, he would see it for a long time in his memories.

  His breath came out in a gust and he banished the image from his mind, closing the study door behind him. He could hear Sonia and Lucia downstairs in the kitchen, talking in a mix of Italian and English.

  As he descended the stairs, Guccio came to greet him, cheerfully waving his tail. Giovanni rubbed his furry ears, then let the dog lick his hands, in love and absolute devotion.

  He entered the kitchen with Guccio following him. Lucia was doing the dishes, while Sonia sat at the table nursing a cup of coffee. She wore a black sweater that made her look even paler, emphasizing the purplish circles under her eyes.

  When she saw him she looked up, her gaze brightening somewhat. The smile stretching her lips didn’t quite reach her eyes, though she forced herself to appear cheerful.

  “Hey, what’s up, darling?” she asked, scraping back her chair and going to put her arms around him. “How are you feeling?”

  God bless her, she had completely exasperated him with that question. He knew and fully appreciated her care and concern, but her asking him that every few hours drove him nuts. If she expected his condition to improve by the hour, she was in for a big disappointment.