by Ritter Ames
I admit, I did a little three-sixty reconnoitering myself.
Ten minutes later, after a particularly circuitous route, we entered the hotel through a service entrance, went up a freight elevator, and were safely ensconced in the room. I ate until I got sleepy, which wasn’t very long. It was past time for the conversation we needed to explore.
“What do we know?” I asked, once we could safely talk behind a closed door. I hid another yawn with my hand.
“She had to be following me when I picked you up at the airport. Otherwise, it would be too coincidental for her to be at the fountain the same time as us.”
“Except we were at one of the most famous tourist sites in Rome. My fault, I know. Unless she has a tracker on you, or had you under surveillance somehow, it sounds more likely she had the most popular sites staked out and we happened on the one she manned herself. The one nearest this hotel.”
“There is that,” Jack agreed. “The fountain and the Spanish Steps are probably the city’s two most visited night attractions.”
“At least we know she didn’t come with me from London. She was too busy killing a man here in Rome earlier today.”
“Small favors.”
I held up my glass and Jack added more wine.
“I read about a University of Alberta study recently saying a glass of red wine may have the same effects as an hour at the gym,” I said.
Jack snorted. “I think we got enough of a workout tonight chasing our perp. You don’t have to justify another glass of wine.”
“It’s what we women do.” I ignored the pasta to pick at some of the fruit and cheese. Despite feeling close to starvation earlier, the adrenalin rush I’d pushed through the past hour was a dieter’s dream. I popped another grape into my mouth. “Or the Amazon already knew you were staying here and was on a simple stakeout.”
“Yeah.” Jack sighed. “We probably need to move.”
“Not tonight. I’m exhausted.” My brain started working again. “How did you book this hotel?”
“Walked in once Nico and I left the hospital. I’ve quit doing anything in advance. Nico’s ability to get into anything digital makes me look over my virtual shoulder all the time. You had the right idea in Florence.”
“Welcome to the dark side,” I teased, then yawned so deeply I thought I was going to pass out. “I want eggs Benedict in the morning. What little strength I had left is zapped. I’m too tired to try to eat.”
“Never thought I’d hear you say those words, but I completely understand,” Jack said, pushing aside his own plate of pasta. He rose and extended a hand to pull me from my chair. “Bloody hell.” He yawned. “I think I’m too tired even to sleep. Or maybe I’m asleep already. I can’t tell anymore.”
I pulled a couple of alarm gizmos from my purse and walked to the door. “These should alert us if anyone comes in during the night. They have a tendency to wail. Is Nico sleeping here?”
“Who knows? His luggage is. He said he’s going to bring in some computers to set up a command center, and there was someone he wanted to see tonight. Thought he might get some intel on the missing forgers.”
I laughed. “Yeah, intel. I lay you odds it’s a girl instead.”
“You know I’m not one to take a sucker bet.”
He called the front desk. “We need a laundry pickup, and we’d like to have it returned with our breakfast in the morning.” After listening a few seconds, he hung up and turned to me. “There should be a plastic sack in the closet for your clothes. They can be laundered by morning, no problem.”
“Thank you.”
“You want to borrow one of my shirts?”
“I’ll use one of the fluffy white robes in the bathroom.”
He entered the room on the left. I stumbled into the room on the right after wrapping up in a robe and setting my bag of traveling clothes outside the door. I remember seeing the bed. I think I disrobed myself. Even that was up for debate.
Ten
My clothes did indeed arrive the next morning with breakfast. While I dressed, Jack set the table. I came back into the suite’s lounge to see him stirring our coffee cups with a clear plastic wand. He pulled out the stirrer and stared hard at it.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Checking to see if the coffee is spiked.” He held up a bottle resembling fingernail polish. “This was developed by a couple of guys to help women keep from being drugged in bars. You can paint it on fingernails, dip the end of a nail in a drink, and if any date rape drugs have been added the polish will change color.” He held up the clear stick. “We’re safe.”
I took the bottle from him. “Does this work with poison?”
“No, just popular knock-out drugs. I’m counting on the premise if the Amazon got our coffee spiked, it would simply be something sleep-inducing ra ther than lethal.”
“Can I keep this? To use on my nails for my own drug-checking purposes?”
“I was already going to suggest it.”
“Nice.” I grinned and set the bottle back on the table. “Cassie and I can function as walking drug tests.”
When I suggested eggs Benedict the previous evening, my stomach had been overly ambitious. Toast and coffee with some spectacular fruit spread were hitting the spot adequately to help us wake up. The lock on the door thunked as we finished eating, and Nico rolled in with computer gear on a two-wheeled collapsible dolly. Fortunately, we disarmed my make-do alarm system when breakfast arrived. My gorgeous geek wore a particularly sour look on his face, and I was sure the dark look would have gone nuclear if he’d had a high-pitched squeal pealing in his ears.
“Morning, Nico,” I said. His response came in the form of a grunt. I raised my eyebrows questioningly at Jack, and he gave a serious look and shook his head. Okay. This should be a fun trip.
Nico started stretching cords and plugging in power strips.
“Need some help?” I asked.
“No.”
We finished our coffee as he positioned a third monitor. Jack headed back into his room for a jacket. I filled a cup with coffee and offered it to my techno wingman. “Here, Nico, have some caffeine.”
“Grazie.”
“Get lucky last night?”
He gave me a grin finally. “I could ask the same of you.”
“You know everything was all business here.”
“Um-hmm.” He finished the coffee and set it aside, opening his laptop as he spoke. “I’ll wait for Jack. I don’t want to tell my story twice.”
“Jack is here,” he said, reentering the space as he straightened his collar.
Nico flopped into a nearby chair. “Gaia connected me with her informant last night at dinner. As I told you earlier—Oh, did you tell Laurel? I don’t want to repeat—”
“No, Laurel knows nothing,” I said and crossed my arms. “Feel free to repeat.”
“It’s not like we didn’t have other things to think about, or run from,” Jack said, setting his hands on his hips. “I didn’t keep you out of the loop on purpose.”
“Mio Dio.” Nico walked to the table to pour another cup of coffee. The pot was empty. “I already have a headache and none of this is helping.”
He obviously didn’t get lucky last night.
“Fill Laurel in and I’ll order another pot,” Jack said, crossing to the room phone.
I joined Nico at the table.
“Over Christmas, I heard about a forger here in Rome who disappeared from regular circles. He’s known as il Carver. Through some research and a little hacking, I learned we had a friend in common, Gaia. I contacted her when we arrived yesterday, and she agreed to talk to me. Said she might be able to get me an interview with the forger. He’d been in hiding after another of his brother forgers was killed. He’d started putting different puzzle piec
es together and didn’t like the picture coming through.”
“What kind of forger is he?”
“As his nickname implies, carvings. Especially religious carvings. Icons.”
“Oh, good. I feared his name had a more ominous tone to it. Maybe it was the il that did it.”
Jack came over to stand beside me. “Coffee will be up in a mo’.”
“Good.” Nico sat down at the table and sighed. “Seriously, I’m getting too old for this.”
“You’re not even thirty.” I laughed.
“I’d like to actually turn thirty too,” he said. He pulled back the curtain and looked down at the sidewalk.
“Were you followed?” Jack asked.
Nico shrugged. “We were chased last night. We had almost finished our meal when il Carver looked up and almost choked. Two men in dark coats entered the restaurant and looked around. Before they saw us, I pushed il Carver so he fell off his chair to the side, and told him to get under the table. Gaia and I shifted the plates around to make it appear there wasn’t a third person. The men stayed, finally taking a table near the front of the restaurant.”
“Did they spot your forger?” Jack asked.
“Only as we left. I’d planned ahead. When I paid the bill I asked if we could go out the back way for convenience. The waiter was suspicious, of course, but I’d paid the bill and gave him a good tip. He told us to follow him. Gaia and I did, and I carried away the forger’s coat with mine. As we got to the kitchen door, il Carver broke from the cover of the table and zigzagged through the diners. The two men spotted him and gave chase.”
“They were after him.”
“Yes, his wariness was justified.”
My turn for a question. “The research you and Cassie found helped you spot the pattern of forgers who’d recently met untimely deaths. Is this something the whole forger community is buzzing about, or simply il Carver’s personal epiphany?”
“From what he said, he hasn’t talked to anyone about it. He confirmed what he’d heard was true, and went into hiding until he learned more.”
“What had he learned?” Jack asked.
Conversation stopped with the sound of a knock on the door announcing room service. I asked about Gaia’s background and Nico said it had nothing to do with art or forgeries. Jack crossed the room and checked the peephole before turning the lock. Minutes later, with his cup refilled, Nico launched into what was discussed the previous evening, picking up where he’d left off at the coffee’s arrival.
“The forger community isn’t necessarily close. Everyone has his own area of expertise and is afraid of competition for the better paying clients. This forger wasn’t the most personable fellow either. Not one to meet others for drinks and chatting.” Nico blew across the top of his cup. “He noticed too many of his ilk meeting untimely deaths. The career choice is risky, but he felt the risks were rising unnaturally.”
“Lucky for him, he sounds a little paranoid,” I said. “From what happened last night I guess the paranoia kept him alive.”
I walked over to grab my coat from where I’d left it on a chair the previous evening. Nico continued with his story, “We got away fast enough to find a cab. But the bad guys had a car and rammed us. They tried to grab il Carver but he fought. Gaia and I helped. One guy hit il Carver over the head and crammed him into their car. We tried to get away from the other guy to help, but the driver found the motor wouldn’t work. He got out again to pull the forger from the back, precisely when two police cars arrived with lights and sirens. The men got away before police could stop them.”
“What was the cab driver doing all this time?” Jack asked.
“Do you know il Carver’s real name?” I asked at the same time.
“The taxi driver was the one who called the police,” Nico said. “He shot a video of the entire thing with his cell phone. And, no, il Carver wouldn’t tell me his real name and neither will Gaia.”
“Did you get the video?” Jack and I spoke together.
“Of course.” He took a tentative sip of the hot coffee, then returned the cup to the saucer. “After that, the police called an ambulance, and Gaia argued with the taxi driver about who was paying for the damage. I stepped in and offered to give him Max’s contact to try to get the foundation to pay the cab repairs if he would email me the video.”
“Max will explode,” I said.
“I know.” He grinned. “I only offered help. No guarantees.”
“Anything else?” Jack asked.
“I spent the rest of the night at either the police station or waiting outside the trauma unit. We finally left the hospital when the forger was assigned a bed and moved from trauma. I will check on him periodically through the day. After I get some sleep.”
“What are the computers for?” I asked.
Nico swung his cup around to point. “Something I did learn last night is there are a couple of new names to research. One sounds Russian, the other Chinese. I don’t figure either of them are important in what we’re looking at, but I’m going to hack into some servers to find out. See if they lead anywhere. However, il Carver did admit he’s done freelance work tying back to a relatively new client he’s heard connects to an organization with a Greek name.”
“Ermo Colle?” Jack asked.
“The very one.”
There it was again. No direct tie, but the hint of one to the organization with an uncanny ability to seemingly hide in plain sight.
“No name recognition when I asked him any of the names we know associated with Moran,” Nico said. “Nor when I mentioned Tony B. I must assume il Carver is a more low-level contact since he’d only done freelance work recently. He may only know middle men.”
“And he’s running away,” Jack mused.
“Smart man,” I said.
“Indeed,” said Nico.
“Can you email me the video?” Jack asked.
“Meant to already.” Nico sighed and pulled out his cell. He tapped his screen a couple of times. “Done.”
“What about theories?” I asked. “Does he remember anything about the job he was on to suggest people would come later to kill him?”
“No. At first he thought it might be some kind of professional jealousy, and each forger was killed by a different competitor. According to il Carver, the money really is good. However, at dinner he said he’d turned down a second job from them. They acted okay with it, but he knew from talk with a friend a few days earlier the same job had already been given to another forger who killed himself the week before.”
“The forger committed suicide after being hired for the job?”
Nico nodded. “When il Carver asked about it the answer was the dead man was depressed, drank too much and probably used drugs. But il Carver knew the whole story wasn’t being told. The men trying to hire him, who said the forger was depressed, acted like they were hiding something. All body language, but il Carver got concerned.”
“How did the other forger die?”
“Slit his wrists in the bathtub. When they came to il Carver and he realized it was the same work and they weren’t completely telling the truth about the death, he decided to be suddenly very busy. He admitted to me he had no evidence about anything, but he was superstitious enough to trust his instincts and say no.”
“They could be killing anyone they fear might make their secret commissions public,” Jack said. “It’s an angle we’d already thought of, but this is the first bit of evidence to back up any of our suspicions.”
I put on my coat, pulled my hair free, and told Jack, “I’m going to check my makeup one more time and freshen my lipstick. While you’re waiting on me, why don’t you brief Nico on our evening adventure?”
Even through the closed door, I could hear the murmur of their voices. A quick check of
my makeup and I was confident the light discoloration on my chin was masked. The hot coffee had done a number on my gloss, as I expected. I finished up by running a quick brush through my hair and pulled gloves from my coat pocket as I reentered the room. The guys had moved over to the computers. One of the laptops was booted up. The coffee cup had become an extension of Nico’s hand.
“I’m ready whenever you are,” I called.
“Great. Everyone’s up to speed on everything. We’ll compare notes this evening on what transpires today,” Jack said. He turned to Nico and added, “We’re heading for the police station to talk to the detective in charge of Tony B’s murder. I assume you’ll be sleeping this afternoon.”
Nico couldn’t respond until he finished a huge yawn. “Yes. I’ll get a few things started here, then nap.”
“I’m leaving my gun in the safe,” Jack said, walking across the room to match action to words. “Don’t be afraid to use it.”
“If you don’t mind, I just got released for using a gun in Florence. I don’t think my grandmother would survive my getting jailed again.”
“Better than killed,” Jack said. “The guys last night proved they play for keeps, and the Amazon showed her hand as well.”
Nico frowned. “Maybe I’ll get us new accommodations before I sleep.”
“If you do, leave a message at the front desk,” Jack replied, checking the peephole again before opening the door.
“In case we get tied up somehow, can you try to touch base with Cassie this afternoon?” I asked. “She’s supposed to meet with Scotland Yard at the office before catching a flight to New York.”
He nodded. “I need to talk to her anyway. On my way here I overnighted a charm bracelet to her.” He set his cup on the floor and half-rose, checking his pockets. “I have your charm. The envelope is—”
“It’s okay, Nico,” I said. “I’ll get it later. Jack and I will be at a police station. What could be safer?”
I heard him chuckling as the door closed behind us.