Midnight in Venice

by Meadow Taylor

  Chapter 18

  Alessandro should’ve had time to spare, but with Carnival starting, traffic was heavy. He glanced at his watch, calculating how long he had before the counter for the New York flight closed.

  He’d told Pamela he didn’t expect anything to be going down on this flight, but in the course of the drive, he couldn’t help but feel a rising, grim excitement. What if it was this flight?

  He kept going over Eduard’s words. I didn’t want her to return to work after Tazia was born, but with the financial crisis . . . Alessandro was certain there was something Eduard wasn’t telling him. Eduard had been evasive in his answers, as if wondering how much to say. Was Eduard hoping to tell Alessandro just enough to catch his wife’s killer without implicating her in any wrongdoing? Or himself? Alessandro imagined them talking into the night, wondering if a little blackmail was the solution to their financial problems . . .

  He called Columbo on his cell and told him to be ready to hold up the noon flight to New York. After hanging up, he remembered joking with Olivia about calling in a bomb threat.

  He cursed when he found the emergency lane in front of the terminal blocked with traffic—he was going to have to call Security on that one—and parked his car illegally. He threw the identification card he used in these circumstances onto the dash and hoped someone looked before towing it away.

  He called Pamela on her cell and found she was already in the terminal. “How did you manage to get here so fast?” he asked. “Never mind. Just meet me at the check-in counter for New York.”

  Jostling and angering everyone, he ran through the crowd, almost colliding with Pamela in front of the New York counter. The clerk was just putting the baggage tag on the last customer’s suitcase when a man wearing an airport uniform picked up the bag and started walking away with it. It was just as Eduard had described!

  “You talk to the clerk and that woman checking in,” Alessandro said to Pamela. “I’ll go after the guy with the bag.”

  He caught up with the man just as he put his hand on a door labeled Employees Only. Alessandro pulled out his badge. “Stop right there,” he said firmly. “Guardia di Finanza.”

  The man stopped dead, turning to Alessandro with an angry look on his face. Alessandro saw that he was young with short sandy hair and a tan he couldn’t get in Venice in February.

  “Where are you going with that suitcase, Benito?” Alessandro asked, reading his name tag.

  “To the plane, of course,” Benito said.

  “Why isn’t it on the conveyor belt with the rest of the luggage?”

  “Because it’s late?”

  Alessandro matched Benito’s sarcasm. “Why are you asking me?” With every passing moment, Alessandro became more confident he was on to something.

  Benito didn’t answer, and so Alessandro continued. “Do you know what’s in that bag?”

  Benito shook his head, beads of sweat forming on his tanned forehead, and shifted the suitcase to his other hand.

  “Perhaps we should get your boss over here to have a look.”

  Benito looked around wildly before diving in front of a motorized baggage cart. Alessandro’s cellphone rang, but he ignored it as he plunged after Benito, leaping over suitcases and dodging passengers.

  Finally catching up with him, Alessandro grabbed him by the jacket.

  “Gotcha!” he said.

  Benito reacted by throwing the suitcase hard, knocking a middle-aged woman to her knees.

  “I’m going to sue! I’m going to sue!” she screamed.

  The commotion alerted airport security. One guard attempted to calm the woman while a couple of others tried to corral the curious onlookers. One of the guards recognized Alessandro. “Another set of wind-up teeth, Rossi?”

  His cell rang again just then. Columbo. Alessandro quickly filled him in.

  “Search the bags as soon as the others get there,” Columbo said.

  Alessandro was about to slip his phone into his pocket when he saw a text from Pamela. Be prepared for a shock.

  The warning came right in time. He looked up. Pamela held a woman by the arm—Olivia!

  Chapter 19

  “What the hell is going on here?” The words escaped before he had a chance to think.

  “You tell me,” Olivia said. Alessandro could tell she was close to tears, and though it was warm in the terminal, she clutched her coat around her.

  “Is this your suitcase?” he said, echoing the same question he’d asked only five weeks earlier. He sounded so official, but he couldn’t help it. The last time he saw her, he was kissing her in the rain. He had a nightmarish sense of déjà vu, only this time he knew he wouldn’t find a plastic toy.

  “It’s Rocco’s glass for the show in New York,” she said finally.

  Alessandro was stunned. But he had to take charge. He took a deep breath and vowed not to look at Olivia. The head of airport security arrived and Alessandro asked him for a private interview room. Benito defiantly demanded his lawyer, but Pamela told him he wasn’t under arrest yet.

  Alessandro broke his vow and looked at Olivia. She stared back at him almost as if she didn’t see him. Her teeth were chattering, and he wondered if the plastic chattering teeth at Christmas had been some sort of grotesque premonition.

  He forced himself to think rationally about the matter at hand. Maybe it was only attempted theft of luggage by Benito, and Olivia was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  Again.

  But how many coincidences did it take before it was no longer coincidence?

  The head of Security said the room was ready, and Alessandro instructed one of his colleagues to bring the suitcase and Pamela to bring Olivia. He didn’t trust himself anywhere near her.

  When they reached the room, Alessandro donned a pair of gloves and opened the suitcase, revealing what appeared to be nothing but bubble wrap.

  “It’s Rocco’s glass jewelry for the New York show,” Olivia repeated weakly.

  He looked from Olivia to Pamela—Rocco, Katarina’s brother, his own brother-in-law. How many coincidences did it take?

  He piled each bubble-wrapped package on the table. The first contained a pendant that looked so much like a drop of water he almost expected it to run through his fingers and puddle at his feet.

  He opened a couple more before turning his attention to the suitcase itself. Searching it thoroughly, he found a seam that had been restitched. It was well done—he was sure anyone else would have missed it. He asked for a knife, and the head of airport security handed him a Swiss army knife. He doubted airport security was allowed to carry a knife at work, but that could wait.

  He slit the seam and found what he’d been looking for: a false wall, and behind it, lined up neatly, bags of white powder.

  Drugs.

  He pulled out a bag and set it on the table. Everyone stared at it.

  “It’s not mine! It’s not mine!” Benito protested. “I didn’t know the suitcase had heroin in it! I was just taking it to the plane! It was late. Why don’t you arrest her?” he said, pointing to Olivia. “It’s her suitcase.”

  “How do you know it’s heroin?” Pamela asked, still holding Olivia’s arm.

  “Well, it’s not sugar or laundry detergent, is it?” he said sarcastically. “Nobody hides those in a suitcase lining.”

  The head of security asked Alessandro if he could give the plane clearance to take off. Alessandro didn’t have a clue and looked to Pamela for help, but she seemed distracted. What was going on with her? Olivia, still staring at the white powder on the table, looked as if she was going to cry any moment.

  Alessandro called Columbo, who agreed to talk to Security about letting the plane leave. That it would be leaving without Olivia was a given.

  “You bring her in,” Columbo said. “I’ll have some of the other guys bring in th
e drugs and Benito. Send Pamela to Murano to talk to Rocco.”

  All of a sudden, he was alone in the room with Olivia. Her violet eyes reflected back his confusion.

  “Do you know anything about this?” he asked quietly.

  “Nothing. Are you going to arrest me?”

  “No. But I’m probably supposed to. Can you at least tell me who packed the suitcase?”

  “I don’t know. I went out to Rocco’s yesterday. We chose the pieces, then Luigi came and started packing them in a small red carry-on. Dino was supposed to pick me up this morning at my apartment and bring me and the suitcase to the airport. But he texted me to say he had errands to run and that he’d meet me here with it at eleven. He was late, and I thought I was going to miss the plane. When he finally showed up, he gave me that big black one instead, and I had to check it.”

  What had Pamela said about trouble finding this girl? How unlucky could one person be?

  Alessandro took Olivia by the arm. “Somehow I didn’t envision our next date going this way.” He’d meant to lighten the situation, but he just sounded tired and negative. She probably thought he was being sarcastic. He just needed to collect his thoughts. Then maybe he could reassure her that he believed her. Because he did believe her, didn’t he?

  Once outside, he led her toward his car, thinking they looked like boyfriend and girlfriend, not cop and suspect.

  No, he thought firmly, she isn’t a suspect. She was a witness at most. She’d been set up to carry the drugs to New York. Once they were in the car, he would start over and tell her he believed her.

  So wrapped up in his thoughts was he, he didn’t notice until too late that they’d walked straight into a large pack of teenaged Carnival-goers openly passing around bottles of wine. Alessandro assumed they were meeting friends. Thank God they were airport security’s problem and not his.

  Suddenly, one of the girls in the group stumbled and fell a few feet away from him. Her friends seemed oblivious to her plight and kept pressing forward. She struggled into a sitting position, only to be knocked down again.

  Alessandro realized with horror that the girl was in danger of being trampled. Without thinking, he let go of Olivia and rushed to the girl’s aid. Pushing himself between her and the crowd, he helped her to her feet. She was frightened and a little shaky, but when he asked if she was hurt, she shook her head and, thanking him for his help, hurried after her friends.

  Suddenly realizing what he had done, Alessandro spun around, panic seizing him as he quickly scanned the faces around him.

  But it was too late.

  Olivia was gone.

  He’d lost her.

  Chapter 20

  “You lost her?” Columbo asked, clearly stupefied.

  “Yes,” Alessandro answered grimly.

  “And this was the same girl? The chattering-teeth, bomb-scare girl?” Columbo made it sound like the title of a paperback mystery.

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve been dating her?

  “Yes.”

  “Is there anything else I should know? Anything that might save us from complete and total embarrassment?”

  “It isn’t up on YouTube yet,” one of Alessandro’s colleagues said helpfully before bursting out laughing.

  “‘Yet’ being the operative word,” Columbo returned. “Any ideas on where you might find her, Rossi? Did you check her apartment?”

  “Of course.”

  “And the offices of Silvio Milan?”

  “Not yet. Silvio Milan or someone at the company could’ve been using Olivia to deliver the drugs, so that all blame fell on her if caught.”

  “Rocco could have put the drugs in the glass. How’s the Zucaro business doing?

  “Just fine. Katarina had completely turned it around before she . . .” He forced himself to say the word: “. . . died. And Rocco is a good guy. It’s like trying to imagine Katarina herself dealing drugs—or Olivia, for that matter.”

  “If Olivia’s innocent, then why did she run away?”

  “Because she was in shock, and because I didn’t tell her I believed her.”

  “We’ll have to put out a warrant for her arrest.”

  “Can’t it wait until tomorrow?”

  “No. And this is your superior talking. Most likely you’re right that she was being used, but just remember we’re probably not the only ones looking for her. A woman who worked at the airport was found in a dumpster this morning, you may recall. If these incidents are connected, these are killers we’re dealing with.”

  Chapter 21

  Olivia sat in the darkened interior of the Gothic church of the Frari. Any other time she would have been awed by the sheer size of the building, not to mention the works of art by painters such as Titian and Bellini. Titian’s glorious depiction of the Assumption of the Virgin hung above the altar, but Olivia barely noticed it. She’d been sitting in the pew for over an hour, looking like any other devout young woman seeking solace for her troubles.

  Could one still seek sanctuary in a church? If she stayed there and never left, would the police be forced to leave her in peace? She pictured herself an old woman living in the tower like the hunchback of Notre Dame, growing stranger with the passing years, a story mothers would scare their children with: “Don’t be bad or Olivia of the Frari will get you!”

  She wiped away her tears. Why had she run away from Alessandro? The police would think she was guilty for sure now. You don’t run away if you’re innocent—unless you don’t think anyone would believe you were innocent. Geez—it sounded like the plot to just about every action movie she’d ever watched with Marco.

  She hadn’t consciously made the decision to run. She recalled walking out of the building, the feel of his hand on her arm, the teenagers surrounding them. And then Alessandro let go of her arm, and she was swept along in the crowd. A few moments later, she was on the quay, in the midst of people pushing their way onto the vaporetto to Venice. Nobody seemed to notice her. Someone handed her a bottle of wine, and she took a swig before passing it on.

  When they disembarked at San Marco, the swirling mass of masks and costumes added to the surrealness of her situation. Pushing her way out of the square, she found herself face to face with a hideous plague doctor and stifled a scream. Backing away, she turned into the first street and found herself wandering aimlessly until she came to the Frari, where she’d been ever since.

  She looked at her watch. Four in the afternoon. The last time she’d looked at the time, it had been after eleven, just before Dino had finally shown up with the suitcase.

  The police would probably go to Silvio. She tried to imagine the shock on his face when they told him she was wanted in connection with smuggling heroin. But what if he was involved in this somehow? Didn’t Marco say that as lucrative as the art market was, he still wasn’t sure how Silvio had amassed his fortune? Was he smuggling drugs with the glass?

  Or was Silvio unaware of it, and it was Rocco Zucaro? But why would a successful artist start smuggling drugs?

  How about Luigi then? He was the one in charge of packing everything. How easy for him to alter the suitcase and pack the heroin along with the glass!

  Or Dino? Maybe his change of plans was only a ruse to repack the glass in with the drugs. She’d always suspected there was something about him.

  If only Marco were here and not in Iceland! But he’d tell her to go straight to the police station, that she was only making things worse for herself.

  The police were probably looking for her right now. What did they do in TV crime dramas? Put out an APB: an all points bulletin. Be on the lookout for a girl with eyes like violet Murano glass. The suspect is armed and dangerous. No, of course not.

  She leaned back and looked up again at Titian’s painting, where heaven awaited the Virgin’s arrival. Yes, she had to turn herself in, but not to jus
t anyone. To Alessandro. He’d understand why she’d run away.

  She opened her purse and pulled out her cell. Should she call or text him? But maybe his incoming communications were being intercepted by his colleagues and they could trace her location and come after her. She didn’t know if that was possible, but she decided to turn off her phone, just to be safe.

  She couldn’t go back to her apartment; that would be the first place they’d check. Silvio Milan’s office too, and she didn’t know whether she trusted Silvio anyway. A hotel? No, hotels took your passport and reported all guests to the police. And while she knew roughly where Alessandro lived, she didn’t have his address.

  Then she remembered the invitation Alessandro had given her the night before. She’d tried to give it back, but he’d said, Keep it. In case you change your mind about going to New York, or there’s another bomb scare . . . She’d put it in her purse with a smile, not because she thought she was going to use it, but as a reminder that he was waiting for her return.

  Would he still go to the party? He’d said he was obligated.

  She took out the invitation and remembered a drop of rain falling on it, smudging the start time. She looked at the smudge now. 20:00, she thought it read. That would make sense: 8 p.m. The party was at a palazzo on the Grand Canal, a few doors down from Silvio Milan’s.

  For the first time in hours, Olivia felt the slightest surge of hope. She would buy herself a Carnival costume and blend in with the crowd until it was time to go to the party. She’d see Alessandro there, and he’d straighten this whole thing out. She imagined him taking her into his arms and telling her everything was going to be okay.

  Now that she had a plan, she immediately felt better. There was a costume shop not far from here, in Campo Santa Margherita. She’d have to pay cash, though. No doubt the police could trace her credit card transactions.