A Pius Man_A Holy Thriller

by Declan Finn

  “No.” She shrugged. “I’m Jewish, and among us Orthodox, we still believe in ‘be fruitful and multiply.’ I’m just finding it hard to believe that any man with your background would be put to use as a mere chaplain.”

  Father Frank let a smile pull at his mouth. “I’ll take the compliment and leave it at that.” He headed for the door, and stopped a foot away. “Say goodbye to Abasi for me; he’s listening at the door. I’m certain you’ll both want to compare notes.”

  With that, he left.

  A moment later, Abasi knocked on the door to the adjoining room. Goldberg opened it. She shrugged. “Don’t ask me how he knew.”

  She looked over the laptop, her hazel eyes lit up by the bright blue screen as it quickly switched to a Lord of the Rings background.

  Over the voice of Orlando Bloom welcoming her back, she said, “In fact, I think he’s in Vatican Intelligence, not just on the periphery as he told us. I mean, who do you think escorts foreign nationals around the White House? Secretaries?”

  * * *

  “Father Frank Williams,” Scott Murphy said, “Society of Jesus, Almost definitely in Special Forces, but double check. Obviously this guy is far more than he seems to be.”

  Murphy paced the carpet of Manana Shushurin’s hotel room. He had spent the last half-hour relaying everything he had observed over the course of his journey from St. Peter’s Square until the time he arrived at her side, as well as everything else he could remember.

  Finally, he sat down on the bed behind her. “I would have helped, but I wasn’t about to pull a Ludlum—”

  Manana raised a hand to stop him. “A what?”

  “Robert Ludlum. Wrote The Bourne Identity? All of his spies know how to kill people with a penny at fifty yards, that sort of thing?”

  She smiled. “Ah yes, I remember reading him when I was a child.”

  Wow, I feel old. Manana Shushurin looked back to her data phone. On the top of the full-color screen was a laser projector that cast the image of a flat keyboard on the tabletop. All she needed to do was tap one of the red “keys” and the corresponding action appeared on the screen.

  “Cute toy,” he said.

  “The keyboard is Sharper Image.” She barely glanced at him, but her lips turned up in a smile. She tapped on a few more keys and slid back. “Take a look. See if I’ve got everything.”

  Murphy leaned over her shoulder. He could get the faintest wisp of perfume. Vanilla sugar? Whatever it is, it makes me want to either kiss her neck or get some biscotti. Which is probably an odd sensation to have around her.

  After a moment, he said, “That’s all I overheard.”

  She tapped the ENTER key and leaned back, stretching her arms up and around. Her right hand landed around the back of his neck. She paused, then ruffled his hair.

  Murphy chuckled as she mussed his hair. “Sorry, I lingered a little too long.”

  Her hand pulled him forward. She placed a light kiss on his cheek. He gave her a confused little smile, unsure of what to make of it.

  Manana patted his other cheek. “You’re cute when you apologize… Don’t worry about it.” She let him go, glided onto her feet and across the room, taking her suitcase out of the closet.

  Murphy watched her, and analyzed her movement. He had considered what she said back in Saint Peter’s Square about her time behind a desk. Her form was impressive. He had spent enough time around the Kidron killers at the office to recognize someone who was at least on their level. Her movements were fluid, she had at least three knives on her, and she used all of her muscles. She was either a dancer or a killer.

  I’m thinking not a dancer. Realizing that his eyes had lingered a little too long, he looked away. Odd. I’m usually not that easily distracted. “What exactly is the computer doing?”

  She threw the case onto her bed, clicking it open. “Hacking through the Special Forces personnel roster at Fort Bragg.”

  Murphy’s jaw dropped. All this, and she can hack the Pentagon, too.

  Shushurin laughed. “Don’t worry, I’m having the computer route its way through most of the planet before it starts working on any American systems.”

  He glanced at her toy. “How much power does that thing have?”

  She dug through her clothes, pulling out a long, lightweight nightgown that reached down to her ankles. “Think in terms of terabytes… Why do you think I plugged it in to the wall socket? It eats batteries like potato chips.”

  “Ah… How long do you think it’ll take?”

  “Anywhere from fifteen minutes to half an hour, or more.” Shushurin placed the nightgown next to her pillow, then rooted around for something else. “Half the time involved is merely routing.”

  Murphy, still looking at the computer, smiled. “I really must think about getting tech like this. Heck, I didn’t even know the Germans were all that up-to-date.”

  “They’re not, really,” she explained. “I sift through a lot of professional-security magazines, and requisition it when I get an assignment.”

  He nodded, and glanced back to Shushurin. Her hair fell across her face, and he studied it a moment. Her hair was a surprising array of colors: a deep brown with flecks of dark gold, and the ringlets stopped around her collar bone. He frowned in thought. When he looked at her, he was distracted by almost every part of her, and that wasn’t something that happened to him a lot.

  Or at all, really. I’ve been alone in this job too darn long. “Looking for something?”

  She pulled out a handgun, checked the load, and placed it next to the suitcase. “Found it.”

  Murphy blanched. “You carry a gun?”

  Shushurin clicked it closed and tossed the case back into the closet. “It comes in handy. Why? You have a problem with guns?

  “I have a problem with spies carrying guns, especially in Europe – let’s face it, it’s a great way to attract attention we don’t need. I’m trying to figure out if I got a fellow spy, or an assassin. Sorry, no offense, but those are two different skill sets. And you’re not exactly the sort of subtle and low key that I expect in my fellow spies.”

  She looked at him. “Are you done yet?”

  Murphy nodded.

  “Good.” She settled on the edge of the bed, facing him, one leg tucked under her. “Do you want to hear my life story?”

  He glanced at his watch. “I’ve got time.”

  Shushurin’s Slavic brown eyes didn’t even flicker. She sat back on the edge, crossing both legs in front of her in a lotus position.

  Murphy let her take her time, choosing instead to glance at her weapon, a large affair obviously meant to keep someone down when they were shot. In fact, it was Russian… a Stechkin ASP, a Soviet military weapon.

  Didn’t she say her family was originally from Lvov? Even if her family made it to Germany, what side of Germany? East, perhaps? “Aren’t you a little young to be have trained with the Stasi? Although, now that I think about it, I know they had Soviet teenage assassins, and one can’t be one of them unless one started early.”

  She gently blinked, once, almost like a woman in a bad romance novel being coy. “The gun gave it away?”

  Murphy nodded. “That, and your reluctance to talk. I’ve dealt with Germans before, and they generally can’t shut up.”

  Shushurin laughed. “It happens.”

  He shook his head. “Thankfully, I’m less stupid than most.”

  She punched him lightly in the arm. “Shut up.”

  “Yes, ma’am, I know when to acknowledge my betters.”

  She laughed again, smiling just broadly enough to show the whites of her teeth without any gum. “What made you think that being silent meant Russian training?”

  “Paranoia — talk to no one, Cold War garbage where no one talked to even their allies. That and the gun; considering my Office, I’m supposed to be packing heat.”

  At that, the BND spy arched a brow. “Heat? You sound like a gangster film.”

  Murphy reached into
his windbreaker, and pulled out a plain meerschaum pipe. He lit the pre-stuffed pipe, angling away so the smoke wouldn’t drift into her face. “You tend to drop your articles from time to time — Russian language patterns which I’m surprised you haven’t retained more of. However, if you were trained by the Eastern bloc, and spoke Russian...”

  She nodded.

  He continued. “I can only guess they charm-schooled you into speaking excellent English. If you were trained young, you must have been picked for a reason. Someone wanted you to go into the family business, perhaps. The Soviet Union fell apart when you were… maybe eight? So the indoctrination was nowhere near complete, and you appear to be sane, which is why the BND lets you onto field assignments.” He thought it over a bit. “I assume they gave your background a thorough scrubbing.”

  She almost smirked. “Is this the point where you say that I am German, hence a Nazi?”

  Murphy almost laughed. “Nah, if this was a Nazi film, I’d be the one under suspicion — I’m the blond. Let me see, what else? You should be living happily and healthy in Cologne with a husband and two kids.”

  Manana cocked her head. “What makes you think I’d be married?”

  Murphy shrugged. “You have a primarily sedentary job behind an intelligence desk, and, I guess, somewhat stable hours. Germany is a generally sexist little country, and you’re …” He hesitated, looking for a polite way to describe her looks. “Pleasant enough to make a priest reconsider celibacy.”

  Manana Shushurin arched her brows. “And you consider that a good thing?”

  “We’re three blocks from the Vatican and I just saw a priest take out four guys with an empty handgun, the thought came naturally …” He frowned, reconsidering. “Should I guess that means you’re not married?”

  “Who has the time?”

  He clamped his teeth over the mouth of the pipe and furrowed his brow for a moment. “I hope you’re not one of those entrenched in the job; that would be a waste of material.”

  Some of the glitter in her eyes went out. “Why? You think I’d make a good wife, locked in a house?”

  He shook his head. “You run the danger of becoming a function instead of a person; I can abstract enough great attributes from your actions thus far to determine that you would make a good human being as well as an efficient officer.”

  She watched the hand gently holding the bowl of the pipe. “I don’t see a wedding ring on your finger.”

  Murphy chuckled. “I look like a Palestinian in Israel; as an undercover operative in Palestine, I’m not going to start dating one of the local girls; none of the Israeli women would go near me; and frankly, I’m a goy, so not even the secretary pool would lay a finger on me.”

  Manana leaned forward and gently touched his arm. “Sorry. That really is a waste of material.”

  He grinned. “Nice of you to say so. Was it the pipe that convinced you?”

  She grinned mischievously, the lights sparkling in her eyes again. “I like the tobacco blend.”

  He blinked, a little puzzled. “Okaaaay. Wow, I’m being complimented by a woman whose initials are a deadly neurological disease.”

  Manana Shushurin didn’t blink. “Fine talk from someone whose initials spell out a kinky sex life.”

  Scott Murphy choked on smoke that went down the wrong way. After he cleared his throat, he said, “Let’s just hope they aren’t prophetic for either of us.”

  “You mean you’re not into that? Pity.” His eyes widened, and she laughed, winking, enjoying his funny faces. “You’re so easy.”

  He cleared his throat. “So, what made you escape that kind of life? Working for the Germans instead of the Russians?”

  She smiled. “My mother, actually. She got me away. I spent my time in the better of two failing economies.” Her eyes wandered over to the computer. “Odd. It’s done.”

  Murphy followed her gaze, reading off the profile. “Joined the Army at eighteen. Filled out his military service while taking courses to become a physician assistant. Transferred into Special Forces at twenty-two. Trained in emergency trauma for a year in Miami. Cool. He’s… thirty-three? How can he be thirty-three?”

  Manana’s eyes narrowed at the screen. “He served in Europe, the Middle East; service records classified. But he’s got a medal… a few of them.”

  “A classified Special Forces record,” Murphy murmured around the pipe. “You don’t think he could have been—”

  “Part of an assassination unit?” Manana finished. “Green Berets have been authorized for such things. Now he’s a priest? That sounds like he’s a prime candidate for—”

  “Vatican intelligence?” Murphy concluded. “I agree. The question is—”

  “Do they have a hit team and call them the Knights Templar, or something like that?”

  Shushurin nodded thoughtfully, staring to the left of the computer screen. “It makes sense. Yousef looked like a professional hit.”

  “So much for this merely sounding like a John le Carre novel,” Murphy muttered. “Vatican assassins. What next? Assuming Williams is still their tour guide, all we need to do is keep following Figlia, et al. We’ll find something.”

  Shushurin nodded. “If the priest is involved, he’ll have to stay close to monitor the investigation. Makes me wonder — what is he doing right now?”

  * * *

  Father Frank Williams slid the collar off his neck and into his shirt pocket; priests were mandated to wear the white collar at all times, but carrying it constituted wearing it. He slipped off his gold ring, tucking it into a pants pocket. He then slid on a set of black leather gloves, and used a black baseball cap to cover his silver hair, and dark glasses to cover his violet eyes.

  Frank looked around. No one was on the street, as expected. He pressed his ear to the window, listening for personnel. He circled around to the front door, pulling on it again to make certain it was locked. He went back to the rear, double-checked his surroundings, and then put on a baseball cap to cover his hair. He pivoted, releasing a vicious spin kick that shattered the security glass and knocked the interior wiring right off the frame.

  Father Frank hurled himself through the window and rolled to his feet. He quickly scanned this section of Vatican Infirmarium set aside as a makeshift forensics lab. He spotted what he was looking for immediately — a file had been left on the table, labeled “Gerrity: Preliminary Findings.”

  The distinctive cocking of a semiautomatic froze him in mid-reach.

  “Don’t move,” Giovanni Figlia told him, framed in the doorway to Veronica Fisher’s office.

  The Jesuit said nothing, he pivoted, grabbing a beaker as he spun, hurled it at the papal security officer and leapt to one side. He threw himself over the table, rolled to his feet and grabbed the forensics report as the beaker smashed into Figlia’s gun, forcing the gun out of his hands and back into the office.

  Father Frank swept four probing needles from the table and whirled, throwing all of them in Figlia’s direction, but the Italian had already leapt back into the office to grab his gun.

  The Jesuit leapt over the table and through the window, and hit the ground in a crouch directly beneath the window frame, hoping Figlia would act as professionally as he would.

  Figlia scrambled to his feet and bolted for the window, aiming into the street. He checked to the left and the right of the frame before slowly sliding his head through the window. Father Frank sprang straight up, both fists pounding Figlia under the chin.

  Figlia’s head snapped back against the window frame so hard, he dropped the Beretta. Father Frank whirled, kicked the gun into the street, and ran off.

  Chapter X: The Men In Black

  Cardinal Alphonse Cannella swept out of the building with the air of a man who thought the red of his robes was a princely color, and that he was a prince first in line to ascend to the throne. The Cardinal moved into the streets of Rome, and he looked down on the people on the street as the police carted them away.

 
Sitting at the curb, Sean A.P. Ryan looked up from his newspaper and glared right at him.

  The Cardinal sniffed at him, and then swept along his path.

  Sean frowned. Something was rotten in the State of the Vatican, and he wasn’t happy about it. The blue eyes followed Cannella, taking in the arrogance that exuded from every motion like a snail’s slime trail.

  Sean glanced back to the cover article about Cannella — or, more specifically, about the Boston diocese the Cardinal ran. Neo-pagan cult donates to the Boston diocese. Diocese accepts money. Cult then busted on drug-trafficking charges.

  Sean gave a low whistle. Someone’s in trouble. But why would drug smugglers donate anything to the Church?

  He was about to read further when a flash of motion caught his eye — a priest with silver hair floated across the marble streets with a hardcover novel under his arm. The blue eyes squinted to focus on the small figure.

  He kept his eye on Father Frank for only a moment — just long enough to know that the silver-haired priest dropped something like a book into a fountain in St. Peter’s Square.

  Must be a bad book.

  * * *

  Scott Murphy glanced over Frank Williams’ old personnel file — those parts that weren’t classified — and let his mind wander. He’d often been accused of trying to be a mobile analyst unit, and he knew he wasn’t, but it helped to come to some conclusions without needing home base.

  He gave his partner from the BND a sidelong look, watching her check the adjustments on the television. He very briefly admired her long legs, then turned his attention back to the computer. “I’m guessing you bugged Abasi’s room.”

  “Close enough,” Shushurin assured him. “I have my earpiece tuned to her room, listening into their conversation; don’t worry, it’s also connected to digital recorder to make sure we catch everything.”