by Declan Finn
Giovanni leaned back in his chair, absorbing the information. “A week ago, you couldn’t even string together a poorly-worded sentence in Italian. Yet, you researched me in newspapers that are all in Italian?”
Ryan raised his mug to him. “I like being dismissed as an ugly American.” He rested the mug on his knee. “As for my grandfather… he raised me. So you know how I feel.”
Giovanni blinked. “I should like to know your story some time, Signor Ryan.”
Ryan gave a sad smile. “Sometime. You see, Giovanni, that’s one difference between us. Your father’s killer was never caught. However, I know who killed Grandpa.” Without blinking, without sadness, simply stating a fact, added, “And I got mine.”
Chapter VII
Pius Recruit
Day 4. Reasonably early
Manana Shushurin awoke, and felt her hair being tenderly stroked, and realized that was the last sensation she remembered before falling asleep in Scott Murphy’s tender embrace, which also seemed to have not altered at all.
“Have you gone to sleep yet?” she asked.
“Maybe,” he replied softly, amused.
Manana straightened, swinging her legs over the edge of the bench.
She looked around and tried to remember where she was—still in the Borgia gardens. She blinked. “We didn’t move?”
Murphy smiled. “Not an inch.”
“Why didn’t you wake me?”
He just patted her hand. “You fell asleep crying in my arms, I wasn’t going to wake you up so you could continue. Besides, they would’ve thrown you in guest quarters with Goldberg and McGrail, and I didn’t want you to be around strangers in your condition. And,” he shrugged, “it’s Italy, night becomes very spring-like in May.”
Manana tried to clear her thoughts. “You said they would have tossed me in with the other women—you think they wouldn’t have trusted me around you?”
Murphy chuckled and squeezed her hand. “Of course not, I wouldn’t. You’re a beautiful, sexy woman who happened to be vulnerable last night. I didn’t want you in a bed with me. I’m not sure who would’ve gotten the bad idea first, you or me, but I’m sure it would’ve been mentioned, and I can’t think of any way it could have come out well.”
She rubbed her eyes. “You didn’t want to sleep with me?”
Scott smiled and touched her cheek, and then slid his fingers into her hair, and then held the back of her head. “I do; but that wasn’t the time, and this…” he looked around the Vatican at large and laughed, “is certainly not the place.”
He leaned forward and kissed her.
* * *
Day 4. 10 AM
She was 5’6”, and amazingly stunning. Her hair was light brown, and her eyes dark hazel. A blouse, brown suit pants, and a light brown jacket dressed her athletic frame. Her lips were touched with faint red lipstick, slightly accentuating the natural color.
But, most importantly, she was here. Sean A.P. Ryan ran out to meet her, wearing black pants, dark blue polo shirt—as usual, he wore something dark.
“Inna!” he called out as he hugged her around the waist and lifted her off the ground. He held onto her for a minute before letting her back down. He kissed her for another minute before letting her go, enjoying the feel of her firm body—arms, waist, back, and what little he could feel of the rest. She always surprised him, but then again, whenever he wasn’t around at night, she would head from the office to the gym.
“Hi, Sean,” Inna Petraro said upon disengagement—she moved back about six inches from his face.
He smiled at her, his hands still on the small of her back. “Hello.”
She smiled sadly, her face on his cheek. “How are you holding up?”
His smile dimmed slightly. “Better now that you’re here.”
“Are your parents coming for the funeral?”
Ryan smiled sadly. “Claudia’s busy on a movie shoot, and she’s coming as soon as she can. Mom just applied for personal time, but you know how the FBI is, can’t live without their researchers. Dad is … Dad.”
“And is thus a bastard?” asked a voice off to the side.
Ryan looked up and he sighed. A six foot-blond male with blue eyes and silver eyeglasses stood teen feet away with Petraro’s luggage. He looked like a pleasant, smiling SS storm trooper with extra padding.. He was vaguely well-built and in his early twenties, although he still had about ten pounds of extra weight on him.
Ryan blinked, as though to clear his eyes. He had met the young author because he was one of Petraro’s clients. The man had acquitted himself well during the same incident he had met the Interpol agent, Maureen McGrail. “Mr. Kovach, what are you doing here?”
“Inna wanted me to meet her at the airport. After all, she is my agent.” Matthew Kovach walked over to Ryan’s side and smiled. “I’ve been here researching Pius XII. And, I’ve heard a few things about what’s been going on—from the news, and from Fr. Williams. I’m actually surprised that he didn’t tell you that I was here … then again, he didn’t know that we’ve met.”
Ryan smiled, still holding on to Petraro, unwilling to let her comforting presence go yet. “I don’t think he would have told me anyway. He’s a little secretive.”
Matthew smiled. “Maybe right. Anyway, if I take the story of Pope Pius—the twelfth, I mean—and add it to what you’ve been going through, I’ll have an even better book than I already did.”
Ryan raised a brow. “That’s it?”
Matthew’s smile faded, and he leaned in close, his voice serious. “I’ve looked into what’s been going on ever since Inna phoned me this morning. You know how politics works, and this is going to be put into a political tailspin so fast that it’ll make whirling dervishes look slow.
“I’m a New York Times bestselling author, and I’ve outsold The Da Vinci Code. Who else are you going to get for counter-spin? Trust me when I say the Boston Globe and the Times heard about the shootout yesterday and started drafting a hundred different ways to make the Pope the bad guy. Congratulations, I’m your man in Rome.”
Ryan smiled. For some reason, he’d always liked this oddball. “Glad to have you around.”
Matthew looked at the couple. “I’ll put her bags in the car … you want to point out the car?”
“Look for the brunette in a black raincoat; she’s with me.”
The author smiled and walked off. Ryan looked to Petraro. “You’re kidding me, right?”
She smiled, and gave a slight twitch of her shoulders. “I am his agent. Besides, whether you like it or not, you’ll need help on the politics, and he writes books faster than I can sell them. This time, I’ve already sold it.”
Ryan chuckled. “Nonfiction is sold in advance, I almost forgot.”
Petraro nodded. “It was sold weeks ago, when he first wanted to write a book on Pius XII. Now he’ll have something a little longer.”
Ryan smiled a little. “Well, given how long this is taking, if it goes on any longer, it’ll either be a Lord of the Rings trilogy, or something out of Proust … You think it’ll work?”
She nodded. “Positive.”
“Let’s hope you’re right.” He looked at his watch. “It’s ten o’clock now, and we’re seven hours ahead of New York. The crud will hit the fan in Turtle Bay in a matter of hours. Then we’re going to need a spin-meister, because you better be darned sure that the Russians will be the dervishes who start first—if only because they’ve had more practice at being the Evil Empire than the others.”
Petraro cocked her head. “Other what?”
“Countries…it’s a long story, and since we’ll need to fill in Kovach on some of the details, I’d rather tell this story only once.”
* * *
The official Vatican dining room had a table that was meant to entertain dozens at a time. Usually, the papal staff used the area for dinners, since official state functions were not something the Pope himself indulged in.
At the moment, the staff
was still there, taking up the bulk of the table. One corner, however, had several guests who didn’t mind eating with everyone else at breakfast. There were only five of them, and literally, almost no one noticed. Several men noticed Manana Shushurin, only because most of her allure as a spy was a distraction—real spies were actually drab, gray people who no one noticed, not a Bond girl. She made those look drab.
Next to her, of course, no one noticed Scott Murphy—then again, his basic method was to blend in and disappear. And, since he was one of those drab little men next to a dazzling brunette like Mani, he faded out of everyone’s perception.
Special Agent Villie Goldberg sat across from them and refrained from rolling her eyes at the two spies in front of her. They both showed small, subtle signs of affection since Manana had fully come over to the side of “the good guys.” She looked next to her at the silver-haired priest, Frank Williams, and his strange father, Wayne, and wondered if she shouldn’t have just followed Ryan, et al, to the airport.
Goldberg tuned into the middle of a conversation. Manana looked at Captain Wayne Williams, Sr. with furrowed brow and said, “She brought who?”
Capt. Wayne Williams, US Army Rangers, retired, and father to Fr. Frank Williams, smiled. He was 5’9” and thick bodied, with graying hair that was part silver, gray and gold, with an odd set of blue-green eyes. He had made certain to be well dressed in a red polo shirt and for some reason wore blue jeans anyway. “Well, you see, Matthew Kovach writes murder mysteries under an alias, you comprehend, da?” he said in a thick Russian accent—he was an American by birth, but he insisted that his various accents were “fun.”
The German intelligence agent blinked and shook her head lightly. “I’m generally too busy to read thrillers.” She smiled. “I live them.”
Captain Williams grinned evilly, dropping the accent. “Oh, they’re not thrillers; they’re non-fiction. His publishers just wouldn’t have it—the books were too fantastic.”
She blinked and leaned back in her chair. Scott Murphy absentmindedly put his arm around her. “Weren’t his novels about teenage serial killers?” he asked.
Wayne Williams, Sr., nodded. “Yup. You remember the Markists, yes?”
Murphy raised a brow. “It’s hard to forget.”
Goldberg half-sighed half-growled in frustration. “What about them?”
“About ten years ago, they had one last educational stronghold in the United States, and he was a student there just as their standards were in rapid decline. They basically took in more and more violent offenders—several of whom were faculty. Ryan’s girlfriend—Kovach’s agent—apparently thought Kovach would be interested in our story.”
Chapter VIII
Recap
Day 4. 10:15 AM
Interpol Agent Maureen McGrail did not look like she was having a good day… it didn’t look like anything had gone her way for at least a day. The young woman wore her typical light raincoat around her long, slender frame. Her pale green eyes missed very little, including the foot traffic around the airport. Underneath her raincoat was a white blouse, black pants, and pale milk-white skin. The only flaw in her face was a blood-stained bandage on her right temple, covering up a small wound from the day before. She almost covered it with her long, jet-black hair.
Between 5’6” and 5’8”, nice legs. I recall her having an Irish accent. She was introduced as Maureen McGrail, Interpol.
Matthew Kovach opened the door to the black van, and blinked, hauling in Petraro’s luggage. “Hello, ma’am…don’t I know you?”
She smiled. “Maureen McGrail, Interpol,” she said in a light brogue. “We spoke once at one of your conventions. I’m surprised you remembered me.”
Matthew grinned. “You’re hard to forget…I remember people whose bodies are registered lethal weapons. You, and my wife.”
Her smile lengthened a little, amused at his odd mannerisms. “You could say that.”
The author shrugged and slid into the seat across from McGrail. “So, what are you doing in this gigantic mess?”
Maureen glanced out at the airport parking lot and watched Matthew with only one eye. “Didn’t I have a murder victim over in Dublin who was on his way to Rome? And didn’t someone have to come over to ask what for? As for the rest, I became involved by accident.”
Matthew eyed the woman’s bandage. “I can only assume a head-on collision.”
The cop shook her head, but at least smiled. “Not really. Commander Figlia—the head of the Vatican’s Central office of Vigilance—had commandeered the murder investigation of a man named Gerrity. I—”
Matthew interjected, “His name was Dr. David Gerrity.”
She slowly nodded. “Yes. Why, do you know him?”
“I did. We met when I first came here to do research for one of my books … I liked him.” He smiled slightly. “He was exceptionally enthusiastic for someone his age … anyway, what were you saying?”
Maureen studied Matthew for a moment. The young man was well dressed, and carried himself well—squared shoulders, fluid movements … almost as though he had wanted to be as well trained as Sean Ryan, and gave up halfway through. She smoothed out her sleeve. “May I ask what you are doing in all of this?”
A smile. “I’m the propaganda.”
She raised a brow. “I’ve not read anything of your fiction, but I like your articles on a certain Mr. Lynch of the Provisional Irish Republican Army.”
“Really? Thank you.” The author drifted off for a moment, then frowned thoughtfully. “You weren’t in the archives lately, were you?”
* * *
Washington DC
Local Time: 7:00 AM
Blaine Lansing walked into DCI Charles Weaver’s office an hour after the head of the CIA had met with the President.
When he first came to work for the FBI’s Internet Task Force (nicknamed “Net Force,”), he had figured it would look good on a resume after his cushy graduate work. He had figured that, by the start of this year, he might have made it to security at a company like Apple.
With his looks, anyone would naturally take him for a yuppie… especially in the suits he had to wear for work; at 5’8”, he wasn’t tall. He had a fluorescent light tan – meaning his skin had a nice pale glow to it. A bland looking face, neither ugly nor handsome, and brown hair and eyes finished out the picture. Blaine was so indistinguishable from the average mailman he couldn’t have been picked out of a lineup for a crime committed at pointblank range.
And then he’d met Special Agent Jennifer Lane.
Jennifer Lane had wonderful, milky-white skin and rich black hair with near-luminescent green eyes. She was, all in all, very beautiful. She was 5’2”, with a very nice figure (the measurements of which he had memorized through numerous shopping expeditions). It was inconceivable for him that this pixie-like creature worked in the Operations branch of the Internet Task Force, kicking in doors and wielding a .45-caliber Heckler and Koch.
“You asked for us, sir?” Blaine asked.
Director Weaver looked up from his desk and waved them into chairs in front of him. “You’ve both heard about the shootout in Rome?”
Blaine nodded. “Yes, sir?”
“You two are going to walk back the cat on this.”
Lansing nodded slowly this time, brow furrowed. “Walk back…the…cat… um…”
Weaver almost smiled at the FBI dweeb. “Go over the entire intelligence fiasco. We should have known what was going on. We missed something; find out what.”
Lane nodded. “Where do we start?”
Director Weaver pulled out a tape recorder and tossed it to Jennifer, who caught it easily. “Listen to the story on the tape, it’s a recording of an operative on scene. We’ve deleted some of the sources because they’re in-the-field operatives, code-word clearance only. After you’ve gone through it, you’ll need to sort through months’ worth of data, possibly years. And you may still not find anything.”
Blaine shrugged. “Are
we getting paid?”
Weaver almost laughed. “Time and a half.”
He laughed. “Deal. Now, what’s going on, exactly?”
Jennifer rolled her eyes as the Director of the CIA blinked. “How so?”
“Someone shot at the Pope yesterday,” Blaine asked. “Who’d do that?”
Weaver looked at Jennifer Lane. “You’re Catholic, aren’t you?”
She nodded, green eyes sparkling. “Yes, sir.”
“Explain it to him, would you?”
* * *
Rome. 10:45 AM
Matthew Kovach’s career had been wide, varied, and strange, and he had just thought it couldn’t get any stranger when he stepped out of the black van onto Vatican City grounds. The door opened, and he spotted three men he knew, then he furrowed his brow and said, “Fr. Williams, how are you doing? Mr. Figlia?” Kovach smiled. “Father, what’s up? Is the world ending and I don’t know about it?”
“You’d be surprised,” Frank answered.
“Try me. Nothing surprises me anymore.” He nodded to Maureen, “Not even the bandage on Agent McGrail’s head.”
“Sit down for five minutes.”
Kovach looked around as he was led to Giovanni Figlia’s office, and quickly noted the people strewn around the room. He smiled again as he noted them, making mental notes on what he thought of as the main cast of his future book.
Auxiliary Bishop Xavier O’Brien, SJ, a.k.a. XO, maybe 5’7”, Jesuit from Marquette. Broad forehead, brown eyes, Roman nose. Wears typical bishopric dress—black outfit, red trim and buttons. The man had short, graying hair, and a perpetually lit cigarette. He was growing a little pudgy, and there were only a few wrinkles here and there to make certain that his face matched the hair color he wore.
The author looked him over carefully. “And where do you come in, sir?”
“I’m second-in-command to the Black Pope,” he said with a smile.
Kovach raised a brow. “That only tells me what you do, not why you’re here.” The author’s eyes flickered around the room and landed on another priest. Fr. Frank Williams, 5’7”, give or take two inches if he ever stood straight, medium height/build, silver hair, violet eyes, young face, quiet, and not his father. Standard black priest garb.