Proof of Lies (Anastasia Phoenix)

by Diana Rodriguez Wallach

  We both hung up, and I stared at my phone. There was one more person I needed to call.

  Straight to voicemail.

  “Mr. Urban, it’s Anastasia. I wanted to thank you, and Donna, for arranging this trip. Marcus and I are in Cortona and meeting with Salvatore tomorrow. Hopefully, he’ll have some answers. This was really nice of you. I owe you.”

  I hung up and looked at my hotel room door, wondering what Marcus was doing in his room. Wondering if he was wondering about me. Then I instantly hated myself for thinking it. Still, I stared at the door handle, debating whether I should open it, whether I should go to him.

  My fingers itched to turn the knob.

  Chapter Seventeen

  I stayed in my room. I didn’t visit Marcus; I didn’t surrender to the distraction. Instead, I spent the night pacing my hotel room, mentally preparing my questions for Salvatore. Then I awoke the next morning with the determination of a Navy SEAL. I jumped into the hotel’s tiny shower, dried my hair, put on a pair of slim gray jeans and my favorite blue-gray T-shirt, which almost matched my eyes, and headed down to the hotel lobby, my threadbare army green laptop bag slung across my shoulder and my mind on my mission.

  Marcus was already waiting for me, lounging on the same velvet green couch where my father once sat, sipping a similar tiny cup of espresso and flipping through a newspaper.

  “Want some coffee? Breakfast?” he asked, peering up from his cup when he saw me.

  “No. I’m ready.” I nodded to the door.

  “Bueno. Let’s go antiquing.” He gulped down his espresso as we headed from the lobby.

  The streets of Cortona are steep, like San Francisco steep, and my Converse skidded on the pavers as Marcus puffed beside me. Every day since my sister had disappeared, I’d pictured myself being the one to find her: I’d burst into a room and see Keira alive and grateful, then I’d spin around and knock some guard unconscious with a scissor kick before flinging a glass ashtray at the head of another. I’d stare at the attackers on the floor, beaten, then run to my sister, hug her, and whisper that we were safe, we’d done it, and we were going home. But never in all the times that I had this daydream did I picture myself standing next to the guy I met in my high school cafeteria.

  “It’s just up ahead,” Marcus said as he looked at the colorful cartoon map distributed by the hotel. Cortona was everything you pictured Tuscany to be—aging chipped facades, burnt-orange shingled roofs, and battered wooden doors. The entire scene breathed like a hometown, all quaint and picturesque, full of locals sipping cappuccino and tourists buying handmade goods. We turned onto Via Nazionale, and I immediately saw the sign for the Cortona Antiquaria. It was just as I’d remembered—its glass windowpane stuffed with dusty terra-cotta pots, copper pans, and wood-framed chairs with fuzzy embroidered cushions.

  “We’re here,” Marcus said, watching as I moved robotically toward the entry.

  I pushed open the glass door, bells tinkling overhead as I stepped onto the creaky wooden planks, inhaling the smell of dust that came with age. Salvatore stood behind the cashier’s counter, adjusting the brown plastic glasses covering his heavy-hooded eyes, which sagged below wild black eyebrows surrounded by decades of deep wrinkles.

  We stared for what felt like forever.

  “Anastasia,” he finally greeted, his wiry gray mustache twitching.

  I could hardly move.

  ...

  Marcus and I sat on decorative upholstered stools in a dank storage room in the back of the antique store. Salvatore Basso sat before us on an expensive-looking wingback chair illuminated by a bare light bulb on the exposed-beam ceiling.

  He handed me a cup of straight espresso. I hated black coffee, so I doubted espresso would be any better, but I accepted the colorfully hand-painted ceramic cup. “Gratzi.” I smiled, forcing down a tiny bitter sip.

  Marcus sat beside me, easily drinking his.

  “Thanks for meeting me,” I said to Salvatore. “But I’m still not sure why I needed to come. Why couldn’t we talk on the phone?”

  “I know this must seem strange, but as I said, I was very close with your parents. May they rest in peace.” He made the sign of the cross.

  “That’s just it. Why didn’t I know that? When we came here, my parents acted like they were just fans of your store.” I rested my cup on a gritty bookshelf.

  “Well, your parents were very private people.”

  “You think?” I raised an eyebrow.

  “They used to come through town on business.”

  “So there’s a lot of chemical engineering being done in Cortona?” My sarcasm was thick.

  Salvatore grinned in response. “No, it wasn’t that type of business. And that’s what I didn’t want to share with law enforcement.” He sipped his espresso. “Your Boston police called not long after you. They had questions about the photo of Luis and your sister’s attacker. He was not friends with that man. He was introduced only once.”

  “But does he know where I can find Craig now?” I squeaked, hope dripping in my voice. “Can I talk to Luis?”

  “I don’t want to get my son involved further. He…”—Salvatore took a deep sigh—“has a record here. He got into trouble years ago, nothing serious. But I’m worried about how it might look.”

  “How it might look for him?” I snapped, my head vehemently shaking at the blatant selfishness in his words. “My sister left behind pints of blood in our tub, so I’m a little more worried about her. What does he know about Keira?”

  “He doesn’t know anything about the attack, but he does know that she was looking into your parents’ pasts right before it happened. That’s what she was talking to him about in Boston. She thought he might know something about their…work.”

  “Does he?” I asked. Was I the only one who didn’t?

  “Yes, and so do I.” His voice was cagey, his drooping eyes tightening like a psychiatrist assessing a patient. I knew that look all too well. I had a history with shrinks, and this was the Can she handle what I’m about to say? look. “That’s why I wanted you to come. There’s something I need you to see.”

  He slowly rose from his chair, his knees creaking under his stocky heavyset frame. Marcus and I popped up beside him, following him to a hulking armoire on the far back wall. Salvatore yanked it open, revealing a secret door with a hidden staircase quite reminiscent of Anne Frank’s attic. “Your parents used to stay here when they traveled through town,” he divulged as he shuffled up the steps with the help of the arm rail. Marcus and I thudded behind him, my heart drumming a Metallica solo.

  Then Salvatore unlocked a dead-bolted door. “This is a safe place. Or, a safe house, as you say in your country.”

  My stomach twined into a slipknot as we stepped into the small windowless studio apartment, my eyes darting about. There were two thin sea-green floral-patterned mattresses resting on metal frames without sheets. A small kitchenette hummed with almond-colored appliances. In the living area rested a tattered brown and orange plaid sofa, a few rickety end tables, and a wooden bookcase full of thick tomes.

  Salvatore waved me forward, and my eyes instantly caught on a silver picture frame nestled among the books. I stopped short. It was a photo of me. Or more specifically, of my family—my mom, my dad, Keira, and I were all standing in front of the Magic Kingdom. It was the Disney World vacation we took when I was six years old. It was one of the few times in my life I remembered my parents kissing and holding hands. We rode rides, watched princess shows, and even ate ice cream in the shape of mouse ears.

  The next month, we moved to Singapore.

  Salvatore held out the frame for me with a quivering hand.

  “You okay?” Marcus asked as he slowly stepped to my side, afraid to make sudden movements.

  The words slid down the back of my throat. It was an unanswerable question. I hadn’t been okay in such a long time, but this pushed me to an incomprehensible level of confusion. I gazed at the image of my former life as I grip
ped the frame.

  “There’s more,” Salvatore continued, and when I looked up, he was pointing to a handcrafted picture frame on a nearby end table. Constructed of salvaged barn wood, the frame held a yellowed newspaper clipping with a photo that, even from a few feet away, I could see featured my parents.

  “That’s how we met.” Salvatore explained, plucking the thick frame from the table and handing it to me.

  Displayed was a grainy black-and-white photograph of a dead body contorted in the hatchback trunk of a car. Not exactly coffee table art. Around the vehicle were police officers and civilians. Among those present in the crowd were my parents—but not my parents as I knew them. This couple was young—maybe in their twenties—and fresh-faced.

  The hairs rose on my arms.

  “What is this?” I gasped.

  “Your parents are heroes in my country,” Salvatore stated proudly. “This is what I wanted you to see. It’s an original copy. I couldn’t part with it. I won’t even travel with it. It means too much.”

  Has he never heard of a scanner?

  I stared at their faces, round and full, their eyes stunned as if they had just stumbled upon the grisly scene. My mom’s hair was feathered like a disco queen, and my dad had a long mustache. It must have been the seventies. Around them were policemen in uniforms that looked European; the car looked foreign as well, and the body in the trunk was completely unfamiliar.

  “Who is that?” I asked. “What is this?”

  Marcus pointed to the corpse. “That’s Aldo Moro.”

  I could tell by the way he said it that the name was supposed to mean something to me. It didn’t. I shrugged.

  “Aldo Moro,” Salvatore repeated slowly as if that would jog my memory. “He was the prime minister of Italy until he was assassinated in Rome in 1978.” He again made the sign of the cross.

  I shook my head, still oblivious.

  “Aldo Moro is the Kennedy assassination of Italy,” Marcus explained.

  Now that, I understood. I nodded.

  “He was kidnapped and held hostage for weeks,” Salvatore continued. “This is a picture from when they discovered the body of the prime minister. Your parents saw the car pull up, and the information they provided tied the murder to the Red Brigades.”

  “Communist bad guys,” Marcus clarified. “But a lot of people don’t think that’s who killed him. The assassination is one of the greatest conspiracy theories in European history.”

  “Nonsense,” said Salvatore. “Your parents put themselves in great danger when they came forward, and they brought down a ring of political assassins. After this photo came out, they had to go into hiding. Their lives changed.”

  “Wait? Are we talking witness protection? Is my last name not Phoenix?” I squawked, horrified.

  Salvatore shook his head. “I’m not sure.”

  “Well, what do you know? How did you get involved? And what does this have to do with what’s going on now?” My heart was pounding so hard it felt like I might crack a rib. Who were these people?

  “My brother, Angelo, was a member of the state police.” Salvatore pointed to a man in the photo, then made the sign of the cross. I assumed from the gesture that his brother was also dead, which could explain why he kept a grisly photo displayed on an end table. “He worked the case, and he asked me to keep your parents safe until things calmed down.”

  “In this apartment.” I looked around, understanding the situation. “So is this how my parents became spies? Were they spies? Was this the incident that started it all?” It almost made sense. They innocently stumbled upon a gruesome event, got entangled in a conspiracy involving an assassinated world leader, landed in danger, went into hiding, and after that, a career in espionage fell into their laps.

  I took out my cell phone and snapped a picture of the image, then instantly sent it to Charlotte. With her computer skills, hopefully she’d uncover more information. Maybe the FBI had misunderstood my parents’ pasts completely. Maybe someone out there could tell me who my parents really were.

  As if hearing my mental confusion, Salvatore stepped toward me. “Your parents were complicated people. But after this day, our families were forever linked. They worked with my brother for years, in a nontraditional sense.” He eyed me pointedly. “We became family.” His jaw clenched when he said this, probably at the mention of his deceased sibling. I was familiar with the feeling.

  “Well, what does that mean? What work did they do? And who were their enemies? Because somebody took my sister recently, and I think your son knows something. At the very least, he knows what she was up to before all of this happened.”

  “Luis is trying to track down some leads.” He snatched the photo and returned it to the table.

  “Where? How?

  I was tired of people telling me things only when they felt like telling me. Urban knew the FBI was investigating my parents since their funeral (three years ago!), and he never told us. Maybe if he had, Keira wouldn’t have felt the need to research our parents’ pasts herself, maybe none of this would have happened. I wasn’t going to let Salvatore get away with the same types of omissions. I wasn’t going to play dumb anymore. “You brought me here for a reason. It wasn’t just to show me a photo. What is going on? Because for all I know, your son’s in on this. Maybe Luis helped Craig? Maybe he’s the one who took her?

  Salvatore’s jaw tightened. “Luis would never hurt your sister.”

  “And I’m supposed to believe you?”

  “He loved your parents.”

  “Yeah, right. My parents never mentioned any of you! You keep talking about family, but honestly, you sound delusional.”

  “They were Luis’s godparents.”

  My body froze, eyes blinking, and Salvatore watched the comprehension wash over my face. Then he walked over to the bookshelf, slid out a yellowed ivory photo album with dusty floral appliques, and opened the first page. He held it out for me to see.

  “Now, do you understand why I am so certain Luis wants to help?”

  I peered at a plastic-covered page with mustard-yellow water stains. An image of my twenty-something parents holding a newborn baby in a lacy antique christening gown was positioned dead center. Salvatore was standing beside them with an attractive woman I could only assume was his wife. It looked as though they were inside a Catholic church. “We might not have been family to you, but you were family to us,” he stated. “That meant something.”

  I grabbed the book and flipped through the pages, searching every face.

  “That’s the only other image I have of them,” he explained.

  It was enough. I turned back to it and stared.

  My parents had godchildren I never knew about? My parents were religious? We’d never gone to church. When Urban insisted on having my parents’ funeral in the Catholic cathedral in Boston, Keira and I thought it was ridiculous. But he was footing the bill, so we went along. Maybe he was right? Maybe he knew what they wanted better than us? Maybe everyone knew our parents better than us.

  I felt tears welling behind my eyelids. My parents had close family connections we knew nothing about; they were witnesses in a political assassination; they were being investigated by the FBI, who thought they conducted secret “missions;” and they had enemies who were potentially willing to kidnap their children years after their deaths.

  Suddenly, all that time I’d spent mourning them, crying for them, missing them, started to bubble into a new sensation in my chest—anger. Violent, pulsing anger. I had been betrayed, I had been lied to by the people who raised me, by the people who were supposed to love me the most.

  I cleared my throat, trying to push away the bile that was rising. Marcus rested his palm on my shoulder; it felt like a brick.

  “You obviously know more about my parents than I do,” I said, my voice defeated as I handed back the album. “If Luis is innocent, I promise I won’t implicate him in anything. I just need to hear what he knows about Keira.”


  “I’ll talk to him. See if he’ll meet with you.”

  “When? How?”

  “You’re staying at the hotel, no? I’ll be in touch.”

  I hung my head. “How could my parents do this to us?” I muttered to myself.

  Salvatore rubbed my biceps with a soft wrinkled palm, his other hand stroking the white tufts of hair standing upright on his head. “I’m sorry. Betrayal, it’s the worst thing in the world, especially when it comes from someone you love, someone you trust. I wish I could tell you more. I truly do. But my only involvement in your parents’ work was giving them a place to stay.”

  I scrunched my eyes, straining to hold back a waterfall of emotion, and Marcus stepped to my side. “We’ll figure this out,” he whispered in my ear. I was glad I wasn’t alone, yet also embarrassed that he saw me so blindsided, that he learned the truth about my family right along with me.

  “Go back to the hotel.” Salvatore insisted. “I’ll be in touch.” Then he moved toward the door. “I hope you find your sister safe. No one should lose family so young.” The sound of his heavy footsteps on the aged wooden steps trailed away, taking with them any bits I held true about my parents.

  I probably would have stayed in that room for hours, dazed, haplessly searching for clues about the strangers who stayed here, only my phone rang in my pocket.

  Chapter Eighteen

  We spoke for only a few minutes. Charlotte was on her way to work, the world continuing to spin in its usual nine-to-five loops. I filled her in on my conversation with Salvatore, and she said she was already researching the Aldo Moro photo I’d sent. Apparently, her hacker friends could analyze images with software that made Photoshop look like a Magna Doodle. I was really glad she was on my side.

  “According to the map, the coffee shop’s up here.” Marcus gestured down the block.

  I couldn’t go back to the hotel. I wasn’t built with the patience to wait; call me anti-Gandhi. And since I hadn’t eaten all day, Marcus suggested we distract ourselves with food. He seemed to be picking up where Charlotte had left off—trying to create a sense of normalcy on a trip that only twenty-four hours in was already stupefying. But I appreciated his efforts. Every time he mentioned food, school, or the terrible font choice on the cartoon map he was holding, I felt a tiny moment of relief from the family revelations that were currently trying to eat my organs.