by Tom Fox
It hadn’t been to her, even though he’d found her number easily enough. He didn’t want to tip the priest off, on the off chance that Father Agostini was actually staying with her. Instead, he called Vico Bellini, the freelance private investigator with whom he’d worked before, and who maintained a good relationship with anyone who had the money to pay him. Whereas Alexander hadn’t been sure before, he was now quite certain his boss would consider this story worth a hundred euros of investment. There was the distinct odor of scandal in the air, and to a newspaper that was gold.
Alexander took the petty cash in hand and promised it to the man in exchange for a reconnaissance visit to the sister’s home. If Agostini was there, he simply wanted a phone call to let him know, and then for Bellini to sit on him and make sure he didn’t flee before Alexander could fetch Gabriella and the two of them make a visit together. If the priest wasn’t there, the PI was given instructions to speak with the sister and learn what he could.
That had been ninety minutes ago. Somewhere in the time since, Alexander’s mobile had finally died. So much sustained use had drawn it to its limit. Annoyed, despite the progress, he plugged it in and lit up another cigarette. At the rate he was going, he’d puff himself through half a pack before he was back in contact with the outside world.
He cursed the fifteen minutes it would take the phone to charge up. He cursed again. He waited. He smoked.
The moment it came online, it began to ring.
8:12 p.m.
The phone blinked before it rang. Alexander lurched for the small device and raised it to his ear, cutting off the first tones that began to sound.
“Trecchio.”
“Alex, it’s Vico.”
He sighed an anxious relief. He was going crazy waiting.
“Are you near a computer?”
An unexpected question. “I’m at my desk. Will my laptop do?”
“Whatever. Power it up. I’ve already got your email address.”
Alexander lifted the gray metal lid of his Acer Aspire S7 and pressed the power button.
“What have you found?”
“You’re not going to like it.”
Vague. Strangely, annoyingly vague. “Try me.”
“Just get to your email. I’ve talked to the woman. And I’ve made a recording you need to hear.”
“You recorded your conversation?”
“Just open your fucking email, Alex!” Bellini shouted into his phone. Alexander could hear him follow the outburst with a long, slow intake of breath, trying to calm himself.
“I didn’t record my conversation. I recorded a message that was on her answering machine. And you need to open that file.”
8:15 p.m.
In his small cubicle, Alexander sat staring at his computer. Tendrils of smoke rose in random swirls from an ashtray to his left, but his eyes were fixed on the gently glowing screen.
He’d played the media file over and over again in the three minutes since his call with Bellini had ended. The PI, diligent and anxious, had sent him an MP3 file containing the voicemail message. It was only nineteen seconds long, but it changed everything.
I’m sorry. I had no other choice.
The voice, Bellini had assured him, was that of Father Alberto Agostini. His sister Pietrina had identified it with absolute certainty.
It had to be this way, to protect you. I … I’m sorry I couldn’t stay. Pray for my soul, especially after what I must do. And pray for hers. I love you.
Alexander’s spine tingled. The yellowed fingers of his right hand rattled nervously over his desktop.
Suddenly he lurched out of his seat. In an instant of perfect clarity, he knew one thing with absolute certainty. Gabriella’s life was in danger. The woman he’d loathed, the woman he’d loved, was about to die.
Chapter 23
The present day: 8:58 p.m.
Gabriella approached the familiar five-arched portico of Santa Maria in Trastevere across a small piazza that served as a hub of the local nightlife, already starting to buzz. The church’s frontage formed nearly half of the piazza’s western side. The fountain at its center—an enormous urn pouring water from the mouths of boars into a pool surrounded by four clam-shell sculptures marked with the ancient abbreviation still used on Roman civic monuments: SPQR, Senatus Populusque Romanus, “The Senate and People of Rome”—gurgled with its usual gentle flow. A young couple sat midway up the seven-stepped rise surrounding the fountain, making out in a manner that Gabriella couldn’t help feeling was out of place in front of one of the oldest churches in the ancient city.
It was strange, and comforting, that Father Agostini had chosen this as their meeting place. Santa Maria in Trastevere had been Gabriella’s favorite church for years, since she was a little girl. It seemed just the right mix of history—a glorious building dating back to the fourth century, perhaps the first church in Rome to have been home to open, legalized celebrations of the Mass—with a sacred beauty that helped set her often frayed nerves at ease. Beyond its unique facade, with palm trees painted on to plaster and twelfth-century mosaics of the Madonna surrounded by female saints bearing lamps, the interior radiated a visual holiness. Imperial Ionic columns lined both sides of the main nave, towering over a brilliantly tiled floor of a swirling concentric circle design. High above, a gilded ceiling seemed to hint at the beauty of heaven, with its deep recesses drawing the eye ever upward despite the relative squatness of the space. And at the front, behind the high altar, the apse was done out in mosaic work unlike any other in the Eternal City. In vivid, brilliant colors Christ sat enthroned with his mother, saints arrayed on either side, above a flock of lambs looking toward their Shepherd.
It was a heavenly place. In a world—a career, a life—where so much was unheavenly, it was Gabriella’s haven.
And today, when so much seemed mysterious and secretive, she would meet a priest here who would help open her eyes to whatever was unfolding around them. He was nervous, and that meant so was she; but there was progress to be made and she was intent on making it.
She reached into her pocket and switched off her phone as she approached the second archway from the right—the one she always used to enter. A quick glance before the power-down confirmed she had no missed calls. Whatever was keeping Alexander, it had evidently taken up his full attention.
Never mind. She was here. Her hour was up.
She tucked her phone away once more, and stepped into the church for her meeting.
9:04 p.m.
Alexander raced down the Via Cesare Battisti. Never in his life had he been as certain of anything as he was of one single fact: he had to get to Gabriella, and he had to get to her now.
She’d sent him a text earlier: Fr. A. in Santa Maria. Asked to meet. Alone. Will be there in 45 min. That had been forty-nine minutes ago.
Damn you for not paying attention, he chided himself as he pressed down hard on the accelerator. He’d been on the telephone with his investigator when the text had come in. He’d felt the slight vibration at his ear, but he’d ignored it. So many things beeped and buzzed on his phone nowadays, from tweets to pokes to BBC news alerts. This wasn’t the first time he’d been too distracted to focus on one. That, he vowed, would have to change. Many things would have to change. And he would be willing to change them. If only he had the chance.
On his lap, he fingered a tool he never thought his hands would touch. A Ukrainian-made Fort-12 nine millimeter handgun. His investigator, who’d returned to the office just as he was racing out the door, had produced it from a holster at his chest and demanded that he take it.
“I don’t know how to use it,” Alexander had protested.
“I don’t care. You’re not taking another step without it.” Vico had been unrelenting. “Whatever you’ve got yourself into, Alex, it isn’t good.” He’d looked him straight in the eye, then held up the gun.
“This is the safety. Snap it to the left, like this, and you’re good to go. From there it’s ju
st point and shoot. Literally.”
He’d pressed the gun into Alexander’s hand. There had been no more time to protest. He’d taken the weapon and raced toward his car.
God forbid he should actually have to use it.
The familiar surroundings eased Gabriella’s heart as she stepped fully into the church. There was a wonderful serenity to the space at nighttime—something she rarely experienced. She normally came during breaks is the day, occasionally on the rare Sunday mornings she wasn’t assigned to work. She knew it as a place of calm, but always one that bustled with people. Faithful or tourists, the church drew in the masses.
But not tonight. Tonight the sacred church was empty. For the first seconds after she stepped inside, that fact comforted Gabriella. Peace and quiet. And then it disturbed her.
The church is empty.
A few votive candles burned in their stands, but there was no one to be seen. No faithful. No visitors.
And no priest.
Had Father Agostini stood her up again?
She took a few paces forward, entering the main space of the church. Its shapes appeared strangely deep in the darkened light of evening as she walked down the center aisle, her hand brushing against the ends of the carved pews.
She was alone.
“Father Agostini?” she called out all the same. She had placed too much hope in this encounter. She wasn’t prepared to admit it was another dead end.
“Father Agostini?” she called out again. And then, just at the corner of her vision at the far end of the church, emerging from a pillar behind the high altar, a movement. She turned to face it. “Father Agosti—”
The quiet exploded.
The foundations of the ancient church seemed to rattle. A single gunshot tearing through such a vast sacred space would not normally create such an effect, but in the sheer surprise of the moment it was as if even the world beneath it shook. Flecks of dust that danced through the enormous expanse of air lurched into new swirls as the bullet exploded out of the old Beretta M1951 and raced toward its target.
Lining the ceiling, the stoic faces of centuries-old saints shimmered from the mosaicked apse. Their features, glorious and transfigured, were unmoved by the murderous scene playing out beneath their feet.
In that instant, the basilica’s serenity became chaos. The nine-millimeter slug slammed into a carved pew, shattering the polished surface and sending shards of hand-crafted artistry, well worn from centuries of bottom-buffing, flying into the air. The great crunch of fragmenting wood joined the report of the handgun. The recent silence was transformed into a cacophony of noise.
Gabriella stiffened in instantaneous terror, but she did not move. Shock kept her feet glued to the marble floor.
At the far end of the gun’s barrel, Father Alberto Agostini had finally made himself known.
Chapter 24
Santa Maria in Trastevere church: 9:05 p.m.
The moments that followed Father Agostini’s ultimatum seemed to stretch out into far more time than could possibly have passed. He’d given Gabriella thirty seconds to make her peace with God. How could such a tiny expanse feel like the better part of an eternity? Was it true what they said, that time really did slow down in the instants before death?
Gabriella had tried to reason with the priest. She’d tried to negotiate with him, appease him. But Father Agostini was unyielding. Now that she knew he intended to take his own life along with hers, the possibility of reaching through his frenzy felt all the more remote. The man had already taken the plunge into the abyss. If such a fall could be stopped, she wasn’t sure she knew how to do it.
He offered her no more details. Apologies kept floating off his lips, but the gun never lowered. He felt bound, trapped—that much was clear. But so was the fact that he felt no point in trying to explain why.
When the world began to thunder again, Gabriella felt a new, deep terror. A violent burst of noise shocked her ears. She saw the priest’s eyes change, his frenzy deepen. The gun’s barrel jolted.
And she realized she had not done what he’d asked. In this moment, when it now seemed she was bound to die, she recognized that she was not ready to meet her maker. Thirty seconds hadn’t been enough. She wasn’t prepared.
But her end had already begun.
9:11 p.m.
Alexander burst into Santa Maria with a full shoulder blow to the heavy wooden door. It was unlocked—a fact for which he could only be thankful as it gave way and he saw the thickness of the old wood. Had it been otherwise, he would have been in a pile at its base.
Momentum kept him moving, though the darkness forced him to slow his step. The piazza outside was also cloaked in the dark of nighttime, but there it was offset by the heady illumination of street lamps, café signage and the illuminated windows of surrounding buildings. Inside, the light was far dimmer. Only a few candles burned their novenas along the side columns, the windows high above now black and devoid of color.
Alexander forced himself to stop. His breathing was heavy. It seemed to echo off the stone walls, and he realized that he could only hear himself: his tight chest, his thumping pulse, his tense breath.
Calm down. Quiet yourself. You’re no good to her like this. He reached up and wiped the sweat from his forehead. Listen!
A second later, the sound of his panting disappeared beneath the cannon-like explosion of a gunshot.
The old priest had fired off his fourth shot of the evening in desperation. The thud from the back of the church had startled him—and then movement in the otherwise still space.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It was only supposed to be the woman. The woman and him. It was late. They should have been left alone.
But he couldn’t let himself be stopped.
He pulled the trigger again, catching a swift burst of motion out of the corner of his eye. If he was already going to kill twice tonight, he might as well go for a good, trinitarian three.
Chapter 25
9:16 p.m.
“Stop!” Gabriella screamed, at first not realizing that Father Agostini was not firing at her. She needed another moment, another second, to make herself ready. She was a believing woman. She had faith. But she needed another sec—
The bullet flew without mercy or consideration. Death, she thought desperately, was not a patient adversary.
But the round landed too far from her position even for the wobbling aim of the unpracticed priest. Death had been stayed. Something had changed.
She spun around. Her eyes, by now well accustomed to the dim lighting, saw him immediately.
Alexander.
He stood at the back of the church, in the center of the aisle. As the gun’s report sounded again, he lurched to the side and dived behind a pew. Fragments of wood exploded above him.
Gabriella spun around again. “Father Alberto, don’t do this! He’s a friend. He’s no threat!”
But the priest was not listening. The gun fired again, and the world seemed to explode around her.
“I know who he is!” Agostini finally cried out through his shots. “God has brought you both to my door. We can end this together!”
Alexander lay belly-down on the marble floor beneath one of the pews. He’d crawled forward as the shots continued to land behind him, the priest at the front of the church unable to spot his location and simply firing at the last position he had been visible.
He wasn’t sure what his plan was now. But it had to involve getting close enough to take a clean shot at the priest. He had never fired a gun before. He didn’t trust his aim. But going for a shot was now a necessity.
That intention became a firm resolve when he heard Agostini’s words shouted from the high altar.
“Since you’re here,” the old priest yelled, “you can both join me in death. And if your friend’s too much of a coward to go first, Miss Fierro, then that honor will have to fall to you.”
Alexander’s body turned to ice. He’d hurt Gabriella badly, and she’d
been cruel to him in response, but there was no way he was going to let her die. Especially not with his belly to the ground like a coward.
His limbs shaking, he rose. As he did so, he slid the handgun into the back of his waistband. Out of Agostini’s line of sight.
“I’m here,” he announced, holding up his hands. “Point that at me, not at her.”
The gun in Father Agostini’s grasp swung compliantly in Alexander’s direction.
“So you show yourself after all.” The words came from the priest with an agony his anger couldn’t overpower.
Pain. Terror. The loss of hope. Alexander saw them all in the old man’s eyes.
“I know why you’re doing this, Father Agostini,” he said to their would-be executioner. He tried not to shout—he didn’t want to sound aggressive—but the massive space required a loud voice.
“You don’t know.” Agostini wagged his head. “There is no way you can know. What motivates me is—”
“Your sister,” Alexander interrupted him. “Pietrina. And her children, Nora, Elena and Giuliana.”
At the names of his nieces, Agostini froze in place. His look switched to one of confusion.
“How can you—”
“I found out about them today. I sent an investigator to your home. I heard your message. I know you’re afraid for them.”
Deep, visible tears welled in Agostini’s eyes. “Then you know why I have to do this.”
“You don’t,” Alexander answered. “We can protect them, all of them. I know people, Gabriella knows people.” He motioned toward her, standing a few meters to his left, still in the center aisle of the church. “We can have your family looked after. They’ll be safe.”
Father Agostini’s expression flashed a flurry of uncontrolled emotions. Alexander’s words seemed to catch him unprepared, throw him off guard. For a moment, he contemplated the possibility.