Iron Dove Page 7

  The ashfall had so perfectly preserved artifacts and bodies of the people of that long-gone world that few archeological sites could match it. Nova recalled the dark, gray-black cast of a woman still protectively clutching her child that she’d seen in the Naples Museum. Frozen in time, bent to save her child, if not herself, the small brave woman had drawn Nova into a deep sadness. She’d stared at the dark remains for many minutes, pondering how fate overtakes everyone.

  Naples covered the hills that formed the westernmost stretch of the bay. Hills rose up again in the east at their destination, Sorrento.

  “Have either of you been to Naples?” Cesare asked through the headphones.

  Joe looked at her and mouthed the words, Can he never be quiet?

  Nova remembered the great surprise of her one trip to the sprawling, hilly city famous for amore and pizza. “Do you know the Capodimonte Museum?”

  “Of course,” Cesare chirped back. “World-class. The art. The architecture. The furnishings. All superb.”

  “Well, I have a friend who lives in San Diego, my town. Susan Vreeland. She wrote a book called The Passion of Artemisia about a woman painter who did a Caravaggesque painting called Judith’s Beheading of Holofernes.” Nova looked at Joe and gave him a wicked smile. “I can well imagine that Holofernes must have lied to Judith.”

  “I didn’t lie. I was misinformed,” he muttered.

  Nova continued, “I loved the book, and then when I wandered through the Capodimante, there, hanging on a wall in front of me, was the painting. Just as my friend had described it.”

  “My last surprising memory of Naples,” Joe said with edge in his voice, “was having my pocket picked in the central train station.”

  “So sorry,” Cesare lamented, his voice bursting with good spirits. Her fondness for Cesare seemed to increase as quickly as Joe’s irritation with him. “La Cosa Nostra is still powerful and widespread in all the region around Naples. They have a hand in everything, big and small, including picking pockets. The train station is particularly notorious.”

  The pilot swung them left, and the crest of Vesuvius slid by on Joe’s side. She surveyed the ground. They were sufficiently high up that at first she couldn’t spot what she was looking for; then she did. “There.” She pointed out his window to a patch along the coast that, in the midst of the sprawling mass of modern development, stuck out as a big brown area on the volcano’s southern skirt. “That’s what’s left of Pompeii.”

  In less than twenty minutes, their pilot put them down in Sorrento. A black Laforza 351 SUV awaited them, as Cesare had arranged. Joe moved toward the driver’s side.

  “It does make more sense, doesn’t it, if I do the driving?” Cesare said, heading Joe off at the pass. “I do know this area, having driven this coast many times.”

  Nova took the front passenger seat again, noting that Cesare had once again managed to set Joe’s teeth on edge. This continuing clash did nothing to lift her gloomy mood. Principessa took her place, demurely curling up and resting her head on her paws in Nova’s lap. Nova enjoyed the pleasure of scratching the small white bit of fluff under the chin, something Cesare said Principessa particularly favored.

  “We have a choice,” Cesare said, pulling out of the local airport. “I am dying to discuss what emerged from your briefings with Provenza yesterday, and it is nearly time for lunch. We could have lunch here in Sorrento. I know a hotel, the Victoria. Five stars. It has the most astounding view of the bay. We could dine on their patio and have sufficient privacy to chat.”

  “Or?” Joe said from the seat behind Cesare.

  “Or we could proceed at once to the coast and on to Positano.”

  “That would get us to our lodgings sooner, wouldn’t it?”

  “Perhaps a little.”

  “Then I vote we head right to Positano. What do you think, Nova?”

  Joe wanted to rush ahead to their rooms to escape from Cesare ASAP. “A five-star hotel with a smashing view,” she said sweetly. “Oh, my. That does sound like a vacation, doesn’t it?”

  She looked back and caught an ever-so-small narrowing of Joe’s eyes. He figured she was going to go for the lunch in Sorrento with Cesare in order to torment him further. She’d scored.

  But then, Positano would also have lovely views, and she knew what it was like to be cooped up with someone who irritates you. Even if Joe was being unreasonable, and as much as she might like to pretend otherwise, this was no vacation so she and Joe needed to be in sync, not at odds. “On the other hand, I’d like to get settled in myself, Cesare. Let’s go on. As Joe says, we can talk while we drive,” she added.

  She looked back to Joe again. Thanks, he mouthed silently.

  From Sorrento, the road at first climbed inland away from the water past small towns and the orchards that produced lemons for Sorrento’s famous lemon liqueur.

  “Jesus, Cesare!” Joe exclaimed. “That BMW!”

  Rather than brake the SUV, Cesare revved into the lane for oncoming traffic, accelerated and passed the BMW. Her heart skipped more than a few beats. Had he even checked to see if it was safe to go around? His reaction had been so fast Nova wasn’t sure.

  After an uncomfortably long pause during which he seemed to be considering whether or not to throttle Cesare, Joe started talking about how to execute the break-ins. Their first target was Fabiano Greco.

  “Ah. I know him personally,” Cesare said. “Handsome devil. Single. A thoroughgoing womanizer. And as crooked as they come. I decorated the home of his close neighbor in Rome and have chatted with Greco on occasion about doing his place here on the coast. He has a condo in Positano that is famously talked about as being utterly elegant, with a perfect gem of a view. I was there once and I agree with that assessment.”

  “Tomorrow or the next day, I’ll ‘accidentally’ meet him at the beach,” Nova said. “He habitually has cocktails at the same beach restaurant in the late afternoon.”

  “Well, then, we are going to have to take you shopping. Please don’t misunderstand. You are certainly a lovely, lovely woman. Any man can see that. But, well, I think you’re not going to catch the eye and certainly not capture the attention of a man like Fabiano Greco in the wardrobe and, well, let’s say, the ‘look’ that you display so far.”

  She grinned. “Yes, shopping is already on my schedule.”

  Joe laughed. “Cesare, your eyes will pop. Nova is a master of the duckling-into-swan routine. What you see now is, in my view, the duckling. Plain Jane, as we say in America. For Greco, she will come armed as a swan—a divine sex goddess.”

  “My, my. That should indeed be a most amusing change to observe.”

  Cesare glanced at Joe in the rearview mirror. “But I’m sorry, Joe, for interrupting. You were saying?”

  “Do you also know suspect number two, Pavel Sorokin?” Joe spoke with a touch of sarcasm, apparently irritated now by Cesare’s seeming knowledge of everyone in Italy.

  “Certainly. Two years ago, I actually did some redecoration of their magnificent villa in Ravello. He has a lovely family. His wife is Italian and quite social. One child, a daughter. His wife loves music. She explained to me that’s why they bought in Ravello. She attends all the festivals and drags Pavel with her whenever she can. I doubt seriously that his wife has any suspicion of any nefarious doings. No, no. Not possible.”

  Cesare honked the SUV’s horn, pulled out into the oncoming traffic lane, and passed a slow-moving but absolutely darling little black car with elegant silver trim.

  “What is that?” Nova exclaimed. “It’s adorable.”

  Cesare smiled. “It’s a minicar, the most in car imaginable. The Smart cars are perfect for narrow streets and miniscule parking spaces.”

  Joe snorted. “Can you imagine the effect of a collision of a Hummer and one of those? Elephant sits on hummingbird.”

  They crested a hill and suddenly a wedge of the blue Adriatic lay exposed before her. Just a hint of blue. Traffic flowed bumper to bumper going n
orth and south on the narrow two-lane highway. “I really hate being behind these tour buses,” Cesare announced as he hit the gas and zoomed around a big one, skipping back into their own southbound lane just barely in time to avoid taking out a ponytailed honcho on a motor scooter with a young girl clinging behind him. Neither wore helmets. Nova’s heart once more clogged her throat.

  Joe said, “I suppose you know suspect number three, Ya Lin, too. And by the way, would you like me to drive? I know we’re in a hurry, but we do need to arrive intact.”

  Acting as if he’d not heard Joe’s snide remark, Cesare said, “I don’t know her. She’s quite the big star in Italian films. But she is extremely private. Although I do know where she lives in Amalfi. Guards are always posted at her gates.”

  Nova zoned out. She stopped listening to Cesare and Joe and just let herself go into what was now magnificent coastline. Rocky points, breaking waves on a rugged shoreline, and now and then a white, sandy beach. How would the water feel on her body? Slick with salt. Warm with Mediterranean June heat. Glorious. Tomorrow she would buy a swimsuit.

  Soon she caught a glimpse, well in the distance, of white and sandy-colored buildings perched in descending row upon row on a steep slope, like birds nesting on a sea cliff. The houses of Positano seemed to defy gravity. The road wound through the town, pressed by businesses on either side. Shops on her left climbed up the hills, and those on her right plummeted toward the sea.

  Before they reached anything she would consider as the center of a town, Cesare made a left up a narrow street and they climbed. And climbed. The road weaved upward until they reached a high, wrought iron gate.

  “The Contessa Rimaldi is one of my best clients. She is also, without question, Positano’s biggest gossip. By this time tomorrow, day after tomorrow at the latest, all the locals will know about the two American photographers who are here to ferret out and document the most beautiful vistas and imposing homes along the Amalfi drive,” Cesare said as he rolled down the window and pressed the button on the gate security box. “Time to start setting up your cover.”

  Chapter 13

  Ahmad counted each hour that passed. Only five days remained before Operation Awesome Vengeance would shock the world. He felt tense, like a man before battle, and also excited.

  He had great faith in the man he had chosen to be in charge of the six bodyguards for this operation. The soldier was Khangi, a seasoned Jihad fighter who looked, acted, and dressed Western, right down to his jeans, T-shirt, clean-shaven face, and short, military haircut. Like Ahmad, Khangi had been raised in Syria, but unlike Ahmad, who had an education, Khangi cut his teeth in the brutal back streets of Damascus.

  Ten minutes earlier, when Ahmad dropped by the safe house with groceries for the four men who had already arrived—the boy Ali, Khangi, and two other volunteers—Khangi had been explaining to Ali how to clean and reassemble a Kalashnikov AK-74. Along with a Markarov pistol, which each bodyguard would carry, two of them would hide an AK-74 under their long dust cloaks. Dust cloaks were not uncommon in fashionable cities or towns in Italy these days, and the long overcoats would actually be common dress at the Doomsday rock concert where Awesome Vengeance would be inflicting the most immediate damage.

  “Only Ali and Khangi will go through the security check points and into the concert venue,” Ahmad instructed the four of them. “The rest of you can hold their weapons for them until they come back out.”

  The call to serve Allah had saved Khangi from a life dedicated to thievery and petty brutalities and sent him to learn the ways of armed resistance in a camp in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley. He was accepted for this mission, as were all the others, because Al Qaeda headquarters knew that he had no record as yet with international security agencies.

  “Your main task as bodyguards,” Ahmad continued, “is to protect Ali as he moves through open public spaces. We can’t risk him being harmed by an accident. Or, a mugging. Or for that matter, arrest. Although arrest isn’t likely, it’s the reason for having six of you instead of the usual two that accompany a suicide bomber. He must not be arrested. Letting him go inside the concert space alone with only you, Khangi, to guard him, is risky. But worth the risk. Thousands will be attending. You and the boy go in. Circulate widely for an hour. Then leave. Your next target is the subway.”

  Khangi nodded.

  A knock at the door stopped their talk. A soldier from Egypt looked out the peephole. He turned to look at Ahmad. “It’s Saddoun. It’s your son.”

  Baffled and angry, Ahmad said, “Let him in.” How did Saddoun know this place?

  Saddoun eagerly took in the men and the weapons. “Mohsin sent me,” he said to Ahmad. “There’s another arrival at the airport and he is very early. Mohsin thought you’d want to know so you can go pick him up now.”

  “Mohsin should have come himself,” Ahmad said, his tone sharpened by displeasure. He did not want Saddoun near weapons or men like these. The boy already had an unhealthy attraction to guns. He would have preferred it if Saddoun didn’t know the location of the safe house. Mohsin should have known better.

  “I’ll go now,” Ahmad said to Khangi. “I’ll return tomorrow and we will make further plans. Our final three men will be here by the fourteenth. We can fill them in as they arrive.” He strode to the door. “Since you’re here,” he said to Saddoun, “you may as well ride with me to the airport.”

  Once in the car, Saddoun immediately exploded with excitement. “Something big is happening, isn’t it?”

  “This isn’t your concern. Mohsin should not have involved you.”

  “But it is big, isn’t it?”

  “You may as well put it out of your mind.”

  “I don’t want to leave with the family. I want to stay. I want to take part. I saw that boy. He’s no older than I am. And I’m good with guns, you know that.”

  “I have humored your desire to learn about weapons and to be able to shoot a gun. A man must be able to protect himself and his family. But it is out of the question for you to be involved with my work here.”

  “Why? I want to serve.”

  “And you will.”

  “I’ve asked to go train in Bekaa over and over. I’m a warrior.”

  Ahmad swerved sharply across two lanes of traffic and into the right lane for the airport. “Boy, be quiet! I nearly missed the turnoff!”

  “Please, Father.”

  “You are going to college in England. I have not given you English lessons for nothing. You have a fine mind. You must train to be the finest thinker and planner for Allah and for our cause. Anyone, Saddoun, can be a soldier. But we need men who have lived among the infidels and know their weaknesses and how to use those weaknesses against them. You have great promise.”

  “I don’t want to be like you. I want to fight them. Kill them.”

  Ahmad sighed. “You are my only son. I love you. And I forbid it.”

  “You let that boy go. Why not me? Am I better than him? Or am I not as good? Why is it all right for him to risk death, but not me?”

  Ahmad felt his neck grow warm from a strange anger, as if Saddoun had stuck a knife of accusation in his back. How dare his son question him, question his motives, question the rightness of his choices? Did the sharpness of the accusation sting because the boy, Ali, was not just going to risk death, but also be marked for death, and a gruesome one at that? That was something Ahmad had not made altogether clear to Ali.

  Chapter 14

  Joe stood on a Positano beach beside Cesare, who was holding Principessa, as they watched Nova slowly descend toward the sand. Above her billowed a parasail flaunting vivid stripes of yellow, red and purple against the azure sky. The motorboat towing her was slowing just enough to bring her down to a safe landing with impressive precision.

  Like Nova, Joe and Cesare wore bathing suits; in Joe’s case, his had been purchased this morning when Nova bought hers. Ten minutes earlier, he had made the same flight and landing. Nova was clearly having fun, reve
ling in the view and feeling the wind on her skin. He caught himself grinning with empathetic pleasure. He loved to see her smiling like now, as her feet hit the ground running.

  Cesare shook his head. “You were quite right, Joe. Nova is a stunning beauty and she hides it well. All that was required, really, was to take her clothes off. You will note that there is not one man on this beach—or one woman, for that matter—who doesn’t stop to look at her.”

  Nova had picked a crimson bikini trimmed with a pattern of small diamonds as coal-black as her hair. Against her fair skin, the red stood out like a cherry on top of vanilla ice cream. Her hair was still French braided at the back, like it had been when he’d picked her up in Costa Rica, but no one was looking at her hair, or even her face. “She works out more religiously than I do,” he said to Cesare.

  “How much is real and how much is surgery?”

  Joe snorted, amused. “Do you really expect me to know?”

  “I do. Clearly you’ve spent a great deal of time with her. You seem to read each other’s minds.”

  “Okay. I do know. It’s all real.”

  “Umm. I like your Nova. I would be deeply grieved should she be hurt. Of course, you are both professionals. Naturally. But Greco’s ruthless. He is La Cosa Nostra. And if he is our guilty man, and he gets any hint that Nova is not the photographer she will claim to be, he will not hesitate to…. Well, I don’t like to think what he might do to try to find out exactly who she really is.”

  For the first time, Joe felt kinship with the endlessly chatty Cesare. “First, let me assure you that Nova actually is a world-class photographer. She’s not going to make any slipups there. Also she has this amazing effect on people. She seems so vulnerable—to say nothing of beautiful. You can trust me, Cesare. She’ll have the same effect on Greco. Greco should pray she doesn’t find reason to damage him.”