“Andre Dufort. I’m a senior investigator with Interpol.”
“Gabriele Valentino.” The officer’s eyes widened with understanding. “Chief of the Polizia for La Spezia.”
Andre handed him his Interpol ID. “Pleased to meet you.”
Valentino ran his eyes across the ID. His face hardened. “Do you mind telling me what Interpol knows about my crime scene, and why we weren’t informed earlier… when we might have had a chance to do something about it?”
“I’m sure they would have if they knew anything in advance.”
The police officer frowned. “They knew enough to send you here!”
“No. I was already here on vacation. When a tip came in that this man was going to defect, I was immediately contacted.”
“Why?” The police officer asked. “It’s not like you could have apprehended the man.”
“No. I was purely there for reconnaissance. I got the call about five minutes too late. My superiors were hoping that he would swim ashore and that I could follow him to wherever he was going to stay for the night.”
The police officer frowned. “Only he never reached his destination.”
“No. Someone took a shot at him.”
The police officer shook his head. “Not just someone. Two people.”
“Really?” Andre arched an eyebrow. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah. Someone fired a high-powered sniper rifle, perched, presumably, on top of the remains of Castle Doria.”
“And the other person?”
“Somewhere near the church. A priest interrupted your man on the beach, startling him, and he ran. If the priest hadn’t, the man would have been killed. I find it unlikely two expert marksmen could have missed a shot like that, don’t you?”
Andre nodded. “I agree. So he ran.”
“Until we caught up with him — whereupon he jumped into the Ligurian Sea.”
Andre placed his hands in his pockets, with an air of practiced casualness. “Where he never resurfaced, meaning he’s most likely dead.”
“That’s right. But not before he killed two people.”
That was news to Andre. “He killed two people?”
“Yeah. They look like hired thugs. Mercenaries or just bad people. Real tough… well, maybe not so tough after all. It looks like they threatened your man, maybe they had been sent there to kill him, I don’t know. Either way, it went wrong for them, and right for your guy, who came out killing both of them.”
A suppressed grin curled upward on Andre’s lips. That’s more like the man I was led to believe the target to be. “I was informed under no circumstances was I to try and apprehend him on my own. Even if I had the legal authority to do so in Italy — which I don’t — I was told the man would be dangerous.”
The police officer met his eyes with a hardened glare. “So, what has he done?”
Andre handed him the Interpol Red Card. “Have a read for yourself.”
There are eight types of notices, seven of which are color-coded by their function: Red, Blue, Green, Yellow, Black, Orange, and Purple. The most well-known notice is the Red Notice which is the one described as the closest instrument to an international arrest warrant in use today. An eighth Special Notice is issued at the request of the United Nations Security Council.
Valentino examined the Red Card. “Your man’s a cyber terrorist?”
“From what I hear.”
“He seems to know how to handle himself very well for a computer hacker.”
Andre shrugged. “You got the same card I have.”
“Alone and trapped, he killed two thugs without much effort.”
“Yeah. If he was a computer geek, it sure as hell wasn’t all he was.” Andre turned his gaze to the dead girl in the wooden rowboat. “What about her? Did he kill her?”
Valentino shrugged. “I don’t know — yet. One of my detectives is currently taking notes on the crime scene. We’ll know more shortly.”
Andre stared at her lifeless body. “Do we know who she is?”
“No.” Valentino sighed. “We were hoping you might be able to tell us.”
Andre studied her face.
There were two execution style shots to her head. She looked young, and quite pretty once upon a time. What a waste of a life…
The sight brought with it a chill of fear that swept across him like a shadow. It was like seeing a ghost. None of it made sense. Nothing about this night was making sense. Anomalies weren’t an unusual part of a contract like his. Normally, he just had to improvise and deal with them without adding too much collateral damage. That’s what he would have to do here, but the dead woman was the worst of his anomalies to deal with. Because of her, he couldn’t simply accept his target had drowned and then collect his payment.
Instead, he would need to find out how she ended up in the equation.
Andre turned to face the chief of police. “She’s not familiar to me, but when your detective finishes up, if he would be so kind as to send me a copy of the photos and fingerprints, I’ll send them to our team at Interpol Headquarters, back in Lyon. Hopefully someone there will be able to shed some light on the situation.”
“Good, good… Vernazza is a small village, but a very popular tourist location. It would be very sad to taint it with the murder of a local woman or a tourist, going about their everyday lives.”
“I understand what you’re saying. If we were to discover that… for example, she was working for the Russian Mafia or something, it would be easier for you to issue a press release to that effect, giving the locals and tourists alike, a stronger feeling of safety.”
“Exactly.”
“I’ll let you know as soon as I do, what they have on her back at Lyon.” Andre turned on his flashlight and shined its beam on the dilapidated ship. “What about the boat? Does that belong there?”
“No. We’ve spoken to some locals. They say it wasn’t there late last night, which means it drifted in around the same time as your Red Card.”
“Does the ship have a name or any registration numbers?”
“No.”
“Have you been on board?”
“Yes, but there was nothing obvious.” Valentino nodded. “We’ll still have the ship towed to La Spezia for more detailed forensic examination, but so far, it looks like nothing more than a rusty ship inside. If anything, it makes me doubt your man even arrived on board — unless he’s been adrift for some time.”
Andre smiled. “What a crime scene, hey?”
Valentino nodded. “I’ve never seen anything like it. A guy floats into a peaceful, medieval harbor, in the dead of night with a woman he’s most likely murdered. He gets challenged by a local priest who witnesses him floating toward the beach. He then gets shot at by two snipers. Before being attacked by two thugs, who he then kills, and then when confronted by my officers, he chooses to jump onto a ledge of jagged rocks in the sea.”
“Yeah, it’s bizarre.” Andre turned and bit his lower lip. “Do you mind?”
“What?”
He grinned. “If I take a look at your ghost ship?”
Chapter Eight
The ghost switched off the lights.
In the dark, he sat still and listened to the pandemonium outside continue. The downdraft of the search and rescue police helicopter’s rotary blades thumped in the distance. The Polizia on the cobbled streets outside barked orders, cordoned off the beach, and presumably brought out forensic teams to investigate the murder of the woman in the rowboat.
He waited until the commotion settled down.