“Nothing yet,” Sci replied, twisting his screen so she could see the video program cycling through feeds from various cameras they’d placed in the Inferno. “Just a bunch of metal heads spending their whole time getting drunk.”
“Try this one,” Mo-bot said, tossing Justine a cell phone.
She activated the phone’s keypad and dialed a number she’d committed to memory.
“Yes,” a voice said. It sounded small and distant.
“The secretary, please,” Justine responded. “It’s Justine Smith.”
“Hello, Ms. Smith,” a familiar voice said a moment later. Justine recognized the speaker as Eli Carver, US Secretary of Defense. He was a fan of Private and owed Jack a few favors. “I’m in the middle of something.”
“Golf?” she asked.
“NATO summit,” he replied coolly, “but I’d rather be golfing. How can I help?”
“We’re in Rome. Jack is in trouble.”
“Mr. Morgan sure does get around,” Carver remarked. “And he has a knack for getting in trouble with all the wrong people. What can I do to help him get back on the straight and narrow?”
“I need to talk to the ambassador here. See if we can access evidence the cops claim to have against Jack.”
“Rome is Emily Carter,” Carver remarked. “I’ll make an intro. One of my people will contact you when it’s done.”
“You can reach me at—” Justine began, but Carver cut her off.
“We know how to reach you, Ms. Smith. We know how to reach everyone.”
He hesitated.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that to come out as sinister as it sounded. We’ll contact you, Ms. Smith. Say hi to Jack for me.”
Carver hung up.
“All good?” Mo-bot asked.
Justine nodded.
Chapter 62
I spent the night in a dive hotel that was one notch above derelict. There were rodent droppings in the corridor, damp and mold on the walls and rot everywhere, but it was the kind of place that took cash, didn’t ask for ID, and couldn’t afford to probe too deeply into the backgrounds of its motley clientele. I was sharing the building with drug dealers and sex workers and a selection of street criminals.
The room was shabby but the bed wasn’t too bad. I managed to get a decent night’s sleep despite my worries. I woke soon after dawn, dressed in new clothes I’d bought the previous evening: jeans and a Rome T-shirt. My shades and baseball cap completed my enthusiastic tourist look.
I was on the street at 6:15 a.m., walking along Via di Porta Maggiore, an ugly road situated between the railway tracks and an old industrial park. I passed other low-cost hotels and hostels, the rundown buildings that housed them all covered in graffiti. The neighborhood was still in the process of waking up and I didn’t have to avoid too many people as I headed south.
An hour later, I was outside the headquarters of La Repubblica on Via Cristoforo Colombo. The newspaper was located in a business district south of the city center, where broad avenues and parkland combined to create a sense of space. Via Cristoforo Colombo was a wide road lined with low-rise office blocks, open-air parking and mature trees. I stood on a grassy square in the shadow of a tall fir and watched the entrance of the building opposite. I had no idea whether Faduma would show, but I was prepared to wait until lunchtime. If she didn’t come into the office by then, I would track her down offsite.
Thankfully, I saw her drive her Volkswagen into the lot in front of the building a little after 8 a.m. She stepped out of the car, wearing white linen trousers and a red blouse. I hurried toward her as she wove her way through the parked cars and walked over to the newspaper building. There was a security guard in the lobby and other staff filing through the entrance.
“Don’t overreact,” I whispered as I took her arm.
She glanced at me and spoke through gritted teeth. “Are you crazy? Do you have a death wish, coming here?”
“Why?”
We kept walking south, past the entrance to the building, and she took her phone from her purse.
She held the device in front of me and I saw my own face on-screen.
“This footage was released this morning. Authorities say it implicates you in the murder of Father Carlos Diaz.”
My stomach wrapped itself in knots as I watched a video clip of me, taken from inside Chiesa Santa Maria dei Miracoli, the twin church we’d fled to through the secret tunnel. The footage must have been shot by a security camera and in fact showed me trying to help Father Carlos.
In the absence of context, though, it did look as though I might be trying to kill him.
“You know I didn’t hurt him,” I said, suddenly aware of all the faces around us. I studied them for flashes of recognition. “It’s a set-up.”
“Of course,” Faduma replied. “But you come to Rome’s best newspaper when your face is plastered all over the front page? Someone is going to recognize you.”
“I didn’t know,” I said, feeling very exposed.
“Then if you didn’t know, why are you here?” she asked. “If it’s not about Father Carlos’s murder, what do you want?”
“I need to find the cop who was on duty the night Matteo was supposed to have tried to take his own life,” I said. “His name is Bernardo Baggio. I need to speak to him.”
“At police headquarters?” Faduma asked in disbelief.
“Of course not,” I replied, ignoring her mischievous smile. “Not in the circumstances. And besides, last time we checked, he hadn’t shown up for his shift.”
“I’ll see what I can do. There’s a little café around the corner, next left, about two hundred meters along. Wait for me there.”
I nodded and she left me. I watched her head into the newspaper building, hoping I was right to trust her.
Chapter 63
Ambassador Emily Carter had a large office on the top floor of the US Embassy in Rome, a beautiful imperial-style building, located in immaculately manicured gardens dotted with high palm trees. It was on the Via Veneto near the Villa Borghese Park. It was a magnificent setting in which to work. Justine admired the gardens and surrounding buildings through the floor-to-ceiling windows that spanned one side of Carter’s office.
Justine sat on a severe contemporary leather couch next to Mo-bot and both of them kept shifting position, unable to get comfortable. Justine could see her colleague squirming and couldn’t resist a smile.
“What?” Mo-bot asked indignantly. “Who designed this thing? And who even buys something like this?”
“That would be me,” Emily Carter said.
She was standing in the doorway leading to her executive assistant’s office, and neither Justine nor Mo-bot had noticed her enter.
“Sorry,” Mo-bot said. “It’s been a difficult night.”
“Don’t apologize,” Carter replied. “I was kidding. It came with the office, probably chosen by my predecessor as a statement piece. I hate it, but I’ve been so busy I haven’t got round to remodeling.”
Justine took an instant shine to the fifty-one-year-old former technology executive who’d agreed to lead the President’s diplomatic mission in Rome. Emily Carter was charming, polished, funny and intelligent. Her lightweight green tea dress would have been regarded by some as too casual for an ambassador, but to Justine it spoke of having enough self-confidence to ensure her own comfort over outdated convention.
Carter took a seat in an armchair that matched the couch.
“Sorry I was late,” she said. “Local situation briefing.”
“Intelligence? Maybe a background briefing on us?” Mo-bot remarked, and Carter smiled.
“Maureen Roth and Justine Smith of Private,” she said. “What can I do for you?”