The blow caught Andrew by surprise. He recoiled, backing into a row of sidewalk display racks.
Most observers laughed, assuming, as Raina intended, that she had just dispatched an overzealous gigolo.
Kovlek stiffened, and took the walkie-talkie from his pocket.
Gorodin was watching from a shadowed doorway. He winced, realizing Kovlek was about to apprehend her. Left alone, she would think her charade had worked and maintain contact with Andrew, which Gorodin much preferred. He whistled to get Kovlek’s attention, and shook no vehemently to dissuade him.
Kovlek had had his fill of his GRU rival. And having blown the surveillance, he shuddered at the thought of facing Zeitzev empty-handed. He ignored the warning and clicked on the walkie-talkie.
“Vladas? Vladas, are you there?” he barked to the driver in the Fiat. The walkie-talkie crackled with a reply.
“She spotted me!” Kovlek went on. “She’s heading west on Sabini! Move in! We have to pick her up now! Hurry!” He clicked off and charged after Raina.
Andrew had spotted them running across the piazza. He had just started to pursue when Gorodin stumbled purposely into his path.
“Merde!” Gorodin shouted as they went down in a tangle of limbs. He made certain he landed atop Andrew to further delay him and, as they got to their feet, acted as if the collision was Andrew’s fault.
“Idiot!” he exclaimed, throwing up his hands. “Ce n’est pas ma faute! C’est vous qui l’avez fait. Idiot!”
“Okay, okay!” Andrew said, trying to placate the incensed Frenchman.
Suddenly, the screech of tires and blast of headlights came from behind them. The Fiat roared past, following Raina and Kovlek into the narrow street.
Andrew whirled from Gorodin, and ran after it. The piazza was cluttered with displays and shoppers, which slowed his progress. He threaded his way through them, rounded the corner, and ran into the narrow street. His footsteps echoed in the tunnel of hard surfaces. Hellbent, he ran a long distance in the darkness before realizing the street was empty. The man and the car and Raina Maiskaya had vanished into the night. Andrew pulled up abruptly, then reversed direction and hurried back to the piazza.
Gorodin was gone.
The fountain’s waters roared.
Andrew was alone.
Chapter Twenty-nine
A pastel moon hovered in hazy twilight as Alitalia Flight 776 from Comiso descended toward Leonardo da Vinci, and taxied to the domestic terminal.
Silvio Festa, the single-minded construction worker whose “gunshots” had gotten Andrew’s attention earlier, was waiting for Dominica Maresca when she deplaned. But alas, upset by the day’s events in Sicily, Dominica wasn’t in the mood for the evening Silvio had planned, and insisted he take her home.
When he parked in front of her building on Via Campagni in the Tributino district, she leaned over and put a light kiss on his mouth, flicking her tongue beneath his upper lip as she broke it off. “Thanks. I knew you’d understand,” she said in a soft, seductive voice. And then, making certain he glimpsed her bare breast through the scooped neck of her blouse, she turned, got out of the car, and walked toward the building.
Silvio hungrily eyed her swaying hips as she climbed the steps and went inside. Then his desire shattered the fragile dam that contained it. He charged out of the car, into the building, and up the stairs after her. He had never raped before. He had never been denied before. Not like this.
Dominica was opening the door to her apartment when she heard the rush of footsteps. Silvio lunged for her, his momentum carrying them into the vestibule. He landed on top of her, tearing at her clothing in a passionate frenzy. She pummeled him, and squirmed and struggled, trying to fight him off, and, finally working a leg out from beneath him, kicked the door closed.
For in truth, Dominica was emotionally charged by her ordeal in Comiso, and wanted nothing more than to scream in ecstacy and drive the painful memory of it from her mind. But she was consumed by it. Consumed by what had happened to that boy, by the image of his body pressed into the earth, the life squeezed out of it by steel treads — and she had put him beneath them. His death was on her soul, as his blood had been on her hands; and she still had the smell of it, and the smell of his last breath in her nostrils. From the moment they pried his body from the soil and took him away, she had been planning her absolution.
Silvio finally pinned her to the floor and plunged into her like a lust-crazed stallion. It didn’t occur to him that she was still controlling the pace; she who knew that women’s rights had become fashionable in Italian courts, that men who treated their women like fazzolettini di carta, like Kleenex, were vulnerable; she who planned to use him, and had.
Soon she had him in her bed, and held him in her arms; and now, while her long fingers made him ready to love her again, she made her next move.
“He will never know this,” she said softly, with a haunting sadness.
“Who?” Silvio wondered, tilting his head up from her breast so he could see her face.
“That poor boy in Comiso,” she replied. “He will never have a lover, or a family, or anything.”
“Ah, Dominica,” he said with a philosophical tone, “there is nothing you can do.”
“Don’t say that,” she pleaded, stealing a glance at him to assess the effect.
“Dominica,” he said comfortingly, gently touching her face, “it will be all right. It will pass.”
“Exactly,” she replied. “Soon, it will be as if he never existed, a forgotten child, a wasted life. I don’t want to live with that, Silvio. I can’t.”
“Well, what are you going to do?” he asked, giving her the opening she sought.
Dominica considered her answer for a long moment.
“Give his death meaning,” she replied, choosing her words carefully. “Force Giancarlo Borsa to pay for that poor child’s sacrifice, so that those who plan nuclear war in the name of peace will think of him every day and never forget he died for their sins.”
“How?” he asked facetiously. “Plaster his picture on milk cartons and buses, like they do with missing children in America?”
Dominica shook her head from side to side, and smiled tolerantly.
“With a symbol. We will use a symbol, Silvio,” she replied, enthusiasm building. “One that already exists. Millions of them, all over the country.”
Silvio pushed up on an elbow.
“Well then, it should be easy to point out one of these ‘symbols,’” he said, challenging her.
Dominica smiled knowingly, almost mischievously. She had him now, she thought. She leaned over him, and ran her tongue over his hardening penis.
Silvio moaned and forgot all about his question.
Dominica answered it anyway, continuing to lick a path from his loins to a sweat-filled hollow on his chest where a tiny crucifix lay. She took it between her teeth and jerked her head, snapping the thin chain.
Silvio blinked, startled.
Dominica bounced up from the bed, and put a leg over him, straddling his hips. The cross was still in her teeth, the chain dangling above Silvio’s face like golden tinsel in the moonlight. Her eyes narrowed in a wicked glint as she put her hands on her bare hips and thrust her breasts forward, declaring victory.
Silvio smiled acknowledging it. He reached up to her mouth and, gently forcing his thumb between her soft lips, took the crucifix from them.
“See?” she said. “Now, all we have to do is — connect the symbol to the event.”
“I can think of at least a thousand ways,” he said facetiously.
“I’m not surprised. I have a feeling you have a real flair for what I have in mind. Matter-of-fact, I know you do.”