Jon Tracy - The Rome Prophecy

They park just off the square and Suzanna is already acting nervously.

Her face is pressed to the car window and her eyes are glued to the iconic bell tower of the Santa Maria.

Louisa touches her hand. ‘We thought it might be a good idea to bring you back here. See if anything surfaces in your memory that can help us to help you.’

The rear door has a child lock on it, which is a good job, otherwise Suzanna would already have been out of the car and probably killed by passing traffic.

‘Hang on! Wait a second!’ shouts Valducci from the front seat.

He turns off the engine and cranks up the parking brake.

He gets out of the car, walks around to the rear passenger side and opens the door for Suzanna.

He takes her arm to help her out.

Or at least it looks like he’s helping.

In fact he has a grip on her wrist that is tighter than a pair of army handcuffs, and he’s sure as hell not letting go. Suzanna feels him restraining her and looks into his bloodshot eyes.

‘You have to be careful around here. I’ll stay close to you and make sure you don’t get hurt.’

Suzanna looks pained. Her attention is fixed on the church and she’s backing away from it like she’s expecting a bomb to go off.

‘Is this the building in your drawing?’ asks Louisa, noticing the tension. ‘I saw the drawing that you did of the fire. Is this the place?’

Suzanna looks confused.

She peers at Louisa as though she’s a complete stranger. Someone who’s just stopped her in the street. ‘ Signora, I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.’ She wheels around to Valducci, who still has hold of her wrist. ‘Vaffanculo! Get your filthy hands off me, you pervert.’

The administrator is struck dumb.

Wham!

Suzanna punches him hard in the face.

He’s shocked and stinging but still holding on.

‘Suzanna!’ shouts Louisa.

Suzanna punches Valducci again. This time she adds a shuddering jerk of her left knee to his balls.

The administrator doubles up and loses his grip.

‘ Testa di cazzo! ’ Suzanna walks casually away, her back to the church.

Louisa freezes.

Should she help Valducci, or run after Suzanna?

No choice.

‘Suzanna, wait!’

It takes close to ten seconds for Louisa to get level – and a safe half a metre to one side. ‘Why did you do that?’

Suzanna shoots her a look of disbelief. ‘Why? The greasy pig was grabbing at me. You didn’t see him? He wanted to get me in his car and crawl all over me. No way, sister. That doesn’t happen to Anna Fratelli, no way.’

‘Anna?’

‘What?’

Louisa hadn’t got a question; she’d just repeated the name out loud because it was new.

Unfamiliar and yet distantly familiar.

Finally her memory gets off its ass and helps out.

Suzie Fratelli is the name of one of the alters.

This new personality is combining an old surname, that of little Suzie, with a whole new and profoundly aggressive personality, Anna. Anna itself being a root form of Suzanna.

‘Do I know you?’ She’s walking quickly, striding away from the square down a back street that she seems to recognise.

‘I’m a doctor from the hospital you were at. I’m Louisa Verdetti.’

‘Naah. I ain’t been at a hospital. I been working my ass off. Two jobs a day, that’s what I been doin’. Louisa, you say? That’s a nice name.’

Verdetti goes with the flow. ‘ Grazie. Anna’s nice too. That a family name?’

‘You’re joking, right?’ Anna veers left down an adjacent alley.

‘Why would I be joking?’

‘Well, if you’re supposed to be my doctor, then you should know my family history – like I don’t have any.’ She takes another sharp turn into a road facing a large stretch of old parkland.

Louisa is almost breathless trying to keep up.

She turns the corner and feels something slam into her face.

The force of the blow drops her on her back and leaves her seeing stars and spitting blood.

Tears come streaming to her eyes.

By the time she’s moved her hands from her face, Anna is gone.

Tom and Valentina grab groceries and toiletries from a small supermercato near the hospital and prepare to spend the night in a Carabinieri-owned apartment in the north of the city. It’s a safe house. One used by the serious crime squad to guard witnesses about to testify in major trials.

The place is cold and smells of cigarettes and alcohol. Valentina pushes open the windows and searches for an air freshener. Tom finds a central heating switch and turns it all the way up. Neither of them yet feels brave enough to look into the bedroom.

The place is sparsely furnished – a well-worn brown velour settee and chair are staked out around an old black box of a TV, while at the other end of the room there’s a teak-effect fold-up dining table filled with squashed beer cans, a full ashtray and a set of dog-eared playing cards. ‘Strictly a men-only set-up,’ pronounces Valentina, as she surveys the evidence. ‘I was warned that the cleaners hadn’t yet been in, but I didn’t think it would be this bad.’

‘Beggars can’t be choosers,’ Tom replies from a small annex off the lounge that passes as a kitchen. ‘At least there’s a coffee machine.’ He holds up a small Gaggia that he’s found in a cupboard.

Valentina claps her hands. ‘Yay! Get that working and I may just forgive you for burning down my apartment.’

‘Will do.’

Valentina opens the fridge and reels back. It smells like she just prised the lid off a coffin. The cooler box holds a mush of long-forgotten vegetables and enough gas to blow up a small country. ‘Yuck! I haven’t seen inside a fridge this bad since I was at college.’

Tom abandons plugging the Gaggia in and wanders over. ‘How about we just stick the groceries in there in their bags and go to bed.’ He puts his hands on her hips. ‘I just want to curl up beside you and see the end to this day.’

Valentina kisses him lightly. ‘You go. It’ll take me ten minutes to sort this. A little boiling water and some washing-up liquid will make all the difference.’ She kisses him again and heads for the sink, but never gets there.

Her cell phone rings.

Surely there’s no way such a bad day could get worse?

Within thirty seconds it has.

She hangs up and relays the news. ‘Suzanna has disappeared.’ She flaps her arms in impotent protest. ‘Verdetti and her administrator took her back to Cosmedin for what they call cognitive recognition therapy and she overpowered them and ran off.’ She flaps some more. ‘Can you believe it? Like this woman wasn’t dangerous. Why did they think we posted a guard outside of her door, just for fun?’ She punches Assante’s number in her phone and vents some more of her frustration.

Tom busies himself working the Gaggia and emptying the putrid remains of the cooler box.

By the time she’s finished her call, he’s drummed up a couple of decent cups of coffee and an almost clean fridge.

‘You’re an angel.’ She takes a small espresso cup from him and cradles it in her hands.

He chinks his cup against hers and wishes it were a glass of red. ‘You going to have to go out?’

‘Maybe not.’ She doesn’t look convinced. ‘Federico is issuing an alert to all our units, plus the Polizia. Louisa and her boss are on their way to the station to be interviewed.’

‘Do you want to be there to do it?’

Her face says she does. ‘I want to be here to make sure you’re all right.’

‘Hey, I’ve learned my lesson. I swear I won’t touch anything electrical after you’ve gone.’

‘I didn’t mean that.’ She puts a hand to his face, ‘You just look wiped out.’