David Hewson - A Season for the Dead

“Shut up!” she hissed when she’d done so.

“Why? What gives?”

She looked at the faces around them. Interested faces. They were hacks. They had the same instincts she had. They knew when someone was trying to pull a stunt of their own.

She dragged him into the shadow cast by the high Vatican wall.

“I got a tip-off. Somewhere we can get a picture of Denney, all to ourselves.”

“Where?” Toni asked suspiciously.

The cameramen preferred to hunt in packs. It was safer that way. She knew he’d tell them somehow, later, so that he got first pickings.

“Never you mind. We just find a cab and get the hell out of here now.”

“What? And let those bastards loose on whatever happens next? You want to get me fired or something?”

“I want to get the story,” she snarled.

“Well, you go off and get it. If everyone else is here, then here is where I stay. If you want to change that, you ring the picture desk and get them to tell me.”

“Moron,” she muttered. “Give me your spare camera.”

“No. It’s company property.”

She glared up at him. “Give me the camera, dimwit, and I will, when they realize what a screwup you’ve made of this, do my very best to let you keep your job.”

He thought about it. Maybe there was a little insurance there.

“It’s idiot-proof,” he muttered, handing the camera over. “So you should know how to use it.”

“Moron,” she repeated, and strode quickly off toward the Piazza del Risorgimento, looking for a cab, noting, as she did, the long, khaki van covered in antennae close to the bus stops, wondering why she had failed to see it before.

Fifty-Five

It was a black Mercedes with darkened windows. Michael Denney looked through the windshield: Two men in dark suits sat in the front, anonymous behind sunglasses.

“Do I tip them, Brendan?” he asked Hanrahan.

The Irishman carried Denney’s case to the back of the car. Then he looked around. The street was empty. That seemed to meet with his approval.

“I can carry my own luggage,” Denney said, watching Hanrahan reach for the trunk.

“If you choose.” Both men looked at the case. It seemed so small, so insignificant.

“Have a good journey, Michael. Call me when you’re settled.”

“Of course,” he answered, and extended a hand. Hanrahan looked at it.

“Come on,” Denney laughed. “I’m not a leper. And you’ve got what you want, haven’t you? No embarrassing revelations. No more scandal.”

Hanrahan took his hand and pumped it in a summary fashion. “Call me.”

“Yeah,” Denney replied as he started to climb into the passenger seat, taking the case with him. “If I don’t just disappear into thin air.”

Fifty-Six

He abandoned the car in the street and dashed through the thickening rain, looking for her, knowing she would be trying to hide. Nic Costa had no idea what was driving Michael Denney to the church but he felt certain his daughter would join him there. Teresa Lupo’s news had cleared his head. He could begin to see a direct, linear connection linking her actions now. When he had time to sit down and think it all through, he would see more. For now that was a luxury. The truth seemed apparent. She was intent on joining her father in his flight from Rome, unaware of the fate Falcone had in mind for Denney.

The crowds milled around the backstreets of the Pantheon, trying to escape the slow, greasy rain. Costa pushed through them, ignoring the curses he got in return, praying she was not already inside. Then, in a narrow alley a minute from the church, he saw her. She wore a silk scarf over her hair and had the collar of her light raincoat up to her face. She was huddled in a doorway, avoiding the rain, avoiding a decision too, perhaps.

He ran across the cobblestones and faced her, holding out his arms, barring the way. Her green eyes were dark in the half-light of the coming storm.

“Sara,” he said, gently taking her by the shoulders. “I know.”

“Know what?” she murmured, pulling away from him.

“There’s no need to pretend anymore. I understand.”

She leaned back against the damp, grimy wall. “Don’t, Nic. I’d rather not hear this.”

He hesitated. There was so little time. “The labs have been looking at evidence. About you. About Gino Fosse. You’re Denney’s daughter, not his lover.” He made sure to see the effect of what came next.

“Gino’s your brother. Did you know that?”

She groaned. “Can’t you ever stop prying?”

“There are people dead, for God’s sake. It’s not done yet. Did you know about Gino?”

“Yes,” she sighed. “Michael… my father told me some weeks ago. He thought it unwise to tell him as well. Gino couldn’t handle himself.

Michael wanted me to know for my own sake. He only told me he was my father last year. Before that I just thought he was a friend from the convent in Paris. Someone who administered the estate of the people I believed were my parents.”

She turned her face toward the wall, fighting back the tears. “You can’t imagine the joy I felt when he told me that. There was a part of me alive, outside myself.”

“A year ago. Exactly when he began to realize he needed help to get out of that place.”

Her green eyes stared into his and he wondered what emotion was there: love, pity, hate? Or a little of all three. “You only think you understand what’s happening, Nic. Stay out of this.”

“No. There’s more. Someone else knew what was going on. When they found out about Gino they had the weapon they needed.”

“What weapon? Gino is… what he is.”

“Perhaps. But he was primed. I know it. Pretty soon I may be able to prove it too.”

“What?” Her head went from side to side. Her eyes were wild. “What are you talking about?”

“This was what they wanted all along. Your father dead. Everything began from that. Gino was just a tool they used to try to make your father run. I know what he was doing for Denney. Driving you to these people. Taking those pictures for blackmail if he needed it. Then handing them to Denney, who used them to try to buy his freedom. What Denney didn’t know was that he was being watched all the time too. By someone who eventually told Gino who you really are. That’s what drove Gino over the edge. He realized what Denney was doing to his own sister. That’s what we’ve been chasing every step of the way.”

“Who would tell him that? Why?”

“Denney’s former friends. Crooks. Maybe some people in authority too. Maybe all three. Why? Think about it. He could put them all in jail. He’s stolen from them. They want to feel safe. Maybe they want payback.”

“Nic!” she said, despairing. “Don’t make this worse than it is. He’s leaving. It said so on the news. They’re letting him go back to the States. He’ll be out of everyone’s life there.” She paused.

“Including mine. I just want to see him before he goes. That’s all. He’s made this arrangement so that we can say good-bye.”

She looked at him in a way he’d forgotten. It was the expression she’d worn when they first met, the one full of suspicion and doubt. The one in which he was a cop, nothing more. “I suppose you know that anyway,” she said bitterly.

He held her hands, not knowing what to say, wanting to believe her.

“You know what I did for him?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“He’s my father, Nic. I thought I could help. The person who did all that… it wasn’t me.”

“I know. I knew all along, I just couldn’t work it out.”

She wouldn’t meet his eyes. She was, he realized, embarrassed. “Was I supposed to say no? What wouldn’t you do to save Marco?”