The Book of Spies (35 page)

"I have a class to teach this evening," Yitzhak said. "A meeting later tonight. When I don't show up, they'll worry." It was not an issue yesterday, when he had no other classes or meetings. He was a professor in the Dipartimento di Studi Storico-Religiosi at the Universita di Roma-Sapienza, and he took his responsibilities seriously.

Roberto massaged his close-cropped brown beard, thinking. "Perhaps it is worse than that. They will phone the house, leave a message, and when no one returns the call, they will go looking for you."

"I thought of that, too. There'll be an uproar. But it's the students who concern me most--no one will be there to teach them."

"You wish to tell the department? We have the cell phone Bash gave us. He said we must not leave, and no one could know where we are. A cell call is not leaving. And you do not have to say any details." Roberto held up the cell.

"Yes, of course. You're right."

Feeling relieved, Yitzhak marched over and took the device. Calling out, he settled into the chair across from Roberto. He had changed the dressing on Roberto's wound earlier. Thankfully it was healing nicely, and Roberto had had a good night's sleep.

Gina, the department secretary, answered. She recognized his voice immediately.
"Come sta, professore?"

Speaking Italian, he explained he had to leave in an hour for emergency business. "I'll need a substitute for my lecture, Gina. And please alert Professor Ocie Stafford that I can't attend his meeting, with apologies."

"I will. But what am I to do with your package?"

"Package? . . . I don't understand."

"It looks and feels like a book, but of course I cannot be certain. It is in a padded envelope. This morning a priest from Monsignor Jerry McGahagin at the Vatican Library delivered it. He said it was most important. The monsignor wants your advice." Monsignor McGahagin was the director of not only one of the oldest libraries in the world, but one that contained a priceless collection of historical texts, many of them never seen by outsiders.

He thought quickly. "Send someone over with it to Trattoria Sor'eva on Piazza della Rovere. As it happens, I'm near there now." Bash had pointed out the place as a good restaurant serving excellent handmade pasta.

"Yes, I will do that. A half hour, no more."

Yitzhak ended the connection and relayed the conversation.

Roberto shook his head. "You are bad. We are supposed to stay here."

"You stay. That puts half of us in compliance."

Roberto gave an expressive Roman shrug. "What am I to do with you. You are always the dog looking for one more good bone."

"I'll be back soon." Yitzhak patted his hand and left.

Dusk was spreading across the city, the shadows long. Yitzhak had steeled himself not to think about Eva and Judd, but as he walked, passing apartment buildings and shops, he felt strangely vulnerable, which made him worry about them. Not until he heard from Bash that their dangerous situation was settled and they were safe would he feel right.

Twenty minutes later he reached the piazza and stopped across the street from the trattoria. All seemed normal, but then, tumult was normal to Rome--the streets a cyclone of traffic, bustling with shoppers, locals,
businesspeople, cars parked two and three abreast. The windows of the trattoria showed customers inside eating and drinking.

Then he saw Leoni Vincenza, one of his advanced students, hurrying toward the restaurant, a padded envelope under his arm. It was bright yellow, a strange color for the Vatican. Perhaps the
monsignore
was using up donated stock.

Yitzhak pushed himself to rush, and he crossed at the intersection. "Leoni! Leoni!"

The youth looked up, his long black hair blowing around his face. "
Professore,
you have been waiting for me?"

Yitzhak said nothing and slowed, catching his breath. When Leoni reached him, he said, "Good to see you, boy. Is that my package?"

"Yes, sir." He handed it to him.

"
Grazie.
My car is around the block. I'll see you back at the university in a few days."

Leoni nodded.
"Ciao."
He returned the way he had come.

Yitzhak went in the other direction, feeling smart he had thought to misdirect the student. As he climbed Janiculum Hill, he stopped. His heart was thundering. He had been meaning to lose weight for years. Now it was evident he had better hurry on that promise.

He resumed walking, slowly this time, and finally reached the apartment building. He opened the front door and gazed up at the long staircase. He had to mount two flights, and the second was as long as the first. He hefted the package--it felt heavy, the weight of a book. He would rest a moment, and he was curious.

Ripping off the staples, he pulled out the volume. And stared, surprised. It was a thick collection of Sherlock Holmes stories, so battered it looked as if it had come from a used-book store. Definitely not a first edition. Why would the
monsignore
send this? He checked for a note but found none.

Shaking his head, he stuffed it back inside the envelope and climbed. Behind him he heard the front door open and close. When he reached his floor, he could hear footsteps on the stairs, hurrying upward. For some reason he found himself rushing down the corridor. As he slid the key inside the lock, he glanced back and froze.

Two men were running toward him, aiming guns.

"Who are you?" Yitzhak demanded, although even to him his voice sounded weak. "What do you want?"

There was no answer. One man was large, burly, and ferocious looking, the other small and wiry, with a mean face. The shorter man grabbed the key from Yitzhak's hand, unlocked the door, and the big man shoved him inside. The door closed behind them with an ominous
click
.

Athens, Greece

THE CARNIVORE
'
S
friend flew Eva and Judd into Athens International, and from there they took the suburban railway Proastiakos northwest through the night, transferring to Metro line three, which would take them into the city. They had been watching carefully for anyone too interested in them. The Metro car was crowded, people sleeping or talking quietly. Eva was eager to check into a hotel so they would be alone and she could rewind the leather strip around the
scytale
and translate the rest of Charles's message.

She peered out the windows as the Metro sped past houses and apartment blocks built in modern Greece's ubiquitous cement-box architecture. Ancient ruins occasionally showed, alight in the night. The juxtaposition of new and old was somehow reassuring, the past meeting today and making the future seem possible. She clung to her hopes for a future as she sat beside Judd, very aware of him. There was a lot about him she liked--but also something she feared.

She looked down at his hands resting on his thighs, remembering Michelangelo's statue of David, his great masterpiece, in Florence. Michelangelo had said when he cut into the marble it had revealed the hands of a killer. Judd's hands looked like David's, oversize and strong, with prominent veins. But when he had sculpted David's face, Michelangelo had uncovered a subtle sweetness and innocence. She glanced at Judd's weathered face, square and rugged beneath his bleached hair, the arched nose, the good jaw. There was no sweetness or innocence there, only determination.

"How old are you, Judd?" she asked.

His body appeared relaxed, despite his constant watchfulness. There
was no way to be certain how long it would take Preston to figure out the Carnivore had not eliminated them. Preston might be chasing them now.

"Thirty-two," he said. "Why?"

"So am I. I'll bet you knew that already."

"It was in the dossier Tucker gave me. Is my age important?"

"No. But I thought you might be older. You've been through a lot, haven't you?"

He stared at her. "Why do you say that?"

"In prison there were women who had a sense about them of . . . it's hard to describe. I guess I'd call it a challenging past. You're something like that."

What she did not mention was the women came from violent backgrounds, many sentenced on murder or manslaughter charges. They seemed to ache to fight, although, win or lose, the consequences for them would be serious. But she had never seen Judd start a fight or even look for one. Then with a chill she recalled his saying he wanted no more blood on his hands.

"I was undercover in Iraq and later in Pakistan," he explained. "Military intelligence. Of course both were 'challenging.' But there were good things, too. In Iraq, I was able to help rebuild several schools. The Iraqis were coming back from the brink, and education was high on their list. Dad put together shipments of books for their libraries."

"That doesn't sound like military intelligence."

"I had some downtime. That's what I did with it, particularly at the end."

She heard something else in his voice. "And before then?"

Smiling, he said, "Do all eggheads ask so many questions?"

"I'm an egghead?"

"A Ph.D. qualifies you."

She scanned the other passengers. "Think what you know about me, including my shady past. I know almost nothing about you."

He chuckled. "At least I'm sure you're not a perpetrator of vehicular manslaughter." He stared at her expression. "Sorry. That was stupid of me." He faced straight ahead again.

Eva said nothing, sitting quietly.

At last he continued: "I uncovered some intel on an 'al-Qaeda in Iraq' operative and finally was able to catch him and take him in for questioning. God knows how he managed to get rope, but he did. He hung himself
in his cell. His brother was also al-Qaeda, and when he heard about it, he came after me. It went on for weeks. He was ruining my ability to do the rest of my job, and I wasn't able to track him down. Then there was a shift. It seemed as if he'd lost interest. I couldn't figure it out--until a message was passed to me he was going to punish me by liquidating my fiancee."

His fingers drained color as he knotted his hands. "She was MI, too. A damn good analyst. I got the intel just as she reached her usual security check. A Muslim woman stumbled and fell beside the checkpoint, and her suitcase slid under my fiancee's Jeep. It looked like an accident, but the guards were instantly on it. The woman managed to shake free and run for it just as the suitcase exploded. It was an IED, of course. 'She' was wearing a burka, but one of the soldiers saw legs in jeans, and big feet in men's combat boots." He took a deep breath. "Four people were killed, including my fiancee. Later I got another message. In English it said, 'Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.' The New Testament, of course. Apostle Paul. The son of a bitch was an Islamic jihadist quoting the Bible to me to justify murdering her."

"You haven't told me her name," she said gently.

He cleared his throat. "Amanda. Amanda Waterman."

"I'm so sorry. How horrible. You felt responsible for her death."

"She'd still be alive. Her job wasn't that dangerous."

"I'll bet you wanted to kill him for what he did."

His body tensed. "I could never find him."

"Do you still want to kill him?"

He looked at her sharply. "Would you blame me?"

"When I believed there was a chance I'd been driving and had killed Charles, it took me a long time to come to terms with it." She paused. "No one went to Iraq without knowing the risks. Both of you were very lucky to find love." She heard the sadness in her voice and wiped it away. "A lot of people never have that."

He nodded, his expression granite.

Still, she wondered whether that was the only story behind the chilling looks she had seen on his face. One of his hands moved toward hers, to hold it. She remembered how he had pulled her to him after she had almost pitched off the yacht, how he had wrapped his arms around her and held her tight, how he had kissed her hair . . . the wonderful sound of his pounding heart. His musky, wet smell. He had saved her at the risk of his own life. In that moment she had wanted nothing more than to burrow
in and forget the hard times. Pretend his protectiveness was the beginning of love. But the truth was she did not know what she really thought of him, much less what she felt, or whether someone with deep heartache and a violent past could ever be stable enough for enduring love. Could she, even?

She gave his hand a quick squeeze and released him. "Your mobile is chirping."

Judd took it from his pocket. "An e-mail from Tucker. Some good news--he thinks he may have found Robin Miller." He handed the device to her. "What do you think?"

She analyzed the photo of the woman displayed on the mobile's screen--green eyes and thick ash-blond hair, but no bangs. The mouth was lush and round. Included were the woman's age, height, and weight.

"The statistics match Robin Miller," she told him. "But if I didn't know better, I'd still say it's not her. On the other hand, Charles had plastic surgery when he joined the library, so she might've, too. If she did, then her nose could've been shortened and turned up at the end, and an implant inserted in her chin. The eyes, hair color, and the rest of the face are the same."