The Inca Prophecy (32 page)

Lapinski’s response was once again calm and deliberate. ‘I’m inclined to err on the side of caution here, Mr President, and invoke the words of a previous secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, who held the view that “the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence”. Nuclear suitcase bombs are technically difficult to manufacture, but I reiterate that it would be a mistake to think such technology is beyond the Iranians. As to the existence of such bombs, I’m sure the CIA is aware that after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, there were over 300 seizures of stolen radioactive material in Europe alone. The material is out there, Mr President, and our borders are not impenetrable.’

Chapter 39

‘The library is closed, Father. What are you doing here?’ the older guard demanded. ‘And where are you taking those papers? It is forbidden to remove anything from the archives!’

O’Connor smiled deprecatingly. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said, putting the file down on the photocopier and taking a step towards the older guard. ‘I fell asleep,’ he added, still smiling as he slammed his knee into the guard’s groin.

The guard screamed and doubled over in pain.

O’Connor slammed his elbow into the man’s skull, just above his ear, and the guard fell to the floor unconscious. O’Connor ducked as the second guard swung his halberd axe. The blade swished past his head and embedded itself in one of the priceless vellum binders. In the moment the guard tried to free it, O’Connor pivoted on the ball of his left foot and raised his right leg parallel to the floor. With his body weight generating impetus, O’Connor continued to
pivot, striking a rear roundhouse kick to the guard’s left kidney. The young guard grunted in pain and fell forwards. O’Connor hit him with a right palm heel to the face and smashed him with a left elbow to the side of the head. The young guard’s eyes rolled, and he folded slowly on top of his older colleague.

Knowing it wouldn’t be long before the guards were missed, O’Connor worked quickly, using binding ribbon to tie the guards’ hands behind their backs. He dragged the semi-conscious men to the conservation laboratory, bound their mouths with tape from a nearby drawer and secured them to the sturdy legs of one of the heavy lab tables. O’Connor quickly returned to the photocopier and copied the cipher and the notes and the Third Secret of Fátima.

Ten minutes later, the files were back in the vault and he’d hidden the halberd behind some shelving. O’Connor cautiously opened one of the secret archives’ bronze doors and crossed the car park. A few minutes later, O’Connor nodded to the Swiss Guard on duty at the Porta di Sant’Anna and disappeared down Borgo Pio.

‘Avanti!’
said Felici, impatient at being interrupted.

‘The commandant of the Swiss Guard is here, Eminence.’

‘Show him in,’ Felici said. When the commandant had entered the room, Felici waited for him to speak, not offering the man a seat.

‘At 4.10 p.m. today, a Father McLoughlin presented an authority for research in the secret archives, Eminence. The document he sought was quite innocuous, but he left it in the reading room without signing out.’

‘Did anyone see him leave?’ Felici asked curtly.

‘No, Eminence, although the guard ceased duty when the doors were locked at five p.m. The duty officer noticed the discrepancy and reported it to Bishop Romano. One of the archivists did a search, but Father McLoughlin was nowhere to be seen. A few minutes ago, two of our guards were assaulted in the archives by someone fitting Father McLoughlin’s description. I’ve brought the security footage, Eminence.’ The commandant placed a laptop on the cardinal’s desk and inserted the CD.

Felici felt the blood drain from his face as he recognised O’Connor. He buzzed immediately for his private secretary.

‘Tell Monsignor de Luca to come and see me – at once.’ He turned back to the commandant. ‘You may leave the footage with me, and I want this information tightly held. If anyone asks, it’s been dealt with.’

‘Of course, Eminence,’ the commandant replied, taking his leave.

Felici drummed his fingers on his desk impatiently. There was only one reason for O’Connor to be in the secret archives disguised as a priest.

‘Monsignor de Luca is here, Eminence.’ Father Cordona showed in the head of intelligence and quietly left.

Felici briefed de Luca and issued his directions. ‘I want an immediate search of the vault. You are to report to me if anything has been tampered with.’

De Luca paled, knowing that if the cardinal ever saw his notes, he’d be finished.

Wiley read Felici’s encrypted email and immediately forwarded a sanitised version to the chief of station in Rome. Three minutes later he was headed for the Task Force Inca operations room, where Megan Becker and Larry Davis were waiting.

The CIA’s top man in Rome, Mike Shelby, had seen DDOs come and go, some good, some suited to other roles, but never in his nearly forty years with the Agency had he worked for a bigger asshole than Howard Wiley. He read the latest cable requiring his presence on the secure, encrypted video link and sighed. Shelby, like many others under Wiley’s command, both liked and respected O’Connor, and was dismayed by the vendetta against him. The former West Point quarterback made his way down to the CIA’s communications section in the Palazzo Margherita. The embassy, a stylish three-storey pink and grey palace on Via Vittorio Veneto, had once been home to Julius Caesar, and to the first queen of Italy, Queen Margherita. Shelby thanked the duty comms officer and settled in for another grilling as Wiley, looking as angry as his spiky red hair, appeared on the screen.

‘We have a situation,’ Wiley announced. ‘A short time ago, Tutankhamun was identified at the Vatican, disguised as a priest. We don’t have a definitive lead on Nefertiti, but it’s a fair bet she’ll be with him. It’s possible they’re headed for Villa Felici on Lake Como, owned by Cardinal Felici.’

‘Do we know why he might be interested in the cardinal’s villa?’

‘That’s not important,’ Wiley snapped. ‘What is important is that you have the approaches and the area around the villa covered. And that includes the lake. I want twenty-four-hour surveillance.’

‘It might help if we knew what Tutankhamun was after,’ Shelby persisted calmly.

‘And it might not,’ Wiley growled, annoyed that he didn’t know the answer. Felici had not disclosed any intelligence as to what his villa might contain. ‘What assets do you have?’

‘Sufficient for the task. This is Italy, sir, a country not known for its shortage of assassins,’ Shelby said. Megan Becker supressed a smile.

‘I assume you don’t want any contact with the guards at the villa?’ Shelby continued.

‘And have the whole operation leak to the media? Of course not. Get on with it!’

Chapter 40

‘We’re moving. Tonight,’ O’Connor announced to Aleta as he strode in the door of their room at the Hotel Sant’Anna.

‘They’re on to us already?’

‘If they’re not, they soon will be,’ he said. He gave Aleta a short version of the afternoon’s events. ‘I’ve fixed the bill and rented a car, and we’ll leave as soon as you can assemble that toiletry bag of yours.’

Aleta rolled her eyes. ‘Just watch me. I’m travelling light,’ she protested.

‘Glad to hear it!’

‘Do you mind telling me where we’re headed, or is that another state secret?’

‘Como. The villa we’re going to is at the southern edge of the lake, about 500 kilometres away. With a bit of luck, we’ll be there for breakfast.’

‘You don’t want to get some sleep and drive when you’re fresh?’

O’Connor shook his head. ‘I couldn’t do anything about the security cameras in the archives, and when they discover Bib and Bub tied up in the lab in their blue and yellow pyjama suits, Felici’s bound to recognise me. Felici’s got a direct line to Wiley, so on past form, we’ll need to get out of here – and into the villa – as soon as we can.’

Aleta shuddered. Wiley’s previous assassination attempts were indelibly seared on her memory.

O’Connor drove sedately out of Rome and took the A1 to Bologna, and on to Milan, skirting the northern city and turning north on the A9 to the lake. Apart from the toll stops on the Autostrada, they made good progress. The immensely powerful Audi S5 V8 he’d rented was capable of over 250 kilometres an hour, but O’Connor kept it down to 120, and they rolled into the lakeside town of Como just as the sun was rising over the Alps. O’Connor had chosen the Hotel Metropolitan Suisse, an unobtrusive but comfortable hotel within a few hundred metres of the Como Nord Lago train station.

‘Don’t tell me … you have to go out for a while,’ said Aleta, once they’d breakfasted on the terrace.

‘You’re learning quickly, but —’

‘I know. Don’t answer the door for anyone. Fat lot of good that did me in Lima. They broke the thing down.’

‘Well, hopefully, as we speak, they’re still looking for us in Rome.’

O’Connor took the SS340, a narrow, twisting road that ran parallel to the lake shore on the east and the Swiss border to the west. He passed through the village of Laglio, where George Clooney had his villa, and north through Torriggia and Brienno, but when he reached Ossuccio, he parked the car in a side street and took the narrow track that led on towards a distinctive tree-covered promontory, on the point of which stood Villa Felici.

O’Connor left the track and, using the trees for cover, he approached slowly, stopping every 50 metres to listen. He worked his way to the top of a small rise and took up a position in the trees. O’Connor focused his binoculars, and the security at the villa was immediately apparent. Apart from the heavily guarded entrance, the villa was swarming with guards. Some were patrolling the shoreline and others were positioned on the roof of the library and the main residence, covering the road and the lake. O’Connor smiled grimly. Whatever Felici was hiding in the villa obviously merited fierce protection. Keeping to the tree line, O’Connor retreated down the path. As he drove back along the narrow road towards Como and to one of the local dive shops, he thanked the powers of the cosmos that Aleta was a qualified diver.