He raised a brow. “Yes. It’s time to fold down your angel wings. Don’t you think it would be safer for both of us if we slept in one room? There’s only the two of us now, no more safety in numbers.”
Mike kept rubbing her arm, aware of only a low throbbing pain now. She stared at the man she’d give her life for, his clothes as wrinkled as hers. He badly needed a shave, although she liked the beard scruff. His shirt was half hanging out of his pants, and he looked so perfect to her she wanted to leap on him and kiss him until her mouth went numb.
Instead, she took off her glasses and started polishing them on the edge of her shirt. “You’ve had lots of good ideas today, Nicholas, but you want to know what?”
“What?”
She slipped her glasses back on. “This one’s the best. I’ll race you.”
She dashed past him, into his bedroom, and jumped on the bed, bounced a few times, then looked around the bedroom. “Now, this is pretty fancy. I’ll have to thank your blond admirer for treating you so well. You should give her a call, Nicholas, it’d be a great reward.”
“Hold that thought,” he said. “You want the bathroom first?”
“Nope, you go on.”
When he came out, all the lights were still on and he saw Mike sprawled on her back in the middle of the bed, fully clothed, deeply asleep.
“Well, bloody hell.” He pulled off her biker boots, slipped her Glock out of its clip at her waist, started to unbutton her blouse, then yawned and plugged in their cell phones. He carefully laid her glasses next to them. He crawled in next to her, pulled the covers to their chins, and was asleep beside her in under a minute.
• • •
Savich called Nicholas at 7:00 a.m. Venice time. It was Mike who answered after four rings.
“If this is God, I swear I didn’t do it.”
Savich laughed. “Good morning, Mike. Give me Nicholas.”
Nicholas was immediately alert, synapses firing. He put his cell phone on speaker. “Please tell me I’m not bonkers and MAX has banned me.”
“No and no. Hurricane Katrina first. There were many very big winners, from the oil companies to contractors hired to repair and replace hundreds of houses and businesses in New Orleans. You were right, the Genesis Group cashed in to the tune of one hundred million dollars, give or take. Even though their buys were diverse, you’d see the pattern if you were looking at them specifically. It’s all there—oil stocks, gas stocks, a number of publicly owned contractor firms, furniture and appliances chains, medical equipment, just to name a few—whatever was critical to rebuilding New Orleans, they invested in the public companies and made a killing.”
“But the profits weren’t out of line with other profiteers from Katrina?”
“Only if examined closely, then, as I said, the pattern is clear. Someone studied this extensively, then bought huge blocks of shares in the key industries.”
“Better and better.”
“As for people building machines to try to control the weather, MAX found nothing of any legitimacy, though there is plenty of scientific research work being done, and weather control for creating rain—cloud seeding and such—has been around for decades. However, I did find information that sparked my imagination. What do you know about Nikola Tesla?”
“About the same as anyone, I suppose. He was a genius, way ahead of his time, what we’d now call a futurist, with his uses of electromagnetic forces, briefly worked with Thomas Edison. Some weird explosion he was blamed for, that’s about it.”
“That’s a good start. What drew me was Tesla’s Coil. As you said, he worked with electromagnetic force and resonance. What caught me was how his Coil was said to shoot lightning bolts and create electron winds.
“In 1908, during experiments with electromagnetic force in the ionosphere, there was a sudden horrific explosion in the Tunguska region of Siberia. It destroyed everything within hundreds of miles, flattened thousands of trees. Many blamed Tesla’s Coil for the explosion. Does this have anything to do with possible attempts to influence weather conditions? I don’t know, but he was toying with forces that could certainly influence the weather.”
“And perhaps someone took that technology and has privately engineered it.”
“Nicholas, weather manipulation at that level is the stuff of science fiction. I hope. But the Gobi storm—you’ll find out. Now, speaking practically, you already have more than enough enemies—hiding in the shadows, even in the Carabinieri itself. Be very careful. If I can offer any other help, let me know. Ah, I suppose you’re bringing Kitsune in, aren’t you?”
“Oh, absolutely. The moment we track all this down, we’re on the plane, the Fox in handcuffs.”
Mike rolled her eyes at him and imagined Dillon doing the same thing.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Cassandra woke after a solid eight hours of wonderful dreams—her mother standing in front of the tunnel in Castel Rigone, a hand on the Ark, and she’d looked luminous. She felt the quiet steady sound of the airplane engine. Cassandra stretched, yawned, and smiled over at Ajax as he made coffee.
At her first sip, she felt caffeine send a lovely zing to her brain. And she felt the movement of the plane. “Where are we?”
“We’ll be home in an hour.”
“Has there been any news on the thief?”
“Lilith called me to tell me our people missed again, but I’d already seen what happened for myself. I told her I would have to punish her.” Ajax smiled. Then he pulled out his iPad. “You can always count on tourists and their cell phones to record everything. Take a look.”
Cassandra watched the scene unfold. When it was over, she said, “I never saw the thief.”
“Lilith said she never spotted her, either, but she already told me she was a genius at disguise. The FBI team killed all Pazzi’s men.”
“And Major Russo? What does he have to say about this?”
“Lilith says Russo is very angry. Apparently this FBI agent, Nicholas Drummond, got in his face, humiliated him, blamed him. Then she laughed, said Russo was primed and ready for payback, that she believed he could be the answer to all our problems.”
“Nicholas Drummond,” Cassandra said slowly. “Isn’t he the British FBI agent who saved the American president’s life?”
“The very one.”
“But however did this Drummond get hooked up with the thief? I mean, he brings a team to Venice to save her, save a criminal?”
“Lilith told me she believed there was some sort of bond created between them, even though Drummond bested her and brought the Koh-i-Noor back to New York. Lilith thinks they might have struck some sort of deal, but she doesn’t know what it is and doesn’t know how to find out.”
Ajax sat down beside her, crossed his legs. He took a sip of his coffee. “Lilith also told me Pazzi’s men are in the Venice morgue and Pazzi is babbling, he’s that scared, and, she thinks, ready to run. She has calmed him and also made it clear to Major Russo that there will never be a connection made to Pazzi or to us, or the good major will never again sleep with his new mistress. Lilith would personally see to it. Evidently he believed her, which means he’s not altogether stupid.”
Cassandra tapped her fingertips together. “We’re still at risk, grave risk, despite Lilith’s assurances. Listen, Grandfather already has a storm queued in the Atlantic, this one is meant to go to the Gulf of Mexico—drive down oil futures with another Katrina, provide us needed funds. This would take the focus off what happened today in the Gobi Desert, and possible tie-ins to us. Maybe we should have Grandfather release it now.”
Ajax said slowly, “I don’t think we can count on Grandfather to do anything we want. I don’t think he trusts us any longer, Cassandra, nor does he approve of our methods. You know he expects all his minions to do his bidding, bow before him. He expects no less of us.”
She clutched his arm. “The old fool’s crazy. He’s been isolated for too long, I doubt he’d even know what do in the real w
orld. He lives in his own fantasy, a world of his own creation where he’s an omnipotent god. I don’t think the real world—our world—even exists for him any longer. So sanctimonious about all the deaths in Beijing, makes me sick. I mean, do you think he cared about the loss of life before the Gobi? No, all those deaths over the decades were outside and apart from him, like deaths on the movie screen. The misery never touched him.”
Ajax said, “Well, it’s never touched us much, either. That’s why I’m worried he no longer trusts us. He’s grown a conscience.”
His sister shrugged. “Who cares? Listen, Ajax, we can’t allow it to touch us, because we’re gods of a different sort.”
He liked that. He leaned over and kissed her cheek. “It is unfortunate we have to pander to him.” He shrugged. “But we have no choice. We want to achieve a particular result, then we have to go to the island, hat in hand, love and admiration for the old coot oozing out of our mouths.”
Cassandra sat back, wrapped her arms around her bent knees. “I remember he wasn’t always like this, not until Mother went missing in the Gobi.” She smashed her fist against her thigh. “I miss her, Ajax, every single day.”
He looked out the window. They were encased in clouds. He felt anger at his grandfather boiling up again. “The old man admired our mother, even worshipped her, she was his lodestone, his guiding star. We’ve never been anything to him. Even with the cherubim’s wing and mother’s map hinting the Ark might be under the mountain at Castel Rigone, still it’s not enough for him. I wonder what direction he will turn? What will he do?”
Cassandra said, her voice vicious, “If we could only talk him into giving us his formula locked away in his precious vault, then we could simply kill him and take over.” She stopped talking, and Ajax knew she was deep in thought.
“Yes,” she said at last. “There has to be a way.” She rose and began to pace up and down the aisle. She paused, looked out the window. “Not long now. Where is the thief’s husband?”
“Lilith had him taken to the dungeons beneath Castel Rigone. He’s strong, tough, trained Special Forces, so I told her to keep him drugged so we wouldn’t have to worry about him escaping.
“I also told Lilith she has to get a message to the thief—since the debacle in San Marco. Tell her Grant Thornton is a dead man if she doesn’t present herself to Pazzi in Venice.”
“I have a better idea,” Cassandra said, and she was smiling. “I no longer trust Pazzi to get the job done. We need to find a way to get the thief to Castel Rigone. Let her know if she doesn’t come, then her husband’s minutes on this earth are numbered.”
He frowned, then slowly nodded. “All right. I’ll have Lilith put up a message board that will connect to this Agent Nicholas Drummond. I have no doubt the FBI will escort the thief, and they’ll all be together. Kill two birds with one stone.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Venice, Italy
After breakfast and a gallon of coffee, Kitsune said, “Adam, I have an idea—came to me in the shower this morning. I have video surveillance of Grant’s kidnapping at our house. I already accessed it, but naturally I didn’t recognize any of the men who took Grant and I didn’t have access to a facial-recognition database. You do. Also, if you can get Major Russo to give us photos of the shooters in the piazza yesterday we can compare them to the men who took Grant. We get matches, we get IDs, then that will settle it, right? We’ll have a definitive link.”
Mike said, “Louisa, can we get photos?”
Louisa gave a huge grin and waved her cell phone. “We don’t even have to take the chance of Russo trying to arrest us, Nicholas, I’ve already got photos of all the dead bad guys.”
This time, Kitsune walked to Louisa and kissed her. “Trust the forensics expert. Thank you.”
Because she wasn’t stupid, nor completely trusting, Kitsune drew Adam and his laptop away into the second bedroom Mike hadn’t yet used. They sat down side by side. Kitsune laid her hand on his arm. “I would appreciate your keeping this private. All right?”
Adam thought about Nicholas holding him up by his heels, but he approved of dodging Big Brother whenever possible. “Hey, so long as you don’t screw Nicholas or Mike, you’re golden with me.”
She rewarded him a smile. “I promise I will do nothing to jeopardize you, or them. Do we have a deal?”
Adam nodded.
“Okay then. I have an extensive video surveillance system. There are cameras around my house, all egress and ingress points, and on the neighboring estates.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“One can never be too careful. The camera feed backs up to a secure server farm in Ohio, in the States. It is very discreet. I would prefer you allow me to enter the information and access the feed, without you monitoring my keystrokes.”
Adam handed her the computer. Three minutes later, she’d pulled the feed. She knew it had geolocating tags in it, but she trusted Adam not to access them.
He saw the tension in her shoulders, knew she was afraid her husband was already dead. He said nothing, accessed the video feed.
“There.” She pointed.
He studied the screen. Four men, a team, all with dark hair, sand-colored pants and shirts with vests—clothes too heavy for such a warm day—walked down the long drive toward an incredible white house on the cliffs.
He froze the screen, tapped the keyboard, said, “Operators, no question.” He hit play again.
The men looked neither right nor left. When they hit the bottom of the drive, they fanned out, coming at the house from four directions.
“Can you get their faces?”
“Already grabbed them.”
She watched as his computer screen changed. The four men were sectioned into four quadrants. Adam had downloaded Louisa’s photos of the eight dead shooters lying where they died in the square. The matches happened quickly—the four at Kitsune’s house matched four of the dead shooters.
“Bingo. Now, let’s see who the rest of these gentlemen are.” Adam called up the FBI’s facial-recognition system. Red lines began running down each face from forehead to chin to create a baseline, then reconstructing it into gridded lines that the computer would run for a match.
“You want to watch what happens next?”
“No,” she said, “I’ve already looked at it a dozen times, looking for clues, anything. They were careful. There are no cameras inside the house, so all there is to see is fifteen minutes after they enter, when they come out the front door, dragging my husband. I’d love to know how they incapacitated him, it must have been drugs of some kind. We need to find out how they got on and off the island.”
“This is Capri, isn’t it?”
She nodded slowly.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to say anything. My dad used to work with a rare book dealer on the island of Anacapri. They were great friends. We visited when my sister, Sophie, and I were kids. I remember the little boats we had to get on and the rope the guy used to pull us into the Blue Grotto.”
Adam typed a few commands and a new segment of screen popped up. “How many public and private cameras are there on Capri?”
“Quite a few of both kinds. There are thousands of tourists each year who must be protected. And many wealthier people have homes there, so security is considered very important. I have a number of them myself as well.”
“That’s good. I’ll pull feeds from every camera I can access. Where are the entrance and exit points?”
“The ferry landing is the main one, and there are a few private boat docks in the same area, plus several around the island itself. Capri is accessible by helicopter as well.”
“I am going to bet they didn’t come by public transport. It wouldn’t do to carry an unconscious man into a crowd. Let me look at the private boat docks, then I’ll check the helipads.”
Kitsune marveled. It took Adam less than ten minutes to access the cameras he needed.
He started a sweep around the isla
nd, a geographical mapping of the coastline. There were a number of coves where boats were docked. He could see pleasure boats and tourist boats roaring through the waters circumnavigating the island.
“Look, this must be the spot. It’s right down from your place, and there’s a boat waiting. Duh, I should have looked there first thing.”
The boat was a large Codecasa yacht, about forty meters, bobbing gently in the waves of the cove. They watched the four men in a Zodiac with a small outboard motor, zooming toward the yacht.
Adam fiddled with the cameras and was able to focus on the center of the Zodiac, where Grant Thornton lay, still unmoving.
Kitsune’s voice was urgent. “Get the name of that yacht. Please.”
“I’m working on it. I can only look at three angles at a time. I’ll have to drop one.”
“Drop the wide shot. We know what happened up top.”
He narrowed the focus onto the yacht. “They’re pointed the wrong direction. We have to wait for them to leave. I have to say, I am incredibly impressed by your setup.”
“We’re not getting facial matches yet on our other bad guys, and that’s weird. They’re thugs, probably career criminals, just like the other four, but why aren’t they popping right up?”
Kitsune said, “Let’s run their faces against transportation feeds, private airports, especially.”
He thought for a minute. “I can do that. I have access to those databases now. I think I can reconstruct the analytics to see if we can match them that way, might be faster. It’s going to take a while, though. Hey, look. Boat’s leaving. Okay, they’re one-eighty now.” He zoomed in. “Elysian Fields. That’s the boat’s name. Should be easy enough to track them down.”
He flipped open another database, fingers flying. “Got it. Look, Kitsune, here’s our absolute one hundred percent proof.” He pointed to the screen. “Gray found this information earlier, it’s all right here. Black Diamond is a financial entity created by the Genesis Group through a New York holding company. Looks like this arm holds all their western assets for both North and South America, plus the Caribbean. Here, Kitsune, read this.”