Arcadia Burns

A DEATHLY SILENCE


AN HOUR AND A half later, Rosa was racing through the twilight in the BMW. She was just turning off the expressway when the cell phone on the passenger seat rang.

“I’m at the driveway now,” said Alessandro. The sound of his engine died away in the background.

“Then wait for me there.”

“No sign of the guards at the gate.”

“Shit.”

“I’ll take a closer look.”

“No!” she said firmly. “Too dangerous.”

“What about Iole? She’s alone up there.”

“Your men are there. They’re—”

Alessandro interrupted her. “If Michele’s managed to eliminate the guards at the gate, he may well have dealt with Gianni and the other two in the palazzo as well.”

She turned up the heating in the car. “Do you think Michele’s on his own? Apart from Valerie.”

“She makes him much stronger than any bunch of trigger-happy killers. He has someone on the inside. The others in the palazzo weren’t expecting that. Nor was I.”

She could have kicked herself for failing to lock Valerie in. Suppose Val’s fear of dogs was only another ruse?

“I’m such an idiot,” she whispered, before she realized what he had just said. But before she could ask any more questions, he admitted, “There’s something else.”

“Damn it, Alessandro…”

“I was not lying to you when I said I had nothing to do with the murders of Mattia, Carmine, and the others. I swear that’s the truth.” He hesitated for a fraction of a second. “But the attempt on Michele’s life, the killer that Guerrini sent to New York—”

“So Trevini was right.”

“I meant it to fail. I intended for Michele to follow the trail back to me and face me in person, instead of hunting my girlfriend through Central Park. That was a cowardly thing to do.”

“You planned it all? For him to turn up here?”

“Not at the palazzo, but in Sicily, yes. That’s why I wanted Gianni and the others to be with you. I couldn’t know that Valerie was working with Michele. And would still be on his side, even after Mattia’s death…I should have factored that into the equation. What a mess I’ve made.”

She could have shaken him—but despite all reason she was moved. “You should have told me.”

“I didn’t want you to have any more to do with it. So that you could put the whole thing behind you. And I will kill Michele, one way or another. I’d have liked to do it on my own terms, that’s all. The bastard foiled me by planting Valerie on you.”

“He isn’t as clever as all that,” she objected. “I think she really did run away from him, or she wouldn’t have stolen his cell phone. But after she got away from Trevini’s men at the airport, I guess she didn’t know what to do next. She must have called Michele again. And of course he’d have known right away how he could use her.”

Alessandro sighed. “I’m sorry, Rosa.”

In spite of everything her longing for him, for his touch, was like a physical pain. “Val fooled us both.”

“I’m going to put an end to this now. Tonight.”

“I’ll be with you in half an hour. We’ll go up there together.”

But his car door was already closing. She heard his footsteps crunch on the gravel.

“Alessandro!”

“There’s another car here at the gate,” he said. “A green Panda. With one of those cards lying on the dashboard that doctors display so that they can leave their vehicles in no-parking areas.”

“It must belong to the doctor I called for Valerie.”

There was a metallic click.

“Do you know him?” asked Alessandro.

“Not well. He comes from Piazza Armerina. He’s kind of…a friend of the family, you might say.”

“He’s lying in the trunk of his car, shot dead. Michele must have stopped him on the way. Wait a minute…”

“What is it?”

“I’m just looking around. There are at least two trails of blood here leading into the bushes beyond the gateway. The gate itself is open…the control box has been destroyed. And there are bullet holes.”

The dry, hilly landscape was racing past her windows in the dim light. It would be a few miles before she saw more trees. Now and then headlights came toward her, and she was dazzled by another pair in her rearview mirror. Her eyes were reacting more sensitively to bright light than usual.

“Okay,” said Alessandro. “I think I know what happened now.”

“Are the men dead?”

“Yes. He hauled their bodies behind the bushes. When they realized that the man in the car wasn’t a doctor they must have tried to lock the gate again, and someone destroyed the control box.”

“The gate wouldn’t have kept anyone out! And there isn’t even fencing on both sides of it.”

“There’s a slope, though. And trees. Like it or not, Michele must have had to go a mile up to the palazzo on foot. And I’ll have to do the same.”

“Wait until I get there, and we’ll go together.”

“No, this is my fault, and I’m not letting Michele do anything else to you.”

“Our chances are much better if there are two of us.”

“Rosa, listen to me very carefully. Stay exactly where you are now, and wait until I call you again.”

“Oh, sure!” she said. “You bet I will.”

“Michele wants to take his revenge on me. That’s why he means to kill you first.”

“He’d better start a club with the Hungry Man: the Kill Rosa to Punish Alessandro Club.” She was making a great effort to hide the unsteadiness in her voice. “There should be twelve of my guards somewhere around the place. What about them?”

“Can’t see anyone.”

“But Michele can’t have eliminated them all on his own.”

“The Hundinga have stopped howling.”

“Maybe they left.”

“Maybe.”

Her hands clutched the steering wheel. “But they didn’t, did they?”

“No,” he said. “They’re sure to be roaming around here somewhere. And if they’re on their way to the palazzo, or there already, then your people won’t—” He let out a low curse.

“What?” she called into her phone, in too much mental confusion to get out a complete sentence. Her fears for him were growing by the minute.

There was a sharp explosion in the background.

“Are those shots?” She tasted iron on the tip of her tongue.

“Farther up the slope,” he said. “Near the palazzo, I think.”

“I’ll call the judge. Quattrini can send reinforcements and—”

“The police? How long do you think it will take them to get here? An hour? Two hours? Forget it. And when this is over, you’ll be glad there were no police here turning the whole palazzo upside down.”

“I don’t care whether—”

“Yes, you do. Well, you should. We’re capi. People like us have no choice but to take charge ourselves.”

“If any harm comes to Iole—”

“The police couldn’t do anything about that if it would take them forever to get here.”

“Men from Piazza Armerina? A couple of calls and I could summon twenty or thirty of them.”

“It’d all take far too long. Anyway, I’m already on my way up to the house.”

She felt choked by her helplessness and fear. “Stupid idiot,” she whispered, but he knew what she meant.

“Love you, too.”

“Take care of yourself.”

“So will you stop somewhere and wait?” he asked. The climb through the olive groves was beginning to make him sound breathless.

“Okay.”

“Really?”

“Of course not!” she said.

“Then I’ll have to make sure all this is over before you get here.”

“Twenty minutes max. And don’t do anything silly.”

“Twenty minutes against the rest of our lives. Sounds like a good bargain to me.”

“The rest of our lives,” she repeated softly, and stared into the gathering night. The outlines of the landscape blurred before her eyes.

“Promise?”

She ended the call and threw her cell phone onto the passenger seat.

“Promise,” she swore to the darkness.