VENICE, ITALY
Malone sprang from the grass, his lungs raw from panting the dry night air. Luckily he had avoided the stone markers that stood at attention all around him when he fell. The helicopter debris continued to burn, not much left but charred bits and pieces. A fading glow from the blaze illuminated the way through the graves to the church. There should be a boat dock near there, perhaps even a night watchman somewhere on the island. But where was he or she? That crash should have attracted some immediate attention. Surely it had been noticed across the lagoon in Venice. Police would soon be on their way, if they weren’t already. Waiting for them didn’t seem like a good idea. He needed to leave. His task had been to simply observe and report. But wow—had that gone wrong.
Once a year, on the birthday of their Dear Leader, North Korean insurance managers sent a gift of $20 million in cash, all generated by fraud. Things like transportation accidents, factory fires, floods, and other catastrophes within North Korea, most of which either never happened or were manufactured. Every insurance policy within North Korea was issued by the state-owned KNIC. To spread its liability KNIC sought out reinsurers around the world willing to accept a portion of its risk in exchange for hefty premiums, and those companies were found in Europe, India, and Egypt. Of course, each of those entities assumed that KNIC would have evaluated its risk and written its policies accordingly, wanting to minimize exposure. After all, that was the whole idea of the insurance business—to pay out as few claims as possible. But that was not the case here. Instead, KNIC made sure there were expensive claims the reinsurers would have to honor. In fact, the more disasters the better. To avoid drawing undue attention, claims were systematically generated against differing reinsurers. One year the focus was on Lloyd’s, the next Munich Re, then Swiss Re. Every claim was carefully documented, then sped through puppet courts in Pyongyang where the outcome was never in doubt. It helped that North Korean law made it impossible for reinsurers to send their own investigators to check anything.
All in all, it was the perfect scam, one that generated annual revenues topping $50 million, some of which was used by KNIC to keep the scheme going, the rest paid into Dear Leader’s pockets.
Twenty million dollars, annually, for the past four years.
Bags of cash had arrived in Pyongyang from Singapore, Switzerland, France, Austria, and, this year, Italy. Sent to an entity called Bureau 39 of the Korean Workers’ Party Central Committee, created to collect hard currency and provide Dear Leader with funds independent of a virtually nonexistent national economy. Intelligence reports indicated that the money financed things like luxury goods for the country’s elite, missile components, even the production of nuclear weapons. Everything an enterprising young dictator might need.
Stephanie wanted this year’s money transfer witnessed, as that had never been possible before. American intelligence had learned its location—Venice—so she told him to leave the cruise ship and head inland.
He’d wondered about the coincidence.
How did that money transfer just happen to occur while he was already in Venice?
The answer to that question had not become overly important until the shooting started. Now the cash was ashes and all of the participants to the payoff dead. So he’d like to know.
His mind searched for everything he knew about his current location.
Isola di San Michele was once two islands, but a canal between them had been filled long ago. Napoleon created the cemetery in 1807, when he ordered Venetians to stop burying their dead within the town. A Renaissance church and a former monastery remained from that time. A high brick wall guarded its shores, the dark outline of tall cypresses rising above it. He recalled one other anomaly. The burials were squeezed tight, the dead guaranteed only a few years’ rest. After a decade the remains were exhumed and stored in ossuaries, making room for more bodies. One of the notice boards that listed the timetable for exhumations stood to his right.
He popped the magazine from his Beretta and replaced it with a spare from his pocket. Then he started walking toward the church, making no pretense of silence. A series of gardens studded with cypress trees and more monuments lined the stone-paved walkways. Some of the graves were gaudy with domes and sculptures and wrought iron. Some were stacked in terraces like filing cabinets. Amazing how audacious people could be with death.
The kink in his leg began to work itself out. He was too damn old to be dropping from helicopters. He was supposed to be retired—after a career in the navy, law school, then a dozen years at the Justice Department working for Stephanie Nelle’s Magellan Billet. He quit three years ago and now owned an old-book shop in Copenhagen. But that hadn’t stopped trouble from finding him. This time, though, he’d found it, as he’d willingly accepted Stephanie’s offer to freelance. The past few weeks had been anything but pleasant. He’d heard not a word from Cassiopeia Vitt. They’d dated for the past year, but parted ways a month ago when trouble had once again found them both in Utah. He’d thought maybe after she cooled down they could work it through. He’d even called her once, but she did not answer. He did receive an email, though. Short and sweet.
Leave me alone.