Red, White and Dead Part 18

He texted back almost immediately. Italy?? What are you doing there?

It's a long story.

The phone rang almost right after I hit Send. "I'd better hear this long story," Theo said.

"It's too long. I swear."

"Who are you with?" Did he sound a little jealous?

I looked down the aisle at Maggie. She and Bernard were laughing, both of their heads thrown back. They almost looked as if they were in an odd sort of play, with their matching clothes, their different sizes, their drastically different looks. "My friend Maggie," I said. "Except..."

"Except what?"

"Well, now she's met a friend."

He laughed. "Ah, so she's just like you. Meets a guy within ten seconds."

I laughed now, too. We were both thinking about the night I met Theo. I'd walked into a club with a friend of mine and within five minutes I was enthralled with him and our conversation.

"I'm not usually like that," I said, "and neither is Maggie."

"So, where in Italy are you guys?"

"On a train. Almost to Naples. Tomorrow we're going to Ischia."

"Where's that?"

"Off the coast."

A pause. I tried to envision him, somewhere in the apartment he lived, the apartment I'd never seen. In fact, we'd rarely been anywhere together outside my apartment. Theo and I existed inside a bubble, almost. A very s.e.xual one.

"You know," he said slowly. "I have my own plane."

"I remember that." Theo wasn't a pilot like my father, but he and his business partner had a corporate share of a plane, a Falcon, or something like that. I'd discovered this the first time we'd dated when Theo and his partner had taken off to a remote site in Mexico, an annual surfing trip.

"It takes a couple of hours to get international clearance..." He sounded excited. "But I could be there before midnight."

I didn't know what to say. "Are you seriously talking about coming here?"

"Yeah."

"Don't you have to work?"

"Since you blew me off this weekend I worked most of the time. If I came I couldn't stay long. Just a day or two but..." He gave a nervous laugh, which made him seem fallible and human. "Would you even want me there? I guess you didn't really invite me."

I looked up the aisle at Maggie and Bernard. He was showing her what looked to be sheet music, his black hair almost touching her gold curls as their heads met in the middle of the aisle. "Consider yourself officially invited."

26.

D ez Romano sat in his office, thinking about Isabel McNeil. He'd learned she was heading for Naples.

His mole inside the antimafia office talked to the idiot notary she'd had coffee with, and the guy had been only too eager to brag about his "date." Yes, she had talked about the Camorra, the notary said, and he had told her that if she wanted to know about the Camorra she should go to Napoli.

Once he knew about the Naples potential, Dez had put out a watch for her name. Because she'd given her pa.s.sport to a travel agent to buy train tickets, his people had been able to find her reservation.

What was she doing? he wondered now. Was she after him? Was she really a federal agent, one who was trying to bring down the Camorra?

He lifted the phone and called a familiar number. Speaking in italiano, he described the situation in vague terms to the man who answered.

"Her name is McNeil?" the man said.

"Yes."

"And she is looking for her father? Is that Christopher McNeil?" The guy's voice was rough now.

Dez had never heard of Christopher McNeil, but he wasn't sure if he should admit that. Luckily, the man kept talking. "Il duca will want to talk to you about this. Stay by your phone."

The man hung up, leaving Dez surprised. Il duca was "the duke," the nickname for Flavio La Duca, the head of Dez's clan in Naples. It was La Duca who'd known Dez's distant family members in Italy and had reached out to him in the U.S. and brought Dez on board. Flavio La Duca was his boss.

Dez's phone soon rang and the gruff tones of the duke filled his ear. La Duca told him that Christopher McNeil was a traditore, a traitor of the worst kind. He told Dez how they had killed him two decades ago, put an explosive in his helicopter.

"So when this girl was telling the antimafia office that she was looking for him," Dez said, "you don't know what she meant by that?"

"No. But this is a man who was against the System, always had been. If there is any chance he is alive, any chance for us to bring him in and kill him, that would mean the world to the top."

The top was the person at the head of the Camorra. The clans warred against each other, and yet the person at the top knew all of them, could get the clans to do just about anything, except to stop fighting each other.

Dez thought he could do better. He wanted to be the top, the head of the Camorra, but he first needed to know who the person was. Once in control of that knowledge, he would be able to formulate his message to that person and eventually grow his own power not just in the U.S., but in Naples, as well. Then he would not only unite the clans and bring more power into the United States, he would take the Camorra around the world. He would operate the System worldwide.

This goal Dez had, it wasn't just for ambition's sake. He was doing it because there was so much potential for this business-for money, for power, yes, but ultimately because it would allow him to craft his life the way he wanted it. Dez thought that everyone should be able to do that. He simply had grander tastes than most.

He and La Duca discussed the possibilities. La Duca said that Isabel McNeil was probably just a woman having issues getting over her dead daddy. Dez disagreed as kindly as possible, told him that Isabel McNeil was a keen woman, someone who learned quickly, acted quickly. He'd asked around about her since that night at Gibsons, since she had eluded him at the nature museum, and he'd learned that she had been involved with a string of bizarre events over the last year-a fiance disappearing with a bunch of her client's money, a friend who ended up dead, causing McNeil to be considered a suspect in her murder. And yet when he'd met her, in that f.u.c.king purple silk dress that clung to her and with a gaze that said, Yeah, I see you looking, go ahead, she seemed as if she'd never been challenged, as if she wasn't bothered with any bad emotions from those situations.

La Duca paused when he heard Dez's a.s.sessment of Ms. McNeil, then said, "And you think that you are reading this correctly, il diavolo?" The devil. It was Dez's clan nickname.

Over the years Dez had gotten the feeling that the duke was presenting him with unique situations, one after another, testing him and yet also telling him that the Camorra didn't entirely trust any of their americano contingents.

So, as he always did, Dez now rea.s.sured La Duca of his commitment to him, to the Camorra and to establishing their place in the United States. He told him that the McNeil he knew, the girl, was a threat to them here, that she was the one who had brought down their launderer, Michael DeSanto.

"What should we do with her?" La Duca said, and Dez flushed with pride. For the duke to ask his opinion meant only one thing-he was finally being trusted. But Dez was smart enough to know that such trust was only for now, and he'd better prove himself by handling this situation with precision.

"Have someone waiting at Centrale in Napoli," he told Flavio. "She's easy enough to spot." He described her with three words-la testa rossa, the redhead. "You'll see what I mean."

"Si," La Duca said. "And then what do you want with her?"

"I want to know who she's with. I want to know where she goes. Any information your men can give me." Then he told La Duca what he eventually wanted from la testa rossa, and the duke agreed completely.

27.

T he station in Naples was nowhere near as nice as the one in Rome, and the line outside for taxis was at least a block long. When we finally reached the front of the line, Maggie and Bernard started to say their goodbyes, if only for a few hours. He was taking a taxi directly to the school where he would teach later in the week, but we'd all promised to meet up for dinner.

"So I definitely have your number, right?" Maggie asked, peering at her phone, then peering up at him, her head c.o.c.ked back so far that her gold curls hung over her shoulders.

"You've got it," he said, a calm voice, a calm smile. He looked at his own phone, rattled off Maggie's number.

"But I don't know how to make a call over here." Maggie's voice was worried.

"I know how, Mags," I said.

"Here." Bernard raised his phone aloft. "I'll text you right now so you have it. You text me when you find a hotel."

"Okay, that'll work." Maggie kept gazing up, giving him a sunbeam of a smile.

"And I'm going to call you in one hour," Bernard reminded her.

He put his suitcase on the ground, bent down and gave her the most gentle of hugs.

When he turned and got in his cab, Maggie turned to me. "He's so amazing."

"He seems like a sweetheart," I told her.

"No, he is amazing." She shook her head in wonder.

When we got into our own cab, our driver spoke perfect English and Maggie began chatting with him. "So what's the name of a really nice hotel here in Naples?"

"Grand Hotel Vesuvio," he said immediately. "On the waterfront. Looks at the bay."

"Perfect," Maggie said. "Take us there, please."

"Mags..." I said.

She held up a hand. "Stop. Please. I've got the money right now so let me spend it. When I'm flat broke in the future, you can take care of me."

"I will take you on a tour of the city on the way there," the driver said.

"No, no," I answered. "That will be too expensive."

"I do not charge for that."

I looked at Maggie.

"Let's do it," she said.

The driver took off, but then right away Maggie's office called. She spent most of the cab ride on the phone, while the driver pointed out the streets and sights. Naples was different from Rome-dirtier and certainly more dangerous-looking. The driver showed us the ma.s.sive port where miles of boxy container ships spread out into the sea, Mount Vesuvius hulking over them all. The streets that surround the port were wide and flat, but the real Naples-the bubbling, chaotic inside-consisted of rocky, steeply angled streets, where children played along piles of street-side trash and under canopies of washed clothes strung from appartamento to appartamento. There were cafes on these streets, too, their doors open, their tables with pristine linens pushed against the soot-covered walls.

But when we turned onto the broad street that ran along the bay, Naples got pretty. The sea was a crisp teal-blue. About halfway down, a medieval castle made of brown stone seemed to rise out of the sea.

"Castel dell'Ovo," the driver said, pointing to it. "Built in the sixth century."

Like so many buildings in Italy, the ancient edifice was flanked by a contemporary setting, in this case a gaggle of bars and cafes that stretched along piers where boats were tied.

Halfway down the block, the cab pulled in front of Grand Hotel Vesuvio, and Maggie finally hung up.

The bellman began to pull the luggage from the trunk.

"Wait," I said to him, hopping out of the cab. "Do you know if they have vacancies?"

"Si, the hotel has rooms."

I bent down to talk to Maggie, still in the cab. "Let me go see how much it is."

She shook her head and scooted out. "Whatever it is, I'll bargain them down, and I'm in desperate need of a nap, so we're staying here." She gestured at the bellman to go ahead with the bags and paid the driver.

"Thank you," I said, stopping Maggie with a hand on her shoulder. "You are a good friend."

"Of course I am." She hoisted her bag higher on her shoulder. "Now, let's go check in."

Inside, the lobby was indeed grand and decorated with oriental rugs, potted palms and crystal chandeliers that hung from high, sparkling white ceilings. The front desk was made of carved dark wood topped with marble. As the clerk checked us in, Maggie pulled her phone from her bag. "I have to text Bernard." She smiled as her little fingers flew over the keys.

When she was done, I said, "Okay, can I get your attention for one second without Bernard or your office?"

She put her phone away. "Yes. Shoot."

"Theo is on his way."

She slid her credit card across the counter to the clerk. "On his way where?"

"Here."

"Here, as in Naples?"

I nodded.

"When in the h.e.l.l did that happen?"

"When you were falling in love with Bernard."