You are, too, I was about to say, but I couldn’t find the words. How did he know my heart was beating so fast? Could he hear it? Maybe he noticed a tick in my neck?
It started to beat even faster as we approached the main building. Maybe it was made of stone, but I had a feeling it was storm proof.
Over the entrance door, in big black letters with a solitary light over it, read:Malum.The door looked like the fence—metal—but it swung open instead of rising. It closed behind us with a thud as the lead guard walked with purpose to offices located in the back.
Men were doing odd jobs, and the scent of coffee percolated in the air. In this new world I’d been dropped in, it was a familiar smell, comforting. I also noticed that this place wasn’t as high-tech as I originally thought it would be. Some desks had old typewriters on them, and the men working behind them had ink stains on their hands.
One of the guards typing at a desk, a pencil behind his ear, looked up at us as we passed. He wore standard-issue black eyeglasses and the same uniform as the rest. He grinned at me, and it was so disarming, I grinned back.
Naz put more pressure on my back to keep walking. We were led to a room where we were legitimately frisked, like we were about to visit inmates. I used the term “legitimately” because after we first arrived, we were just patted down. I thought it was because we were entering a high-security military base of some kind.
In that moment, I wasn’t so sure.
The frisk ended when Naz growled at the guard when his hands lingered too long on my body. I didn’t see a woman guard. This place, wherever we were, hadn’t arrived at that point yet.
Body search done, the lead guard had us wait outside the door of what looked like a man of importance’s office. It was closed, unlike all the other offices, and the guard knocked. It was a secret one. He did it in a pattern. The man behind the door spoke in Italian, and the guard disappeared behind it.
We waited in silence, just the pecking of typewriter keys and the storm outside breaking it some. It had to be less than a minute before the lead guard opened the door and motioned us inside.
A man in a more decorated uniform stood, waiting for us. He greeted Naz and Beni in Italian and only nodded at me.
A sick feeling rolled through my stomach as I stared at him. He was the spitting image of Omero Capanna. My mom had been a bit obsessed with him. She would watchThe Jewel of the Nilenonstop for a while. And she never fantasized about Michael Douglas, the hero, but the villain Omero played.
She’d say to us, “That’s one fine-looking man.”
And there was Lucila with her questions. “What about Daddy? Is he one fine-looking man, too? Is that why you fell in love?”
“Sonny is…okay,” she’d finally say.
Naz applied more pressure on my back, and when I blinked, I realized the man was holding out his hand to me. He gave me a high-ranking position before his name.
“Omero.”
He didn’t give a last name, or maybe that was a last name, but when I held out my hand, I said, “Your mom was aJewel of the Nilefan too?”
He dropped my hand and looked at Naz. Naz shrugged, and then we were all told to sit. Naz pulled out my chair, setting me between him and Beni. We were offered coffee, and all of us took it.
The conversation took place in Italian, so I was fucking lost. I sighed and looked toward the window in the office. It was to the right some of Omero, where if he swiveled his chair some, he could see the expanse of water surrounding him.
A light, reminiscent of one from a lighthouse, seemed to appear out of nowhere for a second before it faded into the night.
Hmm…it happened again. There and then gone.
It gave me barely a glimpse of the dark, stormy water, but confirmed there was a lot of it.
The Atlantic, probably.
We were on an island.
The conversation between Naz and Omero heated some, then a guard came in with a tray of coffee, followed by another guard with a long notebook. Omero took the elongated pad from the guard, set his specs on his nose, and looked over the paper. His eyes stopped scanning, and he turned it toward Naz, tapping at a signature.
Leandro Piero Faustiwas signed in a flourish that was easy to read.
Naz’s eyes hardened on the signature before he looked up and started arguing again. I took my cup of coffee and wandered over to the window. The conversation stopped for a second, and I could feel Omero’s eyes on my back, like he didn’t like me looking around. He was waiting for me to turn to him so he could order me to take my seat without having to get up.
He probably knew who I was, but that begged the question:
Why did they want me off that plane then?
