This stupid, broken body…
“Say something!” I shout. “Baby bird—”
I hear Finch cheerfully bellow out a dirty limerick that I’m not sure is advisable in public, but at least I know he’s safe. As long as he’s talking, he’s still okay.
Maybe there’s just been a power failure. Maybe the tour guide lost track of time and we were all supposed to have left the monument by now. But those are a child’s fantasies that a man like me can’t allow himself. I have to treat every incident like it might be leading up to an attack on Finch.
“Finch!” I shout again.
“I’m with the group!” he hollers back, and that affords some measure of relief. At least in a group, he won’t be so easy to grab.
I’m near the bottom of the Colosseum when it occurs to me that if thisisthe precursor to another kidnap attempt, it suggests there are at least two IFF agents around. One to turn off the lights—because they wouldn’t trust to a bribe for something so important—and at least one more to nab Finch.
But if they’re smart, they’ll have a whole battalion with them, because they’d need one to stop me from getting to my husband.
I’m so focused on Finch, and on making my way under the deceptive light of the moon, that I only hear someone behind me seconds before they strike. I whirl around, but it’s too late.
There’s a tearing sting in my arm as a needle stabs in; I stumble back against a wall; everything goes dark.
Chapter Fifty-Two
FINCH
It takes a few minutes before I call out to Luca again. “Baby, did you get lost?” I shout, amused, but there’s no response. “Luca?” I try again. Nothing. I turn to the tour guide. “You need to get those lights onnow,” I tell him. “If my husband has been hurt, I am going to sue your ass, and your company’s ass, and this whole damncountry’sass into oblivion.”
“It will be best if we stay here,” the tour guide assures me, as though he just didn’t hear me threaten legal action. “The lights will come back on any moment,signore.”
“If you think I’m gonna—” I start, but with several loudthunks, the lights come back on. The tour guide, who can see my furious face more clearly now, takes a step back.
I turn my attention to where I last saw Luca, calling out for him again. I’m starting to worry that he tripped over something in the dark, maybe knocked himself unconscious. The last thing he needs is to get hurt again—and if I make him go to the hospital, which Iwill, he’s going to be really mad. “Luca!” I try again, jogging up the stairs on the other side.
He was definitely on this side. Wasn’t he?
I look over to the other side, but Iknowhe was here. He was right here…
My stomach goes cold and I turn around and around, trying to catch sight of him, calling out his name.
“Please,signore!” the tour guide pants at me. He’s heaving himself up the stairs to join me. “Please, stop screaming. You are worrying the others in the group.”
“Fuckthe others in the group,” I say, and shake off the restraining hand on my arm. “Luca!”
“Perhaps this is his idea of a joke,” the guide snaps.
I turn on him. “Or perhaps he’s lying fucking unconscious somewhere.Start looking.” I start to run up and down the steps, trying to look behind any raised areas, and the guide begins to walk up and down as well, along with a few other tourists still in the Colosseum. Most of them left when the lights came on again, and none of the ones who stayed even seem to know who we’re looking for; I hear one English woman explaining to her husband that my child is hiding from me. At least they’re looking, I guess.
But it’s no use. Luca isgone.
For a second I wonder if itisa prank. If Luca is waiting outside the Colosseum for me with a grin on his face.Baby bird, I could hear you shrieking all the way out here.
No. He would never do that. But maybe it’s a test—maybe he’s waiting to see what I’d do if he suddenly disappeared, and I had to take care of myself?
I picture him just about snapping Róisín’s neck with one hand when he grabbed her at St. Peter’s Square. No way. He’s in no mood for games and no mood for testing me, not outside averycontrolled environment.
I take a few deep breaths and try to think.
“Perhaps,” the tour guide says nervously, “we should call the—”
“No. No police. No law enforcement.” I back away from the guide. “I’ll—I’ll go check outside. Maybe you’re right, and he’s pulling some prank.” I turn to leave, then turn back. “Don’t mention this to anyone,” I say in a low, cold voice, trying to channel my inner Luca.
