I reached the street as he accelerated away and brandished the gun at the driver of a BMW 3-Series that had been forced to stop behind the Alfa. The driver, a man in his thirties, came out scowling, but stepped back as I jumped in.
I gunned the engine and the car roared like an animal as I set off after the shooter.
He was reckless, racing along Via Eutropio, past parked cars on either side, before performing a screeching hand-brake turn onto Via Appiano, a wider street that was flanked by smaller, more tightly packed apartment blocks. The gunman accelerated, weaving around slower-moving cars, mounting the sidewalk, blasting his horn to urge people to jump clear. He shot beneath a bridge and raced downhill, weaving around a delivery truck. I followed more cautiously, eager not to hurt anyone but keen to keep within striking distance.
The tires screeched as I swerved around a Mercedes, the shocked face of the driver receding apace in my rearview mirror as the BMW surged forward, chasing the shooter onto Piazza Giovenale, a small square with a playground at its heart. He went round the square the wrong way, dodging oncoming vehicles, and turned left on Via Ugo de Carolis.
I heard a bone-crunching crash and slowed as I approached the intersection. I saw the crumpled wreck of the Alfa concertinaed against the back of a garbage truck.
The shooter, dazed and disoriented, bleeding from a gash on his head, was tamping down the driver’s airbag and struggling to get free of the vehicle.
I stopped the BMW, unclipped my seat belt, and jumped out. The sight of me approaching spurred him on and he got to his feet, staggered a few steps and started running along the street, ignoring the shouts of the garbage workers who were understandably upset by the crash.
I followed, pushing through the gang of uniformed men and onlookers, and raced after the shooter. I tucked the pistol in my waistband. There was no way I’d even threaten to use the weapon as an attempt at intimidation when there were so many innocent people around.
The shooter was limping and I was closing the gap between us. He kept glancing back and looked increasingly dismayed and agitated to see me gaining on him.
We were approaching the intersection with Via Filippo Nicolai, and a crowd of pedestrians was gathered on this side of the street, poised to go south.
The shooter pushed his way through the crowd until he was at the very edge of the crosswalk. He glanced back at me and, very deliberately, stepped off the sidewalk into the path of a speeding dump truck.
CHAPTER68
I STOOD IN silence for a moment, reeling at what I’d just seen, while people all around me screamed and backed away from the horror. This was the second member of the Dark Fates to have taken his own life rather than risk being captured. Whatever indoctrination these men had undergone was sufficiently powerful to subvert the most basic human instincts. Survival is at the heart of who we are, and to see a core trait so hideously twisted was deeply troubling to me. Could my own belief system ever be subverted like that?
I pulled myself together and in the moment of calm that followed the scattering of the shocked crowd, and the bewilderment of the truck driver and motorists who’d ground to a halt either side of the macabre scene, I ran forward. Under the pretext of checking whether the shooter was alive, I took his wallet and phone from the bloody remains.
“He’s dead,” I yelled as I stood. “Someone call an ambulance.”
I could already hear sirens and knew that was my cue to leave. I pressed through the crowd reconvening on the sidewalk some distance from the crushed body and, when I broke the edge of the cluster of people, jogged along the street and then retraced my steps to Bernardo Baggio’s building, pulling the cap and mirrored sunglasses from my pocket and putting them on.
I found Faduma loitering outside, looking lost and uncertain. She brightened when she saw me.
“What happened?”
“I almost caught him, but he jumped in front of a truck,” I replied.
“Like the last guy,” Faduma remarked.
I nodded. “Whatever this group is, they’ve got a real hold on the minds of these men.”
“What now?” she asked.
“I need to contact Mo-bot. I’ve got the guy’s personal possessions.”
I produced his wallet and phone. “I need them analyzed. See if we can find out who was giving him orders.”
“Milan Verde, surely?”
“I’d like to be certain,” I told her. “Where is the nearest Internet café?”
Faduma shook her head. “Are you from the nineties? Use this.”
She produced a Silent Circle Blackphone. I was familiar with the model. Mo-bot said they weren’t completely reliable at preventing tracking and data theft, but combined with Private’s secure network, it would suffice in the circumstances.
I used the phone to log into Private’s virtual network and accessed the messaging platform.
Me:I need to meet.
