Masquerade: Her Billionaire - Venice

  “Those were Americans,” Anya said breathlessly, voice low. It was hard to wrap her head around that. “And did you hear that name? Do you think it might be Ash Morris?”

  That was why the American who’d threatened her at Palazzo Maltese seemed so familiar. She’d met Ash Morris once, very briefly. But she’d disliked him on sight and he’d remained in her memory.

  Cal kept his voice very low, too. “Yeah. The fucker asked about you at the party. Wanted me to find you. Then he put a tracker in my jacket.” He looked at her, face tight with anger. It came off him in waves. “They got to you through me. It’s all my fault —”

  She shook her head sharply. “Don’t go there. This isn’t your fault. If anything it’s Ash Morris’s fault. He’s with the US Embassy in Beirut but actually —”

  “He’s CIA,” Cal finished.

  How did Cal — she looked at him. He was an engineer through and through. A man of technology and science. He’d never been interested in politics but she imagined that he had a good grasp of the geopolitics behind the Accords and would know the major players. Ash Morris had never been in the forefront but he’d definitely been pulling strings in the background.

  Just not for his country, apparently.

  “We need to get you squared away.” Cal put a little distance between them and she immediately missed him. Missed his hardness and heat. In his arms, it was as if he’d been able to lend her his strength. But now that he wasn’t touching her, she realized just how weak she was. She sagged, saved from falling by his strong hand on her arm.

  “I’m fine,” she murmured but he wasn’t listening. He was looking intently at the door to the repair shop. It was an ancient shop, with two front windows completely covered by thick wooden shutters. The door was made of even thicker wood, with bronze rivets and hinges. Inside there was no doubt a thick wooden bar besides the brand new deadbolt lock.

  “Goddamn,” he whispered. “Left my lockpick set in the hotel. Last time that will ever happen.”

  He eyed the door more carefully, checked out into the passageway, then stepped back. He was going to try to kick the door in. He would undoubtedly be able to do it, but it would take several tries and they’d make a huge noise.

  Plus, she knew from experience that though the street looked deserted, there were dozens of flats above the shops. Venetians, the real kind, the original residents, were few and dwindling. The ones that were left in the city looked after each other. Someone would call the police. That wasn’t a bad thing but if they were taken into custody, they could be trapped. There could be an army after them. If they were willing to kidnap her, shock her, torture her, who knows what else they’d be willing to do? And who knew how high it went? Maybe they were allied with people in positions of power.

  Cal lifted his foot to try to bash the door in, but she stopped him with a hand on his arm.

  “These doors have been here for hundreds of years. And they are probably reinforced with steel bars on the inside. I think I know where we can go until your cavalry arrives.” She had to put a hand out to the wall for a second.

  Cal wrapped his big hand around her arm again. “As long as it’s close by. You’re too weak to walk far. I can carry you but then I won’t be able to react if we run into those fuckheads.”

  She closed her eyes. She’d been here with one of the secretaries, an Italian friend who worked at Peace and Jobs. Marcella had studied in Venice and knew it inside out. She was the one who’d suggested the umbrella repair shop. They’d gone … Anya put the heels of her hands against her eyes, trying to focus. There was static in her head, her mind a radio station she couldn’t tune into.

  She pressed the heels of her hands harder into her eyes, focusing. She could feel Cal next to her, waiting. He didn’t say anything, didn’t try to push her. He knew she was trying hard.

  They could be gunned down at any moment and she was trapping them here because she couldn’t … think.

  Some noise must have escaped her because he gathered her up against him, warm and solid and safe.

  “I can’t remember,” she whispered. “There’s something, but I can’t remember!”

  “Shhh,” he whispered back, bending low, his lips touching her ear. She shivered as a blast of heat shot through her, blowing away the fog in her head. “It’s okay.”

  Anya pushed against him, just a little. Not that she wanted to get away from him but because he needed room to maneuver in. She stood on tiptoe to put her lips against his ear.

  “I just remembered.” Pulling back she looked into his eyes, placing a finger against her lips.

  He nodded and stepped back, holding her by the arms. Ready to let her take charge, but supporting her.

  Tears welled in her eyes. That was how they’d been, that was how they’d operated, all those years ago. Whoever was best at something did it and the other was there for support.

  She’d never had that before and had never had it since.

  His eyes widened as he saw her eyes welling and she shook her head fiercely, angry at herself. This was no time to get emotional.

  Cocking an ear at the calle where the men had run past, she waited another moment. No one was running by. Though the men after them could be anywhere, they had to make their move now. They had to get to some kind of shelter, now.

  Anya grabbed Cal’s hand, feeling an infusion of strength and heat. Where they were going wasn’t far. She didn’t want him to have to carry her. She just had to suck it up, the pain and the aching muscles and the trembling.

  He pulled gently, bent again to her ear. “Can you walk?”

  No, but she had to. No choice. She gave him a trembling smile and quoted one of their favorite movie lines. “Ain’t got time to bleed.”

  And lead him out of the passageway and into another calle. This one ran alongside a canal. She knew more or less where she was in the city but right now she was running on memory. She’d been with Marcella and they’d taken a lunchtime stroll and … yes. There was that ochre yellow house on the canal that had particularly pretty geranium boxes. And — yep — further down a tiny little charming square with a coffee shop with three tables out where they’d stopped for a cappuccino. The coffee shop was closed but she recognized it. Then they’d strolled further down, crossed a bridge and — yes!

  There it was! One of the many stazioni gondola dotting the city’s canals. The 400 gondolas that plied the lagoon by day had all to come to rest like birds at night and this was one of their nesting places.

  And not a moment too soon because Anya felt her knees start to shake. She held herself up by sheer will as she pointed to the striped pole with five gondolas tied up.

  “There,” she said. “Lots of gondolas are covered with tarps. Maybe we might find one and hole up in the bottom of the hull until the cavalry arrives.”

  “Good thinking,” Cal murmured, putting his hand around her waist. She needed it. She was shaking all over and though he saw it — hell, he could feel it — he didn’t say anything.

  The calle was above the banks of the canal. There were steps running down to the bank and the gondolas. Cal wrapped her hand around the railing, hopped down and held his hands up. Anya leaned forward, utterly certain that he’d catch her.

  He did.

  Around a corner came the sounds of boot heels, running. It was impossible to tell how far away they were. Sounds did strange things in this city, bouncing off the narrow streets and canals.

  He half carried her to the middle gondola, slightly larger, with a tied-down tarp covering the inside. Cal untied one section, helped her under it, got under himself, then pulled the tarp over them, tying it loosely.

  There would be no way to tell that they were there.

  “Let’s hope they don’t have IR goggles,” Cal whispered in her ear.

  Oh, God, so there would be a way to tell that they were there.

  “Doubt it, though,” he added. “I didn’t see anything like that, did you? They had night vision but not the
kind that has IR capability.”

  Anya ran her head back over her captivity. She’d been frightened and angry and frankly, not noticing much. The man who’d shocked her hadn’t had anything in his hand other than the electric prod. He’d been armed though. Some kind of gun in a shoulder holster. The two guards had been empty handed, too, other than their weapons. Everything spoke of an operation set up hastily, and of course they thought they’d be dealing with an unarmed woman. Which they had, of course. Fuckers hadn’t counted on Cal being in the mix.

  Cal settled her along the velvet-lined bottom of the gondola, shoving the two chairs to either side of the narrow area, so that the tarp was slightly lifted. It wasn’t how gondolas were stored but Anya didn’t imagine the goons would know that.

  The floor was narrow. The velvet smelled of feet and mold, though if it hid them, she couldn’t complain. The water in the canal was still, placid, but there was a feeling of buoyancy.

  She lay on her side, front facing the open water and could feel Cal settling in behind her. It was a tight fit but they managed. He’d taken his tuxedo jacket off and tucked it under her head so she’d be more comfortable.

  He put his lips to her ear. “Are you okay?”

  She shivered. He was like a warm, living wall at her back, one big arm around her waist. He was curved around her and she knew, like she knew that the sun was going to rise in the east tomorrow morning, that he was angling himself so he would catch any bullet first.

  Cal nudged her with his shoulder. “Anya?”

  Her voice came out husky. “I’m ok.”

  He pulled his cell from the inside pocket of his tux jacket under her head and switched it on. It required his thumbprint and then a six character code. Once it was on, he switched on an app Anya didn’t recognize. From the same inside jacket pocket he fished out a wireless ear bud and fixed it in one ear.

  The screen was very bright — the scene of Petra at dawn.

  “Cal,” she murmured, “dim the light.”

  “God yes.” The cell screen dimmed to almost blackness. “Sorry. Little preoccupied here.”

  She smiled over her shoulder at him.

  He thumbed a saved number and pressed, bringing the phone to his mouth. It was picked up immediately. She could only hear his end of the conversation, barely making out the words even though his mouth was an inch from her ear.

  “New intel. Two of the guys after us are Americans. Probably Ash Morris’s, though I don’t know whether they are freelancers or Christians in Action.” He listened. “Yeah. Listen, get reinforcements. Good ones. Armed. You know where we are. I switched on the tracker. You have the GPS.”

  He put the cell back in the inside pocket together with the wireless bud. “So my guy is still fifteen minutes out. He thought he’d be here by now. He’s in a private boat but he said the Canal is overcrowded and he’s going to have to dock at St. Mark’s Square and cross it on foot and that it’s wall-to-wall revellers. He estimates another fifteen minutes, like I said, but he’s calling in the troops.”

  “Who would the troops be?”

  “Farris is well-connected. It might be the Carabinieri, might be the Polizia di Stato. Might be a good local security team. If that’s the case, though, we’re still going to the cops.”

  Anya nodded. They were getting out of this nightmare. “They wanted to know about my friend June Chen.”

  Cal hooked his chin on her shoulder, cheek rubbing against hers. He had a little sandy stubble already. She’d loved it when he wore his scruffy look, light stubble over tanned skin.

  It had been a long long time since she’d felt his whiskers rubbing her cheek.

  Cal turned his head to look at her. “Who’s June Chen?”

  “A really good friend. She’s Chinese American, family came over twenty years ago when she was a kid. Father’s super smart, an astrophysicist, mom’s a concert pianist. Brother’s a biochemist, sister is an orthopedic surgeon. She’s the underachiever in the family, she studied journalism at Harvard. She’s on the China desk at the New York Times, digital edition. I think she might have sent me a text or a video. As soon as we’re clear, we need to switch on my cell. We can …” her voice trailed off as he pulled her cell from his pants pocket, put in the battery and SIM card and switched it on.

  “You have Petra as a screensaver too,” Cal said absently. She turned her head and their eyes met and it was as if a current had switched on between them. She nodded, not trusting her voice.

  Call pulled out another wireless ear bud, handing it to her along with her cell. She went to the right app.

  “I noticed you don’t even have password protection.” She could hear the heavy disapproval in his voice. Anya sighed.

  “It’s my private one. My work cell is password protected.” He gave her a sideways fulminating glance out of narrowed eyes. “Okay okay,” she whispered. “Total password protection from now on, on all my devices.”

  “Randomly generated, switched out every couple of weeks.”

  She rolled her eyes, sighed and nodded. He was right. She didn’t like it that he was right, but he was. Cal had always been security conscious. Clearly, running a billion dollar business hadn’t improved things.

  “Yes.”

  “Promise.”

  She sighed again. “Yes, I promise.”

  “I don’t really need that promise because I will personally make sure you do that. After tonight I don’t think I’ll let you out of my sight again.”

  A burst of heat and joy bloomed in her chest. The idea of Cal scolding her for a long, long time about passwords made her ridiculously happy. He didn’t even seem to realize the implications of what he’d said. He nudged her shoulder with his own. “Let’s see what your friend says.”

  Anya thumbed the app and — oh my God! — There she was! June! Her best friend. The image was grainy and the sound was bad, and June was whispering. But what she was saying was clear.

  Her pretty, scared face filled the screen. She kept looking over her shoulder. “Anya, I’m sending this to you first. I can’t send it to my editor because I need more corroboration. But I need to tell you that there’s going to be an attempt in Venice on Hu Lin’s life tomorrow some time before the signing ceremony.”

  Anya’s breath caught in her throat. A chill spread through her body. She knew exactly what that meant.

  “You’re more familiar with the political aspects of the Accords. I’m assuming that this would have a profound effect on them.” Cal’s low voice was in her ear as she stopped the recording.

  Anya tilted her head toward him. “Not a profound effect. It would bring the Accords to a grinding halt. They would fail and it would take another decade to put them back together again. Except the Accords failing would not leave things as they were, bad as that was. The Accords failing could very well mean world war, and I don’t mean like World War II. I mean war throughout the world, east against west, north against south. Everyone fighting everyone else.”

  “How’s that? I mean these Accords have been years in the making. How could the death of one man change all that?”

  “Not just one man. This one man.” Anya’s fingers curled the cell. Her muscles hurt, everything hurt, and now her heart hurt. “The Accords are built on the safeguards guaranteed by the six main signatories. The US, the UK, France, Russia, Saudi Arabia and China.”

  Cal nodded, clearly still not understanding.

  “If one of the Six Pillars crumbles, the entire edifice crumbles, that is built into the Accords. If Hu Lin dies, the man who is next in succession is a rabid China Firster. He will pull out of the Accords immediately and would be happy to do it spectacularly, the day the Accords are supposed to be signed. And everything will go up in smoke. He’d like nothing more than to wreck the whole process.”

  “Fuck,” Cal muttered.

  “About sums it up,” she agreed.

  “Let’s watch the rest,” he said.

  She thumbed the video back on and June’s froz
en face became animated again. “I’m going to keep digging in Beijing and see if I can come up with enough concrete info to publish. There’s some evidence that an American who works for the CIA might be involved, too, which would be a disaster. Li Wei, who would succeed Hu Lin, would pay big bucks to anyone who helped trash the Accords. Anyway, you’re on the scene. Pass this on to anyone you think might be able to protect Hu Lin. If it’s a false alarm, no harm done. If it’s not, we might be able to save the Accords from failing. I’m going to be hard to find the next few days. Check our message board.”

  The video stopped, frozen on June’s worried and scared face.

  “We need to contact someone,” Anya said. “Someone with the power to protect Hu Lin.”

  Cal didn’t answer. He tapped the first number on his contacts list again and brought the cell to his lips, speaking in a voice so low she could barely follow. “Yo, it’s me.” He listened for a moment. “We seem to be well hidden for the moment. Listen, there’s something new. It looks like this whole thing, including that fuckhead Ash, is about a possible attempt on the life of the President of China, Hu Lin.” He listened. “Yeah. Do you know anyone you trust in Italian law enforcement? Yeah. Excellent. Call him. Get an extra security detail around Hu. See you in fifteen.”

  Cal put the cell back in his inside jacket pocket and settled back down, wrapping her in his big arms.

  He nosed aside a lock of her hair and whispered in her ear. “How are we feeling?”

  Oh God. His breath against her ear provoked a shiver all along her body. He knew perfectly well how much her ears were erogenous zones, though only with him, she found later. One lover had tried to drill a hole in her ear with his tongue, saliva dribbling, and it had creeped her out. She’d had to jerk her head away.

  But not Cal. The feel of his warm breath, the sound of his low voice, shot heat through her.

  It was almost frightening the power Cal had over her body, as if it didn’t entirely belong to her but partly belonged to him, too. As it had when they were young.

  She tried to keep her voice light. “I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling all right. Better, at any rate.”