The Disappearance of Grace (23 page)

He clicks a couple more keys and the scene appears far more enlarged but at the same time, far more grainy and distorted. But there is no doubt in my mind of what I'm witnessing. The taking away of my Grace.

“From there,” Graham adds, “we believe he boarded her onto a boat or a barge disguised as a supply vessel, and carted her away. Perhaps to one of the islands. Perhaps to one of the buildings on the main island. We just don't know yet.”

Carbone turns around in his chair to face us.

“All we are fairly certain of at this point, Captain, is that Grace has not left the country. There is only two publicly accessible ways out of Venice other than by water, and that's by train or motor vehicle. Our eyes are constantly monitoring roads, water, and rails and thus far we've picked up no sign of their leaving.”

“What about a chopper?” I pose.

“We've not been alerted to helicopters operating in or around the area since Grace's abduction,” Carbone answers.

“We'd know if someone did a hop/skip in and out of one of the islands,” Lowrance adds. Then, shaking his head, biting down on his bottom lip. “I can only wish I'd been on the scene just two minutes earlier. I might have caught the overcoat man in the act.”

“We also have a solid theory as to why the overcoat man wouldn't want to cart her away from Venice,” Graham says.

“And what would that be?” Alessandra poses.

“We believe the overcoat man wants to eventually flush the Captain out. They want him to find Grace, and once he does, he will kill them both.”

“Why?” I ask.

“Retaliation,” he says. “Revenge for the death that occurred on a hilltop in Afghanistan.”

Chapter 64

STANDING INSIDE THAT HIGH-TECH surveillance room, it takes maybe two or three seconds for me to run through the events of that day in my brain. The Warthog cruising across the valley, the thrust of its engines thundering and reverberating against the hillsides, its metal skin reflecting the bright sunlight as it finds its target, dives, and releases its lethal payload. There are the two back-to-back concussions that we feel beneath our booted feet two miles away in our camp and then the dull but distinct pop-pop sound that follows. There's the rat-tat-tat of the Warthog's 30mm nose-mounted Gatling gun as it strafes the hillside and village with exploding rounds. There's the march back up to the hill to a now shattered and burning village, sounds of moans and weeping dripping into our ears like blood as we trek along the two-track road to a gate with a cow chained to it. A cow that one of my men shoots dead. I see it all running through my head like a video played at rapid-fire speed.

I see it all.

See. It. All.

I see a boy lying on his back, his face covered in dust. See an old man going for a gun. See one of my men raising up his weapon, feel the discharge. See all of my men raising up their weapons, hear the sound of automatic fire exploding all around me, and bodies dropping onto the gravel…

“What happens now?” I ask.

“We wait to make contact,” Lowrance says. “I expect the overcoat man to contact us with responsibility for taking Grace. We'll ask for proof of life. When we get it, we'll answer.”

“Does he want money?” I ask.

“Most abduction cases involve a ransom,” Lowrance goes on. “I'm not sure what this man will ask for. Whether it will be something as simple as the release of prisoners or something totally impossible like the end of the war. Doesn't make any difference to us. We won't negotiate. What we will do instead is to try and get a fix on his location, and then send in a team to rescue your fiancée. Right now, we have no idea where he is.” His eyes now fixed on Alessandra. “And I trust we can keep our conversations here under wraps for the time being?”

The journalist nods.

“On the contrary, gentleman,” she says. “Perhaps news of this story is precisely what you need to make our overcoat man show his head.”

Carbone stands, takes his place beside Graham.

“The writer has a point,” he concurs. “It could take days or weeks until we hear from the overcoat man or somehow stumble upon his position. By that time, Grace could be dead. But if we were to goad him into making contact, we stand the chance of getting to him much sooner. Perhaps immediately.”

“I agree with the detective,” Graham offers, biting down on his bottom lip. “Mr. Lowrance, what about you?”

The tall Interpol agent crosses arms over chest.

“Maybe you're right. We're dealing with a human life here, so I will defer to the Captain.”

I plant my eyes on Alessandra.

“How long will it take you to write the piece and have it published?”

“I can get started right away, if you'll allow me the use of your apartment.”

Adrenalin begins to fill my brain. There's a distinct sound to it, like an orchestra about to reach a climactic crescendo. My eyes are beginning to fade, the sight flickering on and off. From light to gray to dark and back again.

“Let's go now,” I say. “I fear I need some rest.”

“Your eyes,” Alessandra says.

“Yes, my eyes,” I say. But then, I'm blinded in so many other ways, I want to tell her. Blind to the possibility of rescuing my Grace. Blind to the future.

She takes hold of my hand.

“I'll lead the way,” she says.

Chapter 65

ALESSANDRA AND I ARRIVE back at my apartment. I am not entirely blinded but I still feel the overwhelming need for rest. While she sets up her laptop on the harvest table behind the couch, I swallow another sleeping pill. Lying down on the bed, I quickly fall into a deep sleep.

* * *

I see Grace.

Grace is standing all alone in the center of a gondola, her long dark hair draping her pale face and shoulders like an angel. She's wearing a black gown covered with sequins. The gown doesn't match the rich glossy black finish on the narrow boat, so much as it blends into it, becomes one with it. Wrapped around her wedding finger is her engagement ring. The square cut diamond sparkles brilliantly in the daylight.

The canal is calm, the water as clean and clear as newly drawn bathwater.

Hers is the only boat on the water while the old buildings and stone canal banks are empty of people. Empty of life. Framing Grace is an arching stone bridge and as the dream progresses, Grace begins to float backwards, under the bridge. I'm not in a boat. I am treading water. I find myself floating calmly at first, but then desperately towards my fiancée, my hands outstretched like I'm trying to grab onto her.

But she's moving away from me far too fast, her boat sinking, filling with the clear canal water, her black-gowned body being swallowed up by Venice.

I too am sinking no matter how hard I try to stay afloat by kicking my feet and slapping at the water with my hands and arms. Then I am underwater and so is Grace.

We lock eyes underneath the silent veil of water. Her expression hasn't changed at all since she began to sink and drown. She just peers at me with her blue eyes and a slightly open mouth.

I can't breathe.

Can't. Breathe.

The more I sink, the more my lungs constrict and I feel the need to open my mouth, take a breath. But I know that if I do it, I will drown. I will die.

Grace stares at me. Into my eyes. She knows I'm about to die. She knows it.

“Breathe, Nick,” she says through the water. “Breathe.”

I do it.

I do what my Grace tells me to do.

I. Breathe.

And I die.

Chapter 66

WHEN I COME TO, Alessandra is again sitting beside me on the bed, once more holding my hand.

“You were dreaming again,” she says softly. “A nightmare.”

She dries my forehead with a warm washcloth and presses the back of her hand against my face like she's taking my temperature.

“I saw Grace,” I whisper.

“In your dream?”

“She was floating on the Grand Canal. In a gondola. I was swimming for her. We both sank under the surface. We both drowned.”

She pats my forehead.

“It was just a dream,” Alessandra consoles. “Just. A. Dream.”

I sit up, my face close to her face, her deep-set eyes looking into my own. For a brief moment, we are desperate figures caught up in a still-life. It takes me a while to realize our hands are still locked together. Until I pull mine slowly away, and stand.

“How are your eyes, Captain?”

“Fragile,” I say, looking out over the easel, out the open French doors and onto the fading afternoon sunlight. “I needed rest. That's all. Rest and sleep.”

My gaze shifts from the doors to the harvest table and her laptop. It's open, a sheet of notes set beside it, a pen sitting on top of the notes, her cell phone set beside the pen.

“And your article?”

“Finished,” she says. “Submitted to my editor, and posted. Thank God for the digital age, Captain.”

“Let me read it.”

She sits down before her computer. Clicking several commands she turns the computer in my direction.

“Please,” she says.

I sit myself down, read the piece from off the CNN website.

It's not much of a piece. But that's not the point. It's the spin Alessandra has put on the piece that counts. What to most people will seem like a follow-up to the “American Woman Missing in Italy” story published yesterday, this piece states that after further investigation, it's been determined by the Venice police that Grace Blunt was indeed abducted from the café in the Piazza San Marco in broad daylight. While no one has claimed responsibility for the kidnapping, the police welcome open contact with the abductor or abductors in order to “consider their demands.” The piece ends with the police phone number and website contact address.

I sit back in the chair, run my hands through my cropped hair.

“Do you really believe this will work?” I pose.

“It's common knowledge that the police always claim to never negotiate with terrorists or kidnappers. Publicly, that is. But I think if Grace was taken by a member of an angry Afghan faction or Taliban as payback for what you had to do to their village, then I believe they will want their demands to be heard. Like any politician, they crave the soapbox.”

“But will we get some kind of proof of Grace's life?”

“We have to wait and see, Captain,” she says, while setting her hand on my shoulder.

She quickly slips it off when the apartment phone rings.

Chapter 67

I JUMP UP FROM the chair. Run to the wall-mounted phone. Grab it off its cradle.

“Pronto,” I bark into the phone. In my head I'm aware of how the police will record the conversation since the phone has been tapped.

“I. See.” says the gruff, almost indiscernible voice into the phone. “I. See.”

“Who is this?” I ask. “Do you have Grace?”

“I. See.” repeats the voice.

“What do you want? Do you want money?”

“I. See.”

“Please. Tell me. Do you have Grace?”

“Yes. Grace. Yes.”

My legs, turning to rubber.

“Is she alive?”

“I. See,” says the voice of the overcoat man again.

And then he hangs up.

Chapter 68

MY CELL RINGS. I hang up the wall-mounted phone and go to it.

“Yes!” I bark.

It's Detective Carbone.

“We have confirmation of the call, Captain,” he says. “It's from the same cell as before, but this time we are more prepared to track its location. We are trying to trace the location now via GPS.”

“I'm waiting,” I say, my eyes locked on Alessandra's.

There's some commotion coming from the background. Police yelling at other police. Until Carbone comes back on the line.

“It's Venice, Captain,” he confirms. “The call has come from inside Venice. And we have an address.”

He pauses, then recites the address to me.

I nearly drop the phone, but manage to hang on.

“Captain,” he says. “Captain, are you there?”

“I'm here, Detective. I'm sorry.”

“You need to come to the station as quickly as possible, so that we will discuss how to handle our next move.”

“On the contrary, Detective Carbone,” I tell him. “Perhaps you should meet me here. The address you just spoke about is my own.”

Chapter 69

THE DETECTIVE ORDERS US to vacate the apartment, and get ourselves to the station immediately. Alessandra packs up her computer. I grab my coat and my keys. As we leave the studio apartment and head out onto the stair landing, I must resist the urge to grab a kitchen knife and begin making a search of the entire building. But I know that would be foolish and dangerous. It could also result in getting Grace killed.