Nomad (5 page)

Blinking again, Jess turned from the boy and looked around her at rough-hewn rock walls adorned with finely detailed hanging tapestries. Twenty feet overhead, large wooden beams supported a ceiling of terracotta tiles, and a huge dark wood chandelier hung down from there, almost to head height. Sitting upright, she found herself surrounded by a sea of brightly colored pillows. A man sat on the foot of the bed, by her left leg, while two other men stood at a distance in the corner of the room. The small boy retreated and pulled on the man’s arm.

The man at the foot of her bed looked familiar, his long black hair pulled back in a ponytail over broad shoulders and his face square-jawed with a scar above his left eye. “
Signora
, how are you…?” Leaning forward, he touched her leg.

“Don’t touch me!” Jess yelled, recoiling and pulling her left leg away from him. “Get away from me.” She pushed pillows to cover her leg. She still wore her jeans and sneakers, with her hoodie on top.

The man withdrew in haste. “I am sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“Jessica, are you okay? You were out for a few minutes, gave us a scare.” Her mother’s voice echoed from a hallway, and an instant later Celeste appeared through the bedroom door, rushing to Jess’s side. “This is Baron Ruspoli. You remember, from the museum tour?”

That’s righ
t, the castle museum tour. Her mind was still foggy, a dull ache behind her eyes, with the metallic tang of blood in her pasty mouth. A breeze from open windows pulled freshness into the musty room. Jess closed her eyes, drawing her body together.
The tour. The police.
She opened her eyes in panic, trying to focus on the two men in the corner of the room.

“Please, call me Giovanni.” The Baron stood but hovered over her, the boy clinging to his side.

The boy.
Hector
, Jess remembered. The Baron’s son.

Jess craned her neck to one side to look out of the half-open door to the room leading into the hallway. No one else out there. She looked back at the two men in the corner of the room. They didn’t look like police. “Mom, are—”

“Everything is fine, Jessica.” Celeste sat beside her. “Calm down. You took a nasty spill.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” added Baron Giovanni, taking a step back.

“Where are we?” she asked her mother. This wasn’t their room. They were supposed to stay one night here, in a small cottage at the side of the castle; part of the whirlwind “castles in Chianti” mini-tour Jess had organized.

“I hope you don’t mind, but I moved you into our private quarters,” Giovanni said. “This is a room in the main tower of the castle. The doctor is on his way.” Giovanni slipped his hands into his pockets and took another step back while clearing his throat. “Your mother said it would be all right.”

So I’m in a castle tower
. It sounded like a prison. Jess pushed her arms down to sit higher, and pain shot through her head. Reaching one hand up, she felt a goose egg on the side of her head. Tender.

“Nico and Leone saved you,” Celeste said, her voice low and soothing, motioning to the two men standing behind Baron Giovanni.

One of the men, the younger one, waved a tiny salute. It was Nico, their tour guide from earlier. Where the Baron had rugged good looks, Nico had more of a boyish charm—tousled brown hair pulled back to one side, a carefully groomed beard of two-day-old stubble on a slender, smiling face that radiated warmth. Jess smiled back.

The other person was the old man who had poked his head into the museum, the one with white fly-away hair over the deeply tanned scalp. He’d announced the police at the gate. The pipe still in his mouth, he narrowed his eyes and nodded at Jess.

“You would have fallen right off the ledge, twenty feet at least.” Celeste added, “They might have saved your life.”

How was she so careless? Jess cursed at herself. The alcohol did it, added to her nerves at seeing the police. “Thank you, Nico and Leone,” she mumbled.

Her head throbbed, but it wasn’t just the fall. A midday hangover from four glasses of sparkling wine at brunch contributed, she was sure. “Thank you,” Jess repeated, “but we can’t stay.”

She had to find a phone and call the lawyer. Looking out the nearest window, she scanned the courtyard for any sign of police.

Giovanni caught her looking outside. “That’s L’Olio,” he said, thinking she was looking at the tree in the middle of the courtyard, “our matriarch, the old olive tree. Had you visited her yet?”

It was mentioned in the castle tour brochure. Jess shook her head, but took a closer look—the tree’s roots dug their way into the ground like old arthritic fingers, gnarled and misshapen, an equally tortured knot of branches spreading out above the roots in a half-dead tangle.

“Over three thousand years old, our L’Olio,” Giovanni added. “She was here when the Etruscans dug their caves into the hills below us.”

“It’s beautiful,” Jess lied. Old. Twisted. The tree looked in pain, hanging on to a bitter end. She’d never be like that. She would never hang on past her time.

“You didn’t finish the tour?” Giovanni looked at Jess, then Celeste. “Then I insist. Please make use of these rooms, and I will take you on a proper tour of the castle myself.” He smiled and nodded. “When you are feeling better, of course.”

Jess smiled thinly. “We can’t—”

“I do have a confession.” Giovanni smiled awkwardly.

This completely threw Jess off. She blinked. “A confession?”

“When I arrived, we passed in the courtyard, do you remember?”

Jess did. The deep scar above his eye. It wasn’t a face she would forget. Jess nodded.

“I recognized you. Sorry if I stared. Jessica Rollins, yes? I’m a fan of extreme sports, and I’ve seen your YouTube videos, your ascent and mid-climb BASE jump from El Capitan. It was the reason I joined the tour group, to say hello to you.”

Flustered, Jess didn’t know what to say. “Well, I—”

“It would be an honor if you’d allow me to show you and your mother around the castle myself. Please.”

Jess was about to say no again, but Celeste interjected. “We’d love to. That is very generous.” She glanced at Jess, frowned, then returned to smiling at the Baron.

Giovanni’s smile broadened. “Perfect, then it’s settled. I’ll go out and see when the doctor will arrive.” Nodding curtly, he excused himself and exited the room, trailing Hector, who kept staring and smiling at Jess.

Nico stepped forward from the back of the room, extending one hand to Celeste. She took his hand, and he bowed and kissed it. Her mother blushed. “A pleasure, Madame Tosetti, a real pleasure.” Straightening up, he took a step toward Jess, but she edged away. “And Jessica, I look forward to seeing more of you as well,” he said, leaving Jess her distance.

“You two, you could be brother and sister,” growled a voice from behind Nico. It was the old man, holding his pipe in one hand, glowering at Nico and Jess.

Celeste reached to hold Jess’s hand. She smiled at the old man Leone. “Our family was from the valley below here, many generations ago.” She glanced at Nico. “Are you from here?”

“No,” Nico replied. “I am from Napoli. I came here looking for work, years ago, and Giovanni’s father took me in.”

Leone grunted and narrowed his eyes. “I have work that needs attending.” He nodded. “Madame Tosetti, Jessica.”

“Thank you again, Leone,” Celeste said to the old man as he disappeared out the doorway, just as another man came in, suitcases under both arms.

“Old Leone is just a little grumpy,” explained Nico, turning to the doorway. “Ah, and this is Enzo,” he added, introducing the small man that deposited their luggage just inside the entrance.

“
Buon Giorno
,” Enzo said, his voice bright. “Anything you need, you come to me.”

Enzo had a thin, angular face with a goatee and a large mole on his left cheek. A brown pork-pie hat covered his head, which Jess imagined was balding. Sitting forward, she pulled her left foot under her right leg. She felt like an invalid. “Thank you very much, but I’m tired…”

“Of course.” Nico bowed. “How rude of us. Come, Enzo, let’s leave our guests.”

“Yes, yes, I just have a few more bags to bring in. Is that all right?”

“Of course,” Celeste replied.

Enzo and Nico both smiled at Celeste and Jess, and then left the room, leaving the door ajar.

“Are the police here?” Jess asked her mother in an urgent whisper.

“No, and in fact, the Baron refused to let them in the castle. He had a huge argument with them at the gate just before the excitement of saving you from almost killing yourself.”

“I wasn’t trying to kill myself—”

“It’s just a figure of speech.” Celeste turned to her daughter. “Giovanni is a very nice man. Why don’t we relax, take our time? We don’t need to be in Rome for a few days, do we? For this surprise of yours?”

Her father’s conference ended in three days. That was when Jess planned on trying to get them together. “No, we’re not in a hurry.”

“Good, then we can stay a few days,” Celeste said cheerfully. “I like it here, and I think you could use a day off your feet.” Her mother winced, looking at her left leg. “Sorry, you know what I mean.”

“A warning,” said a voice from the hallway. It was the Baron, his face hanging in the doorway.

Jess flinched. Were the police back? “Wh…what?” she stuttered.

“The doctor will be here in two minutes, just giving you a warning.”

Enzo watched Baron Ruspoli hanging in the doorway ahead of him, fawning over this new American girl and her mother. He could see the way the Baron looked at this young woman, Jessica. This little dove with her broken wing. “Here are the rest of the bags,” Enzo called out as he barged past the Baron, dropping what he carried onto the floor.

He smiled at the Baron, then at Jessica. He had to admit, she was beautiful—long blond hair, slender, but with fire in her eyes. There were so many things he’d like to do to her himself. Hold her, protect her, show her
his
love…

But he had to smile, to pretend.

He couldn’t let anyone know what he was thinking, who he was. And he couldn’t go back to jail, couldn’t go back to those men. Not after the last time. Never again.

“Is that all, Baron?” Enzo asked.

The Baron put a hand on Enzo’s shoulder. “Yes, thank you. And please, whatever Jessica and Celeste need, you make sure you give it to them.”

Enzo turned to smile at the women. “Yes, of course. Whatever they need.”

Looking at the Baron, Enzo smiled at him as well. Soon the Baron would be getting what he needed as well. Soon the pig would pay for his crimes.

NOMAD

Survivor testimony #JR6;

Event +55hrs;

Name: Sergio Solano;

Reported location: Salt Lake City, Utah;

We took off from the Seattle area just after half past three. All airspace was officially closed, but by then the water had already dropped ten feet in the Tacoma Narrows. We still had six or seven hours, that’s what they said. Enough time for me to get my son and fly back the three hours to Dallas in my Cessna Citation jet. But it wasn’t. Not enough time. Forty-five minutes into the flight, I’d climbed to thirty-three thousand feet, scanning the airspace for any oncoming aircraft as all ATC were down; clear blue skies, no pressure fronts along the whole route. Perfect day.

That’s when it happened. Bands of white light appeared in the deep blue sky, rippling, and a second later all the electronics went blank. Just like that. Everything gone. No GPS, no digital displays. My old Citation works off manual hydraulics, thank God, so I switched to dead reckoning and the six-pack of analog controls. Then straight ahead, a black smudge appeared. It seemed to engulf the entire horizon. Never seen anything like it. It stretched up, high into the sky, higher than any thunderhead I’d ever seen. Those usually flatten out at the tropopause, at the edge of the stratosphere, thirty or even forty thousand feet. But this was a black wall, shooting into the sky, way beyond that.