Killing Pace Read online

  “Then why the hell didn’t he come running?”

  “Don’t go hard on him, Sarah. It wasn’t his fault.”

  “Not his fault?”

  “He and Merola’s security company had their … um … wires crossed, as you say. When he ran for the door, he set off the alarm, and that automatically sealed the building. The stupido security dispatcher forgot he was there and called the Carabinieri to report a break-in.” Marco chuckled. “He came to me while the doctor was checking you over. He wants to apologize and buy you a drink. He thinks you’re totally cool.”

  “Totally cool?”

  “He loves American TV.”

  Sarah sighed.

  And then she laughed.

  After everything that had happened in the last twelve hours, it felt very good to laugh.

  * * *

  Sarah knew she had a call to make. A long overdue call. Apart from the regular inspection data that was dispatched electronically, and a verbal and written report on the four days she’d spent interviewing migrants at Porto Empedocle, she hadn’t been briefing her supervisor back in Miami on everything she’d been up to lately. Old habits die hard.

  Phyllis Corbin was at her desk.

  “Nice of you to remember us.”

  “I’ve been busy.”

  “This is not a dating relationship, sweetheart. Why am I reading about you in The Washington Post?”

  “You’re not. They kept my name out of it. And no one got a photograph.”

  “Okay, let’s see … ‘WOMAN TURNS TABLES ON KIDNAP SQUAD. AP Catania, Italy … Violent incident … shocked diners … woman, believed to be an American … one thug left unconscious…’ et cetera, et cetera. Care to explain?”

  “Long story.”

  “No time like the present.”

  Sarah decided to start with the counterfeit goods investigation since … well … since that was one of the real reasons she was in Sicily. She tagged on the restaurant incident at the end, playing down the theatrics.

  “Okay, so three containers so far?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And you’re thinking these vans are coming in by ferry, they’re parking them out of sight somewhere within the port area, and then transferring the loads into pre-inspected containers overnight?”

  “Looks like it.”

  “What about the overflow? The legit shipments they off-load to make room?”

  “My guess is they’re loading them into alternate twenty-footers and leaving them for us to inspect and clear. Someone’s obviously messing with the paperwork, creating split shipments. My guess is that was one of Terenzi’s jobs.”

  “There’d have to be a few port workers in on that. One Customs officer isn’t doing that all on his own.”

  “You’re right.”

  “This Terenzi … is he talking?”

  “Not yet. The last I heard, he was demanding a lawyer.”

  “And Nelthorp. He’s in the wind?”

  “So far.”

  “We’ll contact Interpol and get a Red Notice issued. Now, here’s what I want you to do: seal up those containers, register the bolt numbers on new paperwork, and let them load the ship.”

  “Let them go?”

  “Yes! We’ll arrest the ship when it arrives at MIA. We’ll get a lot more cooperation from that Greek shipping company once we’ve seized one of their ships.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Send me a full written report via the usual channel. And keep your head down! I don’t want to read about any more of your exploits in the media.”

  “Okay. Uh … boss?”

  “What?”

  “There’s something else.”

  “Should I be glad I’m sitting down?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me.”

  Sarah knew the baby laundering investigation wasn’t exactly within her remit. If anything, it was a matter for ICE and the FBI. Something told her she’d better not get into too much detail about her extracurricular activities with her sometimes prickly boss. So she kept it brief, just hitting the highlights. She repeated what she’d been told by Renate Richter and Father Giardini, and, without naming names, that there were allegations of involvement at the consulate in Palermo and maybe a U.S. Immigration officer in Naples.

  She finished with the tie-in. “And here’s the thing … Nelthorp might be involved.”

  “Nelthorp?”

  Leaving out the long sequence of surveillance, interrogation, and yet more surveillance she’d been conducting, she told her about the woman with the baby who got out of one of the smugglers’ white vans, and about following her and seeing Nelthorp drive her away.

  There was a long silence on the line.

  “Boss?”

  “Unbelievable.”

  “If you’d met him, you might not think so.”

  “Obviously we can’t ignore this! Write up what you have and send it to me. Don’t copy anyone. I’ll speak to the ICE supervisor, but I doubt he can spare anyone to send over there. At least not right away. He keeps sniveling about how he’s stretched to the limit, as if it’s just his branch that’s hurting and not the rest of us. In the meantime, I need you to get back to work on those migrants. The Italian Coast Guard just picked up two more boatloads. Washington is raising hell about making sure there are no crazies hiding in the crowd. They never stop reminding us that if they get into Europe, it’s only a short step onto a flight over here.”

  After a few more perfunctory instructions, Corbin ended their call.

  The last part of the conversation gnawed at Sarah. Infants were being stolen from their parents, but Corbin’s attention was elsewhere. It was all, “The mission, the mission.”

  “Sometimes you can commit an injustice simply by doing nothing.”

  Nonna again.

  No, Sarah wasn’t going to let this go.

  18

  Richard Bird was an old friend from her high school days. Like Sarah, he’d never been part of the high-octane popular set. The two introverts had discovered each other during sophomore year—outcasts drawn together by affinity and, occasionally, for self-defense. An initial fumbling romance had been too awkward to promise a future—at least from her point of view, though not from Dickie’s. But he had accepted the situation, and their bond of close friendship had endured until graduation and for a year or two beyond. Eventually, they had lost touch—only to be reunited a decade later in an encounter that had almost cost them their lives.

  These days Richard was a State Department analyst. He was also one of the few people on the entire planet that she trusted completely. She called his direct line.

  “Dickie Bird! How’s it going?”

  “How many times have I told you not to call me that?”

  She sensed the sprig of welcome behind the crankiness. “But, Dickie, I miss you.”

  “Don’t even start! You haven’t called me in months.”

  “I’ve been away.”

  “Where?”

  “Out of the country. Still am.”

  “Where?”

  “Not on this line.”

  “Name?”

  “Sarah.”

  She heard him expel a heavy breath. “I’m never going to understand you, am I?”

  “Can we talk?”

  “Number 3 in ten.”

  Number 3 was his private, private cell phone. She waited ten minutes, then called.

  “Hi.”

  “Gálvez Park?”

  “Yup.”

  Sarah pictured her friend in the little park behind the Harry S. Truman Building, sitting on the bench near the statue of Bernardo de Gálvez, the little-known Spanish general who had come to the aid of the Americans during the Revolutionary War. It was one of Dickie’s favorite spots.

  “I’m in Sicily.”

  “Should I ask why?”

  “Assignment.”

  “U/C?”

  “Partly.”

  “How can you be ‘partly�
� undercover?”

  “Two files, three jobs. And I stumbled onto something.”

  “Stumbled, or waded right in?”

  “A bit of both.”

  “What do you need?”

  “How much time do you have?”

  “I took an early lunch. Go.”

  “Have you ever heard of baby laundering?”

  “Baby … what?”

  She told him the whole story.

  “Just a minute! These goons that tried to grab you … you’re saying the mob? You mean like, bada-bing, bada-boom? That kinda mob?”

  “Yes, Dickie. That kinda mob.”

  “Jeez, girl! You need to get out of there!”

  “Dickie—”

  “I know, I know. Comes with the job. I just wish—!”

  “I need you to look into a few things. Can you do that for me?”

  “Will I get whacked if I do?”

  “You couldn’t resist that, could you?”

  His laugh sounded a bit strained. “What do you need?”

  She told him.

  Ninety minutes later, he called back.

  “Here’s the short version: When it comes to intercountry adoptions, Italy has never been a sender nation. What I’m saying is zero adoptions from Italy by Americans—none! I checked all the way back to 1998.”

  “But…?”

  “But … that changed two years ago. And I’m not talking two or three adoptions a year. Since the spring of 2013, it’s totally spiked.”

  “How many?”

  “Forty-one.”

  Forty-one! Almost two a month.

  “So, no U.S. adoptions from Italy for fifteen years, and all of a sudden it jumps to twenty a year? Why hasn’t somebody at State noticed the change? Why is this thing still under the radar?”

  “Probably because Italy’s an Adoption Convention signatory—that’s the Hague treaty that covers child protection and intercountry adoptions. No one worries about Convention country files because they’re supposed to be righteous. The State Department focuses on places like Guatemala and Cambodia where baby-stealing keeps hitting the news.”

  Sarah chewed on that for a second. “Thanks, Dickie. I really appreciate it. Keep this to yourself. I’ll get back to you.”

  “Don’t go after those guys yourself, babe. Call in the troops.”

  “What troops? I’m on my own here. The U.S. consul’s implicated, and the rest of our CBP guys are posted over on the mainland. Apart from Marco, I don’t even know which locals I can trust.”

  “Then Miami should send you some backup.”

  “They seem more interested in screening shipments. It’s like they care more about counterfeit goods than counterfeit children.”

  “Exceptionalism.”

  “What?”

  “Same old bullshit. America is unique. America is superior to all other nations. America supports international law, but only as long as Americans are exempt from it. They’re probably thinking, what the hell, if this is happening, these kids are getting a huge break in life. They get to grow up in the greatest country in the world instead of some foreign hellhole.”

  “I have no idea what they’re thinking, Dickie. All I know is I’m supposed to be working the Green Channel and screening half-drowned refugees while babies are being bought and sold on the black market like exotic pets. If nobody else wants to get involved, I guess it’s up to me.”

  19

  Autumn is historically the wettest season in Sicily, and this year was no exception. A week ago, from her lair inside the culvert, Sarah had mentally mapped out the most secure route to the rear of the orphanage. Tonight, she was following that route in heavy rain. It was nearly one in the morning when she finished picking her way by penlight along the igneous margins of the Alcantara Gorge. Leaving the river behind, her path took her through an olive grove and up the broad, soggy slope of a vineyard that was still dense with unharvested table grapes. The rush of the downpour masked the rhythm of her squelching steps.

  But it couldn’t mask a memory …

  A memory that came down with the rain …

  With gritted teeth, she trudged on.

  Her target was the small outbuilding set against the east wall of the main structure. At first, watching from the hillside above, Sarah had thought it might be a utility room, or maybe a laundry. But the well-dressed woman she’d watched repeatedly enter and leave hadn’t been carrying a laundry basket. During her most recent surveillance, earlier today, she’d noticed that the orphanage’s power and phone lines from the street terminated at a single point under the eaves of the annex.

  Whatever it was, she’d decided to take a look.

  When she reached the grime-covered window in the back wall, her suspicion that the annex might be an office was confirmed. It contained a desk and chair, a landline telephone, and a rusting filing cabinet.

  A lamp on the desk had been left on. Right next to it lay a file folder.

  Marco had promised his help, and she knew he was sincere. But now was not the time to worry about finicky prosecutors, search warrant applications, and the near certainty that Marco’s superiors would report Sarah’s activities to Miami.

  She rounded to the front of the annex. She’d noticed during her surveillance that the woman wasn’t consistent about locking the door.

  It opened.

  She stood still and studied the floor near the threshold. The tiles exhibited muddy evidence of recent entries. A few extra footprints wouldn’t be noticed. She stepped inside and shut the door.

  First … check the exits.

  There was only the one door, and a single window in the rear wall. It was small, barely large enough for her to crawl through in an emergency. Fortunately, unlike the windows in the main building, it didn’t have bars. She tried the window latch. It released easily. The frame was designed to swing out from the bottom. She tested it.

  Satisfied, she stepped to the desk and opened the file folder. It only took her a few seconds to realize that it was an adoption file.

  A complete adoption file.

  Every step in the paperwork Renate Richter and Father Giardini had described to her was right there. The female adoptee’s fictitious baptismal name was Gisella Pelizon. The adopting parents were a couple named Eden. On one document, the words ANTHONY NICOSIA, CONSUL, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA appeared in type beneath a scrawled signature. Immediately below that was another signature above a name she didn’t recognize, but a title she did: BENEDICT J. HUNTER, ADJUDICATIONS OFFICER, UNITED STATES CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION SERVICES.

  A small piece of notepaper stapled to the inside front cover of the file caught her attention. It was only two short lines of handwriting, but it suddenly made everything clear.

  It was the key piece in the puzzle.

  She used her phone to photograph the note.

  She was about to photograph each document in the folder when she heard it.

  The sound of braking tires sliding on gravel.

  The sound came from right outside the door.

  She quickly slid the file back to its original position, darted to the window, and launched herself out. For a nerve-jangling second, her coat pocket caught on the latch, but she managed to free herself. She heard a car door slam as she slid headfirst onto the soaking grass behind the annex. Springing into a crouch, she pushed the window frame down. It hung loosely, leaving an open gap about an inch wide.

  Just in time.

  A blaze of light spilled out through the window.

  Quickly regaining her feet, Sarah risked a quick look. The office door stood wide open, and the room was bright from the glare of headlights.

  A silhouette was standing at the desk.

  It was the middle-aged woman she’d seen before. As Sarah watched, she picked up the folder and shoved it into a voluminous purse. She was about to switch off the desk lamp, but her hand stopped in midair.

  Sarah pulled back.

  Again, just in time.

&nbs
p; The light through the window diminished. A hand appeared, pushing the window outward. Sarah retreated quickly around the closest corner. Long seconds passed. Finally, she heard the faint scrape of the latch. She waited. She heard the office door close, heard a key in the lock, and then a car door slam. She eased to the next corner in time to see the car rolling to a stop at the entrance to the main building. The woman got out and opened the rear door closest to the building. Immediately, a younger woman appeared carrying a baby wrapped in a blanket. She ducked into the rear compartment. The driver locked the building. She got back behind the wheel and drove away.

  Sarah hadn’t been able to get a fix on the make of the car. All she knew for sure was that it was a white, late-model four-door with a plate number that began with the letters EM.

  She watched the taillights flare at the end of the long driveway and then swing east. She had a damned good idea where the car was headed.

  She faced a choice. Force her way back into the office and search the desk and filing cabinet … or start running.

  She ran.

  It took her ten minutes to get back to where she’d left her car.

  She got in and drove like hell for Catania.

  20

  The general cargo freighter Atromos III was built in 1990. At 340 feet, she was well within the five-hundred-foot limit on vessels permitted access to the port, but with over twenty feet of draft, she was close to the limit of vessels able to go alongside at Catania’s primary cargo pier. It was nearing peak tide, and the captain was a cautious man. He was getting ready to sail.

  “What are we doing here?” Marco asked. “Those containers went aboard last night, just as your Homeland people asked. I watched them being loaded myself.”

  He was standing at Sarah’s side, watching the Atromos III. The activity under the floodlights on the dock made it plain that the vessel was being readied for departure. Sarah had roused him from his bed and persuaded him to meet her on the roof of a Port Authority suboffice next to the fuel dock. She’d been standing there in the dark for half an hour before he finally showed up.