Page 113 of The Medici Return

Yes, this man could deliver.

“You have been collecting DNA,” Ascolani said. “Are you directly related to Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici? And to Raffaello de’ Pazzi?”

“I am. I know with certainty about Anna Maria. For Raffaello? I still need a sample, but I am confident it will show a connection too. I just discovered that they were married at Santa Croce.”

“Seems all you need now is the pledge. Sadly, the church’s copy is gone.”

Which explained why Camilla Baines had gone radio-silent. She had nothing to bargain with. Still, “Thankfully, there was a duplicate.”

“But you obviously do not have it, or we would not be standing here talking.”

He caught the arrogance in the observation.

“I am wondering,” Ascolani said. “Did you actually think you could extort our support for your party?”

THOMAS ENTERED THEHOTELDUOMO.

A rather dull, faintly antiquated place too small for any convention or gala, but fashionable and surely overpriced. He’d checked the local geography earlier, after Ascolani’s orders, and determined this would be the best place to do what had to be done. No doorman, only an elderly bellboy and a reception desk staffed by a young, dark-haired man focused on a computer screen.

To his right rose a flight of wooden stairs. To his left lay the entrance to a restaurant. The place was quiet. He headed for the restaurant and watched as the clerk abandoned the front desk and disappeared through a door into a back room. No one else was in the small lobby. He approached and studied the wall behind the desk with its pigeonholed slots for keys and mail. From the room numbers he noted there were four stories, ten rooms to a floor, the keys there for many of them signaling unoccupied. All of them overlooked the piazza, so it did not matter.

But height did.

He stepped around the counter and snatched a key for one of the fourth-floor rooms, then headed for the stairs just as the clerk reappeared through the door.

He came off the stairs on the fourth floor.

Silence reigned down the narrow corridor to the door for Room 408. Along the way he passed a set of emergency stairs that led back down to the ground. Good to know they were there. They would provide an excellent escape route. The hotel was definitely an older establishment, the floors creaking hardwood beneath a thin carpet runner, the walls flaking plaster, the room doors wooden with actual keys to lock and unlock. He tapped on the door for Room 408.

No answer.

He inserted the key and released the lock.

Inside was a pleasant space with two windows and a double bed with nightstands and lamps on either side. A wardrobe and dressing table rounded out the comfortable, but dated, furnishings. A small upholstered sofa sat before the windows and would make a perfect firing platform.

He locked the door, then slid the canvas case from his shoulder and removed the rifle, quickly assembling it with the bipod extended. The settee was too close to the window so he slid it back about two meters. He rested the weapon atop the back and sighted through the scope, parting the curtains enough so he could seebelow. He scanned the piazza through the scope until he found Ascolani, in a wide hat, standing near its center. Exactly where the cardinal said he would be. He’d already familiarized himself with Eric Casaburi from photos on the internet.

Both men were there.

Ascolani’s instructions were clear.

“I will touch the right side of my head in some way to signal for you to be ready. Take the shots when I touch my left side.”

He decided to leave the window closed until the signal came.

So he settled in and waited.

STEFANO KEPT MOVING THROUGH THE MIDDAY CROWD, WHICH EBBEDand flowed. Knots of tourists followed their flag-waving guides in tight schools across the piazza. The more people, the more difficult it would be to find Thomas Dewberry. People seemed to be either enjoying the sun or searching for shade. Off to his right, toward the center of the piazza, he had already spotted Ascolani, who was now talking with Eric Casaburi. Both he and Malone had seen photos of the politician. Hundreds of people stood between himself and them, no danger of being spotted. Malone was behind him, searching the side streets. He checked his watch. 12:05P.M.

The sun was high in the sky, reducing the shadows across the cobbles. The center was as bright as a stage under spotlights.

Malone appeared about fifty feet away and he hustled over.

“The tracker is stationary, and has been for the past few minutes,” Malone said. “He has to be inside there.”

Malone motioned to a four-story corner building.

The Hotel Duomo.

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