Page 13 of The Sinner and the Priest: Part Two

I stop. Bianchi takes another step, then notices I am not with him and looks back, raising his lantern to illuminate his face. For a moment, we simply stare at one another, years and prisons and exorcisms and Vatican lies suspended between us. He knew me as I was before. I met him as a frightened man pissing his pants, a man relieved to have someone like me on the side of good for once.

“We have known too much to play games, Bianchi.”

“Francesco,” he says, “if I were leading you to execution, I would at least have the decency to let you finish the espresso.”

That nearly gets a smile out of me.

Nearly.

He waits until I am moving again before murmuring, “Do not mistake their faces for safety.”

There it is, the truth.

“I don’t,” I say.

“Good.”

We arrive at the top floor, where a vestibule leads to a single door guarded by a plainclothes security officer. Not the Pope’s Swiss Guard. Not the Vatican Police. This man is off the books, and he ignores us, which means he expects us.

What makes this more unsettling is the location. Only the Roman Curia—the elite of Vatican City —visits the papal apartments. I had been under the impression that the Pope occupied the entire top floor, but now I can see that it’s walled off. The Pope must live on the other side.

The world believes this side doesn’t exist.

I look Bianchi dead in the eye and ask, “Why am I here if my security clearance is reduced?”

“I said consolidated. Not reduced.”

Porca miseria! Damn it. This is the one place I always refused to be. I agreed to become Entity to do God’s work outside these walls, not within them. They either have something to offer me, or I am not going to leave these apartments, despite what Bianchi makes it look like.

He refuses to meet my eyes, takes my lantern, blows it out, but leaves his own lit. Finally, he lifts his gaze.

“You may call him Eminence. You may call him out. I recommend not doing both in the same sentence.” Then, because he knows me too well, he adds in muttered English, “And try not to let him see how much the girl matters before you decide how much you intend to deny it.”

Five

Mercy

The relic is still strapped between my shoulder blades, which means either Wesley is a genius, God is finally on my side, or the Vatican is too busy to check for holy objects tucked down the back of a fake nun’s dress.

The sour nun in blue marches me down the corridor of a large residence. She’s the furthest thing from the magpies at the Hildegard Sisterhood. Our nuns don’t speak, but they feel more alive than this woman. They slam drawers, hide sweets, and judge us with warmth in their eyes. This nun walks as if concrete had been poured into her clothes and left to harden.

My car arrived shortly after Cisco’s, but he stopped at the papal apartments and was ushered off, probably to speak with his superiors. I am being marched to what I suspect is a guest room, but the nun has yet to explain. She stops at a narrow wooden door and unlocks it with an electric fob, swings it open, then steps back.

I peer past her into a room with a single bed, a lonely desk, and a bathroom. A narrow window overlooks the public spaces and, farther back, I see Rome in the distance.

I smile broadly at my guide and speak in English. “This is where they hold the conclave, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Interesting word . . . conclave.”

“Not really.”

I step into the room. “It wasn’t always called that.” I spin back to her, habit whirling, tapping my lip, and frowning. “It was Latin, though, right? Still something to do with a key, but not quite . . . goodness, what was that word?”

“Cum clave,” she replies coldly.

My smile broadens. “Of course.”