A small field sat across the road at the back of the building. There were some picnic tables there. He walked over and sat on the top of a table — the benches themselves had inexplicably disappeared. He took a long pull from the water bottle, then leaned back, arms behind him, inhaling and exhaling in long, deep breaths.
A flight of Eurofighters took off with a loud rush, roaring into the air. Turk watched their bodies glow silver as they climbed, melting into a white light as they turned in the sky. Rising into the mid-morning sun, they turned black, vanishing into tiny daggers as they turned once more, this time toward Africa.
As the sound of the jet engines faded, he gradually became aware of the shouts of children. Remembering his soccer game the other day, he got up off the table, hopped the short fence, and walked in that direction.
The day care building was on the other side of the road, just beyond a low-slung barracks type building that was temporarily unused. The shouts were coming from a small group playing tag in the corner of the yard. Turk watched them for a few seconds, deciphering the rules, which seemed unusually free-flowing.
“You have children yourself?”
The woman’s voice startled him. Turk turned abruptly and saw Captain Li Pike, the Warthog pilot from Shooter Squadron. In her arms was a cardboard box so big her chin barely rose above it.
“No, I don’t have any kids,” said Turk. “You?”
“Not yet.”
“Oh.”
He took that to mean that she was married, but when he glanced at her hand, she didn’t have a ring.
“When my career gets under control,” Li added. “Then maybe we’ll see.”
“What’s your husband think?”
“I’m not married.”
“Boyfriend?”
“I don’t have a boyfriend. No time yet. Like I said, when my career gets under control.”
“Makes sense.”
She smiled, and he felt like a fool — it was the sort of indulgent smile you gave a simpleton.
“What’s with the box?” he asked.
“Oh, we took up a little collection and got the kids a few puzzles and games,” said Li. “It was the colonel’s suggestion. They’re on a limited budget.”
“Really?”
“The shelves are kind of bare. They gave us a tour the first day — I think they saw women in the squadron and thought that’s what we would be interested in. Italians.”
Her smile was so beautiful it was almost a weapon.
“Let me help you with the box,” he told her.
“Oh, it’s not heavy.”
Turk took it anyway, then followed her around to the side of the building. There was no one at the door or in the hallway; they went along to the first classroom. Li knocked tentatively, then inched in.
Some of the children spotted her peeking in and began to laugh. She pushed the door open wide, greeting the teacher and explaining, in English, that they had brought the things they had promised the other day. The colonel, she added, was sorry that she couldn’t come herself.
The teacher’s English was limited and heavily accented, but she greeted Li warmly, and told the children in Italian that the American pilots had brought them some presents. Turk, meanwhile, went over to a table near the front and put the box down.
“Il Americano!” said one of the children, running over. Within seconds Turk found himself surrounded by the soccer players, who were chattering in Italian.
“I don’t understand a word you’re saying,” he told the boys.
“We will play,” said one of the children. “Football.”
“Soccer,” said Turk.
“They were playing football with you the day two ago,” said the teacher. “You are good, no?”
“No,” said Turk. “They are very good.”
“They want to play with you now. It is almost time for their, how do you say?”
“Game?”
“Yes, game. That is a good word.”
Turk glanced at Li, who stood with her arms folded, a bemused expression on her face.
“You gonna play?” he asked her.
“I have work, Captain. I’m the maintenance officer. I’ll see you later.”
“Sure.”
The boys had retrieved three soccer balls and were already urging him toward the door.
“Just a little while,” he told them. “Five minutes.”
“Cinque minuti,” said the teacher. “Cinque. Solamente.”
“What she said,” Turk told them. “Exactly.”
9
The pilot Kharon normally used to get back and forth in Libya didn’t respond to his messages, and not wanting to wait, he booked on a commercial flight to Sicily, flying on Tunis Air, which was doing a booming business ferrying people in and out of the country. Kharon’s final destination was on the east coast, near Catania, but getting a flight there involved no less than three transfers. Renting a car and driving from Palermo made more sense and gave him greater flexibility. It also meant he would be able to arrive armed.
He had determined that Rubeo was at the base by following the movements of his private company plane, whose registration was public. He wasn’t yet sure where the scientist was staying — there were a half-dozen likely possibilities — but that was a solvable problem.
The more important question was how he would kill him.
Ironically, he had not planned the actual event. He had been so focused on the other aspects that he failed to map it out.
But murder was best executed on the spur of the moment. To plan that too carefully — certainly, he would leave clues that would be discovered and trip him up.
And after all, what had his planning otherwise gotten him? Rubeo so far had not been touched by the disaster of his prideful invention.
Kharon was more than a little out of his element in the tough precincts of Palermo, and he knew that no amount of intellect could substitute for street savvy. But he wanted to obtain a gun, and he knew that this was the easiest place to do it, as long as he was willing to overpay.
He stopped first at a legitimate gun shop, where he had no luck; the owner told him that since he was not an Italian citizen, he could not obtain a license at the local police station, and therefore he could not buy the weapon. But at least Kharon learned what the actual procedure was.
It was not particularly onerous — one was required to register the gun at the local police station, a practice the gun dealer hinted was not always strictly followed. But it was impossible to register if you were a foreigner. Anyone even suspected of being from outside Italy — as Kharon’s poor accent undoubtedly made clear — would be immediately asked for identification.
Armed with the information, he decided that the easiest approach would be to simply claim he was an Italian citizen, back to the country after spending many years in America. All he needed were documents that would prove he was Italian.
Such documents were valuable not only to new immigrants, but to legitimate citizens who wanted to avoid the hassle of getting official records from city hall. A web search of news sources showed that two years before there had been a raid on several tobacconists accused of selling these papers; the list was an obvious pointer on where he should go.
The first was closed. The second was in the lobby of an expensive looking hotel. The only clerk Kharon could find was a young man who gave him a befuddled look when he mentioned that he needed new documents. Kharon told him a story about having lost his driver’s license — the story he had seen indicated that many of the customers of the phony docs bought them to escape the bureaucracy and fees involved in getting replacements. But the young man seemed indifferent.