Alexei
Oleg closed the back door after I followed Gianna into the car. My driver had already disabled the internal controls on her side. She couldn’t make a mad dash, but the way she gazed out the darkened window kept me tense until the car took off. Oh, she was a worthy opponent.
I’d won our first round, hands down. She wouldn’t be silently stewing on the seat next to me if I hadn’t. That wasn’t to say she hadn’t landed a punch or two, surprised me. My intelligence report needed updating.
Gianna’s eyes remained on the window. Were I in her position, I’d memorize street names as we passed them. Easier to escape or call for help when you knew where you were. Without her phone, she wasn’t calling anyone. Knowing the streets wouldn’t help her where we were heading. Better she waste her time and formidable intelligence on that than something that might work in round two.
The pictures I had of her had led me down the wrong path. They showed a facade; that she put on a false face. Underneath, I’d expected a pampered Mafia princess, somewhat sheltered from the Bastard’s empire, but with enough knowledge to know how he made his money. A little scare, followed by a flash of obscene wealth would have her seeing things my way.
The Bastard pampered Gianna. She wanted for nothing but it seemed that hadn’t made her soft. A little cynical? Maybe she knew more about the Bastard’s sins than I expected. No matter. It made her stronger and my inevitable victory sweeter.
She wore a different face now, possibly another mask. As rigid and as unmoving as her posture, her lips pressed so tightly the skin around them whitened. Well, I wanted her angry, thrown off her game. I got that wish in spades.
The anger did nothing to mar her beauty, yet another thing the pictures I had access to hadn’t done justice to. Understandable, given she’d put on a mask for them, her dutiful daughter facade. That fact made my job that much easier, but I found my eyes lingering on her. I couldn’t let it distract me.
She leaned closer to the window to see the sign for the motorway. Her jaw tightened, eyes narrowed. The realization that we were leaving Rome had to have hit her. Her expression schooled before her attention turned to me.
“So, where are we going?” she asked, voice light but I heard the strain in it.
“I wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise, but it’s a great place to have a private chat,” I replied then snapped my fingers, “speaking of private.”
Gianna’s whole head swung to face my hand at the noise. Her eyes never left it as I reached into my coat. She tensed but relaxed when I pulled out a cell phone. Without looking, her left hand patted the handbag on her lap. Her mask cracked with a pursed frown.
“A kidnapper and now a pickpocket,” she said with a mirthless giggle, “you really know how to charm a woman, don’t you.”
“Not a skill I use often,” I admitted, then grabbed the blocking bag from the pouch on the divider separating the driver’s seat. “But I value my privacy.”
“Is that a Faraday bag?” She leaned closer. “I read that Faraday cages don’t block all the signals from modern phones, the frequencies are much higher than they used to be.”
“This blocks everything, tested it myself,” I replied.
Once I zipped it in, I set it to the side of my chair, the opposite side to Gianna. Her attention remained fixed on me, narrowed eyes, but less out of anger than calculation. She’d surprised me too. A pampered privileged Mafia princess wouldn’t be reading up on Faraday cages.
She looked past me, through the window. Rome’s airport lay to its west, bordering on the Tyrrhenian sea. Gianna must have seen an arriving jet. Her shoulders relaxed and she shook her head.
“You aren’t taking me to the airport,” she stated, no question at all in her tone, “so where are we going.”
“Why aren’t we heading to the airport?” I asked.
Her answer would offer insight into her thinking, something my intelligence report lacked, given the surprises. Instead of answering right away, her head tilted, one eyed narrowed and lips forming a deep frown.
“Airports have their own security and a lot of people inside them.” She hesitated but then a smile took her. “I’d have you in custody the moment we stepped through the door.”
She blinked rapidly, deep breaths expanding her chest, distractingly so. My eyes had dropped by the time she started babbling in Italian, way too quick for me to understand. She’d raised the tone of her voice, sounding almost preteen. Yeah, that’d have security on me in an instant.
“I guess it’s a good thing we aren’t heading to the airport,” I said after her performance ended.
“Still not going to tell me?” Her dramatic frown came complete with puppy dog eyes. In another circumstance, if we’d simply been a guy and a girl, she probably would have goaded me into answering.
“If I had a private jet, we could have avoided the crowds and security,” I replied, ignoring her question the best I could.
“If you were Italian, a Mafioso, maybe you could pull that off.” Her head tilted, eyes narrow as she considered my words. “I don’t think you have the connections you’d need to pull that off here. Buy off a guard or two, sure, but they won’t roll the red carpet out for some outsider.”
“Not a bad analysis,” I admitted. She’d shown just how shrewd she was already, but the profile I’d made up on her continued to change.
“But you’re still not going to share where you are taking me?” she asked in a monotone voice.
I remained silent, a slight grin on my face at her second attempt with the puppy dog eyes. It surprised me she hadn’t asked about the other possibilities. Rome’s airport was by the sea, after all.
Gianna followed my lead, pouting, but with a closed mouth. Her eyes widened when my driver pulled onto the road next to the sea wall. She glared at the water and shook her head.
“This is why my father warned me about letting a kidnapper take me to a second location,” she grumbled, turning that glare to me. “You could abscond with me to at least a dozen countries in a boat and that’s not even leaving the Mediterranean. What’s our destination?”
“Dinner, like I said earlier,” I replied, unable to keep a smile off my face when she scowled my way. “I told you it would be private.”
Her only answer came with a huff and a head shake. My driver stopped in front of the stairs down to Ostia’s jetty. The manmade harbor contained several long piers packed with small motorboats. This late in the day, with the sun just about setting on the western horizon, few people were in the area, something I assumed Gianna noticed, judging by her sigh.
Oleg stepped out of the passenger seat and opened my door. I slid out and turned to offer a hand to my guest. From the withering glare she gave it, I might as well have been made out of lava. Still a long way to go, it seemed.