Julia ’ s erratic lifestyle hadn ’ t fazed her parents. But why did it take a week for the Italians to inform the FBI a senator ’ s daughter had gone missing on their soil? He quizzed Nishimura.
“Alessia had no idea who Julia was. They ’ d only met a week earlier. She had Julia ’ s passport when she filed the report and Italian police made a copy of it. The law prevents Italian authorities from sequestering foreign passports, even that of a criminal.”
The implication was clear to Blackwell. The Italians don ’ t make use of machine-readable passports to identify persons of interest at the local police level. So they must have assumed Julia was one of many Americans reported missing each year, only to turn up drunk in Florence or Siena a few days later.
“When were we first notified?”
“Wednesday afternoon.”
Blackwell observed how Monica and the other three agents listened to the case details being rehashed for him. They had probably endured at least three other brain-numbing sessions identical to this one. No one in the room seemed to mind, but Blackwell used to loathe having to deliver or listen to a briefing more than once.
“On the same night Julia was reported missing, another incident occurred close to the bar.” Yet another click and a satellite map of the scene of the crime appeared on center screen.
Nishimura fiddled with the remote control like it was an extension of his fingers, to zoom in the map by a few factors.
“The blue dot you see there is the bar in question in the San Calisto square, a lively area. But if you move six hundred feet away—right where you see the red dot here on Via di San Francesco a Ripa—the scenery changes dramatically. Very quiet and residential. The red dot is the location of a small bank with an ATM machine. The same night Julia disappeared, an elderly lady who lives across from the bank reported hearing a woman screaming at around ten forty-five.”
Blackwell scribbled hard on his makeshift timeline. Nishimura played the audio from the security cameras at the bank. Julia ’ s chilling scream echoed in the room. Even the most jaded of the other agents, like Slant, seemed as disturbed as Blackwell was by the raw fear in Julia ’ s voice.
“That ’ s all we got from the ATM cameras at the bank. Nothing happens on the video. By the time the elderly woman looked out of her window, the screaming was drowned out by loud music.”
A 3-D reconstruction of the scene of Julia ’ s abduction replaced the map on the screen.
“According to the witness, she saw a white van with a man standing outside, his back to her. There was another dude inside the vehicle wearing what she described as a Venetian mask—”
Monica interrupted him. “We don ’ t know for sure it ’ s a Venetian mask, Liam. The old lady said the mask was smiling—that makes a world of difference.”
Blackwell caught Nishimura discreetly rolling his eyes. There was a rift between him and Monica. The kid had balls. Good.
The young agent continued without acknowledging his superior ’ s interjection. He explained that the man in the mask saw the older woman spying on them and formed an imaginary gun with his right hand, which he pretended to fire at her face in a menacing way. She retreated, then filed a police report on Saturday morning at the same station where Alessia Di Lorenzo had reported Julia missing. A police car dispatched to the scene found a silver pendant on the ground, near where the woman had seen the van the night before.
A close-up image of the pendant came on screen. The phrase The Price of Freedom is the Freedom of a Price was engraved around it.
“This exhibit was ID ’ d by the senator as his daughter ’ s pendant. It ’ s a family thing they all wear. The women have pendants and the men have rings.”
“What happened next?”
“On Wednesday morning, the station clerk was logging evidence exhibits from the previous week and was baffled by something she
“Alessia had no idea who Julia was. They ’ d only met a week earlier. She had Julia ’ s passport when she filed the report and Italian police made a copy of it. The law prevents Italian authorities from sequestering foreign passports, even that of a criminal.”
The implication was clear to Blackwell. The Italians don ’ t make use of machine-readable passports to identify persons of interest at the local police level. So they must have assumed Julia was one of many Americans reported missing each year, only to turn up drunk in Florence or Siena a few days later.
“When were we first notified?”
“Wednesday afternoon.”
Blackwell observed how Monica and the other three agents listened to the case details being rehashed for him. They had probably endured at least three other brain-numbing sessions identical to this one. No one in the room seemed to mind, but Blackwell used to loathe having to deliver or listen to a briefing more than once.
“On the same night Julia was reported missing, another incident occurred close to the bar.” Yet another click and a satellite map of the scene of the crime appeared on center screen.
Nishimura fiddled with the remote control like it was an extension of his fingers, to zoom in the map by a few factors.
“The blue dot you see there is the bar in question in the San Calisto square, a lively area. But if you move six hundred feet away—right where you see the red dot here on Via di San Francesco a Ripa—the scenery changes dramatically. Very quiet and residential. The red dot is the location of a small bank with an ATM machine. The same night Julia disappeared, an elderly lady who lives across from the bank reported hearing a woman screaming at around ten forty-five.”
Blackwell scribbled hard on his makeshift timeline. Nishimura played the audio from the security cameras at the bank. Julia ’ s chilling scream echoed in the room. Even the most jaded of the other agents, like Slant, seemed as disturbed as Blackwell was by the raw fear in Julia ’ s voice.
“That ’ s all we got from the ATM cameras at the bank. Nothing happens on the video. By the time the elderly woman looked out of her window, the screaming was drowned out by loud music.”
A 3-D reconstruction of the scene of Julia ’ s abduction replaced the map on the screen.
“According to the witness, she saw a white van with a man standing outside, his back to her. There was another dude inside the vehicle wearing what she described as a Venetian mask—”
Monica interrupted him. “We don ’ t know for sure it ’ s a Venetian mask, Liam. The old lady said the mask was smiling—that makes a world of difference.”
Blackwell caught Nishimura discreetly rolling his eyes. There was a rift between him and Monica. The kid had balls. Good.
The young agent continued without acknowledging his superior ’ s interjection. He explained that the man in the mask saw the older woman spying on them and formed an imaginary gun with his right hand, which he pretended to fire at her face in a menacing way. She retreated, then filed a police report on Saturday morning at the same station where Alessia Di Lorenzo had reported Julia missing. A police car dispatched to the scene found a silver pendant on the ground, near where the woman had seen the van the night before.
A close-up image of the pendant came on screen. The phrase The Price of Freedom is the Freedom of a Price was engraved around it.
“This exhibit was ID ’ d by the senator as his daughter ’ s pendant. It ’ s a family thing they all wear. The women have pendants and the men have rings.”
“What happened next?”
“On Wednesday morning, the station clerk was logging evidence exhibits from the previous week and was baffled by something she
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