Page 66 of Identity Unknown
“He was sure someone was following him. He said that since he’d arrived in Rome he kept seeing the same person. First, when he was waiting for a taxi outside Fiumicino Airport. Then the next day when he was walking through the Piazza della Rotonda. And the day after that when he was returning from the Vatican Observatory.”
“A man or a woman?” I’m taking notes.
“It was hard to tell.” Her voice trembles. “But he thought it was a woman, about my same height and slender, wearing a black baseball cap. He didn’t notice her hair and assumed itwas very short. She looked to be in her thirties or forties with scars on her face. Each time he saw her she was wearing dark glasses, a long leather coat and the cap.”
“When he’d notice her, did he get the sense that she was aware of him?” I envision Carrie Grethen’s androgynously pretty face and the scars from our last encounter.
“He wasn’t sure if she noticed him but felt she did,” Sabina is saying. “He told me he picked up a very bad energy from her.”
“And he had no clue who this person might be?”
“He said he didn’t, but if something happened to him, to remember how much I mean to him.” She can barely talk. “He’s all I have, Kay! It’s always been just the two of us. What will happen now?”
“I’ll make arrangements to send the ashes,” I tell her delicately. “Then he can be buried with your family if that’s what you wish.”
“He would not want that. You know how he felt about our family. He would want to be buried in Alexandria,” she sobs. “It’s been his home for many years.”
“Is there someone you can call? Someone who can come over? I don’t want you to be alone.”
But she’s crying too hard to answer, quickly getting off the phone. My heart hurts as if someone is squeezing it, and I step into the bathroom, closing the door.
The cargo pants and polo shirt I put on this morning are wilted and clammy. I can’t get undressed fast enough, stuffing my clothing into a trash bag liner I find under the sink. Peelingopen a bar of soap withLangley Innon the wrapper, I step into the shower.
I close my eyes in the floral-scented steam, scrubbing and shampooing away death and disaster, letting the hot water drum my neck and shoulders. When I’m done, I’m much better. I feel a resolve settling over me as I put on a bathrobe and blow-dry my hair. Sipping my drink, I look at my face in the mirror over the sink. I recognize the hard set of my mouth, the perfectly calm expression, my anger a steady flame that won’t waver.
The harm she’s done yet again. I realize there’s no proof it was Carrie Grethen following Sal in Rome. We can’t be sure she’s responsible for what’s happened to him. But I know what I feel. I probably know what she feels too every time she looks in the mirror just as I’m doing. Using my fingers to comb back my hair, I study my face.
For an instant I see myself as I looked when Sal and I first met. I envision the Kay Scarpetta he fell for, and then the reflection staring back is who I am now. I don’t look the same. Yet I feel the same in the important ways. But I’m losing people who should still be here, and she’s not finished. I don’t want to lose anyone else, and I return to the kitchen, the microwave oven beeping.
“Almost ready.” Benton lifts out the cardboard containers, setting them down on the counter.
“It’s sounding like someone was following Sal in Rome last month. Yet he didn’t say a word to me. Maybe not to anyone except Sabina. The choices we make in life, and here we are.” I take a swallow of my drink, feeling a spark of anger toward him.
A part of me wants to yell at Sal. He knew better and should have been more careful. He should have told me. Or Benton. Or someone.
“Choices we don’t fully understand at the time. In fact, I’m not sure we understand them at all.” Benton wraps his arms around me. “Learning from our mistakes is the circle of life,” he says into my hair. “You smell good.”
“Air Force shampoo.” I pass on the rest of what Sabina said.
“The question is whether someone was really following Sal.” Benton opens takeout boxes, steam rising. “And was it Carrie Grethen.”
“He wouldn’t have noticed her unless she wanted him to. If he saw her scarred face, then that’s exactly what she intended.”
“To taunt and goad us. To play her games,” Benton says. “It’s precisely the sort of thing she’d do and has done before.”
“I suppose it’s possible that Sal just thought he was seeing the same person. Maybe he was mistaken.”
“Carrie followed him in Rome and wanted us to know. Plain and simple.” Opening a cupboard, Benton finds two plates. “She wants our attention and knows how to get it.” He’s said this in the past, and the thought is enraging.
“Toying with us. Cat and mouse. Her specialty,” I reply as Benton begins serving our dinner.
“Buttermilk fried chicken, fries, and green beans cooked with bacon,” he says. “Also, mashed potatoes.”
“Very considerate of you to get the diet special.” I kiss him.
“By now I think I know what you like after a godawful day.”
“You do. More than anyone.”