The corridor was dingy, clearly disused. Emotion stabbed at Rico, and he suppressed it. There was no time for emotion now. None at all. Methodically he walked along the length of the corridor, testing each handle. Each one yielded to an empty room. They must have been servants’ quarters at some point.
The fifth door refused to yield. He paused a moment, listening. There was no sound. Had she tried to scream? Or would she have realised it was bound to be pointless? No one would hear her here.
Emotion stabbed again, like a hornet stinging him. He suppressed it once more. He felt the strength of the lock with his hand, twisting the handle, then stepped back.
It hurt. In films it never looked as if it did. But the jarring pain in his shoulder as the door cracked was irrelevant.
What was not was the huddled figure on the
bed. She had just launched up into a sitting position, he could tell.
Even from the shattered doorway he could see the look of terror on her face.
And the streaks of tears.
Her face contorted. Contorted into rage. Fury. Incandescent despair.
‘I’ve got Ben—let’s go.’ He spoke urgently. ‘We have no time—come now. Now.’ His eyes bored at her. ‘Trust me.’
He could see the emotion in her face. An emotion that he never, ever wanted to see again on a woman’s face. Then, abruptly, she hurled herself forward.
‘Where is he?’
‘At the end of the corridor, keeping watch. He thinks it’s a game. He’s not upset—he didn’t realise what was happening. Don’t ask questions—we’ve got one chance to get out of here, and that’s all.’
How long would Luca stay out cold? He had no idea. He only knew that precious minutes were ticking by. He seemed to be divided into two people. One of them was raging with fury—the other was deadly calm. It was the latter he kept uppermost.
‘Ben—’ Her cry was almost a scream, but stifled in her throat.
Rico saw the child turn from his position at the end of the corridor.
‘Mummy—come on.’ He beckoned her furiously, his little face alight with excitement.
The palace was labyrinthine, but Rico knew it like the back of his hand. Knew exactly which levels were most likely to be deserted. He walked rapidly, blood pounding, her suitcase in one hand and Ben’s hand in the other. Ben trotted beside him, his mother behind him, both instructed not to talk, not to ask questions. He mustn’t think, mustn’t feel. Just keep moving. Fast, urgent. Undetected. Every corner was a risk—someone, anyone, could be there.
But there was no one. No one right up to the service door to his own apartments. Ungently, he shoved Ben and his mother inside even as he yanked out his mobile phone and punched a number.
Thank God Gianni was there, in position. He’d phoned him the moment he’d left his brother out cold on the floor, to give him instructions. He snapped the phone shut and turned to Ben.
‘Time for the secret passage,’ he said.
Ben’s mouth opened wide in wonder.
‘Here it is,’ said Rico. He’d crossed to the wall into which a fireplace had been set, and felt for the concealed button that operated the door mechanism. He hadn’t used it in a while, but it still worked, if creakingly, revealing a narrow entrance to an even narrower staircase.
He gave a sudden grin, his mood lightening for a nanosecond.
‘It’s the reason I chose these apartments as a teenager. It was a great way to evade curfew. Come on.’
Ben needed no second invitation. He surged forward, his expression blissful, and Rico had to hold him while he flicked on the interior light, got them all inside, and then shut the door.
The concealed staircase opened into a side street in the palace precincts. The car was waiting, its tinted windows closed. Even so, he made his nephew and his mother lie on the floor of the back seat.
‘Drive,’ he instructed Gianni.
Only as he sat back in his seat, Ben excitedly clutching at his leg and asking him if it were another adventure, did the emotions start to come through.
The violence of them shook him to the core.