“That’s because she changed her name after the Noodle Incident.”
For a second, Rake thought he was going to have a stroke. Half his body seemed to go numb and the other half heated up, like he was some kind of weird Iceman/Human Torch Marvel hybrid. He opened his mouth and let out a tiny croak, all the noise he could muster, since his saliva had dried up.
Finally: “The Noodle Incident we promised each other we’d never talk about. Which is why she changed her name to Nedra Naseef,” he said, and if he’d had any doubts, Lillith’s beam was answer enough.
Fourteen
Eight years ago
“This is no way to live,” the woman who was going to change her name from whatever it was
(Debra? Dana?)
to Nedra Naseef commented. “I’m not reliving my childhood. The first time was bad enough.”
“Guh,” Rake replied, because he was too exhausted to attempt words of more than one syllable. Armed with an out-of-date Fodor’s, he and the cute brunette he met at the Bridge of Sighs had decided to find the infamous Cruising Pavilion and christen it. And by “met,” he meant “was bowled over by.” In fact, he’d heard her
(“It’s called the Bridge of Sighs because it was the last thing prisoners saw before they were locked up! For years! And sometimes tortured! Brutally! It is not romantic in the slightest, morons!”)
before he saw her. One thing about American tourists, you can always spot them. Or hear them. Often without trying! His admiration only increased when he saw the petite brunette with the curves of a courtesan and the mouth
(“Oh, I’m out of line? You’re the shithead who thinks it’s romantic to take a selfie where dead men were chained up! So go fuck yourself!”)
of a Red Sox fan.
“Bad enough I’m falling back into bad habits,” Nedra was saying, pulling her woefully grass-stained shirt back over her head, “but the Cruising Pavilion isn’t even a club. It’s an exhibition. A closed one,” she added in a mutter, as if an art exhibit should be open at 1:30 A.M. on a Tuesday.
“Toldja.” Hey, two syllables! Maybe his heart rate was starting to come down. “But I like how this little park served as a handy substitute.”
“Not to mention,” she continued, as if he hadn’t spoken, “it’s an exhibit about homosexual cruising.”
“What?” He sat up from where he’d sprawled on the grass. “But that means we did it all wrong!”
She gaped at him for a moment, then let out a string of giggles. “We’ll never be able to hold our heads up in high society again. Or low society.”
“Oh, the humanity,” he agreed.
“And don’t take this the wrong way, but we’re never to speak of this again.”
“The screwing-up gay sex part, or the—”
“All of it. Any of it. It’s gonna be the thing we know about but never talk about, like the Noodle Incident trope.”
“Weird. But fine. But I think you’re overreacting. It’s not like we’ve done anything wr—”
“Polizia! Sei in arresto per aver commesso un atto osceno in un luogo pubblico!”
“Oh hell,” she groaned. “It’s my senior prom all over again.”
“Osceno? Obscene?” Rake yelped at the cops coming forward. “It was beautiful, dammit!”
Fifteen
“… so then we paid the five-hundred-euro fine and went our separate ways and I never saw her again. And we were sort of … uh … banned.”
“Uh-huh.”
“From the city of Venice.”
“Oh.”
“For life.”
“Ah.”
“Our kids, too. They were pretty mad—the cops, the mayor, the guy in charge of keeping the park sex-free…”
“That’s not fair,” Lillith protested. She tossed the latest wet washcloth on the floor for emphasis. “I didn’t do anything. I don’t want to be banned. What if I want to go to the Accademia di Belle Arti?”
All Rake could do was shrug an apology and wonder, yet again, when he was going to wake up.
“So you did know Donna,” Delaney said, blatantly ignoring the beauty of the tale of tender lovemaking to hone in on one teeny insignificant detail.
“Briefly.” He wasn’t sure how much of this was appropriate in front of Lillith. None of it would be his first guess. “Okay, so—I was wrong, I did know your mom.” And to Delaney, because it was time to face up to the inevitable: “You said the DNA results will be back in a couple of days?”
“Yep. But that’s not your only problem.”
“My missing money,” he said glumly.
She waved away the looming problem of his vanished fortune. “Not that, either.”
“There are bigger problems than a mystery kid—no offense, Lillith—and finding myself broke in a forbidden city with dried shit in my hair?”
“Yes. Because we don’t know if Donna’s death was an accident. Myself, I’m not a fan of coincidences. But I don’t like conspiracy theories, either. Here it is: Donna found out something, either by accident or because she was falling into old habits. That I can tell you for sure. But I don’t know what it was. She sent me some paperwork the week she died.…”
“What kind of paperwork?”
“Some letters, and the fact that she thought you might be Lillith’s father. She also referenced a flash drive … but that’s it. I don’t know where the flash drive is or what was on it. And I couldn’t make that my first priority, because finding Lillith was my first priority. And now that she’s with me, there are still questions to be answered. And if Donna’s death was an accident, that still leaves the issue of Lillith’s minority.”
“I can take care of myself.” The child sniffed.
Delaney smiled. “I don’t doubt it, but that’s not what your mother would have wanted. Right?”
“Right.”
“All that sounds bad,” Rake observed.
“Tell me. So we have to figure out what’s going on pretty damned quick, because we’re way behind. And we have to keep Lillith safe, because she could very well be in danger.” To Lillith: “Sorry to be so blunt.”
“You don’t have to apologize. Mama always said it’s worse to keep quiet about trouble.…”
Oh, is that what the thieving blackmailer taught you?
“… and pollomerda to pretend it’s not there.”
Rake blinked and wondered if society’s rules against children saying chickenshit in casual conversation applied if the child in question swore in another language.
Best not to dwell.
“And that’s where I come in,” he guessed.
“Unfortunately.”
“Hey!”
“You’re plan D,” Delaney continued, “the backup plan to the backup plan’s backup plan.”
“I’ll have you know I’ve never been plan D in my life,” he said hotly. “I’m always plan B!” Huh. This is a weird thing to brag about.