Day Of Confession

2

Italy . Friday, July 3, 10:20 a.m.

Father Daniel Addison dozed lightly in a window seat near the back of the tour bus, his senses purposefully concentrated on the soft whine of the diesel and hum of the tires as the coach moved north along the Autostrada toward Assisi.

Dressed in civilian clothes, he had his clerical garments and toiletries in a small bag on the overhead rack above, his glasses and identification papers tucked into the inside pocket of the nylon windbreaker he wore over jeans and a short-sleeved shirt. Father Daniel was thirty-three and looked like a graduate student, an everyday tourist traveling alone. Which was what he wanted.

An American priest assigned to the Vatican, he had been living in Rome for nine years and going to Assisi for almost as long. Birthplace of the humble priest who became a saint, the ancient town in the Umbrian hills had given him a sense of cleansing and grace that put him more in touch with his own spiritual journey than any place he'd ever been. But now that journey was in shambles, his faith all but destroyed. Confusion, dread, and fear overrode everything. Keeping any shred of sanity at all was a major psychological struggle. Still, he was on the bus and going. But with no idea what he would do or say when he got there.

In front of him, the twenty or so other passengers chatted or read or rested as he did, enjoying the cool of the coach's air-conditioning. Outside, the summer heat shimmered in waves across the rural landscape, ripening crops, sweetening vineyards, and, little by little, decaying the few ancient walls and fortresses that still existed here and there and were visible in the distance as the bus passed.

Letting himself drift, Father Daniel's thoughts went to Harry and the call he'd left on his answering machine in the hours just before dawn. He wondered if Harry had even picked up the message. Or, if he had, if he'd been resentful of it and had not called back on purpose. It was a chance he had taken. He and Harry had been estranged since they were teenagers. It had been eight years since they'd spoken, ten since they'd seen each other. And that had been only briefly, when they'd gone back to Maine for the funeral of their mother. Harry had been twenty-six then, and Danny twenty-three. It was not unreasonable to assume that by now Harry had written his younger brother off and simply no longer gave a damn.

But, at that moment, what Harry thought or what had kept them apart hadn't mattered. All Danny wanted was to hear Harry's voice, to somehow touch him and to ask for his help. He had made the call as much out of fear as love, and because there had been nowhere else to turn. He had become part of a horror from which there was no return. One that would only grow darker and become more obscene. And because of it, he knew he might very well die without ever touching his brother again.

A movement down the aisle in front of him shook him from his muse. A man was walking toward him. He was in his early forties, clean shaven, and dressed in a light sport coat and khaki trousers. The man had gotten on the bus at the last moment, just as it was pulling out of the terminal in Rome. For a moment Father Daniel thought he might pass and go into the lavatory behind him. Instead, he stopped at his side.

'You're American, aren't you?' he said with a British accent.

Father Daniel glanced past him. The other passengers were riding as they had been, looking out, talking, relaxing. The nearest, a half dozen seats away.

'Yes…'

'I thought so.' The man grinned broadly. He was pleasant, even jovial. 'My name is Livermore. I'm English if you can't tell. Do you mind if I sit down?' Without waiting for a reply, he slid into the seat next to Father Daniel.

'I'm a civil engineer. On vacation. Two weeks in Italy. Next year it's the States. Never been there before. Been kind of asking Yanks as I meet them where I should visit.' He was talky, even pushy, but pleasant about it, and that seemed to be his manner. 'Mind if I ask what part of the country you're from?'

'- Maine…' Something was wrong, but Father Daniel wasn't sure what it was.

'That would be up the map a bit from New York, yes?'

'Quite a bit…' Again Father Daniel looked toward the front of the bus. Passengers the same as before. Busy with what they were doing. None looking back. His eyes came back to Livermore in time to see him glance at the emergency exit in the seat in front of them.

'You live in Rome?' Livermore smiled amiably.

Why had he looked at the emergency exit? What was that for? 'You asked if I was American. Why would you think I lived in Rome?'

'I've been there off and on. You look familiar, that's all.' Livermore 's right hand was in his lap, but his left was out of sight. 'What do you do?'

The conversation was innocent, but it wasn't. 'I'm a writer…'

'What do you write?'

'For American television…'

'No, you don't.' Abruptly Livermore 's demeanor changed. His eyes hardened, and he leaned in, pressing against Father Daniel. 'You're a priest.'

'What?'

'I said you're a priest. You work at the Vatican. For Cardinal Marsciano.'

Father Daniel stared at him. 'Who are you?'

Livermore 's left hand came up. A small automatic was in it. A silencer squirreled to the barrel. 'Your executioner.'

At the same instant a digital timer beneath the bus clicked to 00:00. A split second later there was a thundering explosion. Livermore vanished. Windows blew out. Seats and bodies flew. A scything piece of razor-sharp steel decapitated the driver, sending the bus careening right, crushing a white Ford against the guardrail. Bouncing off it, the bus came crashing back through traffic, a screaming, whirling, twenty-ton fireball of burning steel and rubber. A motorcycle rider disappeared under its wheels. Then it clipped the rear of a big-rig truck and spun sideways. Slamming into a silver-gray Lancia, the bus carried it full force through the center divider, throwing it directly into the path of an oncoming gasoline tanker.

Reacting violently, the tanker driver jammed on his brakes, jerking the wheel right. Wheels locked, tires shrieking, the enormous truck slid forward and sideways, at the same time knocking the Lancia off the bus like a billiard ball and sending the burning coach plunging off the highway and down a steep hill. Tilting up on two wheels, it held for a second, then rolled over, ejecting the bodies of its passengers, many of them dismembered and on fire, across the summer landscape. Fifty yards later it came to a rest, igniting the dry grass in a crackling rush around it.

Seconds afterwards its fuel tank exploded, sending flame and smoke roaring heavenward in a fire storm that raged until there was nothing left but a molten, burned-out shell and a small, insignificant wisp of smoke.