F or the third time, Tyler called Grant and couldn’t reach him. Having separated from Grant and the security team earlier in the day, he’d agreed to stay in regular contact. The last time they’d spoken was fifteen minutes ago.
Tyler and Stacy were standing in the nave of San Francesco di Paola, the church that formed the western edge of Piazza del Plebiscito. The church was behind the music stage, and the square was already filling with concertgoers ready for a night of songs and fireworks. Tyler thought the church would be a safe haven until they needed to venture out into the square to meet Orr. Their location would keep him in close proximity to Grant’s team in case Orr made a move early.
They had separated in the afternoon so that Tyler and Stacy could explore Naples, looking for the well Archimedes had identified. With Aiden’s help researching Italian databases and contacting different cultural organizations in the city, they had found four possible wells that might be the one Archimedes was leading them to. They could only hope the well they needed hadn’t been filled in during the intervening years since Orr and Cavano had seen it.
Tyler and Stacy had stopped to look for the sign of Scorpio in each well and found a cluster of dots on the inside of the third one that precisely matched the configuration of the Scorpio constellation. He had called Grant to tell him the location, and that was the last time they had spoken.
“What’s the matter?” Stacy said as Tyler eyed his phone with concern.
“Grant’s not answering.”
“Do you think he can’t get a signal?”
“Unlikely. And if he wasn’t getting one, he’d move somewhere else.”
“Then what happened?”
“I don’t know, but it can’t be good.”
Tyler tried the Neutralizer team members and couldn’t reach them, either. He didn’t like using Grant as bait, but he couldn’t imagine that Orr had been able to get the drop on him and the entire security team.
He put the backpack with the geolabe on the floor and checked the signal for the tracker they’d removed from the geolabe and given to Grant. Instead of broadcasting from the Palazzo Reale, it was en route away from the palace.
“The tracker’s on the move,” he said.
“What?”
“If it’s still with Grant, he’s heading north at a fast clip.”
“What do we do?” Stacy said.
“We abort until we know what happened to Grant.”
“But Carol-”
“Orr won’t kill her yet. Not when he’s this close. We’ll just postpone the meet.”
“Then we need to find Grant.”
“I’m going on my own.”
“But-”
“No buts. I can move faster by myself. I’ll find the tracker and assess the situation. If I can get him myself, I’ll do it. You need to hide someplace safe until I come back.”
“I hate doing that.”
“It’s for my safety, too. As long as you have the geolabe, we still have bargaining power. I’ll drop you off at an outof-the-way pensione. Give me two hours. If I’m not back in that time, call Miles Benson and he’ll help you. Do not meet with Orr on your own, no matter what he tells you.”
Stacy sighed. “Fine. But I don’t like this.”
“Your objection is noted,” Tyler said, putting the backpack on his shoulder. “Now let’s go get the car.”
He opened the front door to the breezeway outside. The semicircular colonnade embraced the piazza. Their car was in a lot to the north. He looked in both directions, but no one in the crowd paid any attention. With tens of thousands of people attending the concert and dozens of ways into the square, the chance that Orr would spot them was small, but with Grant no longer backing him up Tyler had to be prepared for anything.
He waved for Stacy to come out, and they weaved through the strolling crowd.
They had reached the end of the breezeway when a man in cargo pants and a U2 T-shirt stepped out from behind the last pillar and faced them. He had a jacket draped over his folded arms so that his hands weren’t visible.
He stared at Tyler. He had to be one of Orr’s men.
Tyler grabbed Stacy’s arm to run for it but froze when he felt the barrel of a pistol in his back.
“You’re early, Tyler,” Orr said behind him.
“So are you,” Tyler said.
“I had to change my plans. By the way, Gaul has a gun aimed at you.”
“I figured that out.”
With his free hand, Orr removed Tyler’s Leatherman from his pocket, tossed it to Gaul, and pocketed the Glock pistol he took from Tyler’s waistband. He didn’t bother to search Stacy. Her shorts and tank top couldn’t have hidden anything dangerous.
“I’ll take your phones,” Orr said.
Stacy whirled around with her fists clenched, ready to take on Orr, but Tyler grabbed her shoulders to stop her. Orr backed off but kept the gun trained on them from under his folded coat.
“What are you doing?” Stacy said. “They’re going to kill us!”
“If they wanted to kill us, they would have done it already.”
“Listen to Tyler, honey,” Orr said. “Now toss your phones to me.”
“Only if you never call me honey again.”
“Fair enough, sweetie.”
Stacy tensed again, before giving in. Tyler let her go. He took her phone and threw it to Orr along with his.
Orr dropped them both to the ground and stomped on them.
“Now we’re on our own. And finally the backpack. Slowly.”
Tyler didn’t move. “It won’t do you any good.”
“I’d just feel better holding it. I can shoot you in the leg and I’d get it anyway. Your choice.”
Tyler grudgingly held the backpack out for Orr, who took it and rested it on his shoulder.
“Good. Let’s go.” Orr motioned them forward, and he and Gaul fell into step behind them.
“Where are we going?” Tyler said.
“Where do you think?” Orr said.
“I don’t know. And you’re dreaming if you think we’re going to tell you where the well of Archimedes is. This is an exchange, and you haven’t offered us anything yet.”
“I do know where we’re going, thanks to Stacy. The church of San Lorenzo Maggiore near Piazza San Gaetano. You found it there.”
And it suddenly made sense to Tyler. Orr didn’t find them by luck. He had been waiting for them to come out of the church. He would have known where Grant was because of the tracker, but there was only one way he could have known where Tyler was. He and Grant had had a mole in their midst from the very beginning.
Tyler stopped and looked at Stacy, shocked at her betrayal.
“I trusted you,” he said. “You’ve been telling Orr our every move.”
“What?” Stacy said with a puzzled look. “No, I don’t… You can’t think I’ve been helping him?”
Tyler shook his head grimly. “How else could Orr have found us?”
“I don’t know! I’m his hostage just like you are. So is my sister.”
Which Tyler now realized could have been a setup from the very beginning. For all he knew, Carol Benedict was in on it as well.
“Oh, Stacy’s been a good informant,” Orr said, “giving me updates along the way, but she got greedy and demanded more than her fair share. I’d kill her right now, but I still need her.”
“He’s lying!” she shouted at Tyler before turning on Orr. “You bastard!”
“Am I? Then how would I know that you went to Gia’s home outside London? That you rendezvoused with her in Munich? That you went to the Athens museum yesterday and the Parthenon this morning?”
Stacy sputtered, “This is crazy!”
“No, it’s not,” Tyler growled. “The tracker might have told him about our visit to Cavano and Munich, but he couldn’t have known about the Parthenon. We left the tracker in the plane.” He turned to Orr. “Where is Grant?”
Orr smiled. “Dead. Or captured. I don’t really know which, and I don’t care. That’s up to Gia.”
“You told her how to find him?”
“It got him out of the way, didn’t it?”
“And my father?”
“He’s all right. For now.”
Orr was a great liar, but something about his expression made Tyler think he was covering up.
“I want to see him.”
“When we find the treasure, I’ll let him go.”
“If you already know where the well is, why do you need us any more?”
“Because I’m on a deadline, and even though we might have the correct well, I can’t spend days looking for the right tunnel that leads to the chamber. Your expertise with the geolabe will take us there. I have some pages from the codex that you haven’t seen.”
Tyler remembered Stacy saying on Wednesday night that she thought the codex was missing some pages.
“Those pages show how to navigate the tunnels?” he said.
“Using the geolabe, yes. At least, I think they do. You’ll have to figure it out.”
“And if I won’t?”
“I’ll kill you both right here and take my chances on my own. What’ll it be?”
“Don’t listen to him,” Stacy said.
Tyler considered the options and realized that he had none. He didn’t know what was going on with his father, but to have any chance of taking Orr and finding out about the nuclear device, he had to stay alive until he had an opportunity to make his move. If he could escape once he was in the tunnels, he might be able to get back to the surface and get reinforcements. At the very least, he could keep Orr from coming back out.
Tyler nodded. “All right.”
Orr smiled. “Good. Keep walking.”
In three minutes, they were in a parking lot next to a Fiat sedan. Gaul opened the trunk and took out two belts.
“Put your arms up,” he said.
“Why?” Tyler asked. “What are these?”
“Stun belts,” Orr said. “Used in prisons to control inmates. You’ll wear them so that I can keep you in line when we’re in the tunnels. I don’t want pistols sticking out of our belts. With the close quarters down there, you’ll be too tempted to grab for one.”
Orr removed two wristbands from his pocket and strapped them to his left arm. Each of them had a color that corresponded to the color of the belt-red for Tyler and blue for Stacy. The buttons were enclosed in a plastic covering. Orr tapped them lightly. “For easy access.”
Tyler didn’t resist. This meant Orr was planning to give them freer range in the tunnels. If Tyler could figure out a way to get his belt off, he might be able to get away before Orr could activate it.
Gaul snapped the belts on Tyler and Stacy and locked them with a key. The nylon belts were snug enough that they couldn’t be slid off. A box the size of a pack of playing cards was centered over their bellies.
“Get in the backseat,” Orr said. Tyler and Stacy climbed reluctantly into the Fiat. Orr and Gaul got into the front.
As Gaul threaded the car out of the lot, Orr turned in his seat. “Oh, one more thing. Those stun belts have been modified by a colleague of mine. It’ll be difficult for me and Gaul to keep an eye on you at all times while we’re in the tunnels, so these are our fail-safes to keep you from escaping.”
“You think I’m scared of a shock collar?” Stacy said.
“Actually no,” Orr said, holding up a Taser. “But I have this just in case you need some prodding.”
“Then what are the belts for?” Tyler asked.
“As I mentioned before Stacy interrupted,” Orr said, “they’ve been modified. They’re not stun belts any more. They’ve each been fitted with three ounces of C4 and molded into a clever shape charge. If either of you is out of my sight for more than ten seconds, I push this button. I’m told you’d be cut in half before you hit the ground.”