Page 21 of Skotos (Of Shadows & Secrets #6)

Will

T he stairs groaned under our weight as we climbed the Baroness’s tower. There were no sparkling comments about her boys keeping up or rustling of her finely woven silk. This time, it was just the two of us ascending to the tower’s peak.

As we passed ancient arrow slits now paned over, diffused sunlight drifted in through tall stained glass, casting colors across the stone steps that might have been beautiful on any other day. I barely noticed them.

Thomas moved just ahead of me, one hand on the worn railing, his posture tight with purpose. The moment we reached the top, I closed the hidden door behind us, sealing the room off from the world below.

Radio equipment hummed softly, a subtle undercurrent of static and anticipation. The Baroness’s private phone sat nestled beneath the main desk, shielded by layers of reinforced panels and a secured switchboard that put many intelligence agency setups to shame.

“I’ll get us patched in,” Thomas said, crouching beside the desk and flicking a series of toggles.

I stared out the window while he worked. The Alps were so quiet.

Too quiet.

It felt like the kind of stillness that couldn’t last.

A sharp tone rang out.

Thomas gave me a nod and slid into a chair as I took a position beside him and leaned over the desk, our shoulders touching.

“Nest, this is Condor,” Thomas said clearly.

The line crackled. A moment later, a familiar, gruff voice answered. “Manakin. Go ahead, Condor.”

Thomas relayed everything—our redirection to the Baroness’s estate, Vogel’s surprise visit, the bullet casing found at Lugano with the etched spear, and the possibility of a failed op or premature staging near a Swiss airfield.

I watched his mouth move, lips firm but calm.

His was the controlled rhythm of a man used to relaying life-or-death data.

When he finished, the silence on the line was thick enough to choke on.

Manakin finally asked, “Are we compromised?”

“Unknown, but the casing felt like a mistake, not a message,” I said. “There’s been no public attack or claim of responsibility. Whoever left it wasn’t trying to be found.”

“Agreed,” Manakin muttered, then paused again. The faint rustling of paper filtered through the phone line. “Now, I have some updates for you two. You might want to sit down for this.”

Thomas and I exchanged a wary glance. If Manakin was bracing us for whatever Washington had found . . .

I slumped into a nearby chair.

Manakin spoke again. “We’ve just received word from Rome that Italian investigators uncovered fragments of a casing similar in caliber to the one from Lugano, only this one was embedded in a structural beam near De Gasperi’s garage.

There are faint traces of a symbol—likely a match to your spear. It was too damaged to confirm.”

Thomas sat back. “So a backup shot in case the explosives didn’t kill him?”

“That’s the theory.” Manakin paused. “But that’s not the most disturbing part.”

“Brilliant,” I drawled. “Go on.”

“The Vatican issued a quiet statement of condolence,” Manakin said.

“There was nothing unusual until we intercepted a message between an unnamed cardinal and another unidentified person—a coded message our people decrypted last night. The phrase ‘sacred spear struck’ was buried in the message in an almost subliminal way. ”

I straightened. “Are you suggesting the Vatican’s involvement in these killings?”

“That’s what Rome station is investigating.”

Thomas scoffed. “Come on. The Church? The Pope? That’s reckless, and well outside anything they normally do. Pius is too smart to go about murdering world leaders in their driveways.”

“Thomas is right,” I said. “Even if a fringe faction existed, the Vatican wouldn’t risk this, not the Holy See, not with so many eyes on the region. It’s too dangerous. The Pope would never—”

“You think the Pope’s above it? If it furthered their interest, their reach?” Manakin asked, his voice low.

“I think they’ve survived millennia by not being stupid,” Thomas said.

“You should brush up on your Church history.” Manakin exhaled slowly. “I wish I could agree, but nothing is impossible in our business, especially when power and faith mix.”

That line dropped like a guillotine, cold and final.

“I’m sending you both to Rome,” Manakin continued. “Officially, you’re on diplomatic courier detail. Unofficially, you’re to meet our contact inside the Curia. Use your best cover—no cowboy theatrics. If the Vatican is involved, tread carefully.”

“Manakin, seriously?” I snapped. “We just got to Bern last night. We haven’t followed a single lead here. Shit, we’re sitting on a possible staging site and haven’t even pulled at those threads. We need more time.”

“Will—” Thomas started, but I shook my head.

“No. We’re chasing shadows across Europe, and now we’re supposed to drop everything again and go to Rome based on a cryptic phrase in a coded message sent by two people we can’t even identify?”

Manakin didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to.

“Let the Swiss handle Lugano. We are coordinating with them already. Your job is to follow the killer, and right now, Rome is where the trail leads. Full stop.”

Thomas met my gaze. “We go where the target goes. ”

I sat back, my jaw tight.

“And for the record,” Thomas added, “I agree with Will. The Church? The Pope? It’s a wild theory. They’re too smart, too visible, and too interconnected. Any political entanglement of this magnitude would be catastrophic.”

“You think the Vatican’s too careful to do stupid things?” Manakin asked.

“I think they’ve survived this long by not doing stupid things in public ,” I said.

“Then maybe it’s not the Vatican,” Manakin replied darkly. “Maybe it’s someone inside it. Or something . . . something older, more hidden.”

The line went silent again.

“Understood,” Thomas said, resignation coating the word. “We’ll be ready when the car arrives.”

“One more thing,” Manakin added. “The phrase they used—the sacred spear—it’s showing up in another decrypted document. This one’s older, from Warsaw in 1946. We’re pulling the full file now.”

I shot Thomas a pointed look.

“Fine. We’ll be ready,” I said.

The line went dead.

I ran a hand through my hair and tried to blink away my disbelief. “Do you really think the Pope would do something like this? Organize a continent-wide revolution through murder? He’d be signing his own death warrant. The Church would never recover from the scandal to follow.”

Thomas shrugged. “The war may feel like the distant past, but Hitler’s only been dead a few years.

A lot of people’s blood still runs hot, either for vengeance or to revive the insanity of his beliefs.

Maybe the Pope isn’t as pro-Western as he says he is in public.

Maybe he sees a play to increase his own power. Who knows?”

“But the Pope? Pius?”

“I know. It sounds nuts.” Thomas leaned back and rubbed his temples. “We’d better go downstairs. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Baroness didn’t have our bags packed and a car waiting already. ”

“Right.” I grunted. “She said the line was secure. She didn’t say the tower wasn’t bugged for her pleasure.”

Thomas grinned. “Can you please not talk about the Baroness’s pleasure? I won’t be able to look her in the eye when we leave.”

I let my head fall back against the leather chair and laughed. “God, I hate you.”

He stepped around the table, leaned down, and planted a tender kiss on my lips. “No, you love me down to your pinky toes. Just accept it. Everything will be so much easier when you surrender.”

I bit his lower lip.

“Ow! What was that for?”

I grinned and stepped toward the hatch. “For always being so damn right. You’re my little toe, that’s for sure.”

He shoved me against the cushions and turned toward the trapdoor.

Rome. Again.

I released a long sigh.

The Alps stared at us through stained glass like silent sentinels as we crossed the second-floor landing. The scent of roasted coffee and something buttery lured us toward the foyer—along with the unmistakable clack of the Baroness’s heels on marble .

“You look troubled,” she said, her arms folded as though she already knew the answer. “Is it your bird man again?”

I nodded, exhaling. “We’ve been redirected to Rome.”

“Rome?” A flicker of surprise—and disappointment—passed behind her eyes. “But you only just arrived.”

“He didn’t exactly give us a chance to vote,” Thomas muttered beside me.

The Baroness stepped closer, her expression cooling into something far more calculated.

“Then at least allow me to arrange your travel.” She started to turn but froze, narrowed her eyes, and speared out a very pointed finger.

“But only if you agree to finish your breakfast first. We simply cannot have international espionage on an empty stomach—that would be most uncivilized.”

We followed her back to the dining room where the morning feast remained untouched. As I bit into a croissant, the Baroness poured coffee with the gravitas of a priestess blessing an altar.

“So,” she said, settling herself. “Rome. The Pope, I presume?”

Thomas nodded and then glanced around the room, I presumed to check for ever-present servants hovering like choppers over a landing zone. The Baroness, anticipating the need for a private conversation, had already cleared the room. Hence, our wealthy hostess serving her own coffee.

“The Vatican may be involved,” Thomas said without flourish.

She snorted delicately. “Your man always did see phantoms in cathedrals.”

“I thought the same thing, but there’s actually reason to consider it,” I said, more guarded than usual.

“An intercepted message referenced a very particular phrase, and there are now three known instances of those etched bullet casings, each in a different city across Europe, including Lugano. Something far bigger than we first thought is going on.”

“There have been three assassinations in how many days? I fear the scale of whatever this is has already shaken the continent to its core.” She thought a moment and then asked, “A long-range rifle? In Lugano?”

“Hidden near the airfield,” Thomas confirmed. “Same symbol etched on the side, same caliber.”

She stirred her coffee. “I suppose the Vatican’s involvement is possible, but do not discount the Soviets. The Church enjoys drama and colorful regalia, not clumsiness. Assassinating heads of state? That reeks of politics and a thirst for power, not theology.”

“And yet, if the Soviets were behind it,” I argued, “why use religious symbolism? The spear by itself doesn’t sound religious, but add the sacred wording and it reeks of zealotry.”

“Unless someone wants to point the finger at Rome,” Thomas said.

The Baroness smiled into her cup. “Or maybe you are chasing ghosts in vestments.”

“You’re saying the Pope isn’t a killer?” I teased.

She shot me a look. “If he were, he would not leave casings lying around. He would serve you poisoned tea and call it divine retribution.”

Thomas laughed. “Remind me never to drink your tea.”

“Remind me not to serve it,” she replied with a wink.

A soft bell chimed somewhere down the corridor. The Baroness stood, smoothing her gown with regal precision. “Your driver is here. Otto, naturally. He is likely outside polishing the bumper and muttering about the best s'mores he’s ever eaten.”

I groaned. “If he tries to sell us Idaho farmland again—”

“Just nod and pretend you are considering it,” she advised. “His prattling ends far more quickly that way.”

We strode outside to find our luggage loaded and the morning sun painting the valley. Otto beamed as we approached, already opening the car door like he’d been waiting years for this moment.

“You will keep in touch?” she asked .

“We will,” I said.

“And try not to scandalize the Swiss Guard,” she told Thomas.

“Have you seen their uniforms? I make no promises.”

She giggled like a schoolgirl, then kissed us both on the cheek, lingering just long enough to remind us who ran the show. “Go save the world, boys, then come back and tell me all about it.”