Chapter 12

Chapter Twelve

Valletta, Malta

Present

K ira was nearing the walled city of Valletta as she read her cousin's text.

Andre

I hope you have arrived safely. I look forward to meeting you tomorrow evening at the gallery reception.

She was eager to attend the private reception at an art gallery her father had frequented—she'd found credit card statements with the name and had called and learned her father was a favored patron and consultant. The gallery manager was devastated to learn of his passing and invited her to this reception, which was one of the reasons she'd been so eager to catch a flight sooner rather than later.

If she'd caught her Tuesday flight, she'd be plenty fresh for the reception, but with all the delays, she only had twenty-one hours to get acclimated.

She replied to Andre in the affirmative, then tucked away her phone. She didn't want to miss her first sight of Valletta because she was texting.

The old walls that surrounded the city were stunning to her historian heart. Her PhD might be in art history, but it was still history, and every work of art told a story about the time it was created in addition to the time period it invoked.

Michelangelo's David was as much about a biblical figure from an ancient text as it was about the Renaissance period in which it had been sculpted.

The walled city was lit with modern lights, but that didn't take away from the historic nature of the structures. These walls had been erected in response to surviving the Great Siege. They didn't exist during the siege, but they told a story of survival and a community that came together after living through the impossible and building a fortress to prevent the next siege from being successful.

They were fortress walls made by master builders and artists. And four hundred and fifty-plus years later, they were both a military statement and a thing of utter beauty. Add that to the rest of the architecture, all made from the same limestone, and Valletta was breathtaking.

The taxi wound through the streets that edged the city—never venturing into the upper section that crisscrossed the old town—and a few times, she wondered if the driver was lost as they went down narrow alleyways that couldn't possibly be roads.

But they were roads, and all at once, the taxi stopped in front of a corner building with the hotel name at the top.

She tipped the driver in cash and entered the hotel. It was well after ten p.m., and the lobby was quiet. She was starving, but would have to make do with the snacks in her bag this late. At least the hotel had a small bar. She bought a beer to enjoy in her room.

Then she took the tiny lift to her top-floor room with a view of the harbor. Her heart squeezed as she took in the lights and sharp stone walls of the fort and city across the water. The main window faced the harbor, and two smaller windows faced restaurants, roads, and the wharf that edged the walled city.

She sat in a chair and sipped her beer, looking across the water at Fort St. Angelo glowing in the night lights. She was really here. Doing this.

Her phone vibrated. She glanced at the screen to see the incoming text message.

Unknown Sender

You shouldn't have come.

K ira began her first full day in Malta with breakfast in the hotel, followed by a stroll along the wharf toward the Siege Bell War Memorial. The day promised to be scorching hot, and she was glad for her airy sundress, broad-brimmed sun hat, and sturdy sunglasses.

She hadn't slept well between the disturbing text message and disgruntled body clock that was unhappy with the six-hour time difference. Ten a.m. here was four a.m. in Virginia.

She would probably have to take a nap before heading to the reception tonight.

She made her way to Fort St. Elmo and paid the entry fee to tour the fort and museum. She leisurely explored the exhibits, trying to be mindful of anyone following or paying her undue interest.

As she promised Freya, she would not be caught off guard.

The museum was separated into time periods in different areas of the fort. She spent a fair amount of time in the World War II exhibit, even though it was likely that art stolen by Nazis had arrived in Malta much later, as Malta had been a Crown Colony from 1813-1964.

During the war, in spite of massive bombardment by the Axis powers, the Crown Colony of Malta—with the aid of Allied convoys—survived its second brutal siege, this one beginning 375 years after the Great Siege that established the small island country as a force to be respected in the Mediterranean.

After finishing at the fort and museum, she went to the movie theater next door to watch The Malta Experience , a forty-five-minute film that presented the seven-thousand-year history of Malta followed by a tour of La Sacra Infermeria—the Holy Infirmary of the Knights of St. John—a hospital established in 1574.

She sat in the dark, air-conditioned theater with her translation headphones set to English. Only a dozen or so other tourists shared a theater that seated more than a hundred. As she watched, she began to doze. The dark, cool room and exhaustion defeating even the excited history lover in her.

Her eyes drifted closed, but she forced them open when the narrator described Neolithic sites, including the ?al Saflieni Hypogeum, a series of connected underground burial chambers that dated to about 3000 BCE—Before Common Era. She hoped to visit the site, but hadn't been able to get tickets, as they sold out weeks—even months—in advance.

The film progressed, giving the early recorded history of the islands, but even her love of all things historic couldn't compete with jetlag and the cool, dark room. She drifted off, lulled by the Maltese-accented English words describing the battle that had been waged in 1565 in the waters around the fort she'd just toured.

The sound of explosions became gunshots, and the voice in her headphones changed. An eerie, singsong male voice with an unidentified accent saying her name: "Kiiirrraaa. Kiiiiraaaaaa."

She jolted awake. Yanking the headphones off, she jumped to her feet, then twisted and tried to scan the faces of the other tourists in the dark theater. The light from the screen revealed clusters of fellow tourists listening with their headphones. Only the two attendees seated behind her noticed her odd behavior.

She slowly sank back into her seat.

Had she dreamed it?

That had to be it. The pop of cannon fire could have stoked the memory of gunfire. Plus, she'd had lots of realistic dreams of her abduction in the weeks that followed her rescue.

But what if it hadn't been a dream? What if danger had followed her over an ocean and halfway across the Mediterranean Sea?

K ira opted to walk through the interior streets after the hospital tour, following the other tourists, so she would appear to be one in a crowd. The city's interior architecture was even more charming in person than in the photos she'd spent endless hours studying. Narrow alleys with arched doorways and the colorful, enclosed balconies the country was famous for.

It was a visual feast, many of the structures built more than four hundred years ago. There were people everywhere, and she felt safe in the crowd, even though it made it harder for her to spot anyone who might be following her.

She'd grown more convinced she'd dreamed the voice singing her name in the theater, but that didn't mean she could slack on her situational awareness. If she wanted to become a true Valkyrie, she had to act like one. Diana would never lose her vigilance on an assignment.

In a way, she supposed she was playing spy, in addition to being an art sleuth. Her vacation game had gained another layer of complexity.

There was no more perfect setting for such a game. James Bond would blow things up and destroy markets and artwork as he chased down the bad guys, while Kira had just taught a class on how not to destroy local cultural history when deployed. She would tread more lightly than 007.

Unless, of course, there was a warlord seeking a bioweapon that would unleash the next pandemic, like in the book she'd read on her flight. That did justify a little destruction to save humanity.

She'd checked the publication date on the novel when she realized it had a pandemic plotline and saw it had been published late in 2019, prior to the first wave. It bore no resemblance to how things played out, so she imagined the underlying plot—which was a midpoint reveal—hadn't hurt sales. The author's second book had released about a month ago. She might grab it for her flight home if the first book had a satisfying ending.

She shook her head, wondering why she was thinking about her return trip when she'd only just arrived. She'd have to be vigilant in DC too. At least here she was in a real old city, not one that mimicked ancient architecture.

What would it be like to go back and face Freya after this? They should probably have the long-overdue chat about Apollo. After twenty years of avoiding the subject at all costs, it was time. Plus, she'd hopefully have more answers about her parents, so she'd be sorting all the old dirty laundry.

She returned to her hotel room and took a cold shower to both wake her and cool her body down after wandering through the streets of Valletta in the hot afternoon sun. Then she made herself leave the hotel so she couldn't take a nap. She needed to adjust her internal clock, so she'd power through.

She had a few hours to kill before the reception and decided to sit outside at a restaurant that was next to St. John's Co-Cathedral and have a late lunch. She tried rabbit for the first time, which she'd noticed was on most of the local menus.

Not wanting to take chances while alone and exhausted, she ordered a mocktail so she could at least pretend this was a normal vacation. James Bond never worried about drinking, but he wasn't a lightweight like her. Plus, he never suffered from jetlag.

It wasn't long before a man asked to join her, but she declined. She remembered her promise to herself about flirting with handsome strangers, and he fit the bill, but that didn't seem like a wise, Valkyrieish thing to do.

Not while jetlagged, anyway.

Besides, he wasn't as good-looking as Rand. Although, that was a dangerous baseline to set, given that no one—with the possible exception of the happily married Ian Boyd—could match Rand's sheer perfection.

Rand had asked her out, and she'd shot him down. Twice. Most recently because she knew she needed to focus on her trip. Well, that and insecurities built on a lifetime of experience. He'd end up bored by her in less than a week.

Still, she considered taking a chance and agreeing to that date when she returned to Virginia.

She rolled her eyes. And that was exactly why she'd turned him down. So she wouldn't be thinking about him when she needed to be a hundred percent present here.

She should be thinking about her father and the cryptic letters he'd received and might have attempted to destroy before Kira could find them.

It crossed her mind that he'd moved them to the safe so she would find them after his death, but that didn't make sense. In that instance, wouldn't he have told her about his ties to Malta to prepare her?

His ability to speak had been lost in the immediate aftermath of the stroke, but by the time he came home from the hospital, his speech had improved. It took effort, but he could communicate. Lord knew he could argue. So why had he placed the letters in the safe, and where had they been hiding before that?