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fatal robbery. She had actually killed the shopkeeper after the old fool,
using an ancient and illegal shotgun hidden behind his counter, had blown a
hole in her partner.
    The year was
1990. Following the breakup of the Soviet Union and German reunification the next
year, Vendela Noss moved to Brussels, armed with the names and locations of
turncoats, traitors and other despicable types she copied from her uncle’s
files before he burned them. Totally apolitical herself, she made a small
fortune selling those names to people in the new Germany who wanted to settle
various Cold War scores. She made even more money settling scores for people
who didn’t want to do the dirty work themselves. It wasn’t hard. Her seductive
beauty lulled many of her otherwise cautious victims. It wasn’t long before she
had accumulated enough money to buy her house in Italy. The first thing she
placed in it, next to her bed, was a framed picture. In the photo, a
five-year-old girl stood holding hands with a slightly older boy, their proud and
smiling parents behind them with Tuscan hills in the background. 
    The two-story
villa she purchased was now her pride and joy, with its a 200-square-foot
wood-beamed central hall; five bedrooms; three baths, two fireplaces crafted
from dark gray Cardoso stone; an old wine cellar and olive oil storeroom; a
fully furnished kitchen with a wood-burning oven, and a laundry. Decorated with
antique furniture and expensive art from some of the finest galleries in
Europe, Villa Regina, as it is known, was built in 1804 and could only be
reached along a narrow winding road that proved a challenge for visitors,
particularly when leaving at night after drinking too much wine. Since Noss
liked to entertain almost every weekend, her guest rooms were frequently occupied.
It was a better solution than having to organize a drunken search with
flashlights when someone called back to the house to say they had driven into a
ravine. On more than one occasion she and her search companions had run into
nervous neighbors, armed with shotguns, who heard all the yelling. Given the
dangers of her real profession, getting blown away by a lupara-toting
grape-grower would be a bit much. Her table, and hospitality, had entranced the
locals, who now informally referred to her home as the Villa Vendela.
    Tonight, the
guests included not only Giusi and Angelina’s husbands, but also the mayor of
Camucia, the head of a local museum, her Cortona solicitor and all their wives.
As she was between lovers, Noss had also invited Monsignor Puccio to make an
even dozen for dinner that because of the food, wine and political talk would
run late into the night.
    She liked the
priest, who was also in her bicycle club and, although pushing 50, stayed in
great shape. She often stopped by his church, where he helped her polish her
Italian, which was nowhere as good as her French and English. But even though
she was born a Catholic, Noss had to date resisted politely Puccio’s
blandishments to return to the active Church fold.
    She could just
see herself in the confessional:
    Bless me
Father, for I have sinned. I frequently have impure thoughts, and recently I
arranged the murder of an American author and then eliminated my hired assassin
by burning him to death in a van with a phosphorous grenade while he stroked his
penis.
    You must
avoid those impure thoughts, my child. Now, for your penance say three Hail
Marys and recite a stanza from Deutschland Über Alles.
    Noss smiled
inwardly. No, the good Monsignor would have to be satisfied with generous
donations to the church and the occasional meal. Not to mention a bed for the
night. He loved his wine and usually never made it down the hill. Someday, she
thought, I may test the strength of his vows. Now a bad-looking man, he had a
sense of humor, as she found out when she teasingly asked him what the Italian
word for fellatio was. Yes, he might be interested to know that some of my
impure thoughts have