Origin

“Well, Valdespino seconded your request. He called to ask if I would log into the palace’s switchboard and find the record of that call to see if I could figure out where in the palace it had originated, in hopes of getting a better idea of who here might have placed it.”

Martín felt confused, having imagined that Valdespino himself was the most likely suspect.

“According to the Guggenheim,” Suresh continued, “their front desk received a call from Madrid Royal Palace’s primary number tonight, shortly before the event. It’s in their phone logs. But here’s the problem. I looked into our switchboard logs to check our outbound calls with the same time stamp.” He shook his head. “Nothing. Not a single call. Someone deleted the record of the palace’s call to the Guggenheim.”

Martín studied her colleague a long moment. “Who has access to do that?”

“That’s exactly what Valdespino asked me. And so I told him the truth. I told him that I, as head of electronic security, could have deleted the record, but that I had not done so. And that the only other person with clearance and access to those records is Commander Garza.”

Martín stared. “You think Garza tampered with our phone records?”

“It makes sense,” Suresh said. “Garza’s job, after all, is to protect the palace, and now, if there’s any investigation, as far as the palace is concerned, that call never happened. Technically speaking, we have plausible deniability. Deleting the record goes a long way to taking the palace off the hook.”

“Off the hook?” Martín demanded. “There’s no doubt that that call was made! Ambra put Ávila on the guest list! And the Guggenheim front desk will verify—”

“True, but now it’s the word of a young front-desk person at a museum against the entire Royal Palace. As far as our records are concerned, that call simply didn’t occur.”

Suresh’s cut-and-dried assessment seemed overly optimistic to Martín. “And you told Valdespino all of this?”

“It’s just the truth. I told him that whether or not Garza actually placed the call, Garza appears to have deleted it in an effort to protect the palace.” Suresh paused. “But after I hung up with the bishop, I realized something else.”

“That being?”

“Technically, there’s a third person with access to the server.” Suresh glanced nervously around the room and moved closer. “Prince Julián’s log-in codes give him full access to all systems.”

Martín stared. “That’s ridiculous.”

“I know it sounds crazy,” he said, “but the prince was in the palace, alone in his apartment, at the time that call was made. He could easily have placed it and then logged onto the server and deleted it. The software is simple to use and the prince is a lot more tech-savvy than people think.”

“Suresh,” Martín snapped, “do you really think Prince Julián—the future king of Spain—personally sent an assassin into the Guggenheim Museum to kill Edmond Kirsch?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “All I’m saying is that it’s possible.”

“Why would Prince Julián do such a thing?!”

“You, of all people, shouldn’t have to ask. Remember all the bad press you had to deal with about Ambra and Edmond Kirsch spending time together? The story about how he flew her to his apartment in Barcelona?”

“They were working! It was business!”

“Politics is all appearances,” Suresh said. “You taught me that. And you and I know the prince’s marriage proposal has not worked out for him publicly the way he imagined.”

Suresh’s phone pinged and he read the incoming message, his face clouding with disbelief.

“What is it?” Martín demanded.

Without a word, Suresh turned and ran back toward the security center.

“Suresh!” Martín stubbed out her cigarette and ran after him, joining him at one of his team’s security workstations, where his tech was playing a grainy surveillance tape.

“What are we looking at?” Martín demanded.

“Rear exit of the cathedral,” the techie said. “Five minutes ago.”

Martín and Suresh leaned in and watched the video feed as a young acolyte exited the rear of the cathedral, hurried along the relatively quiet Calle Mayor, unlocked an old beat-up Opel sedan, and climbed in.

Okay, Martín thought, he’s going home after mass. So what?

On-screen, the Opel pulled out, drove a short distance, and then pulled up unusually close to the cathedral’s rear gate—the same gate through which the acolyte had just exited. Almost instantly, two dark figures slipped out through the gate, crouching low, and jumped into the backseat of the acolyte’s car. The two passengers were—without a doubt—Bishop Valdespino and Prince Julián.

Moments later, the Opel sped off, disappearing around the corner and out of frame.

CHAPTER 51

STANDING LIKE A rough-hewn mountain on the corner of Carrer de Provença and Passeig de Gràcia, the 1906 Gaudí masterpiece known as Casa Milà is half apartment building and half timeless work of art.