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His head snapped around, his ear barely still attached, flapping loosely down by his neck. He looked at her with absolute rage in his eyes. Her sweaty left hand lost the battle over his gun and he twisted it from her grip. Any feeling of accomplishment or celebration that he might have felt was short-lived. Donatella stuck her silenced Walther .22 against the bloody spot where the man's ear should have been and pulled the trigger. Rosenthal's head jerked violently, his eyes opened wide with the horror of what had just happened and then his whole body went limp. Donatella did not have the strength to move. She just lay there, covered by the body of the man she'd killed.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR.
Four Seasons Hotel, Milan, Thursday evening
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By the time she got out of the shower she'd gone back on her first promise. She toweled herself off and squinted at the clock sitting on the nightstand in the other room. It was 9:20 and despite what she'd just told herself, time mattered. Her job was a series of deadlines, and they were deadlines you couldn't miss. When Tom Brokaw tossed it to you in the middle of the nightly news you were live in front of millions of people. Deadlines were there to be kept. It had been pounded into her psyche from day one other first journalism course at the University of Michigan.
Professionally she was good at keeping deadlines, but personally she struggled. This was a source of great irritation between her and Mitch. For very real reasons, he was a worrier. He was rarely late, and when he was, he called. She was constantly late for everything but the news and it drove Mitch nuts. The talons of fear began clawing at her. She was getting a taste of what he felt. It would be one thing if Mitch was just another tourist, but he wasn't.
Standing in front of the mirror she began applying lotion to her skin. She worked her way from top to bottom, rubbing the lotion in more vigorously as she went. By the time she reached her feet she was mad. She was mad at Mitch for being late, and she was mad at herself for allowing herself to get upset. She kept telling herself to relax, but it didn't work. To help pass the time she got dressed. She had no idea where they were going to di
With few other options she opened the mini bar and made herself a vodka tonic. A
She sat down in front of the TV and turned it on. She stared at the screen but it didn't really register. Her mind was off and ru
The doubt sneaked up on her, and she began asking herself just what in the hell she was thinking when she'd allowed herself to fall in love with Mitch Rapp. There were a lot of obvious reasons. He was an incredibly gentle and sensitive man, especially considering what he did for a living. He was, without exaggeration, the sexiest man she'd ever known. His rugged good looks were backed up by a confidence and intellect that feared nothing. He was a lover like no one she had ever experienced. When they went to bed it felt as if their bodies were made to be with each other. And he had saved her life and countless others. She could place no value on that. He was a phenomenal person, but he had his faults, or more precisely, he had one major fault.
Rielly knew what it was like to grow up in a home where you worried if a loved one might not return after a days work, or if the next knock on the door might be your father's best friend coming to tell the family that Dad had given his life in the line of duty. Rielly's father had just retired from the Chicago Police Department after thirty years. As a little girl she vividly remembered lying awake at night hearing sirens and worrying that Daddy wouldn't come home, crying as she thought of never seeing him again. Her parents did their best to protect her and her brothers from the fears, but they were unavoidable. Chicago was a big city and with it came some pretty rough crime and with that came dead cops. They saw it on TV, they saw it in the papers, and the nuns made them pray for the deceased officers and their families at St. A
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She looked up at the door and wished he would walk through it right now before she went any further down this path. She wished that he would hold her tight and tell her that this last piece of business was taken care of. That he was done with the killing and the field operations and was ready to take a desk job at Langley. She held the sweaty glass so tightly she thought it might break. Tilting her head back, she took a big gulp and finished her second drink. She got up to pour another, and as she walked toward the mini bar, she prayed that Mitch wouldn't let her down. She didn't want any more nights of worrying, wondering if he was on his way to meet her or if he was already dead.
the man moaned and started to move. Rapp tore his headset off and threw it on the seat. Keeping the gun pressed against his head, Rapp took his free hand and undid the man's belt and pants. Then grabbing him by his jacket collar, he yanked him from the car and slammed him against the rear door of the sedan. He'd already checked his breast pocket for ID and had found nothing. Rapp took this as a sign that he wasn't a cop.