As Martín neared the plaza door, Suresh Bhalla materialized beside her. “They’re calling you a hero,” he said, gushing. “All hail, [email protected]—purveyor of truth and disciple of Edmond Kirsch!”

“Suresh, I am not Monte,” she insisted, rolling her eyes. “I promise you.”

“Oh, I know you’re not Monte,” Suresh assured her. “Whoever it is, he’s way trickier than you are. I’ve been trying to track his communications—no way. It’s like he doesn’t even exist.”

“Well, stay on it,” she said. “I want to be sure there’s no leak in the palace. And please tell me the phones you stole last night—”

“Back in the prince’s safe,” he assured her. “As promised.”

Martín exhaled, knowing the prince had just returned to the palace.

“One more update,” Suresh continued. “We just pulled the palace phone logs from the provider. There is zero record of any call from the palace to the Guggenheim last night. Somebody must have spoofed our number to place that call and put Ávila on the guest list. We’re following up.”

Mónica was relieved to hear that the incriminating call had not originated from the palace. “Please keep me apprised,” she said, nearing the door.

Outside, the sound of the assembled media grew louder.

“Big crowd out there,” Suresh observed. “Did something exciting happen last night?”

“Oh, just a few newsworthy items.”

“Don’t tell me,” Suresh chimed. “Did Ambra Vidal wear a new designer dress?”

“Suresh!” she said, laughing. “You’re ridiculous. I’ve got to get out there now.”

“What’s on the docket?” he asked, motioning to the packet of notes in her hand.

“Endless details. First, we have media protocols to set up for the coronation, then I have to review the—”

“My God, you’re boring,” he blurted, and peeled off down a different corridor.

Martín laughed. Thanks, Suresh. Love you too.

As she reached the door, she gazed across the sun-drenched plaza at the largest crowd of reporters and cameramen she had ever seen assembled at the Royal Palace. Exhaling, Mónica Martín adjusted her glasses and gathered her thoughts. Then she stepped out into the Spanish sun.

Upstairs in the royal apartment, Prince Julián watched Mónica Martín’s televised press conference as he got undressed. He was exhausted, but he also felt a profound relief to know that Ambra was now safely back and sleeping soundly. Her final words during their phone conversation had filled him with happiness.

Julián, it means the world to me that you would consider starting over together—just you and me—out of the public eye. Love is a private thing; the world does not need to know every detail.

Ambra had filled him with optimism on a day that was heavy with the loss of his father.

As he went to hang up his suit jacket, he felt something in his pocket—the bottle of oral morphine solution from his father’s hospital room. Julián had been startled to find the bottle on the table beside Bishop Valdespino. Empty.

In the darkness of the hospital room, as the painful truth became clear, Julián had knelt down and said a quiet prayer for the two old friends. Then he had quietly slipped the morphine bottle into his pocket.

Before leaving the room, he gently lifted the bishop’s tear-streaked face off his father’s chest and repositioned him upright in his chair … hands folded in prayer.

Love is a private thing, Ambra had taught him. The world does not need to know every detail.

CHAPTER 104

THE SIX-HUNDRED-FOOT HILL known as Montjuïc is located in the southwestern corner of Barcelona and is crowned by the Castell de Montjuïc—a sprawling seventeenth-century fortification perched atop a sheer cliff with commanding views of the Balearic Sea. The hill is also home to the stunning Palau Nacional—a massive Renaissance-style palace that served as the centerpiece of the 1929 International Exposition in Barcelona.

Sitting in a private cable car, suspended halfway up the mountain, Robert Langdon gazed down at the lush wooded landscape beneath him, relieved to be out of the city. I needed a change of perspective, he thought, savoring the calmness of the setting and the warmth of the midday sun.

Having awoken midmorning in the Gran Hotel Princesa Sofía, he had enjoyed a steaming-hot shower and then feasted on eggs, oatmeal, and churros while consuming an entire pot of Nomad coffee and channel-surfing the morning news.

As expected, the Edmond Kirsch story dominated the airwaves, with pundits heatedly debating Kirsch’s theories and predictions as well as their potential impact on religion. As a professor, whose primary love was teaching, Robert Langdon had to smile.

Dialogue is always more important than consensus.

Already this morning, Langdon had seen the first enterprising vendors hawking bumper stickers—KIRSCH IS MY COPILOT and THE SEVENTH KINGDOM IS THE KINGDOM OF GOD!—as well as those selling statues of the Virgin Mary alongside bobbleheads of Charles Darwin.

Capitalism is nondenominational, Langdon mused, recalling his favorite sighting of the morning—a skateboarder in a handwritten T-shirt that read:

I AM [email protected]

According to the media, the identity of the influential online informant remained a mystery. Equally shrouded in uncertainty were the roles of various other shadowy players—the Regent, the late bishop, and the Palmarians.