In the StoryBlack Smoke
The conclave has not yet chosen. One cardinal remembers a different election. Sequestered in the Vatican, Matteo Valli carries an outcome no one around him can verify. Another name, another sequence of events, lending new weight to every present conversation. His memory may be a warning. It may also become a way to influence others without being able to account for his source.
Open the novel ↗A moment in the opening pages
Cardinal Gabriel de la Fuente entered without waiting for an answer. The chamberlain of the Holy Roman Church—whom everyone, for twelve days now, had simply called the camerlengo—had slept less than the others and complained less about it. He placed a gray envelope sealed with two red strips in front of Valli.Read the excerpt ↗