'Not all of Italy is an art gallery,' remarked Massimo stoically, as he led them past a series of closed doors. They were still several offices away from that of Capitano Sylvia Tomms when she appeared from the depths of the warren. Mass kissed her lightly on both cheeks.
'Sylvia, this is Jack King. It's best we talk in English but his Italian is quite good – especially the bad words – so be careful what you say about him.'
Sylvia laughed and stuck out a hand. 'Hope the jet lag isn't too bad. Thanks for coming.'
'I'll survive. Please call me Jack. It sounds like you have quite a puzzle on your hands.'
She smiled. 'Step by step, little by little, we will solve it. Come to my room. I'll get you both something to drink and show you what we've got.'
The office was tiny and cluttered. Her desk was covered in papers, photographs, memos and maps. In the middle, a flat-screen monitor rose from a heap of plastic water bottles, sandwich wrappings, old cigarette packets and coffee cups.
'Please take a seat. Just put those anywhere on the floor.' Sylvia motioned to two hard wooden chairs and the skyscrapers of files she'd built on them. The floor was also stacked with documents. Jack and Massimo had to place the papers they'd moved under the chairs.
'I'm sorry about the mess. I have an office three times smaller than any male Capitano, and whenever I try to order bookshelves or filing cabinets they never come. I think they're trying to tell me something, no? Anyway, this is how I work, and for me it is no longer a problem.'
Jack liked her. She seemed smart and didn't let shit get her down. A good way to get through life.
Sylvia pulled papers from beneath a thick teetering stack. 'An old man walking his dog in Mount Vesuvius National Park discovered what he suspected might be a human bone. He was right. We recovered more than a hundred smashed and fragmented bones from the site.'
Jack made a mental note of the severity of the destruction. The multiplicity of broken bones indicated a high level of rage and an urgent need for gratification.
Sylvia ploughed on. 'Local anthropologists managed to piece together the outline of a human skeleton. Here, look at this.' She handed over a series of glossies showing a partially reconstructed skeleton.
Jack was impressed. He'd seen experts back in the States struggle with similar cases. 'It's a good job. I'm amazed they got so much done so quickly.'
Sylvia looked pleased at the compliment. 'They are among the best in the country, maybe the best in the world. From the jawbone we have managed to get a conclusive match with dental X-rays. Our skeleton is that of Francesca Di Lauro, a twenty-four-year-old woman from Casavatore, last seen about five years ago.'
Jack scanned the shots again. 'The bones are black
– I take it that's from some kind of burning?' 'Total burning. We don't know how or where or when, but all the bones were like that.'
'Anything from Tox?'
'Not much. Seems a regular accelerant was used to burn her. Paraffin.'
'What kind?'
Sylvia looked puzzled. 'Paraffin is paraffin, no?'
'That's what I used to think. Have them dig deeper. I worked a case in New York and found there are dozens of types of paraffin. Some comes as wax, some is cheap and imported from places like India. I guess there's locally produced stuff as well.'
'Italian factories use paraffin a good deal,' added Massimo. 'Industrial paraffin, chlorinated paraffin oil, that type of chemical. There will be records, health and safety documents, batch numbers.'
Sylvia scribbled a note to herself and Massimo wondered if she'd ever find it again amid the mess. Jack turned back to the photographs, fanned them out and looked for a close-up of the bone fragments. 'You got any better blow-ups? Ones of the end of the bones, the splintered parts?'
Sylvia slid Jack a BCU – a Big Close-Up – of a shattered hip.
'What are you looking for?' asked Massimo.
'I'm trying to work out when our killer set his fire. Looking at this shot, the hip is blackened, though there are traces of cream bone at the edge, where it's been bludgeoned, chopped with something. If it had been chopped first, then none of the cream of the bone would be showing; the splintered end would be as blackened as the rest.'
Massimo followed his train of thought. 'So Francesca's corpse was dismembered after it was burned? That seems unusual. I would expect a killer to try to dispose of a body, and any evidence attached to it, by dismembering it first, then burning it and all the clothing and anything else that he'd come into contact with.'
Sylvia Tomms had worked gangland shootings, a rape murder, and numerous messy domestics, but this was new ground. 'Go slow for the lady police officer,' she said. 'Let me get this right. You're suggesting someone killed Francesca, doused her in paraffin, burned the corpse, then chopped it up and buried it?'
'Maybe,' said Jack carefully. 'But even that doesn't quite make sense to me. Your ME should be able to set things right.'
'What? What am I missing?' asked Sylvia.
Jack turned to Massimo. 'You've got a dead body – what do you do with it?'
'Dump it,' suggested Mass, 'in the woods or in the sea. Chop it up, bury it in a forest, or on some land that you own.'
Jack wagged a finger. 'Okay. So what's with the burning?'
'Like Mass just said, to get rid of forensic evidence, in case the body or part of the body is discovered,' suggested Sylvia.
'That makes sense if it's after the dismemberment,' said Jack. 'Burning pieces of a corpse is easier than burning a whole body. Not many people have the space and privacy to light a giant bonfire and burn an entire corpse.'
'Or the time,' added Massimo.
Sylvia was now in sync with their thinking. 'Another explanation. One that fits with the cream ends to that burned bone, is that the fire was not only pre-dismemberment, it was also ante-mortem.'
Jack nodded. 'You've got it. That's the next assumption. In fact, the most likely one. I suspect the killer set her on fire while she was still alive. Perhaps he even wanted to watch her burn to death. And if that's the case, then the guy you're hunting is not just a killer – he's a sadist and a serial killer.'
'Bad combination,' said Massimo.
Sylvia glanced down at the pictures of bone. Less than a week ago she'd taken charge of a low-level inquiry. Now, all of a sudden, it was turning into a manhunt for a serial killer – and, by the looks of it, one of the worst Italy had ever seen.
23
Casa di famiglia dei Valsi, Camaldoli The two six-year-old boys sat cross-legged in the corner of the lounge. White, black and red Lego was spread all around them. Small hands and big imaginations built space shuttles and heroic astronauts.
The mothers of Enzo Valsi and Umberto Covella sat at the opposite end of the room. Coffee, cigarettes and the criminal world of the Camorra were their playthings.
Tatiana Covella was two years older than Gina, and her husband Nico ten years older than Bruno but ten times less successful – as she kept telling him. Nico was still a guaglione, a guapo; one of the guys that bosses like Bruno would send to do their dirty work.
'The problem with Nico,' explained Tatiana, passing a lit cigarette to her hostess, 'is that he is troppo spavaldo. He is always happy with whatever he has, but sometimes, you know, he is just, just a…' Her hands grabbed at the air as though trying to pluck the right word from somewhere.
'Pagliaccio,' offered Gina with a straight face.
They both burst our laughing. 'All men are clowns,' said her friend, 'but Nico, he is so gullheaded and macho. He is interested only in fucking me, not making our life better in any way.'
Gina looked across at the children. Umberto was banging the two astronauts together in some imaginary intergalactic battle. Enzo was stealing pieces from his pile to finish the side of the space station. 'I wish that, just once, Bruno would be a little more romantic,' said Gina, not meaning to. The thought had just tumbled out, and was now lying there for her friend to see.
'Give it time.
When men are locked up, it messes with their minds. Bruno wasn't just in jail. Nico says prigione di massima sicurezza is awful. The isolation, the brutality…'
Gina laughed. 'Not for Bruno. My father saw to it that he was no more in maximum security than you and me sitting here in this lounge. No one stood in his way. A hand was never raised against him.'
'Still – prison – it poisons minds. It's not natural to be locked up, you must give him time.'
'He doesn't want time,' she snapped. 'What he wants is nothing to do with me. He's said as much.'
'He doesn't mean that. He's just confused.'
'Ha! Bruno, confused? Have you heard yourself?'
The sharpness in her friend's voice silenced Tatiana. Tra moglie e marito non mettere dito, she told herself. Never interfere between husband and wife. But curiosity is a terrible thing and she ached to know more. She lit a cigarette for herself. 'Have you – you know? Sex – have you at least tried?'
Gina looked sad. 'I've tried. He hasn't. He doesn't want to come near me. Says I'm fat and I disgust him.'
'Fuck him! Figlio di puttana!'
Gina smiled at her friend's support. She was embarrassed, but it was good to get it off her chest, have someone to talk to about it. 'I don't know what to do. I'm not a weak woman. At least, I certainly don't think I am -'
'Of course you're not, don't be stupid.' Tatiana thought for a second. 'Has he got someone else?'
Gina shot her a knowing look.
'Okay. They always have someone else. But someone special, someone you think he favours?'
'There were – in the past – many specials.'
'Did you confront him about them?'
'Sure. Every time I found out.'
Her friend didn't ask how many times that was. 'And what did he say?'
Gina looked at her nails. Looked anywhere but in her friend's eyes. 'I went to see the women first. Paid them off.'
'What?'
'Si. I am that stupid and that desperate. I paid the women to leave Napoli.' There were tears in the corners of her eyes. 'But at least the money came from our joint account and so at least my bastard husband paid as well.'
They both laughed.
'And now? Do you think he has someone now – so soon after being released?'
'I don't know.' She played with her cigarette and then shook her head, 'No. No, I don't think so.'
'Check his phone. Text messages sent as well as those received. They always forget to delete the ones they send.'
Gina smiled. Men were certainly stupid.
'Do you still love him?'
'What a question!' It settled on her mind like oil on water. As she thought about it, she glanced again at Enzo. He'd completed his task and had now confiscated one of Umberto's astronauts. 'He's the father of my child, the man I married. That's everything, isn't it?'
Tatiana shook her head. '"Per amore, hai mai fatto niente solo per amore?" You know this song?'
'Andrea Bocelli. "For love, have you done anything only for love? Have you defied the wind and cried out, divided the heart itself, paid and bet again, behind this obsession that remains only mine? " Yes, I know it. It is very beautiful. Beautiful and sad.'
Beautiful and sad – words that Tatiana thought also summed up her friend. 'But do you still love him like that? Do you love him so much you will do anything and everything, lose it all and then try again, knowing you could lose, lose and lose again?'
Gina looked up from the cigarette she was nervously flicking in an ashtray. 'I do still love him. But I wish I didn't. Does that make sense?'
Tatiana reached out a hand. 'Gina, you can't go on like this. You must protect yourself. If you want to avoid years of madness and tears, you only have two possible choices.'
Gina's eyes begged Tatiana for answers.
'Leave him. Take Enzo and leave him.'
'Not an option,' she sighed deeply. 'You know our way. You know my father. Marriage is for life; families are sacred.'
'Your father doesn't want to see you unhappy.'
'He doesn't want to see me divorced either. You know how things are.'
'Then you must choose the second option.'
Gina tapped her cigarette, the filter red from her lipstick. 'Which is?'
Her friend raised an eyebrow. 'Find yourself a lover.'
A cry from the corner of the room turned both of their heads. The boys were fighting.
'Hey, hey! Stop it!' Gina got up and went over to separate them.
Blood poured from Umberto's nose. He was crying. Tatiana pulled him close to her, wiping blood, tears and snot from his face.
'Say sorry, Enzo,' insisted Gina. The six-year-old pulled his shoulder free of his mother's hand. Then he smiled and spat in his playmate's face.
Like father, like son? Is the die already cast? Gina asked herself. Was her beautiful boy already destined to grow up to be as cruel as his father?
24
Stazione dei carabinieri, Castello di Cisterna The winter light faded early and temperatures plunged way below zero. Heating pipes in the carabinieri barracks coughed and banged into life like the lungs of a geriatric smoker. Sylvia, Jack and Massimo continued their case conference over the best pizza Jack had ever tasted.
'A lady in Cisterna makes it for us,' explained Sylvia. 'If she could only take the calories out then I would eat this five times a day.'
'It is good – really good,' enthused Jack. 'But tell me a little more about Francesca.'
Sylvia raised her eyes. 'You've seen the photographs, I'm told in real life she was even prettier. A quiet girl. Lived alone in a rented apartment. Had a degree in art but that only got her a job as a hairdresser. The salon had shut down just before she disappeared. Neighbours thought she'd moved elsewhere to find work. No trace of a boyfriend. At least, not in the block. She comes from a good, respectable family, nothing untoward there.'
'Not like her namesake?' asked Massimo.
Sylvia smiled at the suggestion. 'Not at all. Her parents are about as law-abiding as you can get.' She turned to Jack. 'Di Lauro is an infamous name in Naples.'
'Let me guess. Camorra, the dreaded System?'
'You got it. Paolo Di Lauro bossed the Secondigliano sector throughout the nineties. He was a real wise wise guy. He established strong trading links with gangs and businesses in China, helped exponentially extend the System's power base. He ducked out before the end of the last century but the Di Lauro dynasty lives on. Some years ago they were involved in an incredibly bloody battle with other clans. They won because they're the bloodiest. They beat a sixty-year-old Camorrista to death with baseball bats, shot a woman Capo in the face in public.'
'A woman Capo?' queried Jack.
'Certainly,' said Sylvia. 'Women have been getting top jobs in the System long before they got even lowly ones in the carabinieri.'
Massimo raised an eyebrow. 'Like the Black Widow.'
'He means Anna Mazza,' explained Sylvia. 'She bossed the Moccia clan for at least two decades.'
It was an eye-opener for Jack. The Camorra regularly made the headlines in newspapers around the world, but he hadn't realized the full length and breadth of its activities. 'To be clear, though, our girl, Francesca, she has no Camorra links at all?'
'None whatsoever,' said Sylvia. 'It's just pure coincidence that she shares the same surname. It's also the name of a famous Italian fashion designer and a well-known photojournalist.'
Jack moved on. 'And how have her parents taken the latest news?'
'I've seen them recently. They're devastated. They'd feared something bad but had always hoped the phone would ring and she'd breeze back into their lives. Her father's a sales manager for some computer company. He and his wife split up some time before Francesca vanished.'
'No record. No hint of abuse, or anything?'
She shook her head. 'Not a thing. He's a decent man. I'm sure of it.'
Massimo opened a second box of pizza and ripped off a small slice. 'You said Creed knew Francesc
a personally. Did he give you details about their relationship?'
Jack shook his head. 'No. It was right at the end of our meeting. To be honest, I was keen to get away from him and was losing interest until he mentioned that he knew her. I thought about that overnight and then when I returned to his hotel he'd already gone.'
Sylvia jumped in. 'I don't see them as a couple. She was gorgeous – truly beautiful. Creed, on the other hand – he looks like a sewer rat.'
'Beautiful women have been dating ugly men since the dawn of time,' said Massimo.
'Thankfully,' added Jack.
Both men laughed.
'Sure, but the ugly men usually have more charm or cash than Creed,' added Sylvia. 'I could more easily imagine him stalking Francesca than dating her.'
'My thoughts entirely,' said Jack, 'and that's what worried me. If Newark hadn't got a snowplough down their runway so quickly I might have had another meeting with him and been able to shed some serious light on this.'
Massimo's willpower snapped. He went back for a bigger slice of the pizza. 'This is my last piece; no one let me take any more.'
'Me too,' said Jack, 'I'm stuffed. When I think of Creed I think of him as being inadequate. He seeks power and control and he has traits that indicate an inferiority complex…'
Massimo nodded as he chewed. 'But that doesn't necessarily mean he's an offender. If it did, then we'd be carrying out surveillance on at least half the male population.'
Sylvia poured Coke. 'You say inadequacy. That worries me. Inadequacy is the kind of thing that can drive scrawny men like Creed to rape and murder.'
'I'm not saying Creed is killer material,' stressed Jack. 'Inadequacy and inferiority are more stalker's traits.'
'But sometimes stalkers become killers,' countered Sylvia.
'Sometimes, but it's rare,' conceded Jack. 'There's something about him. Something about this case that just kicks my gut, and I'm old enough to know that I shouldn't ignore being kicked in the gut.'
Sylvia glanced down at the thick pad of notes she'd taken during their hours together. 'You said in your statement to one of my officers that you thought Creed might be a competent psychological profiler.'
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