Violent Daylight

by Caroline Angus Baker

  “If it’s innocent, why hide the fact you were off to see Dane?”

  “Thanks, Giuseppe, thanks for asking about my whereabouts.”

  “Don’t start that. I’m not angry.”

  “Really?” Canna folded her arms.

  “Do we have to fight about everything all the damn time?”

  Canna unfolded her arms and rubbed her forehead. Claudio could see the tiny facelift scars around her hairline. “I went to sign Dane’s paperwork so he could be paid out for the ridiculously overpriced ring he bought me. The ring has disappeared. Dane should be paid out. He should never have bought the stupid thing. I didn’t tell you I was going because you would have been like a bear with a sore head if you found out. I imagined you and Dane arguing again, and I don’t want that. So I said nothing. Now it’s all done. It’s not about you, Claudio.”

  “Blinky, you have to stop drinking. Do it for me and yourself. I’m asking you to not drink alcohol. You did so well until you went to Malta.”

  “I’ll stop drinking if you stop, too.”

  “Deal. I won’t drink anything, even when you’re away, if you can promise the same.”

  “I can’t promise anything, Claudio. That is the God-honest truth. What’s the problem here, the alcohol, or Dane?”

  “The alcohol is a problem. I want you to be well. Dane shouldn’t have drunk with you. He should know better.”

  “He doesn’t understand my rehab or my addictions.”

  “I don’t want you and Dane meeting again. I’m sorry, but I don’t. With me is fine, but not one-on-one. I have to make that clear.”

  “Okay, I can promise that.”

  “Yes?”

  “Yes. I don’t think it would be a good idea for Dane and I to spend time together.”

  “Why? What happened?”

  “Geez, would you lighten up? I was trying to be polite and agree with you.”

  “Tonight is the night I move in here, and I want it to be special. I just came in the door and wondered if I could carry you over the threshold. But now, here we are, fighting yet again.”

  “You started it. You picked on me. I was here, trying to be helpful and fucking wife-like and repair a kitchen appliance.”

  “You started it the moment you picked up the wine glass.”

  “It was at least a whole bottle.”

  “Stop, Canna. The trip here hasn’t been as successful as you hoped, and you’re hurting yourself with alcohol.”

  Canna’s phone began to vibrate against the wooden table top behind the pair. What a relief. Canna felt grateful for the interruption as she answered the call. “Giorgio.”

  “Charmed, I’m sure. Where are you?” he asked in his brisk Italian.

  “London. I will be back in the office on Thursday. I have an assistant for stupid questions, and she works in your office.”

  “I take it that you haven’t seen the Italian news this evening.”

  “No, why?”

  “The Minister of Economic Development is in hot water.”

  “That’s Max Cabrini, isn’t it? The guy we met about the construction of the new university in Naples?”

  “Exactly. It’s been found that he has been spending government allowances on high-end prostitutes.”

  “I don’t care what he does in his free time.”

  “Neither do I, but certain people, like his wife, do care. He uses taxpayers money to have sex with women.”

  “Why should I care? Unless it upsets the university contract, which isn’t my department anyway, I don’t give a fuck who he… well, fucks.”

  “We have to care.”

  “Because?”

  “Because of the agency where he hires these girls. Caraceni Industries owns the escort agency, Discrezione Bellissima. Since uncle Giuseppe is dead, you’re listed as the owner.”

  “Cool, I own a high-end brothel.” Canna watched Claudio’s shocked expression. “I still don’t understand the problem.”

  “While the heat of using prostitutes dies down, Cabrini got suspended from his job. The government department will be digging through his business, and they will see the bribe that we gave to Cabrini in order to secure the building contract.”

  “Who oversees that contract for Caraceni?”

  “I do,” Giorgio sighed.

  “So what you’re saying is, you have a problem.”

  “We all have a problem. The late illustrious Count Caraceni runs brothels that he bequeathed to his young trophy wife. Those prostitutes give out sex to government officials. It’s a conflict of interest.”

  “We aren’t doing anything dodgy if he paid for the sex, we didn’t bribe him with prostitutes.”

  “It looks like a bribe, or a perk.”

  “Sounds like a fun perk,” Canna scoffed.

  “We could be in the shit, Catherine. Seriously in the shit. If that cash bribe gets found, never mind losing the biggest contract the company has in construction at the moment, we could face fraud charges.”

  “Not me, I didn’t do anything. You have your fingerprints all over that bribe money.”

  “You’re the head of Caraceni Industries.”

  “So are you. I need to come back to Milan, don’t I?”

  “Absolutely. The sooner the better.”

  “What are the other board members saying?”

  “They’re saying nothing. That’s the plan.”

  “I will be back in the office tomorrow.”

  Canna hung up the phone and saw the angry look on Claudio’s face. “I just need to send a message to Francesca. I need to get a flight home tonight.”

  “What about us?”

  “I have just found that I own a brothel. The brothel has supplied a government minister with prostitutes. He is the same government minister that Giorgio bribed to get a government construction contract. Half of the story is in the blood-sucking Italian media, and we need the rest of the story to be a secret. We have things to discuss. Papers have to disappear and conversations need to be forgotten. Who knows, there could be money in prostitutes. We could franchise. Discrezione Bellissima, Beautiful Discretion. It’s a catchy name.”

  “You want to franchise a prostitution business after bribing a government official?”

  “Yes, but now we need to shut down the story. I don’t care about being the face of prostitution in Italy, but the cash bribes are a significant and illegal issue. I need to go home.”

  “You could be in real trouble!” Claudio cried.

  “I know. I need to sober up.” Canna looked down at her dirty t-shirt. “I need to change and pack some things.”

  “Why can’t you stay here?” Claudio asked as she left the kitchen.

  “I have to work,” Canna said over her shoulder while she walked through the living room in the direction of the stairs. “I have to keep my job. Imagine if you just didn’t go on stage because things were hard.”

  “I always go on stage.” Claudio stopped at the bottom of the stairs and watched Canna bound upwards, two steps at a time. “Catherine.”

  Canna turned at the top of the stairs. “What?”

  “What about us? What about what we’re doing?”

  “Here in London, you’re getting mad, and everyone in your life is also mad at me. Maybe it’s best I go home, and you can go back to normal. I’m not that welcome here.”

  “I was happy in Corsica and Madrid with you. I was miserable when you left me. How I feel about you, it’s real.”

  “I know that.”

  Claudio climbed the stairs and stopped in front of her. “Do you really have to leave?”

  “Yes I do, unless you want the story in the news to be ‘Prostitute-owner Countess, mistress of married Virtuosi singer, found guilty of bribing government officials’. We are talking about Italian tabloids; don’t discount anything.”

  “I don’t care. I’m not famous.”

  “Yes, you are now. Besides, anyone can be famous with enough of a scandal or a fuck-up. I’m not famo
us either. But money talks, so does sex, and so does scandal. We have all the ingredients for a perfect storm.”

  “If anyone can talk themselves out of police charges, it’s you,” Claudio said as they wandered into the master bedroom.

  “Please, my lawyers would get me free of any charge. Besides, after all the bribes that my last husband paid out, no one would dare want to awaken the sleeping giant that is Caraceni bribery scandals.”

  “How reassuring,” Claudio muttered, but Canna was busy changing and jamming things into a suitcase. “Why don’t you leave your things here and come back?”

  “Because I’m not sure when I’ll be back. Did you think I would get to London and decide never to go back to Milan?”

  “I hoped so, yes.”

  Canna sighed. “I ran from my life for two years, and it did no good. This is the time for me to straighten out my life in Italy. You can enjoy your new home on your own. I think the dishwasher is fixed. If not, call me and I will arrange a repairman.”

  “I’m not hopeless.”

  Canna leaned over and gave him a kiss. “You have how many television appearances in the next few weeks? Eight? More? Sing a lot and get your next album ready.”

  “You just got here!”

  “We’ve had ten days together! I have to go back to work.”

  “Then leave work. Sign it all away now. Sign over everything under a cloud of a prostitution scandal and get out of that mess. This is your chance. Come here. Live here with me.”

  “No. I’m sorry, but no. I can’t.”

  “Can’t, or won’t?”

  “Won’t. The future is unknown, but short-term, right now, I want the life I have.”

  “Embroiled in scandal?”

  “Hey, I was sober until I left Milan. I have been doing well in Italy. I’ve been managing.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means it’s not the epic disaster you imagine.” Canna paused when her phone beeped with a message from Francesca. First-class ticket to Milan on British Airways available. Leaves in two hours. Should I book it for you? “Shit, I have to leave right now!”

  “We shouldn’t leave this on an argument,” Claudio said as Canna replied to the message.

  “Who’s arguing?” Canna zipped up her bag. “There, I’ve left mess everywhere. It’s proof that I’ll be back again sometime soon. Maybe we could have a weekend together in a couple of weeks.”

  Claudio slumped down on the giant bed. “I hate this.”

  “Do you want to sulk? Bloody hell, Claudio, if you were at my place in Milan and you had to rush back to London, I wouldn’t mind. People have to live their own lives.”

  “Excuse me for thinking that one day we would live life together.”

  “Maybe we will, one day. Just not today.”

  “Silly me for thinking we would live happily ever after.”

  Canna laughed. “That was never going to happen. We discussed having freedom within our relationship.”

  “So much freedom that when Giorgio calls, you run.”

  Canna took a deep breath. “I already guessed that you wouldn’t drive me to the airport. Now, I wouldn’t want you to take me anywhere. I’ll go to the corner and get a taxi.” She picked up her suitcase. “I’ll leave you to solve your addiction problems.”

  “Excuse me!” Claudio shrieked. He jumped off the end of the bed as Canna left the room. He followed her down the stairs and dived in front of her when she went to open the heavy front door. “I have to work on addiction problems?”

  “Yes. You need to work on your addiction of trying to control me. I accept my problems, but you’re still living in a dream world.”

  Claudio let her leave, and stood alone in the silent house. There wasn’t any point in going after her. That would end in a fight on the street. Claudio wanted to be needed by Canna, but now that she had recovered from her problems, she didn’t need him. The roles that Claudio and Canna played in each other’s lives had dramatically shifted, and things seemed far more complicated. Happily ever after was a bitch.

  CHAPTER 11

  MILAN/NAPLES

  Things were surprisingly quiet when Canna headed into her office at Caraceni Industries. In fact, not a single member of staff could be seen; instead all tucked away in their offices, doing whatever it was they did. Canna didn’t care.

  She sat down at Giuseppe’s desk and swiveled on the chair. She stared out the huge window behind the desk, out over Milan that bustled on the early Wednesday morning. Behind her, the door opened, but she didn’t turn to see who was there.

  “Buongiorno, Canna.”

  Canna turned back to see her assistant, Francesca. “Good morning.”

  “Was the flight last night suitable?”

  “Fine. Let me guess, I have missed one million calls?”

  “Not quite, but close. Needless to say, the directors are nervous.”

  “Yet absent from the office. Everyone seems to be quiet.”

  “They are all nervous that their bosses have been doing dodgy things and everyone will be out of a job.”

  Canna shrugged. “I don’t know what goes on here most of the time. Some CEO I am.”

  “You have only had the job a few weeks, why would you know everyone?”

  Canna undid the buttons on her white suit jacket and leaned back in the chair. The photo of Giuseppe hung on the wall. “What would the boss do in a crisis?” she pondered.

  “He would ask for peace and a cigar,” Francesca replied.

  Then, when work got too much, he would come home, and slap me around. “Let’s do that. Can you send out a message to all the leaders of every department of the company? Tell them that it’s business as usual. No one has any need to worry. That includes my boatbuilding yard. No company owned by Caraceni Industries is in trouble.”

  “Do I send it to Caraceni Construction? That message would go to Giorgio.”

  “No, don’t bother with that. Giorgio has this situation under control. So it turned out that a government official likes paying for sex and we sell it to him through one of our companies. That shouldn’t affect anything under the Caraceni name. But still, bring me the paperwork on the brothel business. Who runs that?”

  “It’s a holding of Caraceni Properties.”

  “Bring me the details. It sounds amusing. I want to know whether Giuseppe had direct input into the company, and what has been going on down in Naples.”

  “I’m sorry, Canna, this must be unpleasant for you.”

  “Because my husband owned brothels and didn’t tell me?” Canna sat up straight in her chair again. “Let’s not be coy, you know the relationship between Giuseppe and I. We weren’t exactly the loving honest type.”

  “Still, it’s an uncomfortable situation. It’s your name in the papers today as the owner of the brothel.”

  “It’s the perfect excuse for the board of directors, and Giorgio, to oust me from my role in this company. I sit here because of Giuseppe’s will. My job will cease to exist soon. I’m a pawn, put here by a dead man. The men who feed off Giuseppe’s money and legacy will eradicate me eventually.”

  “I don’t know what to say, Canna.”

  Canna gave her a fake smile. “Never mind. How was your birthday?”

  “Wonderful. Thank you for the gift and restaurant reservation. You didn’t have to pay for my evening out.”

  “I wanted to.”

  “How was the boat trip in Malta?”

  “It was fun.”

  “And London?”

  “I got all my work done.” Canna shifted in her seat. It would have been better if she hadn’t gone to London. “I have paperwork to send to the lawyers about buying the house over in London. I need the accountant to set up all those silly things like phone bills, power bills, all that, so everything gets paid without me seeing it.”

  “Of course, the same way we arrange things for the apartment here.” Francesca made a note on the iPad in her hands. “So, you own a house in
London. Could it be close to where Claudio Ramos lives?”

  Canna couldn’t help but grin. “Who have you been talking to?”

  “Giancarlo.”

  “You tell Giancarlo to shut his mouth in the future.”

  “Signore Ramos is a handsome and talented man. You have seen him sing live, haven’t you?”

  “Many times.”

  “Must be wonderful.”

  “He certainly is.”

  “Single?”

  “Married.”

  Francesca nodded with a smile. “Whoever gets to take him home is a lucky woman.”

  Canna rested her elbows on the desk and placed her chin in her hands. “There are exceedingly few men like Signore Ramos. The patience of a saint, a talent given straight from the Gods, looks to die for…”

  “And a red-hot lover?” Francesca teased.

  “Get out of my office!” Canna cried. “Take your dirty thoughts with you.”

  “Okay,” Francesca laughed. “I will get on to those messages for you.”

  “Good.” Canna watched Francesca open the door. “Claudio isn’t a red-hot lover.”

  “No?”

  “White-hot.” She watched Francesca’s mouth open wide with surprise at the comment. “Now, take you take your tightly-lipped mouth back to your desk.”

  Canna heard Francesca laugh while she shut the door. Shit, she needed to send Claudio a message. Last night had been a right mess. But seriously, couldn’t a woman do her work? Their relationship was a long-distance no-strings arrangement. Claudio needed to figure that out for himself.

  A quick knock on the door heralded Giorgio’s arrival. “Good, you actually came back to Milan.”

  “Buongiorno to you,” Canna snapped while she scrolled through messages on her phone.

  “Can we talk?”

  Canna tossed a flippant gesture at the chair across the desk, and Giorgio sat down. He was a tall man, and seemed uncomfortable as he tried to sit in the seat. His perfect grey suit bunched and pulled as he leaned back in the chair. He placed an iPad on the desk. “I don’t know where to start.”

  Canna watched him run his hand through his short blonde hair. “Let’s face it; the Italian media loves a sex scandal. The majority of the problem lies with Max Cabrini. The problem will die down again. As long as no one uncovers the bribe you gave him for the university construction contract, we have no real issues.”