by Joanne Pence
Flora Piccoletti’s home was on Vallejo between Polk and Larkin, at the foot of Russian Hill. It consisted of two flats over a garage. They walked up the stairs and looked at the large brass numbers on the doors. Paavo rang the doorbell. Bianca stood smoothing her jacket and picking off minuscule pieces of lint.
When there was no answer, he pounded hard on the door. A lot of older people, some young ones as well, didn’t open the door unless they were expecting someone. Between solicitors, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and people coming to case the place and rob you, he could understand why they didn’t. “Mrs. Piccoletti?” he called. “Are you in there? Open up. Police.”
He knocked again.
“Look under the flowerpot near her door,” Bianca said.
At the top of the stairs, against the walls of the entryway, were two large cement flowerpots filled with fake nasturtiums, one beside each door. “You’re kidding, right?” he said. “That’s a cliché. Nobody would leave a key there.”
“Flora would.”
He tried it, and sure enough, found a key.
He unlocked the door. “The police can’t go searching someone’s house for no good reason,” he said, eyeing Bianca.
“Oh? Okay.” She took a step forward, but he grabbed her arm, stopping her.
“You’re worried that she didn’t answer,” he prompted.
Bianca formed her mouth into a big O, then nodded. “Go.”
He entered a long hallway. Just past the front door was the living room. He looked inside and saw that cushions from the sofa and an easy chair were on the floor, drawers opened, and a few books and papers strewn on the floor. “Wait here,” he said to Bianca.
She inched toward the living room, her eyes wide. “Oh, my God, look at this—” She reached for a pillow on the floor.
“Don’t touch it!” Paavo ordered. She snatched back her hand.
He went down the hall to the kitchen, which was also torn up, but empty. A bathroom came next. Empty.
When he reached the bedroom, he found that the room had been torn apart worse than the others. But that wasn’t what caused him to freeze in the doorway.
He didn’t need to check to see if she was dead. Rigor had already begun. Her lips and skin had a bluish-white tinge, and her opened eyes were unfocused with the strangely sightless lucidity of the dead.
She lay on the carpet, papers strewn around her. Her nightgown was twisted around her body and had ridden high on her thighs. Her legs were skinny, the skin sagging as if she’d started to shrink within her own body. A pale blue terry-cloth strip was around her neck. For a moment Paavo wondered what it was, until he noticed the bathrobe tossed on the foot of the bed. The sash from her robe had been used to strangle her.
That meant that whoever came here might not have planned to kill her. If they had, they would have taken something to do the job, and not relied on what was available.
Her sheets and blankets were half off the bed and on the floor, as if she’d grabbed them as she was being dragged.
“What’s wrong, Paavo? Why are you just stand—”
He turned as the sound of Bianca’s voice came closer, and as he did, he no longer blocked the view. From the hallway, she could see into the bedroom.
All his life he’d heard the expression “her eyes bugged out of her head,” but he’d never seen it so completely as with Bianca. He moved toward her, to turn her around, get her away from the crime scene, when suddenly she let out the most bloodcurdling yell he’d ever heard. Her whole body went stiff, her bulging eyes rolled back in her head, and she began to topple like a statue.
Somehow, he managed to catch her before her head hit the floor.
And, he thought, she’s the calm, cool, collected one.
Chapter 12
Via Porta Cavalleggeri had been bustling with cars, taxis, and people when Angie and Cat arrived at the restaurant, but now the shops were closed and the streets practically empty. Still, in the distance they could hear the ever-present sound of Rome’s traffic, and the air was filled with the scent of fresh herbs, spices, and citrus. Although night had fallen, the heavy warmth of the Italian sun lingered, a tangible thing that one could almost reach out and touch.
Dinner at Da Vinci’s had come to over ninety euros, thanks mainly to Cat’s wine. Since their ATM money was evaporating right before their eyes, and the Hotel Leonardo was less than a mile away, they decided to walk.
Angie hugged her jacket close. She had the alarming sense of being watched, but that was silly, she thought. It was just the circumstance. Still, she paid close attention to the surroundings.
The direct route from the restaurant to the hotel led them through a tunnel. It had sidewalks, but at that time of night, no one was using them. Widely distanced yellow lanterns cast an eerie glow onto the black tunnel walls. “No one’s in here but us and the muggers,” Cat muttered unhappily as she and Angie clutched each other and walked as fast as they could.
Behind them they heard the echo of footsteps.
They paused and listened. The footsteps began to move faster, as if running toward them. Some people say brothers and sisters can often read each other’s minds. Cat and Angie could have proven that was so because they didn’t waste a nanosecond checking, they both took off at a good clip, running to the mouth of the tunnel. Soon they were out of it, facing the Tiber River.
Nearby, they saw a police car.
Hearts pounding, they hurried toward it in unspoken agreement that it would be preferable to deal with the police than a tunnel-lurking madman.
Whoever was following them—if anyone had been—apparently didn’t like seeing the cop car either because when they turned to see who emerged from the tunnel, there was no one.
A bridge led over the Tiber, and in record time they reached the hotel. Angie had heard of running the four-minute mile; she felt they’d just walked one.
As they stepped through the entrance, she glanced back. A dark shadow darted into the doorway of the building next door. It meant nothing, she told herself. Rome was filled with people. It was just a coincidence that someone had reached his destination just as she turned around.
Still, relief filled her as they approached the front desk. Their search was almost over.
Almost, but not quite. Signore Piccoletti still hadn’t returned.
“Now what?” Cat asked. “I’m so tired I can hardly see straight.”
Angie spotted a phone booth just off the public restrooms. “Why don’t we call home and see if things are any better,” she suggested.
Cat went first, calling collect to talk to Serefina, Kenny, and Charles. As Cat spoke, Angie saw a familiar face approach the front desk. She racked her brain as to where she had seen him, then realized he was the elder of what had appeared to be the father and son duo at the restaurant that evening. He asked the clerk something. The clerk picked up the house telephone, waited, then shook her head.
He backed away, disappointment on his face. Angie couldn’t help but wonder if he was looking for Marcello, too. He turned and took in the people in the bar area. As his gaze swept her way, she faced the wall, pressing herself between it and the phone booth.
When she turned around again, he was gone.
Cat hung up and stepped out. “Mamma told Papa we’re in Las Vegas, so if you call home and he answers, don’t forget. She wants us home, but added she’ll send money if we need it. Also, she thinks we’re staying in a luxury suite at the St. Regis.”
Angie nodded. Sometimes it was difficult keeping all the family’s white lies straight, but she also recognized why both sides of the Atlantic were spinning them.
She attempted to call Paavo, but after his cell phone rang it went to messaging. Since she was making a collect call, she couldn’t even leave a message.
In a corner of the lobby was a small bar with several tables with a view of the registration desk.
“I suppose we could sit there,” Cat said. “We’ll have to order some drinks, though.”
They each ordered a limoncello, a liqueur said to have originated in the Sorrento-Capri area. The bartender brought them to their table with a bill.
When Angie glanced at it, she could hardly believe what she saw. “Since the euro, the price of everything has skyrocketed. These drinks alone are costing us about eight dollars each.”
“Eight?” Cat looked appalled. “I thought it was made from lemons, not gold.”
Angie opened her wallet. Where in the world had all their money gone so quickly? “We might need help. Hasn’t Mamma said something about a cousin in Rome?”
“I met him once.” From Cat’s expression, it hadn’t been a pleasant encounter. “We don’t talk about him.”
“Well, I guess it won’t matter. It’s late. Marcello should show up soon,” Angie said, more as an affirmation than from any knowledge of the man. “We’ll get this straightened out right away.”
“Right,” Cat said with a groan. “But what do we do in the meantime?”
At least she didn’t throw up, Paavo thought, but Bianca’s reaction to seeing what a violent murder looked like in real life had included just about everything else, from faints to prayers to tears. He could well imagine what her parents and husband would say to him next time they met. Yosh had been right about taking a civilian with him.
Why had Flora been killed? And when? Was it before the murder in the Sea Cliff or after? And if after, did that mean the murderer was still in the city and not in Italy after all? Or were there two murderers?
When the M.E. arrived, he borrowed one of their blankets to bundle up a now stone-faced Bianca into a taxicab. He sent her straight home after calling her husband to tell him what had happened.
A couple of hours later Paavo had concluded his canvass of neighbors, and the CSI team was just finishing up when he heard the slapping sounds of sandals against bare feet coming up the outside steps. He turned, and the sinking, desperate, get-me-the-hell-out-of-here feeling that had struck earlier when he saw Bianca hit again. Twofold.
It was Frannie, Angie’s fourth sister, the one closest to her in age.
The one who hated his guts and didn’t try to hide it.
“You sure screwed this up,” Frannie said as she tried to stick her nose in his face. She would have been closer to the mark if, like Angie, she wore platform shoes with high heels, but she was wearing Birkenstocks, so her nose met the knot of his tie. “Mamma’s in tears.”
“I’m sorry about your sister,” Paavo said.
“That’s not why she’s in tears.” Her face scrunched into a scowl. Frannie was Angie’s “tough” sister. Skinny to a fault, her hair was permed until it looked like she’d stuck her finger in a light socket. She could have been attractive, but everything about her shrieked of unhealthy veganism and ecoterror. She supported every radical cause that came down the pike, and he wouldn’t have been surprised to hear that she was arrested for taking part in an illegal PETA activity. Or Earth First. Or last. “It’s because Caterina and Angie aren’t on their way home yet. I need you to come with me.”
“Frannie, there was a murder here.”
Her neck slowly cranked from far left to far right. “With all these people, you can’t spare a lousy fifteen minutes to get your fiancée home? Mamma did all the work for you. She’s been on the phone all morning and set up everything. It won’t take long. Do you love Angie enough to bring her back here or not?”
He didn’t have time for twenty questions with this neurotic harridan, but the investigation was at a point where he could leave for a few minutes. “What do you have in mind?”
As Angie went off to harass the desk clerk yet again about finding Marcello, Cat’s thoughts went around and around about being there. She was one of those perfectly practical people who always did what was logical, sensible, and staid. Until now.
Marcello . . . was he the cause?
She still remembered how, as a girl, Marcello would make her eleven-year-old heart beat faster. He was the first boy she ever had a crush on. He was twelve, and she thought he was the coolest thing on two feet. He never paid any attention to her, and by the time he reached thirteen, he was too old to hang around the house when his mother’s friends came to call. Soon after that, Cat stopped going to visit as well. She certainly didn’t want to see Rocco, who was two years younger than her and a royal pain in the butt.
She’d been stunned when she ran into Marcello at the Wholesale Furniture Mart about a year and a half ago. He was there buying items for his store, and she was there hoping for a miracle. One of her interior design clients wanted a genuine Eero Saarinen chair in a particular style, and she was having a terrible time finding one.
She didn’t even recognize Marcello that day, but to her surprise, he remembered her. And flirted with her shamelessly.
All kinds of thoughts went through her head. That finally, some twenty years later, he had taken notice of her. That he didn’t seem half so cool now as he had back then. That as an eleven-year-old, her taste in the opposite sex had been abysmal. In fact, as she took in his flashy clothes and jewelry, she was quite put off, not to mention disappointed. Still, being around someone from her youth who was so obviously impressed by her was a huge boost to her ego.
When he heard about her problem with the Saarinen chair, to her utter amazement, he offered to help. And that was the beginning—
“Nothing,” Angie said.
Cat started. She hadn’t even heard her approaching.
“It’s late.” Angie remained standing. “Time for our next move.”
Chapter 13
The San Francisco regional office of the State Department was located on the eleventh floor of the Federal Building at 450 Golden Gate Avenue. Frannie strode from the elevator and approached the receptionist as if she owned the place. “Please tell the Regional Director that Francesca Amalfi Levine is here to meet with him. With me is Inspector Smith from the San Francisco Police Department.”
The receptionist lifted a note from her desk and handed it to Frannie. “He isn’t available, but he left this for you. Kevin Delaplane, on four, will help you.”
Frannie took it, but didn’t look happy. “Hmm. Well, I guess that’ll work.”
She and Paavo rode down to the fourth floor. There, she handed the receptionist the note. “The Regional Director said Mr. Delaplane will help me.”
The white-haired woman scanned the note quickly. “I see. Is your 10-5-39 filled out?”
Frannie blinked. “My what?”
The receptionist’s mouth turned down. “Didn’t they tell you upstairs? Mr. Delaplane can’t do a thing without a 10-5-39. It starts the entire process.”
“There’s no process here.” Frannie forced herself to smile. “I simply need to explain the situation to Kevin Delaplane and have him help.”
“I’m sorry.” The receptionist’s chin rose. “But we need our 10-5-39.”
Frannie’s nostrils flared ever so slightly, but then she squared her shoulders, her jaw tight as she said, “I see. Well, that’s reasonable. Give it to me and I’ll fill it out.”
“I don’t keep forms here. They’re on six.”
Frannie’s right eye began to twitch. “On six?”
“Correct.”
Paavo’s body tensed. He was ready to physically drag Frannie away from the receptionist if it came to that. The woman didn’t know how close she was to meeting her maker. Frannie’s nerves were on edge at the best of times. He feared that adding worry about her sisters could drive her right over it.
She surprised him, however. “We’ll take that elevator right over there, and we’ll be back in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.” Smiling with her teeth clenched so tightly she looked like someone displaying her bite to a dentist, she waltzed over to the elevator and jabbed the button. Hard.
“You okay?” Paavo asked.
“I’m doing this for my sisters,” she said, teeth still gritted.
“For them I can go to the sixth floor to get a goddamned form that I don’t give a shit about. No problem.”
Management on six had had all forms moved to the basement, and in the basement they found out that the 10-5-39 wasn’t a single form, but a form packet, requesting information that went back to grammar school.
“I can’t fill out all this crap!” Frannie fumed, flipping through the sheets. “It’ll take a week.”
Paavo looked it over. “If Serefina was thinking of having the government bring her daughters back, was she told we’ll also have to deal with the Department of Justice?”
“That’s what you think! I’m going to see Delaplane right now!” Frannie stabbed repeatedly at the elevator button until it arrived.
They returned to four. Waving the 10-5-39 packet in the air, she leaned over the startled receptionist’s desk. “Where is Delaplane’s office?”
The receptionist’s eyes were wide. Just then the telephone began to ring. “Excuse me.” She reached for it.
Frannie slammed her hand down atop the receiver. “I said, where is Kevin Delaplane’s office?” She gave her bared teeth smile again, looking wolfish.
“It’s at the end of the hall, but—”
Cursing a blue streak, Frannie took off in a rush, Paavo after her, and the receptionist chasing both of them.
Frannie found his door and pushed it open. The room was empty.
Furious, she spun around. Heads peered over the tops of cubicles, and some people even stood on chairs to see what all the fuss was about. She glared at the receptionist. “Where is he? Is he hiding from me?”
“No! He’s at a training program on improving customer relations.”
That was when Frannie lost it.
Angie slept like the dead. She remembered getting into bed thinking, Chef Poulon-Leliellul, and the next thing she knew, she opened her eyes, and the sun was beginning to rise. The clock read 6:00 a.m. She couldn’t believe it. She never woke up this early at home. But then, Rome was nine hours ahead of San Francisco. For Paavo, it was only nine o’clock, last night. No wonder she was awake. And confused. And miserable. She missed Paavo badly. Since meeting him, except for a short stint at a Napa Valley winery, this was the longest they’d been apart. She needed to get this situation settled and go home to her honey—and show him exactly how much she missed him!
