Elegant Death Page 11

  Aunt Violetta perked up. “Patrizio gave her regular massages?”

  “Yes.”

  “That's a . . . now what did they call it in the marketing book?” She scratched her head. “A USP!”

  “What's a USP?” Fabbiola asked.

  “A Unique Selling Proposition. Something that makes your product different from all the rest, something the competition doesn't offer. I could advertise him as a celebrity-masseur. That sounds nice, doesn't it? And I bet none of the other spas have that on offer!”

  Stefano sighed.

  Carlina could feel her head starting to turn. “It's getting too hot in here. I've got to go.” She rushed from the sauna without waiting for a reply.

  Stefano soon followed her, and when they left the spa, Carlina took Stefano's hand. “Let's take a break and go out to dinner on our own, before the family can catch up with us. Enzo told me there's a nice area at the navigli.”

  “Navigli? Canals?”

  “Yes. Those are the old canals of the town, but today, they are lined with restaurants and shops. Let's go for a stroll along the banks, forget we're in a city, and let's not mention the family even once.”

  “Sounds great.”

  But when they found the navigli, the market stands were just breaking up after a busy day, and the area was filled with the noise of clanging metal and slamming doors as the tables that had held goods were dismantled and packed into compact delivery cars. A cold wind blew dirty packaging across the long streets that lined the canal, and people were everywhere, dodging the cars, talking, taking out their dogs.

  Stefano looked at the tumultuous happenings. “What did you say? You wanted to forget you're in the city? Go for a leisurely stroll?”

  Carlina frowned. “Well, I'd expected it to be greener. But look.” She pointed at a small bridge. “Let's go up there.”

  The last rays of the setting sun shimmered on the water of the canal when Carlina leaned over the broad banister, feeling the rough texture of the stone beneath her hands. “Why, it's very romantic.”

  Stefano watched two sweating men who carried a huge cardboard box between them and crammed it into a dirty delivery van. “Definitely.”

  She followed his gaze. “No, no. You have to look at me, my dear, with the water in the background, then you'll see how romantic it is.” She held up her thumbs and forefingers, creating a frame she held in front of her face. “Like a picture. You blend out all the rest, take a quick photo with your cell phone, and later, everyone can ooooh and aaaaah over the wonderful honeymoon we had in Milan.”

  A string of curses came from their right, followed by the roar of a decrepit engine.

  Stefano winced. “Now that you mention it, I know exactly what you're talking about.” He slid next to her and held up his phone, taking the picture she had described, capturing the two of them.

  “That's too close,” Carlina said. “Now nobody can see the atmosphere. There's barely a shimmer of water behind my curls.”

  He looked at the picture with a satisfied smile. “That's enough. I see all I wanted to see.” Then he put his arm over her shoulder and drew her close. “Now let's try to find a romantic place to eat that isn't filled with tourists.”

  Carlina grinned. “We are tourists, my dear.”

  “Yes, but you know how it is. If there are only tourists, the quality of food is often less than stellar.”

  They ambled along the canal and not far away, they found a nice place called Luanna. It had red-and-white checkered tablecloths and fabric napkins held together by a little sticker that showed the name of the restaurant. The charming waiter showed them the menu written by hand on a blackboard. Stefano chose the risotto alla milanese and Carlina took papardelle con ragù, broad strips of pasta with minced meat sauce. They combined it with the house wine, which was excellent, and when they had finished, Carlina leaned back with a happy sigh. “This was really good, and I don't mind at all that the place seems to be full of tourists.”

  “Hmm.” He took her hand and kissed it. “You've got a point there. And I remembered another point in favor of tourists.”

  “Really? What is it?”

  “The Japanese are so much quieter than the Mantonis.”

  Chapter 7

  The next morning, Carlina and Stefano returned early to the office. Carlina yawned. Who'd said New York was the city that never went to sleep? Milan was a close second. All night long, the sirens of ambulances had pulsed through the streets, alternating with pimped-up motorbikes, yelling youths, and even one lone singer who made up for his false notes by being extra loud. She'd woken up every hour or so, taking too long to fall asleep again, and a certain grumpiness filled her. Would they manage to achieve anything at all? She had to force herself to go through her notes, hoping against hope to find something that jumped out and would give her the clue they needed.

  When the phone rang, she was relieved. Carlina saw “CEO” on the display and snatched up the receiver. How typical for Dorotea not to have her name programmed into the system, but her position. She knew her brother would never even have thought about updating it.

  Enzo's voice was excited. “Carlina, you've got to come to my office right now. There's been a new development.”

  Carlina hesitated. The last time he'd sounded like this was when he'd planted a frog in a chair and had asked her to help him with his homework. She pushed the memory away. “We're on our way.” She gave Stefano a sign, and together, they hastened to Enzo's office.

  He was already waiting for them, dancing on the spot with impatience. As soon as they were through the door, he closed it behind them, almost scraping off a bit of leather from Stefano's shoes.

  “What happened?” Carlina stared at her brother.

  His cheeks were flushed, and his eyes were sparkling. “I just got a phone call from CCG.”

  “What's CCG?”

  “The Chicago Consulting Group, certified public accountants and general business consultants. Quite famous, actually. And extremely stuffy. Though today, I wanted to hug them.”

  “Yes?”

  “It seems Dorotea suspected something fishy in the accounts a month ago. Secretly, without anyone knowing about it, she gave them access to all the files, so they could do an in-depth check.”

  “And?”

  “And on Friday morning, they had an appointment with her and told her she'd had the right instinct. Someone had cooked the books.”

  Carlina's bad mood vanished, and she clapped her hands. “Fantastic!”

  Enzo grinned. “My thoughts exactly. I tried not to appear overjoyed and asked them who it was, but they aren't yet able to conclusively pin it down on one specific person.”

  “But inconclusively?”

  “Well, it seems the director of Finance must at least have been aware of what's going on, even if he didn't do it all himself.” Enzo made a fist with his right hand and hit it into the open palm of his left hand. “I knew it. I knew it! Marco is a bad one.”

  “I wouldn't jump the gun.” Stefano's voice was dry. “Did they suggest further steps?”

  “Yes. They'd agreed with Dorotea to look deeper into the matter before confronting Marco. Of course, she might have decided to talk to him on Friday already.”

  “But didn't she mention anything to you during lunch? She must have come straight from that meeting with CCG, and this should have been on her mind.”

  Enzo frowned. “Maybe she did. She mentioned in passing that it's always dangerous to trust people, but I thought she referred to our quarrel, so I decided to ignore it.”

  “If she did indeed talk to him, he would have had a perfect motive for murder,” Carlina said.

  “I'm not so sure about that.” Stefano shook his head. “After all, the people at CCG know about it, too. Even with Dorotea dead, he couldn't expect them to keep silent. Which they didn't.”

  “Hmm.” Enzo looked crestfallen. “Maybe he didn't think things through.”

  “That's a possibility. On the
other hand, the crime was carefully planned and definitely not the result of a panic-induced attack.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “The crime took place in Florence, nowhere near her usual hunting ground. Someone saw the opportunity and grabbed it, but it wasn't a spur of the moment thing, done in the heat of the passion. Otherwise, it would have happened in Milan.”

  “Unless I did it.” Enzo swallowed. “I was the only one who could have acted on the spur of the moment.”

  “True.”

  “But I didn't, so we'll accept your reasoning.” Enzo looked at his brother-in-law. “So, what do we do with our knowledge?”

  “Did CCG say when they would have the final results?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “I'd wait until tomorrow then.”

  “What? And do nothing?”

  “No. Let him think he still has time. If we flush him out now, he might flee the country, and we don't want that.”

  Enzo took a turn around the room. “You know, I really hate the idea of leaving that louse free.”

  “It won't be for long,” Carlina said. “Enzo, since you know the people here better than we do, can you imagine who might have an affair with your secretary?”

  Enzo gasped. “With Liza?”

  “Yes. She acted very suspiciously yesterday.”

  “Gosh, no.”

  “Nobody at all come to your mind?”

  “Well, she's mostly in touch with the other directors. Lorenzo is way too old for her, and I happen to know he's devoted to his wife, as is Silvio, by the way. Benito is gay. That leaves Marco and Franco. Franco looks like a jockey, but he happens to be able to charm women without any effort. I've seen it happen. Besides, nobody can possibly fall in love with that dried-up old lemon Marco, so it must be Franco.”

  “Or someone else in the company. She might have fallen for someone else.”

  Enzo sighed. “Yes.”

  “Maybe I can talk to her over lunch,” Carlina said.

  Enzo looked at his watch and jumped up. “Madonna, it's late. Silvio wants me to authorize an investment for a new machine that costs five hundred thousand euros, and I've no clue what he's talking about. He'll already be waiting.”

  “No problem,” Stefano said. “We'll report back to you as soon as anything turns up.” They left Enzo's office, walked with a smile past Liza and the waiting director of Production, and had to wait for the lift to arrive.

  When the door opened, though, they stood rooted to the ground.

  “Stefano Garini!” Cervi stared at his subordinate while his face slowly turned red. “What on earth are you doing here?”

  Carlina stared at her husband's boss, then at the man next to him who seemed to be equally speechless. He was as broad as he was tall and quite pale, and he stared at Stefano as if he'd seen a ghost. A colleague of Stefano, no doubt.

  A door farther down opened, and Liza came out.

  Carlina faked a smile, grabbed Cervi's sleeve and pulled him forward. “Why don't you come in here, so we can talk in peace?” She opened the door of a small office she knew was empty and managed to get the men in there. When she'd carefully closed the door behind them, she said, “We have to talk, but it's not necessary that the whole office knows about it.”

  Cervi focused on her as if he'd never seen her before. “What do you mean? What are you doing here?”

  Stefano looked at him without blinking. “Enzo Ashley has asked us to do some consultant work for him.”

  “Consultant work? What's that supposed to mean? I thought you're on holidays! On your honey moon, no less!”

  The large man next to him gave a start, stretched out his hand in the vague direction of Carlina, and muttered, “Auguri. Best wishes. Sorry. Should have said so right away. My name is Sergio Marasi.”

  Carlina shook it and waited until he'd also congratulated Stefano, then she looked at her husband's boss. “My brother has asked us to come to Milan, to get to know Dorotea Di Silva's friends.” She hesitated when she said the last word. You can't really call them friends. “Co-workers, I mean. He's convinced one of them killed her.”

  Cervi crossed his arms. “Ha. I'd be convinced someone else did the job, too, if I were in his boots. But that won't help him at all. We've come to arrest him.”

  “No!” Carlina's throat turned dry.

  “Yes.”

  “This might be a bit premature.” Stefano's voice was cool.

  “I knew you'd say so, Garini, as you've often done before,” Cervi snapped, “but in this case, you're biased! I won't listen to you. This young man now has all the money in the world to escape, and I'm not going to let a murderer slip through my fingers.”

  Carlina balled her fists to stop herself from bursting. She was not going to help Enzo if she started to shout at the head of the police department.

  “I suggest a deal.” Stefano's voice was still calm.

  “Deal?” Cervi's face was puce. “How dare you offer me a deal? This is not a bazaar!”

  Stefano ignored him with the ease of long experience. “I promise to share all the inside information we can get, and in return, you share the information you've got.”

  “So you can hand them red-hot to the suspect, and he can find a loophole!”

  “So we can find the real murderer.”

  “We know who it is! And it's going to make the headlines before the newspapers come out tonight! It'll be in huge letters on every wall: WITHIN FOUR DAYS, THE POLICE HAVE ARRESTED THE MURDERER OF THE SNOW QUEEN!”

  “And within six days, they had to release him again.” Stefano still kept his cool.

  “What? What do you mean?”

  “I mean we've found a strong motive for someone else.”

  Cervi stiffened. “What kind of motive?”

  “Someone has cooked the books of this company, and signora Di Silva learned all about it on Friday.”

  “What?!”

  “Yes. I suggest you take a few more days to analyze this suspect before making an arrest.”

  “Do you know who it is?”

  “There's a strong possibility the director of Finance is involved. However, the auditing company, Chicago Consulting Group, will give signor Ashley further information in a few days.”

  Sergio looked at Stefano. “What do you think about this case, Stefano?”

  Stefano lifted both shoulders. “I'm far from satisfied. If Enzo had shot her, it would have been a spur-of-the-moment thing because it would have been sheer lunacy to kill his lover at his sister's wedding when nobody else around even knew her. If he had indeed planned a murder, it would have made a lot more sense to do it in Milan, where there are plenty of suspects. The fact that the murder took place in Florence strongly speaks for him because it puts him on the spot with no alternative suspects.”

  “So maybe he shot her on the spur of the moment,” Cervi pursed his lips. “Who says he didn't?”

  “I say so.” Stefano still sounded calm. “Sneaking out to a car, getting a gun that must have been stored there before, sneaking back, and shooting her from a distance is not a spur-of-the-moment crime. It is deliberate, cool-headed murder.”

  “Fair enough.” Sergio wagged his round head. “I can understand that reasoning.”

  Cervi looked as if he wanted to stamp his feet. “You have a way of making things more complicated than necessary, Garini.”

  “And it usually helped to find the real killer. I suggest you go to Enzo Ashley with an open mind. Let him tell you about the report from the auditing company, and start to investigate on that end.”

  “It might not lead anywhere.” Cervi sounded sullen now.

  “You should have a good look at all the other co-workers while investigating here in Milan,” Carlina said. “It seems she was a much hated person.”

  “Oh, really?” Cervi glared at her. “No doubt you've already found plenty of other suspects.”

  She wanted to hit him, but she doubted it would help Stefano's career.

/>   “Nothing substantial, but if we come across further information, we'll certainly hand it over to you,” Stefano said. “So far, we've focused on opportunity because she was so unpopular that everyone seems to have a motive. As far as we know, only seven people knew she planned to spend the weekend in Florence.”

  “Seven people? Who is it?”

  “I suggest you ask signor Ashley about them. You are in a position to find out where they spend the weekend and if they had the opportunity for a quick trip to Florence. That's something I couldn't do.”

  Cervi glared at him. “You needn't think I'll share the information with you.”

  Stefano only nodded, took Carlina slightly by the elbow, and left the room. “No doubt we'll meet later.”

  Once they were in their own office, she slammed her notebook on the table. “I could kill him! How do you stand that pompous ass? You were so cool while I wanted to kick him from here to Jericho!”

  He grinned. “I know you did, and I was afraid you'd lose control any minute. That's why I made our exit as soon as possible.”

  “But how did you keep your calm?”

  He stretched. “I didn't. It was all a facade, and I'm now in urgent need of a massage by that Rambo guy you talked about. My shoulders feel all cramped up.”

  “Well, it doesn't show.” Carlina slanted her head to the side. “Why didn't you tell him about Liza? After all, she was on notice and seems to be having an affair here in the company, an affair Dorotea might not have approved of. The more suspects he investigates, the less he'll focus on Enzo.”

  Stefano shook his head. “I didn't want to overwhelm him. She's on the list Enzo will give him, and if she's as nervous as you say, she'll spill the beans soon enough. That'll give him a sense of achievement.”

  “I see.” Carlina frowned and looked straight ahead. “I thought only a big company like this is full of politics, but it seems it's also the case in your job. You deliberately left some information out, so Cervi will feel cleverer when he learns about it. That's quite a maneuver. But is it honest?”