The night is almost pitch-black, but there’s a waning gibbous moon shining bright over Mount Etna.
Nino turns and flashes a smile. He looks youthful, almost boy-like.
The sweet night air and frangipani: sugary as candy.
The sound of crickets chirruping.
A sultry summer’s night.
‘Nino.’ I laugh. My head is fucked up. A wide grin spreads across my face. I sing ‘Nino. Nino. Nino’ to the tune of a fire engine.
‘Hurry up, Betta. Come on.’
I’ve got the church giggles. I bite my lip to try to stop. It’s all I can do to stop myself shouting my name is Alvina.
We push past leaves. Some lemon trees. Some olive groves. Some houses. A warm breeze blows across my face. We come on to a quiet clearing. That’s when I catch up with him. Oh fuck man, I’m so high. I lean over to put my hands on my knees; I’m dizzy. I look up to see where I am. Nino walks over to me. He takes my arm and I follow him. We look out over the edge of a cliff and stand in the breeze holding hands. He leads me to the very edge. It’s a fucking long way down. It looks dangerous. Deadly. The moonlight casts an eerie glow, rippling on the silent water. Everything’s in black and white, just like an old movie. My heart is beating faster now. What are we doing here? This looks like the cliff where we dumped Ambrogio. My whole body freezes.
‘Nino, what was your idea?’
‘We are going to jump.’
‘Are you out of your fucking mind?’
‘Do you trust me?’ he says.
I pause. That’s a very good question. Is he going to lose me like he lost my twin? He made her disappear.
Nino grips my hand even tighter. His palm feels slippery in mine.
‘Uno, due . . .’
‘Nino, wait.’
‘Uno, due, tre.’
First he fucked me, and now he’s killing me. It’s a tale as old as time. But why? Oh God, does he know I’m not Beth? Does he know I murdered his boss? If he knew I killed Ambrogio, that I had smashed his head in with a rock, he’d get revenge and murder me, just like he did with Salvo.
He pulls me and – I can’t help it – I jump.
The ground gives away to nothing . . .
Nothing . . .
and we’re falling,
falling,
screaming.
‘AAAAAAAHHHHHHH.’
A wall of cold sea air slams into me.
The starlight blurs.
My stomach flips.
The rush is nuts, like nothing ever.
I’m completely off my tits.
I leave my mind and watch us fall from way up high. I see our bodies tumbling. The curve of the world as it turns. The Earth’s a shrinking blue-green ball.
Then we crash into the water.
There’s a deafening noise. A thunderous ROAR and I’m back. Wide awake. I’m buzzing. My senses way too sensitive. I feel crazy alive. And now we’re deep down under water. There’s a tug on my right hand as Nino pulls me up. Cold, black, heavy, freezing water. Bubbles streaming from my mouth. I swim as fast as I can to the surface, kicking my legs. Thrashing my arms. Nino’s still holding my hand. He never even let go. We burst up through the icy water, out into the midnight air. I’m gasping. Splashing. Swearing. Rushing.
‘FUCK. FUCK. FUCK.’
Nino kisses me. He squeezes my body against his wet skin, slippery and sliding. Our hearts pound as one. We’re treading water in the waves under the vast and starry sky. We rise and fall and rise and fall and rise and fall and rise . . .
This kiss. The salty sea. His icy lips. I’m shaking. Shivering in the water. And I can hardly breathe.
Nino pulls me closer again.
‘Betta,’ he says. ‘You like it?’
Urgh. There’s that name again. I’m just going to tell him.
I close my eyes and let him hold me. Feel his naked chest on mine.
‘Nino, there’s something I have to tell you.’
I stop.
I don’t think I can do it.
I picture Beth’s face in my head.
I look up at him, afraid.
His eyes are shining black in the moonlight.
‘What is it, Betta? Come on.’
‘This is the best night of my life.’
This time, I kiss him.
Chapter Twenty-three
Saturday, 5 September 2015
Trastevere, Rome, Italy
I find my clothes on the bedroom floor. I pick them up and pull them on. Prada knickers. Leather trousers. Leather pumps. Black leather jacket. I check myself out in the full-length mirror. Run my fingers through my hair. That pink dye is washing out. I’ll have to do it again. Not now. There’s something far more urgent, more important than my hair. I wipe yesterday’s mascara away with a licked fingertip and apply some concealer to cover the bruises – blue and green – on my new nose. Purple lipstick. More mascara. I add the mirror shades. I pull out Nino’s old fedora. Tilt it at a jaunty angle. Try it on the other way around. It looks fab with my pale fuchsia hair.
Right.
I’m ready for Dynamite.
I’m ready to find my man.
Nino will wish he hadn’t messed with me. He’ll be sorry that we ever met. I’ll find him and I’ll bed him. (A quickie. Just one more hit. I deserve that.) And then, when he thinks he is safe, when he thinks he is in the clear, I’ll kill him, slowly and painfully. And then he’ll disappear.
I double-check my cuckoo clock. The money’s still inside, that’s good. But I need to travel light today. I can’t lug all this stuff around. I might need to leave here in a hurry. I may never come back.
I grab the banknotes from the clock and shove them down my push-up bra. What else? What else am I going to need? I look around the room. I can’t take all these clothes with me, the lube, the electric toothbrush . . . All these things are heavy, bulky. They would slow me down. I’ll have to be selective, discerning. I wish I had a carving knife, but there aren’t any more sharp knives in the kitchen. I’ve already looked. I take the cock ring and the condoms, my cigarettes and my passport. I don’t need my sister’s any more; everyone knows she’s toast. I zip up my bag. Let’s do this thing. I light myself a fag.
I tiptoe into Domenico’s room and check he’s still asleep. He is in bed with my mother with Ernie passed out in between them. The baby cuddles Domenico’s face and sucks his tiny thumb. They’re the picture of a happy family. I still can’t believe he fancies my mum. Perhaps he’s into necrophilia? Each to their own, I suppose.
Poor Ernie, I’m leaving him again. This is the second time now. I can’t help feeling bad about it. Abandoning him with my mad-whack mum and that fucking psychopath. Poor kid’s going to need some serious therapy. Probably even more than me. You know what? I’ll take him too. I don’t want my mother to have him. I’ll adopt him. That’s an awesome plan. I’ll steal the kid, find Nino’s phone and Dynamite’s number. Then I’ll take the gun.
The floorboards creak as I creep in and look around for Domenico’s weapon. I rifle through his jacket pockets, but it’s not here. Goddamn. I can’t find Nino’s mobile either. Can’t see it on the bedside table or charging somewhere by a wall. What the hell has he done with it? I need it for my plan.
I bet Domenico sleeps with his gun underneath his pillow. I know I would if I were him. Perhaps the phone and the gun are both there? It’s got to be worth a look. I sneak over to the bed and peer into his brutish face. He’s snoring loud and snarly snores, as I imagine an ogre would. He seems to be in a deep sleep. Fuck it, I’m going to try it. I slide my hand under his pillow, slowly, slowly, inch by inch. He rolls over and traps my arm. His nose an inch from my tits. If I move now, he’s sure to wake up . . . Well, that didn’t work.
‘Shit,’ I say under my breath.
My mother
wakes up.
‘Alvina?’ she says, rubbing her eyes and sitting up.
Her voice pierces my eardrums like needles. It’s way too early for this shit. She’s wearing a lacy scarlet slip. Her make-up is smeared and her hair’s a mess. Oh God. My mum and Domenico. That’s something I can never un-see. I close my eyes, but all I see is Domenico’s massive erect penis. It’s burnt on to my retinas for all eternity. It’s like some kind of phallic screen saver I don’t know how to delete. I open my eyes again quickly.
‘Hello, Mum,’ I say.
Domenico rolls over and I reclaim my arm.
‘Did you have a nice time last night?’ I ask. Of course she did; I heard EVERYTHING.
‘Oh yes. Thank you,’ she says.
Urgh. Post-coital bliss.
I check Domenico’s hog-like face, but he is sound asleep and snoring.
Ha. Have you eyes? You cannot call it love.
Even I wouldn’t shag him.
I hear my cuckoo clock chime in the next room.
I get an idea.
‘Hang on, Mum, I got you a present.’
I run back into my bedroom and grab the stupid clock. She follows me out into the hall. I give my mother the clock. She eyes the gift suspiciously, as though it were a home-made bomb.
‘Did you steal this from Grandma’s house?’
‘No, I bought it in London.’
She winds the clock forward an hour, then gives it back to me.
‘Domenico doesn’t know a thing about pest extermination. I asked him the best way to get rid of a cockroach and he suggested that I shoot it. Have you been lying again, Alvina?’
‘That is actually very effective. Cockroaches are hard to kill.’
‘Why are you up so early?’ she says. ‘This isn’t like you.’
‘I’m just popping out to get some milk.’
My mother raises an eyebrow. ‘Well, there’s a first time for everything.’
I look into my mother’s beady eyes: a pterodactyl from the Cretaceous period. I’m just going to ask.
‘Can I take Ernie out with me? I’ll give you a break. You look like you could use some help. You’re too old to look after a baby.’
My mother frowns. She’s not convinced.
‘If Celine Dion can have a child at the ripe old age of forty-two, then I can look after my grandson,’ she says.
‘But you’re in your sixties, not your forties.’
‘Nonsense,’ she says. ‘My dermatologist says I have the skin of a thirty-year-old.’ She definitely doesn’t. She’s probably fucking him. ‘You’re as old as the person you feel.’
I picture my mother feeling Domenico. It is way too graphic.
‘Well, I think you should give Ernesto to me. I look a little bit like Beth, so he might think I’m his mum.’
‘Ha. You and your sister are nothing alike. Now, that’s the end of the subject.’
‘But I gave you a cuckoo clock . . .’
Ernie starts crying inside the bedroom. My mum goes back into the room.
I sigh. For once, at least, she’s right. It was hard enough dragging that puppy around, never mind a baby. I have a vision of Ernesto strapped to my chest in his papoose, screaming all the way through a shoot-out. Guns blazing. Bullets flying. No, no, no, I can’t be arsed. It’s tough to ‘have it all’. It’s hard work juggling kids and a career. What the hell were those feminists thinking? I guess I’m just not that maternal.
‘All right. Fine. Whatever.’
Domenico emerges from the bedroom. He stretches out and yawns. The inside of his mouth looks just like a hippo’s. A hippo with lots of fillings.
‘I need to talk to you,’ I say.
He closes the door behind him.
‘Dynamite?’ I say. ‘Come on, let’s go. Right now.’
‘Sì. We can go today. But she might not talk,’ he says. ‘She might be loyal to Nino.’
‘Dynamite’s a she?’ I say.
‘Sì, sì, she’s a she.’
I don’t know why, but I’d assumed that she would be a guy.
‘Don’t you have ways to make people talk?’
‘I don’t torture women.’
I follow him into the lounge. I scoff. ‘You tortured me.’
‘We did not,’ Domenico says. ‘We left you in a fence.’ He sits down in the living room and turns on the TV. ‘You still have all your fingernails. You still have all your toes . . .’
‘All right. OK, I get it.’
He skips the channels on the TV to get to the news.
‘I don’t care. I want to see her. I’ll make her talk,’ I say.
* * *
*
This place looks familiar. I don’t know why. I’ve never been here before. All of these cobbled streets look the same. All of these wooden doors . . .
Domenico’s fist pounds the front door:
I hear a voice call from inside.
‘Hold your horses,’ it says.
The door swings open to reveal . . . Rain? It takes me a second to place her. She’s drinking some kind of protein shake from a blender cup, standing before us in skin-tight leggings, Nike trainers and an exercise bra that’s turned see-through with sweat.
‘Rain?’ I say. ‘What are you doing here?’ He must have got the wrong door.
‘Beyoncé? I tried to call you . . .’
She grabs me and throws me into the hall. Pins me up against the wall. ‘You fuck me then you don’t answer my calls?’
She lifts me off the ground.
‘The police. They took . . . they took my phone.’
Now that is true, if not relevant.
Damn, my killer move won’t work. She doesn’t have any balls.
I struggle and strain, but her grip is firm. My feet kick out at nothing.
She drops me and I crash to the floor. I rub my shoulder. That hurt.
Fucking crazy violent bitch.
I think it’s dislocated.
Rain pulls me back up to standing. I grab my Prada bag. Domenico steps inside the flat and closes the front door.
‘Oh, hey, Domenico,’ says Rain.
‘Ciao, Dynamite.’
‘Wait a minute. What the fuck? You are Dynamite?’
‘I am. Well, that’s my nickname really . . . like Beyoncé, I guess?’
Rain lets us through into the hall and checks the door behind us. She bolts it three times and hooks a chain, then peers out through the spyhole. She’s more paranoid than I am. I don’t think there’s anyone there. She turns and looks into my eyes, then gives me a quick kiss on the lips. ‘I was hoping I’d see you again . . .’
‘You two know each other then?’ Domenico says, scratching his head.
‘Yes we do,’ says Rain. ‘She’s a bad, bad bitch.’
I could say the same.
She rubs sweat from her brow with a purple towel.
I shake my head. Who is this woman? What is going on?
‘Come and sit down,’ says Rain.
She gestures inside her flat. There’s a Fitbit on her wrist. Her nails are bright turquoise. She’s painted them since I last saw her. It’s a cool colour; I like it.
We follow Rain into the lounge. The air is hot and stuffy. I haven’t been in here before. I would remember this . . .
There’s a treadmill spinning in the middle of the room. ‘Drag Me Down’ by One Direction blares from a widescreen TV. The boys are dressed as astronauts. Orange spacesuits. Floppy hair. Dancing around on a shiny spaceship. She must have been working out. Rain grabs the remote control and then mutes Harry Styles. The walls are lined with shelves and stacked up high with plastic cases. There are hundreds and hundreds of them piled on top of one another. I spot an open cardboard box on the floor just by the door; I take a look inside.
It’s full of small round silver objects roughly the size of pears. I frown. They look like hand grenades. Oh, no, wait. They probably are.
‘When you said you worked in sales . . .’ I say.
Rain takes off her translucent bra and peels her leggings down. She steps out of a barely there black lace G-string and stands naked in front of us. We make eye contact for a second, then she turns and leaves. I watch her toned and muscular back.
‘Won’t be a sec,’ she says.
Domenico and I sit down and watch some MTV.
‘That’s one hot piece of ass,’ he says. ‘You tapping that?’
‘I am. What happened to the Jane Austen?’
‘Oh, that was for your mum.’
After six or seven minutes, Rain comes back into the room in a spandex minidress. Her hair is wet. She’s taken a shower. She looks like an Adidas model. She sees me checking her out and smiles.
‘I like your trainers,’ I say.
‘So what will it be?’ asks Rain. She gestures around the cluttered room. ‘I presume you are here for a weapon?’
Domenico and I exchange glances.
‘I have some gorgeous sawn-offs at the moment, fresh from the USA. Or if you’re after something old-school, I have a 1972 Lupara. It’s really pretty, good as new.’
She shoots a wink at me.
I look around the living room. These cases must be full of guns. It’s like we’re in some kind of warehouse/living room/gym.
‘No, no. I don’t need a weapon,’ Domenico says, opening his jacket. The handle of his gun sticks out. You can’t really miss it.
‘Nice, is that a Colt?’ she says.
‘Sì, a 10mm,’ he says. ‘It used to be my father’s.’
‘Oh, I need a weapon,’ I say.
Domenico shakes his head.
Rain smiles a radiant smile. She’s stunning. More beautiful than I remember. Everything’s fuzzy from that night. She is a vision. A goddess.
‘And what would you like, sexy?’
Ordinarily I would say the bigger the better. But I’m on the move. I’m stealthy. Sneaky. A killer undercover.
‘Something small I can fit in my pocket?’ I show her the pocket of my jacket.
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