Charmer's Death (Temptation in Florence Book 2)

by boeker, beate

  “I, Trevor Vincent Accanto, am of sound mind as I write this, my last will. At first, I played with the idea of giving each of the wonderful women who have shared my life a piece of my fortune, but I imagine that some of them might find it difficult to explain the sudden riches to their current partners, and also, it would be an effort to find them all again, when I have so successfully lost them in the past years.”

  Garini swallowed. Thank God the American hadn't gone through with that impulse. While it would have given him the name of every woman concerned, it would also have multiplied their motives for murder. He shuddered when he imagined Lucio learning about Emma's involvement with the rich American by way of an inheritance. What a mess this man had created. He turned back to the document. “So, instead I donate my whole fortune to a new-found institution that will support young women with children born out of wedlock. The Trevor V. Accanto foundation will be situated at my mansion in Boca Raton, Florida, and all the necessary details are already laid out in the corresponding Business Plan.”

  The document ended with the signature Garini had already seen on the fly-leaf of the notebook.

  Young women with children born out of wedlock. Garini frowned. Could it be that Trevor Accanto had illegitimate children somewhere and knew about them? Apparently, he had not cared to help them directly and had preferred to found an institution. Children - Fabbiola's prophecy came out of nowhere into his mind. Beware of children. He shook himself. What utter rubbish.

  The police at Boca Raton had included a summary about the life of Trevor Accanto that sounded like the eulogy at a funeral - an astute business man, not only fair but also generous, generally liked, a pillar of the Catholic community, president of the country club, owner of countless first-class properties . . . Garini felt slightly sick. He did not suspect the US police of being bribed, which only left one conclusion - the millionaire had come to Italy to sin in style while leading a blameless life at home.

  He shrugged. Well, why not? If only he hadn't managed to get himself killed in Florence. Still . . . something irked him. Something about this man was not right - he was too glib, too superficial. On an impulse, he pulled his phone closer and asked to be connected to the contact name given on the American report. He was put through without a hitch and soon found himself talking to the man who had put all the data together, Sergeant Dan Matador. He explained his situation, looking for words more often than he wanted, regretting his impulse. I should have looked up some words beforehand. But Sergeant Matador seemed to be a patient man, and when he started to speak, Garini gave a silent prayer of thanks that he spoke slowly, with pauses in between that left enough time for taking a quick note.

  “I see what you mean,” the sergeant said when Garini had finished his explanation. “You're looking for a more personal connection - for friends.”

  “Exactly.” Stefano was glad to have found someone who was quick on the uptake.

  “Well, I noted the same thing. Mr. Accanto was well-known in the community, of course. He often donated money at sponsorship events, and I remember that he briefly spoke at the inauguration of Boca Raton Plaza.”

  “The Boca Raton Plaza?”

  “A new shopping mall he purchased and re-vamped two years ago.” Dan Matador paused and added. “But he didn't have friends.”

  “No?”

  “No. I talked to the people he usually did business with, to his lawyer, his architect, his banker, the other members of the golf club. They were full of praise, but when I asked them if they would consider themselves to be close friends, they all said it had been a more superficial relationship.”

  “His housekeeper?”

  “His housekeeper has been with him for twenty-seven years. She said he traveled a lot, always to Florence in winter, but that he remained by himself when he was at home.”

  “Didn't he entertain?”

  “Oh, yes, he did entertain, but never less than twenty people at a time. He didn't have one or two special friends, nobody to share confidences with.”

  Garini chewed on that piece of information for a moment. What a lonely life. “What do you think he did if he wanted advice?”

  “Then he got the best people in the industry, paid them handsomely, and remained in friendly contact forever.”

  “I meant personal advice.”

  Now it was the Sergeant's turn to be quiet. “I don't know.”

  “The report says he was never married. Did he have women friends?”

  “No.” The answer of the Sergeant was decisive. “Nothing like that.”

  “Family?”

  “He mentioned an uncle in Florence.”

  Garini gave a snort. “This uncle was only an euphemism for an attractive woman - a different one each year.”

  “So I gathered from your initial contact request.” Sergeant Matador sounded unconvinced. “But I find it hard to reconcile that with the man we knew.”

  “It seems he built up two separate worlds and never mixed them.”

  “Apparently.”

  Garini frowned. If Accanto had managed to build up two separate worlds, what had stopped him from building up a third or fourth one? The American's passport had shown stamps from all over the world, with the only repeated entry being Italian immigration. However, the US was a huge country. Maybe Accanto had built another world within the US. “You said he traveled a lot. Do you happen to know if he went to other places within the US again and again, just like he did with Florence?”

  “We checked that,” Sergeant Matador said in his slow way, “but we found nothing.”

  Discouragement hit Garini. He had clung to his hope that the roots for the murder were far away from Florence, far away from Carlina and her family . . . but every clue led him to nothing, leaving him with a mess much too close to home. Why couldn't the rich American have a disgruntled wife, an heir with expensive hobbies and a furious business partner, cheated by a huge amount of money? That would have been some help. Instead, he had behaved like a universally loved saint when at home.

  “How about his financial situation? Where did he get his money from?”

  “He was a very rich man - inherited the lot from his father when he was nineteen and continued to enlarge it with clever investments. He'd already retired years ago and lived on the interest. There's nothing wrong with his business. We looked into that very thoroughly, thinking he might have done himself in.”

  Garini blinked. “The idea of strangling yourself with a pair of nylons inside a church seems a bit far-fetched.”

  “We only learned about the details of his death later.” The Sergeant sounded hurt.

  “I see.” Garini suppressed a sigh, thanked the Sergeant, and hung up. While his hand was still on the receiver, someone knocked on the door. A head with black spectacles and hair that looked like overcooked spaghetti poked around and blinked into the weak afternoon light as if he had just emerged from eternal darkness.

  “Arturo. Come in.” Garini waved at the computer expert of the police station. Maybe he had found something of better value on Trevor Accanto's laptop. One could always hope. “Did you manage to crack the password?”

  “Yup.” Arturo nodded. “'Twas easy.”

  Of course. Arturo found everything technical easy. Buying a loaf of ciabatta was a different matter. “What was it?”

  “Carpe_Diem.”

  Seize the day. That fit. Trevor Vincent Accanto had understood the art of living in the present, with no thoughts about the past or the future. “Did it reveal anything else?”

  “Music.” Arturo didn't believe in wasting words.

  “Music? What kind of songs?”

  “Classics. And sweet stuff for ladies.”

  Garini eyed Arturo's blue jeans that looked as if he had last taken them off in July. He hoped Arturo would not come any closer. “Anything else?”

  “Nah.” Arturo shook his head. “Shame. Great hardware. Too good for a juke box.”

  “How about correspondence?” Garini
felt desperate. Couldn't the victim have left any clue at all?

  “Some e-mails. Mostly orders for music.” Arturo shrugged. “Jewelry too. Expensive.”

  “But no other business correspondence?”

  “Nah.”

  Of course not. That would have been too easy. “Thank you, Arturo.” Garini waited until the door had closed, then got up and squared his shoulders. Now he had to tackle the next point on his agenda - the wife of his boss. Sometimes it was difficult to remember why on earth he had chosen this profession.

  The temperature had dropped still further, and Garini pulled up the collar of his leather jacket as he got out of the car in front of Cervi's house. He clenched his teeth as he mounted the few steps toward the villa and pressed the bell with a ridiculous feeling of inevitability.

  She opened the door herself. Thank God. “Good afternoon, Signora Cervi.” Stefano forced himself to smile at the wife of his boss.

  She had improbable blond hair, piled high on her head, a tanned face in the middle of winter, and glitzy earrings combined with a Chanel costume. The twenty-five kilos she had gained in the last years had shrouded her beauty in a more cuddly frame, but they didn't conceal how attractive she had been, even when she frowned. “Commissario Garini? Is anything the matter with my husband?” Her voice was the least attractive thing about her - it sounded high-pitched and squeaky.

  “None at all.” He shook his head. “I'd like to discuss a personal matter with you, if I may.”

  “Of course, though I can't for the life of me imagine what you'd like to say to me.” She opened the door wide. It was decorated with a tasteful Christmas wreath and a tartan ribbon, looking very American and out of place.

  He followed her into the villa. Marcella Cervi had been an heiress with excellent political connections. She spent her days on several committees and unofficially ran parts of the town. Garini had met her at several official meetings and soon realized that she was a dangerous woman, greedy and unhappy. Whenever possible, he gave her a wide berth, but he knew he had to interview her just like all the other women on his list if he didn't want to lose his self-respect. Still, he wished he was anywhere but in Cervi's opulent villa right now and only hoped that his boss wouldn't take it into his head to return home on this frosty winter afternoon.

  She opened a door to a room too perfect to be decorated by anyone but an interior architect. A white carpet complemented the shiny wooden floor, white brocade curtains were held back with broad linen tassels, and the walls were painted in a soft muddy color that was probably called misty taupe in the designer's catalog. Elaborate stucco provided an adequate frame for the glistening chandelier, and the furniture - a sofa and two armchairs - were too pristine white to have ever been put to serious use. In the middle reigned a low table made of heavy glass. The only note that didn't fit was the smell of cold smoke.

  Marcella Cervi draped herself on one of the large armchairs and pulled a cigarette from a golden case. “Do you want one?”

  “No, thank you.” Garini pulled the copy taken from Trevor Accanto's little book from his jacket but held it so she couldn't see the picture.

  “I forgot, you're always uber-correct.” She narrowed her eyes, lit the cigarette and pulled at it with a nervous move, then bent forward and placed the spent match with care onto a heavy glass ashtray.

  “I'll be brief,” he said.

  “You always are.” Her voice sounded tart.

  He ignored her, though his heart-beat accelerated. She'll make this difficult. “You will have heard that the millionaire Trevor Accanto was strangled at the Basilica di Santa Trìnita four days ago.”

  She didn't reply.

  He didn't take his gaze off her and thought he could see a cautious withdrawal, a watchfulness in her eyes. “When we got access to Signor Accanto's private documents, we found this.” He passed her the picture. “It was part of a highly suggestive album, one that leads us to believe that the ladies shown were his lovers.”

  Marcella Cervi looked at the picture without moving. For an instant, her fingers clenched on the paper, then they relaxed again. She lifted her head. “What is your question, Commissario?”

  “I'd like to know everything you can tell me about Signor Accanto.”

  She pulled at her cigarette again and gave a high-pitched laugh. “I suggest that you concern yourself more with the present than with the past. If I had had a grudge against Trevor, I would not have waited some twenty years before acting on it.”

  “When was this picture taken?”

  She shrugged. “I don't recall exactly, it's all so long ago. Twenty-five years ago? Twenty-six? I don't know.”

  Garini didn't take his gaze off her. “I think you could remember very well if you wanted to.”

  She blew a ring of smoke into the air. “I assure you, dear Commissario, that I never remember unimportant things.”

  “Were you already married then, Signora Cervi?”

  She bent forward, her dark eyes suddenly sparkling in anger. “So this is it? I admit I'm surprised. I'd never have taken you for the kind of man who goes for a bit of blackmail every now and then.”

  Stefano clenched his teeth. “I am investigating a murder, Signora Cervi, no more and no less. Your husband doesn't know that I'm here, and if the information I get from you has no connection to the murder, I will not tell him about it.”

  She leaned back and gave him a supercilious look. “What about your reports?”

  Damn. With unerring instinct, she had placed her finger into the wound. As the wife of his boss, she knew that he was obliged to put every single bit of information, no matter how unimportant, into the reports. If he offered to leave out the information, he was making himself vulnerable, and she would use it to her advantage as soon as she was out of danger.

  However, if he left it in, he also knew that Cervi would take it as a personal insult and would take it out on him. He couldn't win.

  Stefano held her gaze. “My report will contain every word we have exchanged.” He had by no means decided what he would do with the information he could get from her, but under no circumstances would he tell her so. What a difference to Carlina, Carlina who was straight-forward, honest, and never played games. Suddenly, he missed her with such intensity that it felt like a shot of pain going straight through him.

  “Aha.” She stubbed out her cigarette. “So I've not been mistaken in you. That's something, at least.” She got up. “However, I see no need to give you any further information. My past has nothing whatsoever to do with the murder of Trevor Accanto. You have my word on that.” She gave him a faint smile. “That should be enough.”

  Garini stretched out his legs, pretending to make himself comfortable. “Pray remain seated, Signora.”

  She met his cool gaze with a look of blazing temper. “What do you want? I'm not going to tell you anything.”

  He took out the pictures of Snow White and Laughing Eyes, with Trevor cut away. It cost him an effort to reveal their pictures to someone as uncooperative as Marcella Cervi, but she had been Trevor's lover a year or two after them, and she might remember their faces as they had been then, even if the women had changed drastically in the meantime.

  “Could you look at these pictures and tell me if you recognize these women?”

  As he had expected, her curiosity was stronger than her hostility.

  She held out her hand.

  He first gave her Snow White.

  A quick shake of the head. “Never seen her.”

  Laughing Eyes.

  Her eyes widened. She opened her mouth, then she closed it again. “Never seen her, either.” She returned the pictures. “Is that enough or do you plan on remaining sitting here for the rest of the day?”

  He got up without hurrying. “You have given me all the answers I need.” So she knows Laughing Eyes but wants to keep the secret. He frowned. Why? It could be loyalty. Hard to imagine in a woman like Marcella Cervi. He could better imagine that she would hide her kno
wledge for other motives . . . power, for example - or maybe even blackmail. Yes, he could see Marcella Cervi using her knowledge to get an advantage she would otherwise not have had. If that was her plan, it was dangerous.

  He turned at the door and fixed her with his most intimidating gaze. “I have to warn you, Signora Cervi, that this killer is ruthless.”

  She lifted a mocking eyebrow. “Aren't they all?”

  “Possibly.” His voice was dry. “If you should realize that you want to add something to your statement, get in touch with me immediately.”

  “I could also tell my husband.” She gave him a saucy smile.

  Heaven forbid. “Of course.” He nodded and went down the stone steps leading from the villa. An icy wind blew straight between his neck and his collar, but he felt better outside, with a bigger distance from the wife of his boss. Phew. Now he had to look for a woman in competition with Marcella Cervi. Who could it be? An acclaimed beauty? Maybe even a previous lover of her husband. Stefano shuddered. He'd rather not investigate a case that had its roots deep in the Cervi family.

  On an impulse, he took out his phone and called Carlina.

  “Hello Commissario.” Her voice was faintly mocking, but tender.

  He could feel his mood lighten. “Hi.”

  “Is anything the matter?” Her voice sounded worried now.

  Strange, how much he wanted to smooth that fear away. “No. Nothing more than you already know, that is.”

  “Good.” A pause.

  He could hear her taking a deep breath, as if steeling herself for something.

  “So why are you calling?” she asked.

  He hesitated, then said the first thing that came to his mind. “I wanted to hear your voice.”

  “Oh.” She laughed.

  It sounded as if it was a private laugh just for him, low and intimate, and it gave him goosebumps. “Are you all right? No after-effects from the shock this morning?”