Things were hotting up in town again, Carlo thought grimly. It had been pretty quiet since the killing of Guido Scarlatti and the attempted shooting of his sergeant – just the usual stream of no-hope crooks, people traffickers, pimps, pushers and street kids that made up the daily grind of their lives.
‘Someone is sending out a very strong message here, Leo,’ Carlo said, as they stood at what was left of the bar. It had been peppered by bullets, many of them heavy-duty rounds by the look of it. ‘Who owns this shithole, anyway?’
‘Salim Mandretta.’
‘Really? I didn’t think there’d be anyone crazy enough to take him on, not even in this town.’
‘Could be an out-of-town outfit.’
‘Camorra? Or the Calabrians?’
‘The ’Ndrangheta, you mean? Yeah, it could be them and they’re getting stronger all the time. Stronger than the Mafia now, some say.’ Leo pulled up a tall bar stool, sweeping the glass from it before he sat down. ‘Don’t want to stab myself in the arse,’ he murmured. ‘There’s gonna be hell to pay for this, boss.’
Alvarese had finished the autopsies on the three Satisfaction guards. As he handed Carlo a cup of his infamous espresso, he thumbed through his notes.
‘All these boys had been around,’ Alvarese said. ‘Two had the scars of old bullet wounds, and the other had been carved up at some time. He’d been stitched up all down his arm and shoulder.’
‘The weapon used?’
‘Hah, that’s easy: .44 Magnum. No other handgun could rearrange a man like that, but I found enough of one round to be sure. What about your ballistic boys?’
‘Yeah, they said the same. Most of the Magnum’s bullets went through those two and into the wall. Other guns were used, though. We have plenty to go on – the club was plastered in bullet holes from Glocks. Standard police-issue, too.’
‘Yes, here and everywhere else. They’re all over Europe like a rash. I’ve never known the local boys to use them much though.’
‘I thought Mafiosi preferred more exotic stuff – Berettas, mainly, and sometimes even old stuff like Brownings.’
Alvarese’s eyes lit up at the last name.
‘Ah, that was the old English standard. My father was given one of those by a Tommy captain at the end of the war, a reward for his partisan work. The old man was really proud of that. I still have it somewhere around the place.’
‘I hope it’s registered, Doc, and not kept loaded.’
Alvarese sat down without answering, rolled up the sleeves of his white coat and drained his own coffee in one draught. ‘Do you want to see the deceased?’ he asked.
‘Not much point, is there? It took only minutes for the computer to get them up, once we had the photos. They were three of Salim Mandretta’s foot soldiers, all with a long list of previous.’
‘Salim isn’t going to like one of his clubs being hit. Is there another war on the way, Carlo?’
Carlo shrugged, wincing as he downed his espresso.
‘Do you ever sleep, drinking this stuff?’ Carlo said.
‘Who needs sleep? Plenty of time for that when I join the thousands of people I’ve pulled apart down here.’
‘There’s been no indication that the Mafia is about to kick off. You can usually see the signs coming long before there’s a major incident like this, but I think that hit on Guido Scarlatti might have something to do with what’s going on. His girls worked at Satisfaction, and he was close to Mandretta too.’
Both men became silent, Alvarese as he thought back to the carnage of former times. Lawyers, judges, politicians and even priests had been assassinated, and sometimes whole Families blown up. At sixty-eight, he could be out of all this, growing roses in his garden and sitting in the sun in happy dotage, but he knew that would never happen. His work was his life and his life was his work, and Alvarese was determined to go out mid-autopsy, scalpel in ageing hand.
‘Thanks, Alvo,’ Carlo said, ‘ I’ve got to go find Leo now.’
‘Leo?’
‘Yeah, he’s disappeared this morning.’
Alvarese smiled. Leo Bracchi always made him smile. He liked the way the guy wobbled. ‘Well, Leo’s finally got himself into a relationship. Maybe the work is demanding.’
Carlo rolled his eyes. As he put down his coffee cup, Alvarese put a hand on his shoulder. ‘You know the tricky thing about wars, Carlo – whether they’re our murderous little affairs here, or world-stage stuff?’
‘What?’
‘They’re all so easy to start, but so much harder to stop. That’s my philosophical thought for this bright morning.’
‘Cheers, Doc.’
Carlo collected up Alvarese’s untidy notes and left.
‘Chess!’ Alvarese shouted at Carlo’s disappearing back, before pouring himself another cup of insomniac juice from his ancient coffee pot.
Carlo dismissed the marked car that was waiting for him outside the morgue. After the heavy rain of yesterday, a bright-blue sky graced the city and he fancied the short walk back to the station. He tried Leo’s mobile again. Still nothing. Not only had Leo vanished this morning, but he was also using the department car they shared, which had forced Carlo to ask for a ride in the marked car. He had covered for Leo so far with the boys upstairs, but that would get harder as the day wore on.
Salim Mandretta had been at Satisfaction the night before, when it was hit, but had left early. As Gianluca revealed the details of the raid, Mandretta’s fingers whitened around his wine glass until it cracked under the pressure.
‘They do this to me?’ Mandretta muttered. ‘Are they crazy?’ He got up quickly, throwing the glass into the large log fire in his even larger fireplace. The days were chilly enough for some heat now, and as he aged he increasingly felt the cold in his bones.
‘Do you think it’s them bastards from Calabria, spreading their filth down here? Don’t tell me it’s scum from Naples, that arsehole of the world.’
‘Don’t think so, boss.’
Gianluca shuffled his feet a little and looked discomfited, an attitude Mandretta didn’t usually associate with his number-one foot soldier.
‘What are you not telling me, GL?’
‘Marco the barman, he was lying on the floor behind his bar at the time, calling for his mama probably . . . Well, he saw one of them take off their mask for a second.’
‘Did he recognise him?’
‘That’s just it, boss. It wasn’t a him, it was a fucking woman, and not only that, she was a cop.’
‘What?’
‘A cop! Marco is sure of it. Someone who busted him five or six years ago, a good-looking dyke, he said, but he can’t remember the name. We got a photo, too. Marco managed to get the tape from one of the cameras before the cops came. Don’t worry, he smashed all the stuff up after that.’
Gianluca produced the photograph with a flourish and Mandretta squinted at the hazy image.
‘Marco better be right about this or I’ll pickle his balls in a jar. Find my phone, I gotta make a phone call to an old friend.’
Leo shifted position in his chair. It was hard, with a low back that did not suit his bulky frame. He was sitting in the sea-facing main room of one of Mandretta’s mansions. The place was the size of a small aircraft hangar, and the whole Bracchi apartment – the same one that Mandretta had just reminded him he’d provided – could easily fit into this one room.
Leo glanced around at all the stuff that shouted money, status and power. The paintings on the walls, the futuristic sculptures that Leo thought awful and, along the length of one wall, a fifteen-foot-long glass-fronted bookcase that must have held a few thousand books. Leo was amused by this because he knew Mandretta had never read a book in his life – in fact he doubted that the man could even read.
‘Well, what favour?’ Leo asked.
‘All in good time, Leo, all in good time.’
The bastard is stretching this out, Leo thought, making me sweat. In any other world he would not even hav
e turned up here. In a sensible society, favours of this sort would not be expected to be repaid, but this was Palermo, and he was dealing with Salim Mandretta, as dangerous a man as had ever operated here.
‘How old are you now, Leo – forty yet?’
‘Almost there.’
‘Tell me about this woman of yours . . . Sylvia? Who’d have thought it, eh? Leo Bracchi walking out with someone? She ain’t bad-looking neither. Dresses well, too.’
Mandretta had mentioned Leo’s mother and now Sylvia. Leo knew only too well what he was being told. Mandretta could threaten a man without really saying much at all. Leo would have to accept this performance until Mandretta cut to the chase.
Leo had driven to Mandretta’s place by the most roundabout route he could think of, and had turned off his phone. He had grown up in the same world as Mandretta, but Leo Bracchi from the tenements had joined the police force, which had been unheard of until he’d done it.
Leo thought he had left that old world far behind, but maybe that had always been wishful thinking. Even just being seen with Mandretta would be enough to endanger his job and put paid to the fifteen years of blood, sweat and tears it had taken him to make sergeant. Mandretta knew this full well, and this was his ace in the hole – and they both knew that if Mandretta hadn’t been able to change where the Bracchis lived then Leo would never have got into the force.
‘So, Leo, how the hell are you? Life is good, eh?’
‘I’ve already asked you – what do you want, Mandretta?’
‘No “Mister”? I remember when you used to call me “Mister”, and hung on my every word.’
‘I was just a kid then.’
‘Yeah, but to me it seems like just yesterday. Lemme see now, it must have been twenty – no, twenty-five years ago. You were a snot-nosed little punk waddling round them tenements while I was a young dude on his way up.’
‘Am I here for a history lesson? We haven’t seen each other in years.’
‘No, and I regret that, but you being a cop and all it would be kinda difficult, huh? Hey, how about that? Little Leo became a cop, and doing well at it too. And a plain-clothes sergeant now, eh? See, I been keeping an eye on your career all these years.’
Leo rubbed at his eyebrow, but the wound had healed and almost disappeared, leaving just a small, dark-red mark as a memory.
‘So, you had someone take a shot at me for old times’ sake, is that what you’re saying? I wondered why that shot missed.’
Mandretta offered his usual thin-lipped smile; which was a bit like the kiss of a snake, Leo thought. He wondered how many men had witnessed it just before they met their end.
Mandretta spread his hands in way of apology. ‘Sorry you got nicked, Leo, but it was just my way of concentrating your attention before our little chat.’
‘Hearing your voice on the phone would have been enough to do that. My mother was terrified, and my girl . . .’
‘How is Mrs Bracchi?’
‘Not getting any younger, and she’d age another ten years if she thought I was talking to you.’
‘Maybe. Maybe not. She was very grateful I got you that place, got you out of the shit end of town when your old man died. I can hear her now . . . Oh, Mister Salim, how can we ever thank you? I never dreamed we’d ever have a nice apartment like this.’
When Leo heard Mandretta mimic his mother, he had to fight hard not to react and crush the man with his hands. Leo had already asked Mandretta what the man wanted – twice – and he bit his lip to prevent himself doing it again. Outside, the day was heating up and he felt sweat starting to creep from his armpits into the shirt Sylvia had ironed to perfection. His cell phone had been turned off for a few hours now and CC would be going nuts, especially in the wake of that Satisfaction job.
Mandretta put another slice of lemon into his black tea then stared at Leo, his dark eyes unflinching as they seemed to look into Leo’s very soul.
‘I’m calling in that favour, Leo,’ Mandretta said, making a slight slurping noise as he enjoyed his brew.
‘That’s obvious.’
‘The fact that you expect it tells me that you haven’t strayed that far from the old ways. But actually, the favour has changed. At first I wanted any inside dope you had on who might have whacked Guido Scarlatti, but things are different now. Here’s a photo for you to look at.’
When he saw the image, Leo shrugged with what he hoped was his best puzzled shrug.
‘Could be anyone,’ he muttered, but he had recognised the person instantly. It was a grainy black-and-white shot of Adelina Cervi, a sergeant from Homicide he’d worked with in the past. Adelina was from a rich family – far too rich for her to be a humble cop. They called her ‘The Queen’ behind her back, but she’d been off work for a long time. Stress, they’d all been told.
As Mandretta just sat there waiting for the correct answer, Leo knew that his life was about to get very difficult.
Carlo was phoning Leo yet again when the man himself appeared – pulling up outside the morgue with a screech of brakes – just as Carlo was about to start walking. Carlo stood on the steps down from the building with hands on hips, a stance that demanded an explanation. As a flustered Leo got out of the car, Carlo realised they’d barely said a cross word in the six years they’d worked together.
‘It had better be good,’ Carlo said. ‘You’ve been gone all morning, Leo, at a time when the whole city is jumping at shadows with that Satisfaction raid. And your phone is off. Why the hell is that, Leo?’
‘Sorry, boss. There’s something wrong with it. The battery’s not holding its charge or something. I gotta get another from the station when we get back.’
‘So where were you, Leo?’
Leo rubbed his jaw ruefully.
‘Dentist,’ he said. ‘This back tooth has been driving me crazy all night. I went straight there first thing this morning, but as soon as I sat in the chair and tried to call you I realised my phone wasn’t working. I should have got straight back up and come in, but early on a Tuesday I thought it would be okay, and the tooth was killing me. It just took a lot longer than I expected, and you know how much I hate dentists.’
Leo could see the doubt in Carlo’s eyes as his boss looked at him thoughtfully. He prayed the chief inspector wouldn’t check out his dentist.
‘Here,’ Carlo said, thrusting Alvarese’s file into Leo’s startled hands. ‘I’ll drive because you look a bit shaken. Fancy a big guy like you being afraid of the dentist.’
Adelina Cervi tossed back her hair, letting it flow down over her shoulders in a black wave. Marianna watched her closely; she was still in awe of her saviour.
‘Will you brush it for me, Mari?’ Adelina said. ‘Use the hard one.’
Marianna followed the texture of Adelina’s hair, marvelling at its luxury and shine. As it began to quickly dry she felt the static charge transfer between hair and brush, as if it were part of her too. She wanted to smell the hair, but didn’t have the nerve to do so. Adelina must have sensed her desire, however, as she turned and pulled her closer.
‘Don’t be shy,’ Adelina said, but Marianna was shy with her. Despite her experience with a few thousand men, she knew this was something different – and real. In the time she had been with Adelina, a bond had developed between them. Marianna could not believe that someone like Adelina could be interested in her as a person, and what she now felt was turning from gratitude to love. She pushed her own hair back self-consciously and pushed up against Adelina.
Marianna had gained weight, and her skin had improved. All the girls were helping and supporting her in this. Marianna felt her eyes well up as she thought of her new extended family, and what they had done for her.
‘You could be really pretty, you know,’ Adelina said. ‘Once you get completely free of all that shit you’re pumping into yourself. I think I’m going to call you my little gypsy, because that’s what you look like.’
‘There is a lot of Romani blood in my family,�
� Marianna said.
‘I thought there might be. Put the brush down now.’
Adelina took Marianna’s face in her hands and started to caress it softly. Marianna felt her strength – a woman’s supportive strength, not the cruel abusing hands of a man. As Adelina’s lips sought hers, Marianna froze for a moment, then responded, feeling safe for the first time in her adult life.
Leo’s head was awash with conflicting thoughts. He drove into the part of Palermo no one had yet managed to change, the area of his youth. This was the first time in many years he’d been here without it being part of his job. Leo almost felt like a tourist, one of those gawky Yanks or northern Europeans with their stupid shorts and hats and sunburned legs, who came every summer in their droves expecting to see a thousand Marlon Brandos, or at least a few hundred De Niros or Al Pacinos. They even had Mafia tours in the city now, and how crazy was that? But Leo knew that people had always believed legends rather than the truth; it was easier that way.
Leo passed close to the tenement of his early childhood, or at least as close to it as he could get in the car. The old Bracchi place was on one of the narrow streets that led off from the main highway, a maze of winding stone canyons that had bred crime more than anything else in the last hundred years. Leo realised how far he had come, but now Mandretta was threatening to pull it all down.
Perhaps he had been foolish to think he could ever get away. Maybe you could take the man out of his past but not the past out of the man. That was what all the Mandrettas on the island would say – and they had good reason to, because if things remained the same their power would never diminish. There had been some successes for the police in Leo’s time and the Mafia had been hurt. The beast had been wounded but it was a long way from being down, and now Leo was being asked to help it.
Leo slammed his hand down on the steering wheel in anger and frustration, as thoughts collided in his head. If he helped Mandretta he would be crossing back over to the other side and there would be no way back after that. Leo pulled over sharply into a parking spot and thought of Sylvia and his new life with her – and of his boss, Carlo, who had helped him so much since he had arrived in Palermo. Leo did not want to lose any of this, yet the old ways of debt and honour gnawed away at him.
Stiletto Sisters (Kindle Single) Page 3