“I understand that you may have something interesting for me. You know what I am talking about..?”
24
Laura drew the curtains, anticipating darkness inside her apartment, lit by the low artificial lights sunken into the floor. They managed to maintain a strange, antique atmosphere in that house, on the top floor of an old building near the Dome.
She lived in semi-darkness, like her personality, incarnated in continuous passing from antique to modern, from romantic to gothic, like the city she had chosen as her permanent home.
Laura was born in Romagna, her mother was from Verona and had married a rich landowner from the area, but after high school she had demanded to go and study in Verona, as she had the chance to temporarily occupy the old apartment which had belonged to her maternal grandmother. Her parents contented her and, enthusiastic at the possibility of living in the city of her dreams, she enrolled at the local University, starting a course in the Faculty of Languages and Foreign Literature.
She got tired of it very quickly and preferred to follow her new instinct which took her to Architecture and therefore enrolled in that particular Faculty, in Venice.
In the lagoon city, thanks to a vice she inherited from her father, she started to attend the local casino more than the University and, seeing as she could not ask for too much money from her parents so as not to make them suspicious, she had had to find a job.
She had a natural talent for furniture which, together with her beauty, attracted the attention of others, but her character could be, at times, awful.
After a few not exactly exultant attempts, she had finally been able to express her true talents in the very architectural studio where Giorgia worked.
She looked out of the window at the fine rain that was falling, keeping passers-by indoors and enveloping the piazza, creating a sense of empty space which appeared to return the ownership of the environment, which noisy tourists took away from them during sunny days, to the houses and adjacent streets.
She turned the controls to lower the lights even further, at the same time turning up the volume on the voice of Bruce Springsteen which had just started singing the first suggestive notes of his Streets of Philadelphia.
She let herself be rocked by that music which gave her goose pimples.
She would have loved her favourite singer to write a song about the old dark streets of Verona, under the rain.
Giorgia was asleep, stretched out on the large bed which belonged to her grandmother.
Laura moved close to her, stroking her cheeks and long hair while her face, usually hard and tense, suddenly softened.
Laura, with her gossamer beauty, had always been a dominating type, even towards the opposite sex, ending up detesting men.
Her perfect curves, the sensuousness of her smooth, golden skin, her expressive face and her penetrating eyes attracted members of the opposite sex, but no-one had ever given her a shiver of excitement anything like the one she got from the roulette ball, when it ticked in the silence broken only by the anxious breathing of the players.
She smoked and drank too much, deluding the men she went out with, enjoying making them suffer, amusing herself and exploiting their useless courting.
Then, as in a game of destiny, at the exact moment when she had decided to give up on any type of affectionate relationship, Giorgia had fallen into her arms.
Giorgia had been the first to open up, to confess everything that tormented her soul and that had taken her to the edge of a nervous breakdown. She wanted to talk and to ask for help from someone at the time of a painful choice, which she wanted to keep from her husband. Laura needed to listen, to feel in communication with someone, in a strange reverse process in which the role of confessor fell to the younger woman.
So, while advising Giorgia, Laura ended up finding the sweetness she needed, the words and the caresses she perhaps never had as a child.
Together they resolved their worries, discovered the conscience of an instinctive but secret love, experienced common emotions, until they became accomplices in their games, which were often made of deception.
They had become inseparable to the point that Laura had involved her friend in her unhealthy passion for gambling and Giorgia had satisfied her, until she took over her debts.
Gianni Veronesi had disappeared, even if he still physically existed.
Laura was jealous when her intuition told her Giorgia had been to bed with him, but this had happened more and more seldomly.
She thought about the scene that afternoon.
She should have made Giorgia end the relationship with her husband years ago when she found out that he went with paid prostitutes, but until now Giorgia had not wanted to.
Now there were no more obstacles, they could live their lives. With the death of Mauro Ridolfi and Patrizia Barone their financial problems seemed to have disappeared, but there was still something, something irritating that had to be rooted out.
She went into a side room off the bedroom and got undressed, dropping first her jumper, then her jeans on the floor.
She opened the wardrobe, pushed a short black raincoat to one side and put on her favourite kimono, admiring herself in the mirror.
For some years they had started taking an interest in oriental art, they ate out in Japanese restaurants, they were both attracted by their rituals.
One old friend, an antiques dealer in Venice ruined by gambling, showed her a pair of ancient samurai swords he had possessed for generations.
She had been fascinated.
She wanted them immediately, but she thought the sum he demanded was too high and, as usual, she did not have the necessary cash. She was overcome by the sudden urge to possess them, in her mind she could hear an imaginary “I want it, I want it” from when she was a small child and she threw a tantrum in front of something asking her father to buy it for her.
Fearing that she would lose the swords and they would be bought by some unknown buyer, she managed to convince Cesare Cavasso to buy the two swords, exchanging them with another piece he had in his shop.
The two dealers had known each other for years and the reciprocal lack of cash made a swap the best way to keep the exchanges interesting and not let prices fall.
He could not refuse her the small favour against her promise that he would make a good deal: Laura immediately started working to ensure the trophies would come into her possession.
A shiver ran up her spine at the thought that it had been her and Giorgia who organized the mess to confuse Mauro Ridolfi with the dodgy Flemish painting.
First Giorgia had pushed him to buy it, then Laura had insinuated a doubt about its authenticity into his mind and he fell for it. They would have sorted the whole thing out by later convincing Mauro to keep it against a discount on the agreed price.
The pair of swords would be part of the agreement.
The antiques dealer was one of her favourite victims, she knew that he was fascinated by her and she amused herself by intoxicating the little man who had been drooling all over her since the very first day she stepped into his shop. They were both however victims of Patrizia Barone..
She hated that woman, she had been squeezing her for years, hoping to get her hands on her fantastic apartment, luckily Giorgia, when she learned of her financial trouble, had saved her, but finishing in the grip of those fatal claws herself. And the Casino had not resolved their problems, in fact.
She picked up the dark raincoat and put it on, turning up the collar. Perhaps the killer had done the same thing, a dark silent shadow which walked in the rain, pouncing on his victims suddenly.
She felt a surge of gratitude towards him, he had resolved a couple of her problems without explanation, and his method of killing fascinated her.
When it rained she also loved walking in dark streets and when she wore more masculine clothes the criminal potential she nurtured inside seemed to exult.
She was sure that it was one killer, she knew there could
be no other explanation and she was sure that he struck with a blade of origins she had no doubt about.
She was certain he would kill again!
An idea leapt into her head, and a terrifying light came into her splendid eyes.
“Laura?” it was Giorgia as she woke up in the other room. “I’m coming darling, don’t worry” Laura answered, hanging the raincoat back in the wardrobe and going straight to her in the communicating room.
“Did you see how he treated me? I don’t want anything more to do with him, it’s over, but I can’t help thinking about afterwards, the consequences. From now on I’ll need you more than ever, more than before..” said Giorgia, in a voice half awake and half tearful, as soon as Laura reached her.
“Don’t worry, we’ll manage somehow” her friend consoled her.
“I’ve got such a headache, I’d like to sleep, maybe forever” Giorgia continued.
“There are always plenty of tablets in this house” said Laura smiling, as she walked towards the bathroom.
She came back holding a glass of water, stirring a painkiller to dissolve it.
She handed it to Giorgia saying” If you promise to stay here, and be good, I’m going for a walk”.
“But..? In this weather?” Giorgia asked her suspiciously.
“Ideal for a killer, don’t you think?” she replied with a look that seemed to demand her complicity.
25
Closed inside his office with a mountain of papers on the table, the commissioner had not yet calmed down after the discovery of his wife’s involvement in Patrizia Barone’s web of loans.
He knew that Giorgia had always had a love of gambling, in particular roulette, with her friend Laura as accomplice, but he couldn’t believe she had been reduced to borrowing money, unless?
Maybe she had to cover debts for Laura, he had to put a stop to their plotting, even if his marriage would be involved.
It seemed even more incredible that Giorgia had no scruples about dragging even her friend Mauro into it; perhaps she had been deceiving him as well for goodness knows how long.
The other investigative departments were at work on the new lead of money lenders, but he had a feeling that this enquiry was only marginally involved with the murder.
His thoughts were interrupted by a telephone call.
“There’s a lady asking for you, a certain Susanna Chiari?”
The velvety and consumed voice, full of charm, of Mauro Ridolfi’s favourite escort, was on the telephone.
“DI Veronesi? Is that you? You wanted to speak to me? I am back and at your complete disposal. I’ll dictate you my address.”
Once he finished writing, Gianni Veronesi locked the drawer and went towards the clothes pole. He took his scarf, folded it so that the ends met and passed it round his neck, tightening it slightly.
He was looking forward to finally coming face to face with the woman who in the past literally made the columns in the piazza turn to watch her walk by.
He put on his raincoat and shut the door behind him, walking up to and opening the door of Domenico Saturno’s office.
“I’ve had enough for today, I’ll see you tomorrow”.
And he left with no mention of where he was heading.
26
It was past 8 when Veronesi rang the doorbell of a modest townhouse in a street leading off the main road leading from Verona to Lake Garda.
The curtains moved, the lock clicked opening the gate which Veronesi walked through and then ran quickly up the few steps.
The door opened to show a glimpse of the apartment hallway. A very beautiful face with an open smile indicated he should come in.
As soon as he entered the apartment Suzy closed the door behind him, leaning against it and holding out her hand.
“Hello, DI Veronesi, or .. can I call you Gianni? I’m Susanna Chiari, thank you for coming so quickly” she said, her black eyes flashing.
Veronesi shook her hand while a shiver of desire ran through him at the sight of her sensual smile showing a line of white teeth framed by perfectly coloured pink, soft open lips. He knew she must be between 30 and 40, but nothing had changed as he remembered her from about 10 years ago, strolling through the streets in the centre in the evening, accompanied by admiring comments on her body.
She was extremely attractive with very pronounced features, a constant tan topped up even in winter by hours of sun beds and holidays in sunshine paradises which wealthy elderly men fought to pay for. Her long, black, curly hair brushed against her chin as she closed the door and walked towards the living room, leading the way for the DI.
The high-heeled black mules she wore added to her height of 1.70m, she moved with a rehearsed walk, while her blouse slipped down to reveal her left shoulder. Her body gave out the essence of a perfume Veronesi did not recognise, but which must have been really expensive.
Susanna was wearing a short, transparent robe tied round her waist through which the outlines of her nipples on her full breasts, even if presumably surgically retouched, were visible, almost overflowing from a thin balcony bra.
She wore a pair of pretty, wisplike white silk shorts, tied with laces at her knees, fisherman-style, not tight but slightly skimming her thighs which allowed him a glimpse of the sinuous movement of her buttocks as she moved across the wide living room.
“I was just having a whisky. Would you like one?” she asked, walking towards the bar unit without waiting for his answer.
“Yes, please” replied Veronesi sighing deeply (undoubtedly the best rear in Verona he thought, Mauro Ridolfi was right..)
Inside the furniture was much more elegant than could be expected from the external appearance of the house: the finest pieces, alcantra sofas and paintings in silver frames hanging on the walls, a truly beautiful nest of … pleasure.
“Ice?”
“Yes please”
Susanna joined him on the sofa, handing him a glass, adjusting the strap on her shirt which had fallen to one side showing the delicate line of her neck and the more sensual curve of her breast.
“You look a little warm .. don’t mind me, I always dress like this at home”.
She slid onto the sofa, lifting the glass to her lips which caressed the rim.
She suddenly moved her head making the large gold hoops she wore in her earlobes shake flirtatiously.
“I’m in shock, I’ve just heard that Patrizia and her husband have been killed too”
“Did you know them too Susanna?” Veronesi asked, taking a long drink.
“Of course. She was friends with Mauro, she drooled over him, for his savoir-faire and she made her husband believe that he made love to her, to tease him and make him jealous. But I don’t believe she ever did, they had a business relationship and dodgy deals in common. Mauro loved company; it was more smoke than fire. Anyway, as a rule, the women who had been to bed with him did not go back again after the first time, unless he paid them.
But he loved making everyone believe that he screwed all of them.
He revelled in the envy he could provoke, that was the way he was.”
Her smile died, she was thinking about something pleasant in her past that had gone forever.
“So even Patrizia’s husband could have been amongst the suspects, at least until last night” Veronesi commented.
“The list of suspects could include all the husbands of half the women who were into ballroom dancing. Mauro was passionate about it, Patrizia and I taught him the first steps. Once we even went to the Caribbean together for a sort of festival. Actually it more sex than dancing. Don’t think it’s only little girls there, there are also boys who are not only good dancers, they have great bodies and they know how to console lonely women…
Mamo organised the whole thing, but the real purpose was not the music. It was for a girl, a young married woman he was strangely taken with, and because in Verona she was too controlled by her husband, he organized a fair-sized group, with the excuse of learning the da
nces in the places they originated in.”
“Why strangely?” Veronesi asked curiously.
“Because in my opinion that girl was nothing special, even if she was a poor friend of Patrizia’s. Not so poor actually because she had been a shop assistant, then she married the director of the place where she worked and they had a son. But after a few years she started saying that he made her live the life of a recluse.”
Veronesi smiled, giving a reproving look to Suzy who immediately responded:
“My dear if you knew how many women are unhappy with the lives they live and are willing to do anything to add to their housekeeping money or their salaries.. I think I know, better than you, many secrets of this city, I could be a good source of information” and she challenged him with her beautiful penetrating eyes, flashing him a wide smile showing perfect teeth. “Anyway, I remember that this Valeria had started to go out with Patrizia.”
“Did you say Valeria?” Veronesi interrupted her immediately thinking of the connection between the name and the barely legible signature that he had seen on the cheque for 3,000 euros “Go on, continue with your story”.
“I was saying that they met or went out together. Patrizia, trust her to ruin someone’s peace of mind, introduced her to me one evening, telling her that if she wanted to get to know new people, I was the right person. So, one evening, I introduced her to Mauro. I don’t know why, but he fell for her.
She was a small blonde with a nice figure and a pretty, sweet face, but insignificant; with that air of little virgin girl from college she conquered Mauro.
She wasn’t like the usual flamboyant women he went around with, or perhaps he liked her shyness. The fact is he started courting her seriously, involving both me and Patrizia, the real queen of scheming between couples, her favourite occupation. That’s it, now I remember! Mauro organized the trip and got tickets for everyone, including Valeria. Your wife was there too, do you remember? Or maybe you don’t? Well! Her husband did not take it too well. He phoned Mauro and asked him to stay away from his wife. Mauro, as you can imagine, just laughed and carried on, so much so that Valeria did come with us, leaving her son at home with her husband.
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