Suicide Italian Style (Crime Made in Italy Book 1) (9 page)

It had been a few years since I’d driven the freeways in L.A., but I knew right away it was a Harley to die for. Billy wrapped his arms around my waist and kept his belly in my back as we purred down the road and over the bridge, powered down the exit and curled around to the north.

Campione d’Italia
had been home to a casino since the 1920s. They’d knocked down the old one a few years before and put up a concrete monster. We rolled down into the underground garage, parked the bike and rode in silence up to the bar.

I sank into a black leather sofa and closed my eyes. Glasses clinked. Gamblers mumbled, chattered, laughed. The piano man fumbled through a medley of evergreens.
Pretty Woman. Stormy Weather. Yesterday.

Billy Bob flopped on the sofa beside me and waved a waiter over. “Johnny Walker,” he said. “Ice.”

The waiter gave him a nod and shifted his gaze to me.

“Glass of white,” I said. “No bubbles.”

I waited for Billy to spill the beans. It didn’t take long. “How much you know about Gigi’s business?”

“Less than you, bubba,” I said.

He jerked forward. “What about the guy looks like Dr. Zhivago?” He paused, waiting for my brain to kick into gear. “You remember him?”

I put on a frown and stroked my chin. The scene came back.
They were in Gigi’s office, Zhivago set to pop a gasket, waving his arms and yelling at Gigi. I threw a glance at Julia and saw her smile. She rolled her eyes for me, turned away and shut herself in with the two of them. She came out again about twenty minutes later, Zhivago on her tail. He clamped an envelope under his arm and stopped to light a cigarette, all charm and honeyed smiles again
.

“You and Tommy used to call him something. A nickname.
Ali Baba
?”

“It wasn’t me and Tommy. It was your friend from Milan, Marco something. You remember Marco?”

Did I remember Marco. Short answer: yes. He had been a friend of mine, so to speak. A good friend of Eva’s. Lived with his mother next door to my place in Milan. “What about him?”

Billy Bob shook his head. “He was on his way to see Gigi when they drove off the road.”

“Eva,” I said. I could barely breathe. “Eva was driving. They were on their way here.”

A sigh rolled through him. “Pete—” He stopped himself. “What’s the worst way to die? For you, I mean. Pete Pescatore.”

Humor him, Pescatore. He knows something. “Drawn and quartered,” I said. “Boston Pops playing
My Way
for the crowd, sixteen violins and a harp
.
”

“They’ll do it.” Billy Bob grabbed my drink and tossed it down. “They’ll find out what you fear the most and have the boys deliver it. In person.”

“They?”

“Same people as got to Marco, Pete.”

A fluttering in my gut. Worms. “So what are you saying?”

“Drop the story. It’s bad for your health.”

“What story?”

“You heard me.” Billy Bob flagged the waiter and pointed at our empty glasses. The man took note and went away.

“What’s in the briefcase, Billy?”

The Texan turned his gaze on me, his eyes gone slow and glassy. “Where is it?”

“You left it in the Merc. In the trunk.”

“Bullshit. You stole it.”

“You’re hallucinating, Billy. Delirium tremendo.”

“You don’t get it, do you, Pescatore? You need a biometric. It won’t open without it.” He showed me a fist and flipped me the middle finger.

“Likewise, I’m sure.”

“You scan the fingertip and you program the lock. You follow me?”

I wasn’t good with detail. “Get to the point.”

“Gigi’s dead. You’ll never get the briefcase open.”

“Don’t count on it.”

“Damn!” he spat. “I knew you had it. You’re screwed, Pescatore. You and your lady friend, whatshername—Ludmila? Svetlana?”

“Anastasia.”

“You’re in over your head. Both of you.”

“Yeah? Guess we’ll find out soon enough.” I retrieved my notebook from a pocket. “What’s in the briefcase, Billy Bob?”

“It’s not important.”

“That explains it.” I opened the notebook.

“Yeah,” he said. The frown on his face turned into a question mark. “Explains what?”

“Why you were playing Santa Claus.”

Another frown. I’d confused him. The waiter set the refills in front of us. I grabbed mine and waited for Billy’s brain to warm up.

“Oh,” he said, finally. “The villa.”

“Good man.” I let him narrow the focus to the boxed-in roof terrace at the Villa Sofia. “I saw you up on the roof and came running to get you. You with me?”

He nodded.

“So who were the dudes in white shirts out front? The goons in the BMW.”

He thought for a moment, staring down from the window to the black sedan and the two men scuttling up the drive. “I think they work for Zhivago.”

“Yeah? Interesting.” I made a note. “And you?”

He raised his eyebrows. Furry, dark.

“Who do you work for, Billy?”

“Mother Teresa.”

“She’s dead,” I said.

He threw me a long, wary look, the whites of his eyes shot through with red. “Come on, man. We’re the good guys.”

“Sure you are, Billy. And I’m the next pope.” I drained my glass, hauled myself out of the sofa and walked.

“Pete—” he called out after me. “About your wife—”

I froze, whirled and strode back to him.

“Have a seat.” He was pale now, looking drained and puffy around the gills. He slapped a flat hand on the seat beside him. I took a breath and sat down.

He began by saying he was very sorry to drag my poor dead wife into things, because Eva had nothing to do with it.

“It was Marco they were after at the time. Eva was just—what’s the word?” He slapped his forehead, knocked something loose. “Collateral damage.”

I reached for the wine, saw the fingers still shaking. It was another man’s hand, another man’s life. Trembling fingers clamped the glass and carried it to my lips. Icy wine flowed down my throat.

Billy Bob leaned in close, “They ever find the car?”

The voice sent me scrambling down into a cave where the walls were lit with photographs.
There—Eva as a child with flowers. Eva on a bicycle. Eva in her wedding dress, smiling all over. And there, years later, Eva standing with Gigi. They are close, too close. Eva pulls away. Gigi pulls her back, pulls her closer, too close. And one last photo in black and white, the last I ever see of her, taken at the Villa Sofia that night. We’re due to celebrate Arab money, everybody heading to the casino for dinner. I tell her I will join her later, walk her to the car and hand her the keys. She gives me a kiss and calls to Marco. Marco skips up and climbs in beside her. She waves to me and drives away. I stare after her for a good long while, turn and trudge back inside, back to Julia and the press release. We go over it, again and again, on the phone with Gigi from the casino. It’s midnight by the time we finish, and gone two in the morning before we make it to the party. I go looking for Eva but cannot find her. I have a drink with Julia, worried now. I call again. No answer. Another couple of drinks while I wait. I call Marco. No answer. I call Eva again. She does not answer. Ever
.

The voice. And again, louder. “Pete!”   

I crawled out of the cave, back up to the smoke and the empty jazz. Billy Bob’s question lay waiting there.
Did they ever find the car?

My old Alfa Romeo. “No,” I said. “I figure they stopped looking.” I got up, tossed him the keys to the Harley and walked.

Two floors down I found a roulette table and made a few bets and lost and walked away from the table back into the past, chasing a wine red Alfa Romeo around a curve and over a cliff to the bottom of the lake.

“May I help you, sir?”

It took me a while but when I broke the surface I found her waiting. I stepped back and looked her over. A slinky young thing in a little black number, looked a bit like that Bond girl, the French one. Succulent. Luscious. “Depends,” I said, “what’s on the menu?”

“You never know,” she said. She had a high, breathy voice. “But a girl gets thirsty.” She winked at me from under fake eyelashes thick with mascara. “Buy me a drink?”

“Some other time, kid.” I saw a flash of disappointment before her face turned to stone. I left her there and ambled off to a slot machine. I played for a while but there were too many ducks that couldn’t walk straight. Later I found the elevator and rode it down to the basement garage. I stepped out into the cold, dank air and rows and rows of shiny black Mercs and BMWs. No wine red Alfa Romeo convertible. No. Gone. Forever.

An exit sign led me up and out and down a path to the lake. I held my face up into the rain. It was time to go home.

I dug out my phone and punched up a number.

“Pete?” Johnny’s voice, foggy with sleep. “It’s the middle of the night. Are you all right?”

“I need a ride.”

“I can’t help you, Pete. I’m in Rome. Where are you?”

“I’m at the casino in Campione.”

“Call Joe. I gave you the number. Remember?”

Joe. “Hang on.” I fumbled for my wallet, fished out the page with the name and number. “Got it. Thanks.”

“I’ll be back in Milan tomorrow morning. Meet me for lunch.” He hung up.

I called Joe and told him where to find me. He showed up twenty minutes later.

“Morcote,” I said.

“Sure. You got an address?”

“It's a bed and breakfast, right on the water. Ungaretti.”

He knew the place.

I climbed in and shut the door. I pulled back my sleeve and had a look at my watch. Nice watch. I looked up at the sky. Dark. “Forget Morcote. Can you take me to Milan?” I could grab my bag another time, next time I saw Renata.

Joe said sure and gave me a price. I said that was fine by me and that our friend Johnny would pick up the tab. On the way to the border we got to talking. A friend of his told him a story, he said, about the dead man, Goldoni,
poveretto
. The friend used to drive him to the casino, drove him there every week.

“When was this?”

“Couple years ago.”

“And then what? He stopped going?”

“I guess.”

In the silence that followed I made a few notes and then drifted back to Billy Bob. He wanted the briefcase and he wanted it bad. And bad things could happen if he didn’t get it back. Like what happened to Marco and when they got Marco they got Eva too. Eva was
collateral damage
.

Pain flared in my chest.

It wasn’t an accident. I shut my eyes and sank back down with the memory of Eva to the bottom of the lake.

Sunday morning I woke to a church bells and a song, a choir chanting in the back of my skull. They had funny voices, but the tune was familiar. They sang faster and faster:
Followthe Followthe Followthe Followthe Follow the yellow brick road!

Munchkins! I threw back the covers and thumped to the bathroom. Things were no better under the shower. I couldn’t get the critters out of my head. I shaved and made coffee and went back over the story from Julia, built up the scene again, piece by piece.
Gigi’s slumped against the wall in his kitchen, she finds him there, the gun still in his hand. His right hand.
He signed all his papers with his left. No reason to pick up the gun with his right. Unless he did it on purpose. Some kind of a message. A telegram, in code, his last will and testament, tossed overboard.

The Munchkins roared back, demanding I follow the yellow brick road. To the Masons? Right. A second cup of coffee finally shut them up. I belched and picked up the mail. Electricity. Gas. A letter from New York. I tore it open. A check?
Yes!
Finally. For a piece I’d written on Tuscan wines.
Super Chianti: Don’t Tip the Tuscans.
I stared at the check and felt a smile spread over my face. It was enough to liberate my car from the shop.

I had a FIAT 500, a classic
cinquecento
built in the seventies, one of the last to roll off the line. I’d parked it too close to the tracks one night and the tram coming round the curve the next morning had smacked the damn thing into the road. It had cost me a fortune to fix it.

I checked my watch. Ten, ten-thirty, maybe eleven. You couldn’t rely on a fake to keep time. It was there for the looks. I dug out the Nokia and dialed. A sleepy voice said, “Pete.”

“Stazz, baby. Darling. Sweetheart. Honey-bun. How are you?”

“You owe me story.”

“I know. But listen, the briefcase, where is it? I got a great idea how to open it.”

She yawned down the line at me. “Tell me.”

“I will when I see you. When do I see you?”

“Story, Pete. I’m waiting.”

“Hang on. Let me get my notes.” I was ready for her. I even had a headline:
Take The Money & Run!

“You ready?”

“Shoot me.”

I laid it out for her: The rich were abandoning Italy. They had looted combines owned by the state, bought judges, cops and bureaucrats, passed laws to keep themselves immune and now, with the country sinking fast, the rats were on the run. They were taking hundreds of millions with them, hauling it off to Switzerland, to Lugano and its super-secretive banks.

Anastasia yawned again. “Old story. What it has to do with Goldoni?”

Good point. “I’m getting there.” I plunged on. “First, how does the money get up there? Ever heard of
spalloni
?”

“Is too soon for lunch.”

“No, no.
Spalloni
—“ I broke off. She was laughing.

“I know, Pete. They carry bags of money on trails in mountains. You tell me already.”

“Right. So the money from Italy gets to Lugano. What happens? What do they do with it?”

“Black money, yes?”

“Good girl.”

“I am no girl.” Her voice had an edge. “Is black money, yes or no?”

“Yes.”

“They wash it. That is your story? That’s all?”

“It’s a good story, Stazz.”

“Good, but old story. What is new?”

I was ready for her. “Man called Ali Baba. Ever heard of  him?”

Silence while she thought about it. “Forty crooks?”

“Good girl, no cigar.”

“Why no cigar?”

“Ali Baba is a nickname for a big-shot here in Lugano. It’s not his real name.”

“This man is money washer?”

“I think so. But not just him. He has help. Lots of help from his friends.”

“Yes, yes. Bank people, law people. That is the way.”

She was bored. “You sound like you know all about it,” I said.

“Not me. Nicky knows.”

I was quiet for a moment, so she helped me out. “My ex and his friends.”

“Ohh,” I said, bored now too. I knew who he was. I just didn’t want her to know I was interested. “Sicilians?”

“Nnn. Naples.”

“Right. They know Ali Baba?”

“Ali Baba? I will ask. Call me later.” Another big yawn. “Sorry. That is all?”

“No. The briefcase, Stazz. I need it for the story. The briefcase
is
the story. Where is it?”

“Trust me.” She hung up.

Trust. It was the dark heart of Italy, the only currency that had any value. Never trust anyone outside your own tribe—your family and maybe a blood friend or two—and never turn your back. 

Anastasia wanted more, but Johnny would like the story all right, so I sat down and typed it up.
Take the Money & Run—to Lugano.
Gray money. Black money. Every year millions were smuggled into Switzerland, cash on the run from the taxman in Rome. Yet the week before they had done it again: some government flack put out the word that untaxed funds could be sent back home, tax owed slashed to five percent. A sleazebag scam and an insult to boot, the law turned black money white overnight.
Message from Rome to the people of Italy
:
Crime pays
.

I read it again, a sinking feeling in my gut. Anastasia was right. It was nothing new—same old, same old Italy.

I sighed, picked up the phone and called Johnny.

“Lunch in thirty,” I said. “I’ll buzz you from the street when I get there.” I hung up on his cough and was out the door and on the stairs when I heard the chain rattle behind her door. I stopped. I’d been planning to talk to her anyhow. A mass of red curls appeared in the doorway.

“
Buongiorno, Signora. Come sta?
” Clementina Romano was one of those people, you said hello and got a two-hour monologue in response. She was my neighbor and my landlady and a magistrate. Sixty going on seventeen. A hopeless flirt. She asked me once to call her
Tina
. I tried a few times, but it never fell off my tongue very well.

“
Carissimo
Pietro, where have you been? I haven’t seen you for weeks.”

I climbed the steps back up to the landing. “You’ve been busy,” I said.

“I am always busy, and now I have a new baby.” A big, sad smile washed away in the crinkles around her eyes. She patted the head of a pup in her arms. It had a smooth, shiny coat of long red hair, the same color as hers but no gray at the roots.

“Good looking dog,” I said. “A setter?”

“Irish setter,” she said. “He’s adorable, don’t you think?”

“Handsome,” I said. I liked dogs. I had dogs when I was a kid in L.A. Used to run along the beach for miles. “I had a mutt just like him once. What’s his name?”

“Red,” she said, and smiled again. “Isn’t he a beauty?”

“He’s terrific. Wonderful.” I reached out a hand and gave the pup a pat on the head. He nipped at me. I wrapped a hand around his snout. “Uh, Tina, can I ask you something?”

Tina shook her head. “It is I who must ask you a favor. What are you doing, in this moment?”

“Talking to my landlady.”

She laughed. “I see. Well, I will stop talking and let you go for a walk. The dog likes to walk.”

“Does he.”

“Yes. Here.” She pushed out her arms and managed to dump the dog into mine. “I will answer your question when you come back.”

“Tonight?”

“It’s Marco’s birthday. I will visit the cemetery. He is forty today.”

Forty. Marco would have been forty. If he hadn’t died in the lake with Eva. If they hadn’t—

I set the mutt on the doormat. Tina disappeared and came back with a leash, hooked up Red and gave me a little wave as she disappeared behind her door.

I dug out the phone and called Johnny to say I was running late. He said we should try a new sushi place not far from the
Arco della Pace
, the peace arch in the park. “Sounds good,” I said. “They take dogs?”

“Sushi, Pete.” He coughed. “Fish. No dog.”

He broke my silence with a cackling wheeze. I hung up on him, picked up the puppy and carried him down the stairs to the street. We followed the tram tracks to the
Arco della Pace
and on to the sushi. Johnny stood smoking outside the door. I roped Red to a streetlight and pushed inside.

It was one of those places designed to rush customers in and out. I picked up a tray and a pack of sushi under cellophane and a can of beer and shuffled to the register. Johnny heaped up sashimi and sushi rolls, ordered miso soup for two and paid. I led the way to a white plastic table and chairs and pulled out a chair.

“So how was your trip?”

“Not so good,” said Johnny. The meeting in Rome had not gone well. The print edition was running up debt. Subscriptions were down, ad income sinking. As for the web site, it got plenty of hits but was still losing money.

“And you’re telling me this why?”

“You asked.”

“Come on.”

“I’m thinking of learning how to use a computer.”

“Welcome to the nineteenth century.”

He missed the crack. “I figure Mario can show me the ropes.”

“Johnny—”

“All right, all right.” He held up his hands in surrender and sighed, downcast. “I can’t pay you.”

“Nothing? Not even expenses?”

“Expenses, yes. But that’s all.” He wouldn’t look me in the eye.

“Better than nothing,” I said.

Surprise lifted his eyebrows. His eyes lit up. “So you’re with me?”

“Sure,” I said. “It beats writing about watches.”

“Great.” He speared a hunk of raw fish. “So what have you got for me?”

A young woman in white appeared from the kitchen and set down black wooden bowls full of soup. Floppy seaweed and tofu cubes. I slurped a sip and gave Johnny what I had so far. It wasn’t much. Black money,
spalloni
, Gigi up to his neck in debt and working on a deal to save his hide. I mentioned the briefcase our light-fingered Russkie had lifted from Billy Bob. It was important, I said. The case was the key to the story.

Johnny was already shaking his head. “You never learn, Pete.” He forked in a load of a sushi and starting talking around it. “How many times I have to tell you? Corruption is boring. Tax evasion is worse, puts people to sleep.” He cracked open a beer. “You have to give them what they want.”

“Blood.” I said. “They want blood, right?”

“Yah.” He was nodding. “Blood, sex and tears,” he said. “And money.”

Same story, different day. “OK, so let’s talk about blood. Stazz said you had news on the autopsy?”

“Right. I hear the doc from Varese is up at the lab in Locarno today. It shouldn’t take him more than a couple of hours.”

“Today’s Sunday, Johnny. It’s Switzerland. The lab is closed.”

He shrugged. “It’s what I hear.”

“They in a hurry or what?”

“Could be.”

“Get him in a coffin and nail down the lid?” I dipped a finger in my soup. It had cooled. I picked it up and drank straight from the bowl, set it down and peered at my sushi. California roll? “What else do you hear?” I tore off the plastic and picked up the chopsticks, poured soy sauce and mixed in a dab of the green stuff. Wasabi.

“The police have traced the gun,” said Johnny. “A SIG Sauer. Swiss Army issue. Guess what—it wasn’t registered to the victim.”

“Goldoni was Italian. Why should he have a Swiss Army pistol?”

“Guess who owns the gun, Pete.”

“Sergio Ungaretti, the accountant. Ex Swiss Army, kept Gigi’s books.” I soaked the salmon in soy. “I told you, I know the man.”

Johnny went quiet. “The bullet killed Goldoni came from Ungaretti’s gun.”

“That I didn’t know.” The room felt colder. “You sure?”

“I got it straight from the horse.”

“Mouth,” I said. “Straight from the horse’s—“

He was shaking his head again. “That’s his name.”

“Who?”

“My source.” He raised a finger to his lips. “With the Swiss police.”

I sighed and dug out my notebook. Codename:
Horse
. “So, did the horse say if they’d picked him up yet?”

“Nope. Ungaretti filed a report. Claims the gun was stolen.”

“So Ungaretti’s a suspect?”

A shrug lifted the big man’s shoulders. “Follow the money.”

“You always say blood.”

“Blood, sex, money. Whatever.” He drank and set the glass on the table. Traces of foam glistened in his mustache. “Give me something I can work with, Pete.”

I was waiting for that. I smiled. Drum roll. “Freemasons,” I said.