Last Kiss (25 page)

Once out in the night air, Adam wrapped his arm around her to walk to the hotel. It wasn’t a long way, a couple of minutes at most.

‘Let’s not go back yet,’ she said. ‘The Luxembourg gardens aren’t far from here.’

‘I don’t mind. It’s up to you.’

It was late, but she didn’t care. There was something about the night, the chill in the air, the narrow Parisian streets, the feeling of Adam’s arm around her, a sense of the familiar and unfamiliar, histories and new beginnings all rolled into one. He was right. She needed to take that leap.

Before reaching the Boulevard Saint-Michel, he turned her to him, his hands locking around her waist. Leaning down, he kissed her, gentle at first, their first taste of each other, then more passionate, as he pulled her closer still. It felt good, being held, desired, wanted, and knowing that he wanted her as much as she wanted him. And somewhere deep in the back of her mind, she knew she would never forget their first kiss and, no matter what happened from that moment on, neither of them could ever deny it.

When his mobile phone bleeped with a text, she told him to ignore it, and for a time he did.

‘Hold on,’ he said eventually. ‘I’ll only be a second.’ One arm still around her waist, he took his mobile out of his pocket.

She saw his face change. At first it showed confusion, then shock and finally anger.

‘Shit,’ he said, and she felt his arm slip away.

She waited, feeling the chill of the streets. There was something about the way his eyes stared at her that told her she wouldn’t be feeling any more warmth or desire that evening.

‘That was Mark.’

‘What is it? Did he find something in the list of names?’

He looked down to the text message again, the one with a media image attached, before handing her the phone. ‘Shit,’ he repeated, this time with even more rage.

Kate saw the copy of the next day’s front-page headline. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said. ‘What’s it mean?’

‘It means trouble, lots of it.’

MICHELE PINZINI COULD change, like the witch, charming one minute, harsh and horrible the next. I recognised a form of madness in him. His wife becoming pregnant put an end to our silly games. A baby wasn’t part of the plan. I suppose he told his wife he loved her too – the selfish bastard. The wife and the baby survived the fire. People think it was good fortune, but things are rarely purely accidental, or not as far as I’m concerned. I made sure she and the baby survived. I’m not the witch. I don’t harm the innocent.

He begged me when he realised what was happening, his wife unconscious on the bed, him tied up on the floor. It was too late then. I put duct tape across his mouth to shut him up. Naked,
he looked like a slob as I dragged him across the room, a piece of ugly white meat. I saw the fear in his eyes. I liked that too – getting his undivided attention. I despised him then, and I know he loathed me. But I was the one in control. I would have liked to have more time, but the wife being pregnant complicated things. I thought: Kill him and be done with it.

When I flicked the lighter, he wriggled, looking up at the smoke detectors, hoping I hadn’t seen them, that he was one step ahead of me, but I had already taken care of them. Staring at his wife, the woman carrying their unborn child, I thought: Too late, my friend. You didn’t care about them when you were fucking me. I slit his throat with ease, the blood spurting, before my rage fully took hold. He deserved more pain. I poured alcohol from the mini-bar onto the rug and set it alight. I gave him his last kiss, like my step-father always wanted.

The hotel maid who discovered the fire, did so because I told her one of the patrons wanted her. It was a risk, but she wouldn’t have recognised me. I had come prepared, in a wig and dark glasses. Melodramatic, I know, but I enjoy a dash of drama.

Either way, I was glad the child survived – a girl. I owe her a debt of gratitude. She helped me understand my lack of importance to him. Stupidly though, with my pride hurt, I tried to replace Michele too soon. That relationship didn’t end well either, apart from the financial benefits. Looking back now, after Pierre, I realise going to Rome was an attempt to put loving him behind me. But life doesn’t work that way. Wherever you go, your personal baggage stays with you. As I said before, I’m not looking for your sympathy. I’ve done my fair share of cruelty,
and will do more. I got my training from the witch. She poked and pushed and mocked me to perfection.

I’ve waited a long time to draw the Lovers card. I’ve gone through my introspection, change and indecision, and now I’m ready for a fresh start. The cards tell me I deserve it. I’m entitled.

My new lover’s wife won’t have the same protection as Michele’s. She is a naïve, stupid woman. The guileless cannot understand the depth of the dark. They cannot fathom what will come next because they have no concept of it. I don’t envy them their stupidity. I revel in it.

I’ve played games with her for long enough. All good things must come to an end. She doesn’t matter to him, not any more. She certainly doesn’t matter to me. She thinks she’s getting close, playing the clever little detective, but she doesn’t know anything. You might think you know me too. I doubt it. I haven’t told you everything, not yet.

THE MORNING FLIGHT from Charles de Gaulle airport to Rome was nothing like the one Kate and Adam had taken the previous day. They were tense, having reflected on the contents of the day’s newspaper headline in Ireland. The chief super had already been in touch, and his mood was about as explosive as the engines of their plane on take-off. If the article had simply been a slur on the lack of police resources, that would have been one thing, but it fired in dirt and innuendo, not only at Adam’s police record but by quoting a reliable police source close to the investigation, who placed a question mark over the relationship between the detective leading the international
leg of the police inquiry and the female criminal psychologist helping to profile the killer. The article went on to say that, apart from the known lack of resources, there seemed to be more questions than answers when it came to the investigation of Rick Shevlin’s death.

It wasn’t going to change the task ahead of them in Rome, but it certainly concentrated their minds. Adam had moved a couple of levels down from furious to seething. Kate had phoned Declan at first light. The last thing she wanted was Charlie seeing her picture in the paper and asking why. She hadn’t expected Declan to be cool with her, but he gave her the distinct impression that he believed there wasn’t smoke without fire.

‘What you do in your personal life,’ he said, ‘is no concern of mine, but you can’t have it plastered all over the newspapers.’

She wanted to say she hadn’t intended it to be plastered all over the bloody newspapers, that he should know Charlie was always number one with her, and that he wasn’t in a position to be playing the perfect-father card, but she bit her tongue. He would protect Charlie until she got back.

The meeting with Andrea Giordano, the retired police officer from the Michele Pinzini case, was scheduled for ten o’clock at a café close to the Trevi fountain. Kate doubted that she or Adam would be flicking coins into the water any time soon. They arrived with some minutes to spare. She ordered tea, he ordered an espresso, and as the Roman sunlight glistened on the water, and the tourists thronged, everybody seemed in a better mood than either of them.

When Giordano arrived, despite the informality of the location, he looked like a secret-service agent, dressed in
a dark suit, shoulders held back, with army-style tight grey hair and reflective sunglasses. His chin was distinctly Italian, with puckered lips, and when he sat down and removed his sunglasses, his eyes reminded Kate of the dark blue from a choppy, dangerous sea.

After a brief introduction, Kate was surprised to see Giordano remove a collection of photographs from his inside suit pocket.

‘Don’t look so shocked, Dr Pearson. I may be retired, but I still have a keen interest in this case.’ His English was impeccable.

‘Why is that?’ Adam asked.

‘You are a detective, so you understand a case getting to you, especially when it remains unsolved. When Alfredo Masciarelli in the Polizia di Stato told me Michele Pinzini’s murder could be linked to an investigation in Ireland, I was intrigued.’

Kate removed her own sunglasses. ‘What can you tell us about Michele’s murder?’

‘As you know, it was vicious. The victim was found naked and tied up, his throat slit. His wife, with their unborn child, was unconscious during the attack. The hotel room was set alight, presumably with the intent of killing everyone involved, other than the murderer.’

‘You say presumably – you have another theory?’

He nodded to Kate. ‘The maid who raised the alarm spoke to a woman a few moments before discovering the fire. She told the maid she was needed in a room close to the killing. We couldn’t find anyone staying at the hotel who had made such a request.’

‘What about a description from the maid?’ Kate asked.

‘Nothing concrete. The woman wore large dark glasses shielding most of her face.’

‘And accent?’ Adam put on his own sunglasses to cut out the sun’s rays.

‘She spoke only briefly, and in French. The maid again couldn’t be specific.’

‘And Michele Pinzini?’ Adam pressed. ‘What did you discover about him?’

‘His profession and personal details are all in the file, but there were a number of people, mostly women, who gave information off the record.’ He looked from Adam to Kate. ‘As far as the finer sex was concerned, Michele had a demanding appetite.’

‘He used prostitutes?’ Adam finished his espresso.

‘
Sì
.’ Giordano rubbed his hands over his face. ‘This was not unusual. What was unusual was how he was found.’

‘You mean the crime scene and the method of killing?’ A frown formed on Adam’s forehead.

‘Yes, it was a horrible death, but there were contradictions.’

‘What kind of contradictions?’ Kate asked.

Giordano shuffled through the photographs until he found what he was looking for. He handed Kate and Adam two close-up images of Michele Pinzini’s lips. Then, sitting back in his chair, he said, ‘There was ambiguity as to whether or not the killer wanted the wife and the unborn child killed, which is why I’ve always been suspicious of the mystery woman in the corridor. What is contradictory is that, despite the brutality of the attack, the killer left a message, one that normally denotes love or tenderness.’ He pointed to Pinzini’s lips. ‘You can see the faded lipstick. Of course we made comparisons with the wife’s brand, but it didn’t match. Whoever killed Michele Pinzini
kissed him before setting the room on fire. It was a minor dtail, but one that irked me.’

The significance of Giordano’s last words was not lost on Kate and Adam.

‘I assume you took a swab and compiled a list of properties?’ Adam seemed positively energised for the first time that morning.

‘Oh, yes. They would be on the file too. We couldn’t get an accurate DNA profile, because of the heat in the room, but we tracked the lipstick to a major cosmetic range. At the time, the company had worldwide consolidated sales in excess of fourteen billion dollars.’

Adam leaned closer to him. ‘But you got a description of the shade?’

‘Yes, that is correct. It was called Carmine but the brand had an enormous distribution.’

Adam slammed the table with his fist. ‘That may be the case, Andrea, but the likelihood of it being the same killer has just shot through the roof.’ It was the break in the case that they had been looking for, and final confirmation that they had an international investigation on their hands.

Everyone in the café was staring at them now, so Kate lowered her voice: ‘We’ve been told Pinzini’s wife was concerned about him before the attack.’

‘That is correct. He had become increasingly aggressive, drinking heavily, and appeared agitated, constantly checking who had called at the house or had been on the telephone. Their domestic situation was not a good one, which didn’t help matters.’

‘You said earlier, Andrea …’ Kate paused, as if to clear her thoughts ‘… that a number of people, mostly women, refused to go on the record about their relationship with Pinzini. Were there any men?’

The Italian seemed hesitant. ‘There was one. He is influential, so please do not ask me his name.’

‘How did you find him?’ Adam was unsure about the retired detective holding back on them, but he let it go.

‘At the time of the killing, I looked for similar attacks, but I could not find anything, at least not initially. Then a friend of mine, a nurse in a private hospital, mentioned a man who had been stripped and tied up. He had suffered knife wounds, with a similar blade to the Pinzini killing.’

‘A carving knife?’ Kate asked.

‘That is correct.’

‘And you spoke to that man?’ Adam kept his tone mellow, keen to get as much as he could.

‘Yes, but he asked me to keep everything confidential. Because of his position, I agreed.’ Giordano relaxed his shoulders. ‘He said he had been with a woman, a very lovely woman. At first, everything was fine – she was very loving and sexy.’ His dark blue eyes went from Adam to Kate, and back again. ‘But soon she became possessive, completely obsessed with him. He had wanted to pull back, and when that happened, she threatened to tell his wife. I understand he agreed to give her a considerable amount of money.’

‘Blackmail?’ Kate said in surprise.

‘Yes.’ Giordano’s lips seemed to pucker even more. ‘The attack took place after that. Lucky for him, a visitor, a business
colleague, called to the hotel room. The female attacker escaped through another door into an adjoining room.’

‘But you got a description?’ Adam could hardly believe what he was hearing.

‘He refused to give one.’ Giordano’s face was like stone.

‘Don’t tell me,’ Adam was even more agitated, ‘you couldn’t insist on a description because of his position?’

‘We do some things differently here in Italy. I can tell you certain things, but not everything.’