When Alessandro arrived at the office the next day, his colleagues were gathered around Pamela’s desk. “You’re not watching that YouTube video of me again, are you?” he said with more humor than before. With the memory of Olivia’s kiss on his lips, he felt as if everything else had faded to insignificance. If only he could get through the next week until her return!
He had his jacket off and hung in his locker before he realized they hadn’t answered his question. No laughter came from around the desk either, and he walked over to see what held everyone’s attention.
“City police found a young woman’s body in a dumpster early this morning,” Columbo said.
“Foul play?” Alessandro asked.
“With a Czech-made 9mm Luger, to be exact.”
“What was her name?”
“Vanessa Alberti.” Columbo handed Alessandro a small stack of photos. “She worked at the Marco Polo Airport. City police want to make it our case.”
A security photo came first, showing an attractive woman in her mid-thirties trying to look poker-faced for the camera. The next couple showed her on the stainless steel table in the morgue, eyes shot through with blood, a neat red hole where the bullet had pierced her skull and entered her brain. Then, most disturbing, her body in a dumpster, limbs splayed over the black garbage bags that had been shredded by seagulls in search of scraps. There were signs that gulls or rats had also had a taste of the poor woman’s body.
Alessandro swallowed hard as he returned the photos to Columbo. “Why would the city police want us to take the case? I mean, other than to get out of work, obviously.”
“Didn’t you hear?” Pamela piped in. “George Clooney was arrested for illegally navigating a boat through the canals last night. I think they’re holding him until they all have his autograph.”
“You’re just jealous you weren’t the one to bring him in,” said one of the new recruits while a few people snickered. “You know, handcuffs and everything. I bet you would’ve gotten more than his autograph—”
“Children, children,” Columbo barked. “Let’s get serious here. Vanessa Alberti’s body was found on Murano about six thirty this morning by a guy searching through the dumpsters outside the glass studios. He makes jewelry out of waste glass.”
“I’m not following you,” Alessandro said.
Columbo took a deep breath, then looked Alessandro right in the eye. “The dumpster belongs to the Zucaro family. And when the city police learned that, they tied it to Katarina’s murder and decided it was our case.”
Alessandro could feel the tension in the room. In the past, he’d always been quick to counter “Katarina’s murder” with “Katarina’s disappearance,” but today he didn’t. He knew he further surprised them when instead he said, “Sheer coincidence, I’m sure. The likelihood of the two things being connected after all this time is remote. But as you say, it’s a good way for them to pass their work along. Has anyone talked to the dumpster-diving jeweler?”
“Not yet,” said Columbo. “But first things first. No one has spoken to the Alberti family yet. They put in a report yesterday that she hadn’t come home from work the night before. The police were about to send someone out to investigate when this connection came up. I don’t think they could believe their good luck. They sent the file over here so fast there are skid marks on the fax machine. We were just going to pull the old files to see if there was any connection to Katarina’s case when you showed up.”
“I’m sure you won’t find anything,” Alessandro said firmly. He didn’t need to look—he’d long committed all the files to memory, and he knew there was no mention of a Vanessa Alberti among them. A few short days ago, that wouldn’t have mattered to him; he would have searched high and low for a link between the two cases, no matter how remote. But he’d come a long way in the healing process—all thanks to Olivia. He wondered if she was already on her way to the airport and if she was missing him as much as he was missing her.
“How long did Vanessa work at the airport?” he asked Columbo, wrenching his thoughts back to the case. It didn’t matter if she was unconnected to Katarina—her killer still had to be caught.
“About two years. Took some time off for a maternity leave last year.”
“Oh great. So she has a young child.”
“Two of them, in fact, and a husband going nearly out of his mind with worry. Someone has to go talk to him, pronto.”
Alessandro looked over to his workmates, who were now all trying to look busy flicking on computer screens, shuffling papers, picking up their phones. Of all the jobs they had to do, telling a family their loved one wasn’t coming back had to be the worst. He’d been on the receiving end and knew this was the most horrific news they’d ever hear. “I’ll do it,” he said evenly. “Where do they live?”
There was a half-hearted murmur of objections before Pamela told him the woman had lived with her husband’s family south of Padua in the Euganean Hills.
“Okay, and while I do this, someone has to talk to the guy who found her. Then her boss, colleagues, the usual.” He stopped and looked at Columbo, realizing he was already going into overdrive. “Be damned if I’m going to organize this investigation. Let me go talk to the family, though I doubt we’ll get anything useful from them today.”
Pamela followed Alessandro to his desk. “How did your recital go last night?”
“Very well, thank you.”
“Think you’ll start performing again?”
“Yes, I do.”
“There’s been a change in you. Wanting to play again, not trying to link the Alberti woman’s death with Katarina’s. I can’t help but wonder if there’s someone new in your life. Is it the chattering-teeth girl?”
He smiled. Not much he could hide from his partner.
“Are you sure it’s a good idea?”
“We’ll see, but keep it to yourself, okay? I’d never hear the end of it from these guys. She’s leaving today for a week in New York.” He left out the kiss, the very thought of it now making him feel warm. The dreams he’d had last night had been of the X-rated variety. He smiled again. “Besides, I’m only following your advice. Remember when I was filling out the paperwork and you told me it would’ve been easier to ask her out on a date?”
“I was kidding.” Pamela rolled her eyes. “Does she know she’s dating a billionaire?”
“I think she may have been given an inkling last night. I haven’t let on I’m anything other than an underpaid, overworked cop. If she likes the poor me, I figure she’s going to love the rich me even more. I’m being cavalier, but I have to be sure it’s real. We’ll see what happens when she returns from New York. Now let me go. The Alberti family needs to be told.”
He went back to his locker, thinking how when he hung his jacket there only a few minutes earlier, he assumed he’d be spending his day catching up on paperwork. He never locked it—after all, if you couldn’t trust your fellow police officers, who could you trust? Besides, the locks were so ancient, even a sharp tug could dislodge them. A good thing, as they sometimes locked themselves—a purely explicable phenomenon that Columbo blamed the station ghost for.
It was locked now, and Alessandro gave it an extra-hard tug. The door swung open, and what was inside made Alessandro jump back. “What the hell?” he exclaimed, his heart pounding.
Out of the shadows, two black empty eye sockets stared at him over the long hideous beak of a plague doctor!
He stood still for a moment, then realized his mistake. He’d opened the wrong locker door.
“What is it, Rossi?” Columbo asked. “You look like you’ve seen the station ghost.”
“Or more killer wind-up teeth!” the receptionist chimed in.
He had no chance to respond. “That’s my locker,” Pamela said with more irritation than Alessandro thought the situation deserved. It had been a mistake, after all.
“Sorry, Pamela. I wasn’t paying attention.” He noticed that the mask was hung over a long black cloak before Pamela slammed the locker door closed. “Going to a Carnival party tonight?”
“Yeah,” she said unenthusiastically.
“That’ll be fun. What’s Fabio going as?”
Pamela turned away. “I probably won’t go,” she said evasively, and Alessandro decided to let the subject drop. It wasn’t like Pamela to be so short with him.
“Sorry,” she said. “Tired today. I’ll come with you to see the family. No one should have to do that on their own.”
“Don’t worry about it. Just make sure someone talks to the dumpster guy. And to Katarina’s brother, Rocco, too.”
She nodded just as her cellphone rang, then excused herself to take the call.
“What’s going on with her?” Columbo asked Alessandro.
“She says she’s tired, and I believe her. I can’t believe the hours she works—not just here but at Fabio’s bar too.”
“You’re probably right, but rumor has it you’re seeing someone and she’s jealous—”
“You know better than to listen to rumor.” Now it was his turn to be short.
Columbo raised an eyebrow.
“Sorry, boss,” Alessandro said contritely. “But it wouldn’t be the first time the guys have speculated on our partnership. I assure you it has always been completely professional. And whatever her reasons are for being out of sorts, it has nothing to do with me.”
“Fine,” Columbo said. “I’ll believe you, if only because the last thing in this office I want to deal with is some jilted-lover fiasco.”
“I think you’ve been watching too many cop shows,” Alessandro said. “But I’ll see if I can find out later what’s bothering her.”
Alessandro left the station and walked to the vaporetto stop. He got off at Piazzale Roma, the sprawling parking lot on the city’s edge. His own car—a high-powered Rossi sports car—was in a private garage, but today he was on official business, so he took one of the Guardia di Finanza cars.
Alessandro crossed the causeway that connected Venice to the mainland, the only land link there was. It made Venice a safe city, since the causeway could be closed with a few minutes’ notice. But it hadn’t been safe enough for Katarina or Vanessa.
He liked the Euganean Hills and had driven this way often. Made up of extinct volcanos, they stood out against the sky as green triangles, like the mountains a child would draw.
He found the Alberti home without difficulty. A neat white house, it sat back from the road, its green shutters open to let in the weak winter sun. On either side of the drive and extending beyond the house were rows of grapevines, dormant now until spring brought them back to life.
The door was opened by a woman in her late fifties. “It’s not good news,” she said. It wasn’t a question.
“I’m sorry,” Alessandro said quietly.
“Vanessa is my daughter-in-law.” Her voice remained steady, although Alessandro didn’t think it would stay that way for long. “I’ll go get my son—Vanessa’s husband, Eduard. The children are at my daughter’s.”
A few minutes later, Alessandro was walking in the vineyards with Eduard. Crows rose from the ground in a black cloud, their raucous cries filling the air. Alessandro watched the birds until they were only a dark smudge in the distance. In English, he thought, a flock of crows is called a murder of crows.
Alessandro asked Eduard if he knew why it had happened, if there was something he hadn’t told the police when he reported her missing.
“A couple of months ago,” Eduard said, “she told me she noticed a strange pattern on certain flights. At the last moment, someone would arrive with bags that needed to be checked in. That in itself is nothing unusual, but in this case, rather than the bags going on the conveyor belt, the same baggage handler would suddenly appear and take them himself, saying they were too late to go the usual way and he would take care of them.”
“Did she say how many times she’d seen this happen?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Did she report it to anyone?”
“I told her to go to her supervisor with it.”
“And did she?”
“I don’t know. I honestly didn’t think about it again. Until now.”
Alessandro could hear the guilt in the man’s voice, and he was sure he was already blaming himself. Alessandro also had the feeling he was holding something else back, maybe something he couldn’t quite face yet.
“I guess if she didn’t mention it again, it wasn’t anything,” Eduard said. “It’s just when you asked if there was something I hadn’t told the police . . . I didn’t want her to return to work after Tazia was born, but with the financial crisis . . .” He stopped, clearly trying to keep from breaking down completely.
Was this what he was holding back? Alessandro wondered. Had he been afraid that if she went to her supervisor, she might lose her job? He wouldn’t push him further for now.
“I lost my wife too,” Alessandro said kindly. “I know what it’s like to keep thinking you could have done something that would have prevented it from happening. All I can say is call the grief counselors right away. They can help. And thank you for telling me about the airport. We’ll certainly look into it.”
He still needed someone from the family to positively identify the body, and Eduard said he’d have his brother-in-law drive him to Venice after he talked to his children.
On the way back to the house, Eduard was quiet, and when they reached it, he shook Alessandro’s hand. “I remember something else. She said it was always a direct flight to New York. She was to work that check-in counter today.”
Alessandro felt a lurch in his chest. Olivia would be on the noon flight to New York today.
Eduard’s voice cracked on saying good-bye, and Alessandro could see the tears were not far behind.
Alessandro called Pamela’s cell from the car to tell her everything he’d learned. “Can you confirm a direct flight to New York today at noon?” he asked.
“I’ll check online.” It was quiet for a moment, then Pamela was back. “There is. Venice to New York JFK. No other stops. 1200 hours.”
“Can you meet me at the airport?”
“I’m just about to head there. Columbo wants me to talk to Vanessa’s supervisor.”
“I think Vanessa Alberti might have become mixed up in some kind of smuggling. Her husband said she was going to report it, but I have a feeling he’s not being completely honest about that. We’re going to have to talk to him some more, but I do think he feels guilty and is trying to tip us off in his own way. Have Columbo send someone over to keep an eye on him and tell him it’s for his own protection.”
“You think something’s going down today?”
“I hope not,” he replied, “because Olivia’s on that flight.”
“Chattering-teeth Olivia?”
“Same one.”
“She certainly knows how to find trouble.”
Alessandro started to object, but Pamela cut him off. “Don’t worry, partner. I’ll fill Columbo in.”
“Would you leave out the part—”
“You don’t even need to ask. I’ll see you at the airport. But this better not be a ruse to get one last glimpse of those lovely violet eyes.”