Private Rome

Chapter 10

Fury still blazed in her eyes, so I repeated myself.

“It’s over.”

Her heightened emotion dwindled and she slumped a little. Acknowledging defeat? Or an injury picked up in the car crash?

“Are you okay?” I asked.

Luna nodded. “We need to get off the street.”

She glanced around nervously. The man who’d been keeping lookout by the main entrance to the tower block was crossing the courtyard toward us. Luna caught his eye and waved him back.

“Va bene — è un vecchio amico,” she yelled. And to me: “I told him you’re an old friend.”

I looked at the man and gave him a reassuring wave. He hesitated but backed away.

“Come on,” Luna said. She took a step and faltered. “I think I hit my head.”

“Sorry,” I said. “It was the only way I could think of to stop you. Do you need a doctor?”

She shook her head. “No doctors.”

“Why?” I asked. “What’s going on?”

She steadied herself against the BMW and focused on the row of cars opposite us.

“The Fiat Coupé. We can take that.”

There was a twenty-five-year-old black Fiat Coupé parked in a line of ancient mid-range performance cars.

“We can’t just steal—” I began, but she cut me off.

“Not steal. Borrow,” she said. “These all belong to the Pleasure Hall. You drive.”

She walked to the car and opened the passenger door. I found the driver’s door unlocked and slid behind the wheel. The black leather interior was trimmed with chrome, and the Pininfarina signature on the dash signaled that the small sports car had borrowed its interior styling from Ferrari.

“The key is in the visor,” Luna said as she closed her door.

I lowered the driver’s shade and the ignition key dropped into my hand.

“What about thieves?”

“Thieves?” she scoffed. “We don’t worry about them here.”

I puzzled over her reply as I started the engine. Fiats were notorious for poor electrics, but this one had been well cared for and the engine growled to life on the first try. I drove out of the space, wove around the wreckage of Luna’s crashed BMW and pulled out of the lot.

“Sorry about your car.”

“It’s not mine,” she replied. “It’s like this one, and most of the others back there... borrowed.”

“Who from? Who owns the Pleasure Hall?”

She didn’t reply.

“Where am I going?” I asked.

She shrugged. “You spoilt my day.”

“Your day spent hiding in a brothel?”

She remained impassive.

“What was a cop doing in a place like that?” I pressed her.

“I’m not allowed a personal life?”

“According to your colleagues, you called in sick. And you tried to escape. So this is about more than an unconventional personal life.”

I took a left onto Via Acquaroni and joined the traffic heading south toward the highway. We were in the heart of Tor Bella Monaca now and our surroundings were noticeably rundown.

“Even the most generous mind would think you were hiding,” I remarked.

She gave a hollow laugh. “Why would I be hiding?”

“That’s exactly what I want to know,” I said. “Matteo told me to talk to you. You used to be his partner, right?”

She pursed her lips and kept her eyes fixed on the road.

“Why? What did he want you to tell me?” I wondered.

She glared at me.

“Let me out,” she said.

“I don’t think so. I think I’m going to take you in. Sit you down with Mia Esposito, the detective in charge, and see if she can figure it out.”

I sensed anger and frustration radiating from Luna, but her resolve crumbled.

“How do I know Matteo wants me to trust you?”

“You don’t,” I replied. “But I can take you to police headquarters if you want to ask him yourself.”

She pondered the situation and reached a decision.

“Filippo Lombardi,” she said. “He was a Rome prosecutor who died in a car crash a couple of months ago. Matteo and I were working the investigation together. I thought Lombardi had been driven off the road, but Matteo said it was an accident. He said he’d been visited by a man who’d convinced him there was no need to investigate Lombardi’s death. A priest.”

“A priest?” I asked, sensing a connection. “Brambilla?”

“I don’t know,” Luna replied. “Perhaps.”

“And?” I asked.

“And?” she repeated. “That’s all I know.”

I studied her, trying to gauge if she was being truthful.

“I know that look,” she said. “Why would I tell half the story? Filippo Lombardi died out near Poli, in the hills. I thought there was another vehicle involved. Matteo convinced me I was wrong.”

“So someone might have killed Brambilla to cover up the earlier murder?” I suggested.

“Or else Matteo silenced him?” she responded.

“You think your former partner is capable of murder? And even if it was him, why are you running? He’s in custody.”

“I’ve been a police officer long enough to know we can all kill. Given a strong motive,” she replied. “And you’re the only one in this car who thinks I was running.”

I couldn’t disagree, but I also couldn’t believe her former partner, my country manager, was a murderer. But detective work was about evidence not belief, and so far the evidence against Matteo was overwhelming.

“Have I earnt my freedom?” Luna asked. “Or do you intend to keep me hostage?”

“You’re free,” I replied. “But if you think this has something to do with your earlier investigation, you should inform your colleagues.”

I pressed the brake pedal as we approached the intersection with Via Amaretta.

“Welcome to Rome, Mr. Morgan,” Luna said. “Spend enough time here and you will learn how the city works.”

Was she alluding to corruption? Almost certainly.

“Show me where Lombardi died,” I said.

She sighed and nodded. “Meet me at La Rustica Mall at two tomorrow afternoon. The west entrance. I’ll take you where you want to go.” She opened her door. “Ciao,” she said, stepping onto the sidewalk.

She swung the door closed, and I watched her head east along Via Amaretta, past the graffiti-scrawled shutters of a shop in the ground floor of an abandoned apartment block.

The toot of a horn focused my attention on the road. I noticed the traffic had moved on. I stepped on the accelerator and caught up to the slow line ahead, wondering why Matteo would have subverted an investigation into the death of a city prosecutor.