Viper

FIVE
86

Il Giardino di Zeus, Napoli Mazerelli met Pietro Raimondi twice more within twenty-four hours of their first get-together. But not at his home. Instead, it was in the one place that he was sure would be safe – his private health spa, the Garden of Zeus.

Stripped to their Speedos, sitting in the bubbling water and watched only by marble statues of Greek gods, the consigliere had made certain the officer hadn't been taping anything. They'd spoken openly. And, on Finelli's instructions, Mazerelli had demanded proof of Raimondi's claims. Proof the officer had promised to supply.

Now, Raimondi was literally in hot water. It was delivery time. After tonight there'd be no more talking. He was sure he'd either get his money, or get a bullet in the back.

Between the meetings, Mazerelli had run checks on the lieutenant with other carabinieri on the Family payroll. He was clean as a whistle. No hint of scandal or corruption. But that meant nothing. In Hollywood movies, cops only go bad when they're blackmailed; maybe a member of their family is threatened with violence or faced with ruin. In real life, the truth is simpler. Cops go bad because it's a short cut to easy money. Double money. Pay from the police and tax-free pay from the other side.

Mazerelli and Raimondi stepped out of the hot tub and dripped water through to the pine-benched changing room.

'So, I will be hearing from you?' The lieutenant changed, then ran a comb through his still-wet, slicked-back hair while bending slightly in front of the mirror on a locker door.

'Let's hope so,' said the lawyer. 'Ciao.'

Raimondi left. Empty-handed. The way it was supposed to be.

Mazerelli, still with only a towel around his waist, waited a full five minutes on the slatted bench and wondered how all this was going to end. Not good. He had that feeling. And he was seldom wrong.

Red-faced and sweating, Salvatore Giacomo entered from the sauna.

'Buona sera,' he said, as though they'd never met before. He took a yellow band off his ankle and used the key to open a stainless-steel locker next to Mazerelli's. The consigliere dressed and left without saying another word.

Five minutes later, Sal the Snake swung open the long, thin metal door of the locker that Pietro Raimondi had just used. He pulled out the blue and white Adidas holdall that had been left in there and didn't even bother to look inside.

If Raimondi was telling the truth, it contained the gun Finelli had used almost twenty years ago to murder a prominent gang member. Proof beyond doubt that the cop really was on the take and had enough ammunition to bring down the whole of the Finelli Family.