Viper - Michael Morley [51]
Legend. He liked that bit. Okay, so these days murder was no longer big news, but Il Grande Leone was a legend and still warranted newsprint. He was starting to feel much better when his gold-plated cellphone rang – a ringtone of music that he’d personally composed. He looked at the caller display and grimaced. ‘Buon giorno, Capitano. I have been trying to call you.’
On the other end, Sylvia Tomms erupted. Her language would have shamed a Neapolitan docker.
Sorrentino protested the best he could. ‘Sylvia, it wasn’t me! It was a leak. Truly, a dreadful leak.’
Sylvia’s swearing continued to scorch the phone and Sorrentino had to wait for the abuse to die down before adding, ‘My assistant Ruben was responsible for it. I have fired him. He’s cleared out his desk and gone back to his precious Catalan friends in Barcelona. Treacherous snake! I am so angry and so embarrassed. I tried to call you as soon as I found out but I was told you were unavailable. And as you know, you refused to give me your private cellphone number when I asked for it.’
Sylvia Tomms felt furious and sickened. His comment about her private number reminded her of the awful day when Sorrentino had hit on her. He’d told her how exciting she would find it to spend an evening – and maybe a night – with him. The memory stoked her anger and she imagined what a good punchbag he’d make if only she were near him and had a spare half-hour to let off steam.
‘I really am very sorry about this leak, and I do hope it doesn’t personally cause you too much trouble.’ Sorrentino made little effort to sound sincere.
Finally she hung up on him and he allowed himself a smile. He was happy there had been no need to tell her what else he’d discovered. What vital information he’d held back from the press, and from her. Something far more significant than Francesca being pregnant. Something that would teach her not to treat him as though he weren’t good enough for her. Something that might even make the front page.
40
Campeggio Castellani, Pompeii
Martina Novello snorted contemptuously at the bed her daughter had clearly not slept in. ‘Idiot.’ Surely she could have waited. No, of course not. Rosa was never one for waiting. No waiting to have sex. No waiting to spend the night with a man who wasn’t fit to clean her shoes. That girl – she’d been born early and been impatient ever since.
The sheets on Rosa’s small bunk were pulled tight and tidy, just as Martina had made them, but she still couldn’t help freshening them up, turning back the top sheet and re-creasing it. She smiled as she moved Benni, a tiny teddy bear, given to Rosa at birth and now losing his fur in several places.
Cristiano, her lump of a husband, lumbered into the caravan’s awful chemical toilet, clutching yesterday’s newspaper. Damned paper. These days he spent more time looking at newsprint than he did at her. When had that all changed? More memories tumbled in – Cristiano back in his twenties, with the body of a boxer, a twinkle in his eye and a permanent hard-on. So long ago, and yet still so vivid.
Martina wriggled her feet into blue slippers and padded outside to the neighbouring caravan. She’d give them hell for letting her daughter sleep over with that no-good Filippo. She rapped her knuckles on the cold thin metal of the Valdrano camper and a thought hit her. Rosa had never stayed out before, not all night, so why now? Martina could hear voices, mumblings inside, the scraping of furniture and the patter