Viper - Michael Morley [93]
‘Clooney’s booked. Brad Pitt and Matt Damon might still be free. You want me to ring for you?’ She picked up a phone and waited for the command.
‘Nah, it’s George or nothing.’
‘Then I’ll order caffè instead. Why don’t you take a seat?’ Marianna dialled for a lab secretary to bring some. ‘I do have some tests back for you. No holiday with a hunk but we got DNA from the Jane Doe burned and shot in the pit. Mother of Christ, what kind of monster are you hunting this time?’
Sylvia shrugged. ‘Your guess is as good as mine. Whatever happened to the days when we thought weird and kinky just meant a strangling with a fishnet stocking?’
‘Long gone. The profile has just been sent over to your team. It was quite good, so I’m sure you’ll get an ID from it.’
‘Anything on the car and other bodies?’
‘Rosa Novello and Filippo Valdrano?’
‘The very same.’
Marianna shuffled files and found the notes. ‘We’ve discovered a lot of loose hair and trace samples inside the car and we’re eliminating the two victims and members of the family. His mother and father used the car as well, so it’s quite a compromised site. We’ve singled out some very distinct samples – arm hair, we believe. It was found on a rubber door buffer. It looks like it may have been scraped off by someone leaning to get into the back of the car.’
Sylvia’s hopes rose. ‘It’s not Filippo’s?’
Marianna smiled. ‘Definitely not. And before you ask, no, we haven’t yet had time to compare it with the other DNA samples you had brought in.’
Sylvia had ordered all Franco Castellani’s belongings to be confiscated and sent for testing. ‘When will you be able to tell me if there are matches?’
‘Forty-eight hours – earlier, if I can.’
Sylvia rested her head on one hand and tried to rub the tiredness from her eyes. She always seemed to be waiting for things to happen, things she couldn’t speed up, couldn’t control.
‘Sorry, Syl. That really is as fast as we can get them to you.’
‘Sure. I know. Thanks.’ She hauled herself out of her chair, mainly because she feared that if she stayed there much longer she’d simply fall asleep.
‘I’m going to skip the caffè and hit the sack. Hope you don’t mind?’
‘Of course not. But before you go, I want to mention something else to you.’
‘Go ahead.’
Marianna searched a scaffold of desk trays. Some papers were in folders, some were in plastic covers, others were marked with yellow Post-it notes and covered in black pen scribblings. ‘A carabinieri desk sergeant in Scampia had a human tongue thrown at him by a young child.’
‘Yuuck! Che scivo! ’ Sylvia screwed up her face. ‘They ran out of stones and bottles in Scampia?’
‘This gets worse. We’ve just completed tests for the division. The tongue was cut from the body of a woman called Alberta Tortoricci – that name mean anything to you?’
‘Rings a bell, but I’m not sure why.’
‘Tortoricci was the prime witness in a Camorra prosecution. She testified against a mobster called Bruno Valsi, the son-in-law of –’
‘Fredo Finelli. I remember it all now. Valsi is just out of Poggioreale. I saw pictures of his release in the papers. Handsome bastard.’
‘Brutally handsome, with emphasis on the brutal. Tortoricci testified against him five years ago. A couple of days after his release she disappeared from protective custody.’
Sylvia raised her eyes in irony. ‘A pure coincidence, of course?’
‘Of course. As was the fact that she turned up dead in the grounds of an old factory complex with her tongue cut out.’
‘Typical Camorra revenge attack.’
‘Then, someone burned her body. Crisped her up like the last of the chicken on a barbecue grill.’
Sylvia scratched at her hair. ‘I didn’t read anything on the internal bulletins, or in the news. Did the Anti-Camorra Unit go dark on this?’
‘Very dark. Since the last attacks on their staff, the unit is keeping everything close to its chest. I had to ask Lorenzo Pisano if I could share this with you.’
Sylvia let out a sigh. ‘I’ve put two calls in to his office recently, just to fix up a meeting