The Milan Contract Page 5

  Life after his father’s passing was significantly different. His mother spent more time with him, and they both enjoyed their new-found relationship. Whilst his mother had talked of remaining in England, the country of her birth, she decided instead to take young Raphael back to Italy. So, shortly after the funeral, they moved from the Kent countryside, leaving behind the servants, the nanny and the chauffeur to set up home on the Italian coast, north of Rimini.

  Whilst his father had left them enough money for a comfortable existence, they were far from rich and since she had moved to Campione d’Italia, Conza noticed that his mother was no longer surrounded by the oil paintings, silverware and porcelain that he’d helped her unpack. When Conza asked about the small Goya print that had always hung above her bed, she became irritated. It transpired that his father may have been a diplomatic ‘safe pair of hands’ but had been more than a ‘little free’ with the family wealth. Conza was shown a pile of worthless share certificates for companies that had long since ceased trading.

  At twenty-two, Conza attended police college in Rome. He had a plan. It was in his diary. A timetable for his rise through the ranks. He was now twenty-nine, a lieutenant and on schedule.

  He’d always known he was smart with an instinct to exploit an advantage to its fullest. He listened rather than just heard, possessed a thirst for knowledge and a strong sense of curiosity. He was resourceful and could communicate at different levels. Seniors would talk of Lieutenant Conza in terms of either, ‘how far up the ladder he could climb’, or how the force ‘didn’t need another clever dick’. Lieutenant Conza was confident but was generally only liked and respected by other confident people. To everyone else, he was often perceived as being somewhat cold and patronising.

  Raphael Conza was relatively fit, not tall, but with soft brown eyes and a warm smile that he’d learnt to use effectively on the girls at university. In their view, he tended towards ‘attractive’ rather than ‘good-looking’, but even so, his love life was only sporadically successful. Mainly because he’d always viewed ‘intimacy’ as a utilitarian rather than a romantic function – a predilection most women perceived if not on the first date, at least very soon afterwards. In his diary, the morning after his most recent girlfriend had stormed off, he’d written: ‘Girlfriend – distractions – only casual from now on – three weeks maximum.’ He ignored the fact that only once in his adult life, had he sustained a relationship in excess of that period.

  Conza saw the word ‘Skyguard’ in his notepad and thought of Harry Chase, his English friend. Ex-Royal Air Force. He would know Skyguard. They hadn’t spoken in a while. ‘I should call him,’ Conza decided as he took a new memo pad from the carton.

  He drafted a note to his boss, Colonel Scutari, explaining that he had not yet drawn a conclusion about Stolz’s killing. He cited the fact that the victim was foreign as the reason for things taking longer than anticipated. But he offered reassurances that he’d be in a position to make a recommendation on jurisdiction by tomorrow. Conza read through the memo twice, making an amendment to the punctuation after the first reading, before folding it neatly into an envelope.

  He reviewed the page in his notebook headed ‘QUESTIONS’.

  1. Motive - contract? robbery? other?

  2. Killer - Vespa?

  3. Witness - girl - bread?

  4. Mobile phone - movements?

  5. Cards - spend - movements?

  6. Identity?

  7. Chauffeur - involvement?

  8. Hotel - breakfast?

  9. CCTV?

  10. Notebook - FC?

  11. Wallet - code?

  12. USB???

  13. Skyguard?

  14. Newspaper/magazine?

  He added a line at the foot of the page: ‘15. Call Harry!’

  He tidied up the documents on the table into neat piles, locked the windows, turned off the fan and after dropping the letter at the front desk, went home to his immaculately clean but empty apartment.

  15

  Milan, Italy

  The two-tone siren of a police car roused Kadin with a start, and he ran to the garage door to listen, but the sound faded into the distance.

  He heard himself repeating his father’s instructions: “Mobile, clothes, gun, station, don’t go home.” He pulled out the grey and silver sleeve from his jacket and placed it on the workbench along with the dead man’s cash, the gun and his balaclava.

  He fingered the brass key given to him by his father before running over to the inspection pit. He pulled at the first two boards allowing the acrid smell of burnt oil to drift up as he crawled forward. As light penetrated the chasm, he began to make out the floor of the pit; oil-soaked sand and old rags. He jumped down but had to push off three more planks before there was sufficient light for him to find the grey metal of the small safe, semi-recessed into the concrete. The door was no more than ten centimetres square. The key fitted snugly into the lock and the safe opened smoothly and silently.

  The metal box was surprisingly deep. A green plastic A4 folder had been rolled up and pushed to the back of the recess, but there was nothing else. Kadin snatched the folder and clambered back up to ground level before emptying its contents onto the workbench; five passports, five train tickets to Genoa – valid for another two months – a thick roll of euros in an elastic band, a train timetable for Milan to Genoa, a bus timetable for a route with unfamiliar names, a nickel-coloured key attached to a brass disc on which was etched ‘VN3’, and certified copies of four title deeds: the Abebe bakery, the two garages and a fourth property, a building in Genoa – ‘Villa Nuova’. The owner of the properties was listed as ‘The J-Sky Corporation’ with an address in Rome. The final object in the folder was a wristwatch. Kadin picked up each item in turn, but already knew what his father intended. ‘It’s a fire escape.’ A means, if it was ever needed, for the Bennani family to get out of Milan, fast. For the first time since leaving the barn, Kadin was sure of what his father intended for him to do.

  “Mobile, clothes, gun, station, don’t go home.”

  Working quickly, Kadin changed back into the grubby jeans and sweatshirt he’d been wearing when he was snatched and wriggled into a blue, lightweight anorak. He transferred the mobile sleeve and banknotes into a side pocket of his bag and flung the Ruger semi-automatic and balaclava onto the pile of discarded clothes. He threw the bundle into the pit and stowed the passports, title deeds and four of the train tickets in his bag. The other train ticket, cash and ‘VN3’ key, he pushed into his pocket. Finally, he strapped the watch to his wrist and threw the empty folder into the pit.

  “Mobile, clothes, gun, station, don’t go home,” he recited for the final time before replacing the boards over the hole, pressing them down with his heel as quietly as he could.

  “Thank you, Papa,” he mouthed just before the sound of another siren warned him that time was running out. He snatched up the rucksack and scanned the garage before flicking off the light.

  As he pushed open the garage door, Kadin caught sight of his reflection in the mirror. The skin on his face was tight and pale, his eyes red and swollen. He pushed a strand of lank, dark hair from his eyes and thought of dying. He tasted salt and the colourless image told him he was crying, but he felt nothing. Beyond his own pained and frightened face, beyond and yet inside the mirror’s surface, he saw Nyala, her beautiful dark skin, her smile as it was announced by a slender ribbon of white and pink. Her hair in pleats framing her warm and kind expression. Her smooth, muscular legs that he’d glanced at guiltily as she rode away on her old bike. The girl from the bakery. His first love and the girl he’d met every Sunday since volunteering to collect rent for his father. The girl he dreamed of talking to without losing control of his words, or his cheeks. The girl who would tell the police that the vile murderer on the Vespa was him – Kadin Bennani.

  Her expression suddenly changed, and she was looking at him in bewilderment; afraid and confused. Beautiful and yet vulnerable. He wa
s on his Vespa, riding past her again, but this time he shouted out, as loudly as he could, “I’m sorry.”

  The vivid image of Nyala dispelled his dark thoughts of dying, and for a fleeting moment he allowed himself to believe that everything could go back to how it was if he just surrendered, handed himself in. But the sound of an ambulance ruptured his dream and he thought of his mother, brother, and sister. He’d been told what to do, and what he definitely could not do. Surrendering was not an option and no matter what happened, he wouldn’t give them a reason to hurt his family.

  He wiped away the tears and images of Nyala with his sleeve and breathed deeply. He locked the door and headed east towards the railway station. In his pocket, his fingers ran across the smooth matt surface of the train ticket. He’d noticed that it was a ‘single’; a reminder, as if he needed one, that his return journey was neither assured nor his to determine.

  He checked his watch. Eighteen minutes before the train departed. It would take him about ten minutes to walk, ‘not run’ to the station. “Too tight,” he muttered to himself, cursing the moments of self-pity he’d wasted in the garage.

  Eight minutes later, Kadin arrived at the piazza in front of the high, columned arches fronting Milano Centrale station. The air was warm and thick, and he was sweating. He could feel drops of water tracking down his spine and between his thighs. He recognised the cycle rack from the photograph and, trying not to rush, walked towards the black bin at the far end. He dropped the mobile phone, still in its sleeve, amongst the plastic bottles, coffee cups and discarded napkins. He didn’t look back.

  ‘From now on,’ Kadin thought, ‘if they’re watching me, they’ll know that I’m not following orders.’ He glanced around, delaying his next move for as long as he dared, but when his watch told him he had just two minutes, he turned and darted up the steps to Platform 2. He thought his heart would stop when he read the screen telling him that the train had been delayed by four minutes.

  Visibly shaking, he sat on the edge of a bench clutching his bag. He didn’t look up, nor do anything that might attract attention. He desperately needed the toilet but suppressed the sharp stabbing pain that ran from his kidneys to his groin by rocking gently back and forth. Time passed slowly, and he tried to replace the memory of the grey-haired man who at the moment of death, had looked at Kadin with sad blue eyes.

  He tried thinking of his mother but could only picture her crying, as she had so many times whilst fighting his father. He thought of his younger sister, smiling and laughing as she danced to music that he could no longer hear. He thought of his little brother, frightened and alone; calling for him, “Kadin, where are you?” he could hear Yousef screaming, but the sound morphed into a metallic squeal as the train to Genoa coasted to a halt.

  Without hesitation, he scuttled aboard the nearest carriage and dived into a toilet.

  As Kadin Bennani vomited into the sickly smelling metallic bowl, he acknowledged that he was about to leave Milan for what he was sure would be the last time.

  16

  Three Years Ago

  Lugano, Switzerland

  The first time Raphael Conza saw him, Harry Chase was sitting at a blackjack table. He looked bored and slightly drunk. Although it annoyed Conza that the man’s chips were piled in a haphazard heap, he was also intrigued. The man knew how to play blackjack. The way he placed bets and moved around the card tables was compelling.

  Seemingly, the man had three rules: he never sat at a table while the cards were being shuffled; if he suffered five losing bets, he changed tables; and winning stakes were doubled, but only ever twice. Conza soon worked out that strict adherence to these rules meant that unlike the rest of his companions, the man didn’t chase his losses, but he did capitalise on his wins. It seemed to work, much to the annoyance of the other players, who not only saw their Swiss francs disappear into the croupier’s money slot at an alarming rate, but they also had to put up with the fidgety Englishman who changed tables every few minutes.

  And then suddenly, as if responding to an unheard call, the man stopped, threw a generous tip to the croupier and retreated to the bar. Conza heard him order a gin and tonic.

  The casino was squeezed in between two hotels in the Paradiso area of Lugano. It was a relatively new construction but managed to give the impression of being somewhat ‘tired’. Many of the bulbs in the faux-crystal chandeliers had blown and the rooms smelt of furniture polish, stale cigarette smoke and cheap perfume. The walls were covered in poorly painted representations of roman pillars, but the artwork was cracked and peeling, and the gold-coloured finish to the bar top had worn away to reveal grey alloy. The laminated wood floors were scuffed, and the bar stools were struggling to retain their foam padding. Conza had already decided that it was not his sort of place, but the blackjack-playing Englishman had pricked his curiosity.

  “Clever system,” Conza remarked as he leant against the bar.

  “Sorry?”

  “Your system on the tables. Very clever.”

  “Oh, right. But it doesn’t always work. I got lucky tonight.”

  “I’m Raffy, do you mind if I join you?”

  “Be my guest. Do you want a drink? They don’t know how to make a gin and tonic, but the local wine is pretty good.”

  “Thank you. But let me buy you one. I’ll stick to beer. Another one?”

  “Thanks, I’ll have a beer with you.”

  The men sat in awkward silence until the drinks arrived.

  “You a local? Sorry, the name is Harry. Harry Chase.”

  “Cheers, Harry,” said Conza, raising his glass. “No, my mother just moved into a house on the other side of the lake. I got bored unpacking boxes, so I took a trip across the lake to do some exploring. I live in Milan, although I was schooled in England.”

  “In which case, I won’t feel so ashamed of myself. My Italian is an embarrassment.”

  They laughed.

  “What are you doing in Lugano?” asked Conza, “holiday?”

  “Yes, sort of. My wife is due to join me with the children in a couple of days. She insists I have a few days on my own at the start of family holidays. Apparently, I’m a bit grumpy in the transition period between work and play. Don’t relax too well.”

  “Now that, I can sympathise with,” said Conza with a grin.

  It was the start of their friendship. The English barrister and the Italian policeman.

  ◆◆◆

  They agreed to meet again the following day and found themselves wandering aimlessly through the pine covered shores of the lake. They talked, ate, talked and drank. Inevitably, their conversation turned to crime and the law and unsurprisingly, their experiences crossed many similar themes.

  Following a well-trodden tourist route, they took the funicular to the summit of San Salvatore and looked down at the wide, dark expense of Lake Lugano. Conza pointed out his mother’s new home.

  “That’s Campione d’Italia over there, where the houses reach down to the shoreline.”

  “And that’s part of Italy?”

  “Yes, it’s an exclave. During World War Two, the CIA, or OSS as it was then, ran operations throughout Italy from there.”

  They sat on a bench outside the tiny, vaulted chapel of the Chiesa di San Salvatore.

  “Don’t you ever get fed up with it all, Raffy? Crime, I mean.”

  Conza was surprised at the question. “I guess so. But I take comfort from the fact that we’re making a difference, even in a small way.”

  “Are we though? The criminals seem to hold all the cards these days.”

  “I think that sometimes. But then I remind myself that it’s probably always been that way. We just know more now, whether we want to or not. Crime isn’t a modern phenomenon.”

  “I know that, but the bad guys know how to use every trick in the book. Doesn’t that get to you? We aren’t really solving anything are we?”

  “We’re doing what we can, Harry. That’s all we can do.”


  “I used to think that. I guess I just became tired of trying to defend the indefensible. These days, I see myself as a litter picker rather than a barrister.”

  “Don’t you ever prove that an accused is not guilty?”

  “Not very often. Contrary to popular opinion, it’s pretty rare for the police to prosecute the innocent.”

  “But surely, these people have the right to be defended; guilty or not.”

  “I’ve only been a barrister for two years. I spend my life mitigating rather than defending. It’s all about trying to excuse the inexcusable. Reduced sentences, bail hearings, pleas for clemency; that sort of thing. It’s all just a game.”

  “But you must represent the innocent on occasions. Not everyone who hires you is a criminal, surely?”

  “It does happen. Just not very often. I try not to judge, but it’s pretty difficult. My problem is I can’t let go. I try to solve everything, take personal responsibility. But I’m powerless. Just a voice in the wilderness. I don’t like my clients because of the crimes they commit, and don’t like myself because I do nothing to prevent them doing it again.”

  Harry set down his glass and stared at the lake.

  “But you’re frustrated because you care, not because you don’t.”

  Harry Chase picked up a stone and turned it over in his hand.

  “You’re probably right, Raffy.” He suddenly roused himself. “Come on, let’s go down to the casino and throw some money away.”

  17

  Sunday

  Genoa, Italy