A/N: I suppose somebody owns Chuck, but it ain't me.
A/N2: A note on translation. For ease of reading (and, to be honest, writing) when a conversation takes place entirely in Italian, I am presenting it in English. I will, at the beginning, mention that the characters are speaking in Italian, but will not write it in Italian with adjacent translations.
A/N3: Also, I am deliberately not locating the neighborhood in Rome where our friends find Ms. Ricci's pimp. If I mention a particular neighborhood known for the lucciole I might inadvertently offend one or more Roman readers of my story. Those areas exist in Rome, as they do in any big city, but I see no need to bring particular attention to them here.
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The evening was cool, but not freezing. Trash blew down the street in the light wind as cars slowly cruised by, with men ogling and judging the merchandise. Other than the street lights and the headlights of passing cars, the only illumination was from a small kiosk twenty or so meters up the street selling cold drinks, hot coffee, and cigarettes.
The girls were dressed to attract customers, as befits intelligent marketing. Micro shorts or skirts and skimpy tops covered by open puffy jackets to ward off the evening cold. The dozen or so girls were a veritable United Nations, with Russians, Africans and Eastern Europeans mixing with the native Italians. Sarah and Marie walked up to the group and Sarah said, speaking in Italian, "Evening, ladies. Any of you friends with Rosa Ricci?"
The mood among the women turned colder quickly. Some wandered off immediately to find more pleasant company or discussion. The rest sort of milled around looking unhappy or scared. Marie said, "Did she work here? This neighborhood?"
"Yeah, sometimes," one of them said.
"We're sorry about what happened to her," said Sarah.
"You two cops?" asked one of the girls.
"No. But we are trying to find out what happened," said Sarah.
"Why? I heard they caught the guy. Some suit did it," said one of the girls.
"Yeah. We heard the same thing. Wondered if the guy was a regular customer." Sarah showed them a picture of Grillo that they had borrowed from Lou.
The girls shook their heads. They didn't recognize him. One of them volunteered, "He doesn't look so bad. Like he could do that to Rosa. He looks sort of nice."
"Aw, you can never tell," said another older woman. "They're all animals."
"Her pimp around here?" asked Sarah. "We'd like to talk to him."
"No, you don't. He's nasty. You do not want to talk to Franco," said one of the women.
"Yeah, he likes to hit the girls," said another.
Sarah smiled like a wolf who had just caught a goat, and said, "No kidding? Now I really want to talk to him."
"He's around the corner. Just bought a new car. A fancy Alfa Romeo. You'll find him shining it or something," said one of the girls.
"Thank you," said Marie.
They walked around the corner and, sure enough, they found Franco lounging against a red Alfa Romeo Spider soft-top and looking at his phone.
"You Franco?" asked Sarah.
He was in his late twenties, tall, maybe as tall as Chuck and Casey, and looked strong, but not with bulky muscles. He had a dark craggy face with the pockmarks of a bad acne problem in his youth. He looked at them with unconcealed contempt. "If you're looking for a job, show me your tits. Otherwise, beat it."
"No, Franco, I don't think we are going to do either of those things actually. We want to ask you about Rosa Ricci," said Sarah.
"You cops?"
"No," said Sarah.
"Then beat it before I make you sorry you stayed," said Franco, standing up to his full height. Sarah supposed that normally intimidated people.
"You recognize this man?" Sarah asked as she held out Grillo's picture.
He moved to her and poked her hard in the shoulder with two fingers. He was about to say something, but Sarah used the hand not holding Grillo's picture to grab the hand he had used to touch her and twisted it in an aikido wrist twist. Whatever threat he was about to utter was never voiced. He sucked in a breath against the sudden pain in his wrist. He tried to move on her with his other hand, but she moved his hand in a particularly painful way and discouraged the attempt. They stood in that way for a moment or two. Marie was merely watching calmly, without expression. Finally, he nodded.
Sarah said, "Will you behave?"
His voice tight with pain he said, "Yes."
She let him go. No sooner had she done so when he produced a switchblade knife, clicked it open and lunged for her. Grillo's picture fluttered to the ground as Sarah caught the wrist of the blade hand, twisted it away from her, and used it to pull him off balance. Putting her other hand near his elbow, and pushing down on his arm with both hands, she brought her knee up hard and fast to the point midway between his wrist and his elbow. Both forearm bones broke together with a snap. The knife fell to the pavement and Franco howled in pain.
Sarah let him go and stepped back. He was a tough guy, though, and moved to swing at her with his left hand. Marie, looking almost bored, blocked the punch aimed at Sarah and twisted his arm. Putting her hand behind his left elbow, she pressed his unbroken arm into an arm bar. She used the arm bar to plant him facedown onto the hood of his car. She said to him, "If I break this arm also, you won't be able to wipe your own ass. I want you to think about that for a moment." He nodded, grunting in pain.
Sarah frisked him quickly and took a small pistol from his pocket, dropping it into her jacket pocket. She picked up the knife from the ground, closed it and put it in the same pocket, and retrieved the Grillo picture.
"Ok," said Sarah. "Let's start again." She brushed her hair out of her eyes and put the picture of in front of his. "Recognize this man?"
"Yeah. He's the guy who killed Rosa." he said through gritted teeth. "The cops told me."
"You recognize him from anywhere else?" she asked.
'Yeah, he was one of her regulars."
"How regular? When did he see her?"
"Every couple of weeks. He'd make a date to see her," he said.
"A regular schedule with a set night and time every couple of weeks?"
"Not regular like that. He'd call her and make the arrangements. Sometimes more than two weeks would go by, but it was usually about two weeks."
"When did it start?"
"About a year ago. Maybe a year and a half. It was soon after she started to use again, so...yeah, more like a year, I guess."
"Where?" asked Sarah.
"Always the same place. The garage where he killed her. Blowjobs, nothing else. It was all he wanted. Didn't want to take her to a hotel or anything like that. Really secret. No chance of anyone finding out."
"But you saw him. You knew what he looked like."
"Yeah, I took her the first few times, until I was sure he was ok. Shit, was I wrong."
"How'd he pay?"
"Cash."
"Anything different the other night?"
"Well, yeah. He killed her."
"I mean leading up to the meeting. Anything out of the ordinary?"
"No, nothing," he said.
Marie said, "How did she get there?"
"She had a Vespa she used to use around town," he said.
"Where is it now?" Marie asked.
"How the hell should I know?" he asked. Marie moved his arm a little and he hissed in pain. "I don't know. I don't know."
Marie looked at Sarah, who shrugged and nodded.
Sarah leaned down to speak to him in almost a whisper. "I'll keep in touch with the girls out there. If I hear that you keep hitting women, I'm going to come back and break your other arm. Understand?" He nodded.
Marie let him go and she and Sarah walked away. He lay on the hood of the car until they were several meters distant, then screamed, "You bitches. I'll kill you."
They kept walking, not even bother to look around. Sarah said, in English, "Casey we are heading for you. We'll fill you in when we get to the car."
"Roger that," Casey said in her ear.
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By the time they returned to the Villa Palone, Major Volta was back and had given Chuck the best recording they had from the garage. Two of Tony Palone's IT guys had been busy setting up some computers and large monitors on mobile stands in the dining room. Cables ran across the floor, and Chuck made a point of telling people to watch their steps. The men were just leaving. Chuck had been talking to them and directing how he wanted the equipment arranged, while Tony, Megan, Lou and Morgan watched.
When the other three came back from the conversation with Franco, the attention turned to them. Pietro followed them into the room to listen.
Chuck gave Sarah a kiss and said, "How'd you do?"
"Ok, I guess." She took out Franco's gun and knife and put them on the dining room table as she was taking off her jacket.
Casey said, "Son of a bitch tried to knife her." The Palones looked at Sarah with alarm.
Marie said, "So, she broke his arm." Tony and Pietro exchanged a look. Lou looked at her friend wide-eyed.
Volta laughed without mirth. "I think I like you, Ms. Walker."
"I don't like pimps. It's a thing," Sarah said with a shrug. "Anyway, his story is that Grillo was a regular customer of Ricci's and would see her every couple of weeks at the same garage for a blowjob. He'd call her to set up the meet, so look for her number on his cell phone and ask his bodyguards if they can confirm taking him there on other nights over the past year or so. According to him, she probably took a Vespa to the meet with Grillo, so maybe some of your guys can look for it."
Volta said, "I will take care of all of that. Anything else?"
"That was it. What's happening here?" she asked.
Chuck said, "I've got some more powerful computers to clean up this footage. My laptop doesn't have the power to run the programs well. I want to take out the fuzz and tighten up the focus. See if that helps us. It's gonna take a while, though, as it's a bit time consuming. But if I start now, it should be ready in a few hours."
"Ok. How about we all get some sleep then? It's late," said Megan. "Major Volta, you are welcome to stay here if you'd like. There's more than enough room."
Volta declined and wished them good night.
Pietro showed Casey and Marie to a room on the second floor and the others retreated to their respective rooms...except Morgan and Lou.
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Lou was sitting on her bed and Morgan on a nearby chair. She said, "You deserve to know what is going on. You keep hearing bits and pieces, but you deserve to know the full story."
"Ok, Lou," he said, reaching out to hold her hand.
"So, about two years ago I was going through a wild period. Dad wanted me to start working with him in the hotels and I wanted to party before that. I'm not proud of it, but at least it didn't last long. That was when I dated Stavros. Eventually, Stavros wanted to get out from under his parents' direction. He loved them, but wanted to be his own man without his family watching his every move. So, he left Greece to set up Club Ares in LA.
"I calmed down after a while and went to work for my dad. I loved the work and my dad is terrific. I started to date Enzo, who I'd known since we were little kids and our families were friendly with each other. My parents were thrilled. They loved Enzo. My mom in particular." Lou rolled her eyes. "She really loved Enzo, or at least the idea of Enzo. She wanted us to get married and settle down. But, like, right away.
"She started in on me. 'You are so in love with each other,' 'why wait?, just get married already,' 'oh, your kids are going to be so cute.' It drove me crazy how heavy handed she was. How pushy. No matter how much I told her to stop, she just kept right at it. We had some huge fights about it. Huge.
"I mean, I liked Enzo, don't get me wrong. He's a really sweet guy, but to have that pressure on me all the time...uugggghhh. It wasn't his fault, but still. I honestly came to resent him...totally unfair I know, but I did.
"Finally, I had had enough. I broke up with Enzo, took some money I had and followed Stavros to LA. Started my own business. I dated Stavros in LA for a few months, but after Enzo I realized what a jerk Stavros was as a boyfriend, so we broke up.
"So, that's the story, Morgan. It's why I was pissed that Mom seemed to be starting up all over again on this visit home. Why I flipped out to see Enzo at the party. And to do that stuff with you here...in front of you...well, I got really annoyed at Mom all over again. I just thought you should know what it was all about."
Morgan sat holding her hand and said, "Thank you for telling me, Lou. It means a lot to me that you would share that with me. I know your Mom can be a bit much, but you know she loves you. She wants what's best for you. It's easy for me to say, but her heart is in the right place. You'll forgive her. You know you will. And you don't have to worry on my account. I'll win her over. Just give me time." He gave her a confident grin.
She leaned forward to kiss him. "Thanks, Morgan. I feel better having told you."
The kiss extended. After a while, Morgan pulled back a bit and said, a little breathless, "Um, I guess I should get to my room?"
Lou said, with a somewhat salacious smile, "You know, my folks don't do bed checks."
"Are you suggesting..."
"Damn, right," she said, taking him in her arms and leaning back onto her bed.
"Whoops," he said, with a laugh.
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When Morgan came downstairs the next morning, Chuck was already up and in the dining room. He had put the cleaned up security cam footage on continuous loop and was watching it on the large monitor on the far side of the table.
"Morning, pal," said Morgan.
"Morning, buddy."
"Coffee?"
"That'd be great thanks."
Morgan went into the kitchen. Ginni Caron was already up. She was an attractive woman in her fifties, with dark hair. She gave him a smile and two cups of coffee.
He walked back out and gave Chuck his coffee. He sat down next to his heterosexual life partner and said, "Been here long?"
"Few hours," said Chuck, not taking his eyes off the footage.
"How many times have you seen it?"
"Couple of hundred, probably," said Chuck.
"Wow. Get anywhere?" Morgan asked.
"Morgan, don't look at it like security cam footage. I need you to look at it like a video game and critique the graphics. It took me a while, but that's what I started to do."
"Ok, Chuck." Morgan sipped his coffee and watched the footage over and over again. Pietro came in and watched them for a while and then went to get coffee from his wife. Seating himself at the table, he silently watched Morgan and Chuck studying the tape.
Morgan started to frown. It was on the thirty-second viewing he turned to Chuck with wonder in his eyes, "Holy shit. Holy shit. Oh, my God."
"You saw it too! I know, right?" Chuck said, "Pietro can you lend us a car and give us directions to the garage where Ms. Ricci was killed? Oh, and we'll need a tape measure."
"I'll drive you myself. Meet me outside in two minutes," he said. He had no idea what was going on, but he was as excited as he'd been in a long time.
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On the floor of the garage where Ms. Ricci had been murdered, Chuck and Morgan were moving around with the tape measure.
Chuck said, "Morgan, text Lou and find out how tall Grillo is."
Morgan did so while Chuck measured the height of the wall mounted light near the door.
Morgan said, "165 centimeters."
"Right," said Chuck. "Hold this," he said, putting the tape measure at the foot of the wall. Chuck walked out from the wall with the tape. The tape ran out, so he marked it on the floor and Morgan came to him. They had to do that a couple of more times, but eventually they got to the spot Chuck was looking for. He made a note of the distance from the wall and from a second spot on the floor.
"Ok," he said. He took out his phone and began to enter numbers into the calculator.
Curious, Pietro asked, "What are you doing?"
"Trigonometry," said Chuck. He finished his calculations and showed the final number to Morgan, who whooped and gave a bit of a fist pump. "Big difference."
Turning to Pietro, Chuck said, "Grillo didn't kill the girl."
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A/N4: What? What the hell? We saw him kill the girl. Tune in next Saturday for the explanation. This arc sure takes some weird turns.
A/N5: Thanks for following along, folks. If you liked it, please leave a review. If you didn't, please leave a review. Actually, just please leave a review.
A/N6: I'm a big believer in masks. Please wear a mask. The scientists say it works.