Killer Smile by Lisa Scottoline Read Free Book Online Page A

Pebbles ponytail. It was almost midnight but she felt oddly energized, sitting cross-legged on her puffy blue comforter with her newfound FBI memo and Amadeo’s personal effects spread out in front of her. She had gotten them from Frank Cavuto, the estate’s lawyer, who’d gotten them from Amadeo’s son, Tony. She had seen the effects a hundred times, but the FBI memo had got her blood going, and she looked at Amadeo’s things with new eyes.
    On her left sat three photographs. The first was of Amadeo, bending over in a fishing boat and evidently doing something to one of the nets that lay in ropey piles on the deck of his boat. Mary squinted but couldn’t see what he was doing. Repairing the net? The deck? Either way, he focused intently on his task and didn’t smile for the camera. It told her that he wasn’t a vain man; he was a little shy. Mike had been like that. She set the photo down on the bed.
    The next photo was a wedding portrait of Amadeo and his wife, Theresa. He stood stiff as a toy soldier with his bride, and Theresa’s dark eyes shone behind the gauzy veil. Her hair curled to her shoulders, and her dress was frilly in an appealing, old-fashioned way. Mary found herself drawn back to Amadeo. His eyes, brown-black but so animated, had been joyful on his wedding day. Again, it reminded her of Mike, on their wedding day. He had teared up at the altar, and his frat brothers had never let him forget it. Mary smiled at the memory, then remembered something Judy had said, in her office:
    It’s like you have a crush on him or something.
    Mary set the photo down. The next was of Theresa and Amadeo holding a baby boy with dense, black curls; their son, Tony. The end of the photo was tattered, as if it had been torn from a booklet. Mary turned it over to read JULY 4, penciled in a woman’s flowing hand. There was no notation of what year the photo had been taken, but if the baby was Tony, it had to be around 1920; Tony grew to be old enough to enlist when World War II came around. But in the happier times of the picture, they were all dressed up to celebrate the birth of their new country. Mary couldn’t ignore the irony, as bitter on her tongue as broccoli rabe.
    She set the photos next to the last item, a flimsy black wallet with a cheap fake brass snap. It was made of black plastic and inside were three clear photo compartments, now cloudy with age. She flipped to the first, which held a black-and white picture of a woman’s face, cut out in the shape of a circle. Mary slid it out and flipped it over, the paper thin and pulpy in her hands. The writing on the back was printed Italian, cut off where the circle was, but the name was visible.
Francesca Saverio.
Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini, patron saint of immigrants. Mary should have recognized her. Cabrini’s face was typically framed by a black veil and graced with a sweetly melancholic smile; her story was that she was a quiet, withdrawn child. Her symbol was a boat. It made sense that Amadeo, an immigrant and a sailor, would have adopted Cabrini as his patron. And if his suicide was any indication, he had been the melancholy type, too.
    Mary went to the next envelope, which contained a lock of dark hair pressed within the dusty plastic. It had been snipped crudely and curled into a question mark about an inch long. She pried open the envelope and caught the lock as it came sliding into her hand. It felt soft, fine, and seemed to have almost no weight in her palm. She prodded the strands with an index finger, as if the lock were something alive, then held it under her bedside lamp, watching the filaments catch the light. The hair wasn’t as black as it looked in the envelope, but was a deep brown, shot through with russet highlights. Whose hair was it? Amadeo’s son’s? His wife’s? Mary held the hair to the heads in each photo, like a fright wig. Funny, but not good detective work.
    Mary fingered the lock. Amadeo’s effects only reinforced her sense