Michael Morley - Spider

Massimo looked up from his desk top. 'None of the progeny of the flies had themselves reached the breeding stage?'

'No,' she answered. 'I asked the same question. Apparently that would have taken about a month.'

'So again the timing coincides?' checked Roberto.

'Yes,' Orsetta confirmed. 'In the summary, the notes concur again that the head was probably kept in a lukewarm place for between ten and fourteen days.'

Massimo scribbled some words on his pad and the team waited silently until he had finished. 'We need to have a stab at a timeline. Let's look…'

Roberto interrupted him. 'Direttore, I think I have a rough one.'

'Go on,' said Massimo, pleased to see the youngster had been thinking ahead.

'Cristina was last seen alive on the ninth of June and was reported missing on the tenth. From what we've been told by the pathology reports, it's likely that she was killed somewhere around the twelfth to the fourteenth. We're told the corpse was kept for six days before it was dismembered and disposed of. This takes us to the twentieth of June as probably the earliest that he started disposing of the limbs. We have our first public finding of remains two days later, on the twenty-second.'

Massimo held up a hand. 'That's good, but let's stop for a moment and back up a little. It looks as if this man held Cristina alive for between a minimum of two and a maximum of four days.' He looked up at his team, and continued, 'Then, when he killed her, he kept her body, or parts of it, for another six to eight days. Why? Why did he wait so long? What was he doing?' He let the dates and questions sink in, swallowed hard and added, 'Our killer then kept Cristina's severed head for another four or five days, before it was delivered to us. Again, why?'

Orsetta made the sign of the cross and bowed her head; she could not begin to imagine what agonies Cristina had endured, or what kind of man they were hunting.

'He has left us with many questions to answer, but let's concentrate on the main ones,' said Massimo, preparing to tick them off on his fingers. 'How did he manage to abduct Cristina? Where did he hold her for those two to four days that she was alive? Did he keep her corpse in the same place, for up to six days, or did he move her somewhere else? Why did he wait so long before sending Cristina's head to us?'

Massimo let his hand fall to his desk and glanced across at the framed picture of Cristina. She seemed not to have a worry in the world. Her face was unlined, radiant and full of promise. Her smile was so wide that the photographer had probably caught her just as a laugh was about to escape her lips. Massimo looked up again, and moved the conversation on to something he'd so far kept secret from Jack. 'And the other big question is: what exactly did the killer mean to tell us by the note that he sealed in a plastic bag and left inside Christina's skull?'

Wednesday, 4 July

Rome 'Jack King, you look magnificent!' exclaimed Massimo Albonetti, throwing his arms around the former FBI agent as he entered his office.

'And you – my smooth Italian friend – you still look like a polished cue ball,' said Jack, playfully rubbing the top of Massimo's bald head.

Massimo slapped his hand away and shut the door behind them. 'They told me you were ill, but look at you. You're heavier and healthier than I've ever seen you.'

'Good food and a good wife, that's the secret,' said Jack, patting his stomach.

'Jack, please, I am Italian – these things you do not need to tell me.' He waved a hand towards a chair on the other side of his desk. 'Please, please sit down. Can I get you a drink? Coffee, water?'

'Just some water, please. I'm trying to fight the caffeine.'

'Me too,' said Massimo, 'but the caffeine is always winning.' He pressed his desk intercom. 'Claudia, two double espressos and some water, please.'

Jack shot him a disapproving glance.

Massimo shrugged his shoulders. 'If you don't want it when it comes, then I will have yours as well.'

Jack took the seat and leant on the desk. 'Benedetta and the kids good? Did they get away on holiday okay?'

'Yes, fine, thank you,' said Massimo. 'Though there was another terrorist scare at the airport and the children were disappointed at not being able to take certain toys on the plane. No toy guns, no water pistols – how does a young child cope these days without them?'

'Air travel will never be the same again,' said Jack. 'Pretty soon you're going to have to empty your body fluids, then zip yourself up in a clear plastic bag before they'll let you board. The boys and girls in the anti-terrorist units certainly have their work cut out for them.'

'si,' said Massimo, smiling. 'I thank God every night that I managed to avoid being drafted into that particular war.'

The small talk had come to an end, so Jack asked the question that had been preying on his mind ever since they'd last spoken. 'So, Mass, are you going to tell me what you couldn't tell me on the phone?'

The Italian sat back and his old chair creaked so loudly it sounded as though the joints might break. The question was far from unexpected, and the answer was simple, but he still hesitated to break the news. 'Jack, you know how much I respect you and treasure our friendship, so forgive me for this. Before I tell you everything, I have to look you in the eye, man to man, friend to friend, and ask you: are you really all right now? Are you really strong enough mentally and physically to face up to what we are asking of you?'

It was the same question that Orsetta had alluded to, and one which Jack had been repeatedly asking himself over the last few days. 'I am,' he said forcefully, though deep down he still had his doubts. 'From what you've said, your murder, if it is not a copycat killing, may be the work of a man who killed at least sixteen young women in America. Now, I've tracked this bastard for close on half a decade, and the effort and strain damned near killed me. But I'll tell you this, Mass, watching him kill again and again, and being unable to try to stop him, well, that would be the worst thing in the world for me. For the sake of my own sanity, I have to be involved in this with you. I must, one more time, try to do everything I possibly can to get this guy off the streets.'

'Bravo, my friend,' said Massimo, relieved that he'd got the answer he'd been hoping for. 'I'm very proud that you have decided to work with us.'

'Okay, cut the gushy stuff,' said Jack light-heartedly. 'What is it you haven't been telling me?'

Massimo leant forward on his elbows and let Jack read the serious look on his face. This wasn't going to be easy. 'The report I sent you mentioned that Cristina's body had been dismembered, but some things were left out.'

Jack said nothing; his eyes asked the question for him.

'Cristina had been decapitated. He dismembered her body and severed her head. After he disposed of the other parts, he sent her head to our offices, here in Rome.'

There were a dozen questions Jack wanted to ask, but he started with the most obvious one. 'Why wasn't this in the confidential briefing notes? If I remember correctly, they'd gone to your Prime Minister's office.'

Massimo smiled. 'There is nothing confidential in Italian politics, especiallyin the Prime Minister's office. Send something confidential to the highest level and you merely push up the price at which an aide or civil servant will sell the document to the press.'

Massimo opened a long drawer that ran the full width of his desk. 'There's something more,' he said, determined to address all the outstanding issues with Jack as quickly as possible. He pulled out a thin file marked 'Barbuggiani/Confidential'. He handed it across the desk, adding, 'This is a copy of a note found inside the mouth of Cristina Barbuggiani. Forensics have the original.'