She stood in the hallway, taking in the macabre scene in front of her.
At the end of the ornate and beautifully decorated entrance hall was a tall marble stairway, with a giant-size replica of a fancy shoe to its right. The body was lying at the bottom of the stairs, crumpled and still.
With snapshot precision, Falcone took in the rest of the scene.
Nothing looked out of place. The hallway looked and felt undisturbed. There were no footprints or scuff marks on the polished tiles in front of her, and the house was quiet.
She walked slowly over to the body and glanced up the marble stairway.
It was high enough and steep enough for a fall to have been deadly, but healthy women in their forties didn’t usually fall down their own staircase for no reason.
But wait. Her gaze sharpened, noticing that one of the woman’s stylish boots was minus a heel. She guessed that was it, glinting halfway up the staircase. Had the shoe broken and caused the fall? Or had it broken during the fall?
Remembering the name of the deceased, and looking at those exquisite boots, and at the large replica at the foot of the stairs, she wondered briefly if the woman might be part of the wealthy family that owned Rossi Shoes. If so, this would be a high-profile investigation and she and her team could not afford to make even the smallest mistake.
She bent and felt the woman’s pulse. She didn’t expect to find one and there was none. Her flesh was cold, but rigor mortis had not yet set in.
The call had come in half an hour ago and that timeframe rang no alarm bells. However, as she crouched down and took a closer look, she noticed that there was a large scratch mark on the dead woman’s cheek. Dried blood had darkened the wound so it stood out on her pale face. There was a contusion on her cheekbone, her nose had bled, and her hair was matted.
Gently taking the well-dressed woman’s right hand again, Detective Falcone noticed that her knuckles were grazed.
She glanced up the staircase again.
These injuries could possibly have occurred during the fall—but face, head, knuckles—those locations rang alarm bells for her. They pointed to a fight, or a struggle.
“You have not interfered with the scene in any way?” she asked the girl, who was standing a few yards away, wringing her hands and shifting from foot to foot. She appeared extremely anxious and again, Falcone wondered if her anxiety was disproportionate to what had occurred.
“No. I haven’t touched anything,” she said.
This time, Falcone picked up that she was American. An American woman, working in the home. Was she a maid or an au pair? Who else was residing here?
“Is there anyone else at home this evening?” she asked gently.
“Ms. Rossi has two children, Nina and Venetia. They’re upstairs in their bedrooms. They know this has happened. Then there’s Nonna, Ms. Rossi’s mother. She arrived earlier today, and is in one of the spare bedrooms. She doesn’t know yet. She seems to suffer from dementia and I didn’t feel capable of telling her.”
Falcone nodded.
“She suffers from dementia? Is there a person to care for her?”
Cassie Vale gave a worried frown, and Falcone wondered why her question had caused this reaction.
“I—well, not really. Ms. Rossi would have cared for her but she fell.” Her words tailed off and she stared at the body for a few moments, before drawing in a deep breath, as if she was struggling to pull herself together emotionally. “I helped Nonna into her nightgown and made sure she was in bed,” she told Falcone.
Falcone stood up. The body offered clues. Some she had read, and others, the coroner would supply during the examination later tonight. What interested her was that the girl, too, looked as if she had been in a fight.
Under the brilliant light of the hallway chandelier, Falcone could clearly see a scratch on her cheek, and there was a shadow on her cheekbone that she thought might be a bruise, covered in makeup. She had seen many similar injuries, and attempts at concealment, in the domestic violence cases that she handled.
“The children’s father? Where is he?”
The auburn-haired woman shook her head and gazed back at Falcone helplessly.
“I don’t know. They were divorced last year, from what I understand, and the children haven’t had access to him since. I don’t even know his last name. Rossi is her name. She owns—owned—a shoe company.”
Falcone nodded. Her guess had been right. The deceased was indeed a well-known and high-profile businesswoman.
“I will ask one of my team to locate him and make contact,” she said.
Falcone stepped away from the body and made her way upstairs. Slowly, step by step, keeping a close lookout for any evidence that might present itself along the way.
There were a few strands of hair on the stairs. Again, unusual for a fall, and more symptomatic of a fight. Smudges—blood, lipstick, who knew? The forensics team would test, when they arrived.
There was the spiky silver heel, lying on the stairs like a long nail.
Falcone loved shoes and fashion; she supposed it was written into the Italian DNA. Outside of working hours, she loved to dress well, and spent a lot of money—probably too much, if she was truthful with herself—on quality items of clothing. There were a few pairs of Rossi shoes in her own wardrobe, but even she would never have worn boots that were quite so impractical and edgy. Generations of passionate dressers might be in her blood, but she had to balance it with the requirements for her job.
Her father had been a detective for many years. He’d retired from that department after a heart bypass operation, and was now heading up the local team in the village where he’d relocated, in a quiet countryside area outside Rome.
He had always encouraged Falcone to follow in his footsteps and was inordinately proud of her decision when she’d
