Her voice calm, and kind, returned a serene feeling to Leonardo, who still felt upset for his gaffe with Madlen.
“Good afternoon,” Maurizio replied. “Please forgive this late afternoon visit. I understand you might have just arrived from work. This is Forensic Inspector Romizi from the forensic team.”
With a shy smile Leonardo shook her hand, “Pleased to meet you Ms. Martini,” he greeted briefly.
“There’s absolutely no problem about it,” she replied, guiding them to the living room. “Lucio! Come here, Detective Scala arrived!” she called.
Turning her eyes back to her visitors, she took their jackets and offered for them to sit on the couch. “He will come soon. He’s preparing for one exam and he’s always in his room studying.”
“Ah, the life of a student; I miss it,” Maurizio replied chuckling.
“Good afternoon,” said Luciano appearing from one of the doors leading to a corridor that remained in the darkness.
Maurizio and Leonardo stood up to greet him, “Good afternoon, Mr. Calvani. We will try to be brief and not to steal too much of your time. This is Forensic Inspector Romizi, and if you prefer to talk in private...” he explained peering at Ms. Martini.
Giulia glanced at them, understanding that probably they wanted to ask confidential questions, and included details of his private life, one she might not be aware of. They never spoke about a relationship, and she was afraid he was feeling slightly embarrassed to open up his private life to anyone, particularly to his mother. That was something she was aware of, and she accepted the fact that probably a daughter would have felt more comfortable talking about boys and relationships with a mother, meanwhile a son would have preferred speaking to his father.
“Oh, I was going to see a friend of mine on the second floor, you can chat freely here,” she winked, feeling amused.
“Thank you, Mom,” he smiled shyly at her.
As they were alone, and seated on the couch, Luciano scrutinized both men, trying to guess their thoughts, and wondering about what they knew. “Is there any news about getting the keys back to my apartment?”
“We expect to have everything ready by the end of next week. We’re sorry for the delay, we needed to collect as much information as possible,” Leonardo replied in an apologetic tone.
He understood there had been several delays due to the lack of manpower at the laboratory, but that was a detail he wasn’t willing to share with anyone.
“That’s not a problem, I can certainly wait.”
“I know you have already answered this question, but I would like to go into a bit more detail. How would you describe your relationship with the victim? I know there had been highs and lows, like in every family, but the neighbors were claiming having heard quite inflamed arguments coming from your apartment. Can you tell me a bit more specifically the reason why you argued with your father?” Maurizio needed to handle the question of the girlfriend with care.
He could not get straight to the point, in that case, besides being considered rude, it would have raised some suspicions from one of the potential assassins.
Luciano averted his eyes from him and slowly entwined his fingers on his lap. “Our relationship was sometimes a bit troublesome, I understand. The reason we were often arguing was because of his broken promises,” he commenced, raising his glance shyly. “My father was a busy businessman, and that wasn’t something new. The problem began when he started to be more serious with his girlfriend and had no time for me anymore. I felt like a useless presence in his life, and I tried in every way possible to spend some time with him.”
“Did you ever ask your mother for advice?” Maurizio started to dig deeper.
With a sarcastic chuckle, Luciano tilted his head backward. “He divorced her because of his girlfriend, and I asked her for any advice on how to have my father back. She suggested to leave him, because it was a lost cause.” Returning serious, his eyes returned to his hands. “Perhaps she was right, and I should have returned to live with her. She always listened to me when I asked her something.”
“What about your friends, your girlfriend, did you ever talk to her about your problems?” Leonardo chimed in. He regretted it immediately and waited for another admonition coming from Maurizio.
Nevertheless, Maurizio nodded, considering his way of introducing the presence of a girlfriend, simply brilliant.
“Irina? Yes, she was the one who was always listening to my complaints. Sometimes I feel guilty for including her with my personal problems, but this is what a relationship is made of, isn’t it?” Luciano asked.
“So, Irina is your girlfriend, that’s a beautiful and exotic name. Where does she come from?” Maurizio wondered, pretending to be curious.
“I met her at the University. She’s originally from Hungary, but she has the double passport.” Luciano replied, hesitatingly. He realized he made a mistake in telling them anything about his relationship with Irina and her citizenship, but it was too late, and he had to hope this information wasn’t going to bring any trouble to either of them.
“Does she study here in Rome?” Leonardo pursued, intending not to let go that lead for any reason in this world.
“No, I met her when she was trying to figure out what to do with her life. She is still deciding whether she is going to follow any course or not. She still lives in Hungary with her aunt and comes here only for holidays. She has a job as a waitress back in her country and can’t come here as often as she’d like. Sometimes I go to visit her, so we can spend more time together.” He desperately hoped this would have taken her away
