Chapter 1
Arthur messaged me the next morning to invite me for a walk along the beach. The sun had come out and I needed to clear my head anyway, so I agreed. We met at Pedra do Leme, where I found him handing out flyers with Ruth’s photo.
“I had three thousand of these printed. I’m going to keep handing them out until I get more information,” he said excitedly. “I asked for the café’s security camera footage, but can you believe they don’t have it?”
At first I thought he was just going to talk about Ruth nonstop and regretted accepting his invitation.
To my relief, Arthur soon switched it up, talking about life in Rio and what TV shows he’d been watching.
We walked for forty minutes. He was polite, kind, and intelligent, and I could see he shared many of Miguel’s traits—maybe because, to my business mind, a pharmacist and a doctor did similar jobs.
He quickly grew on me: the deliberate way he expressed his ideas, his conciliatory tone, his shrewd eyes that captured everything around him.
It was like taking a nostalgic stroll through my best days with Miguel.
Arthur had undoubtedly already noticed that I was gay, but I didn’t sense any judgment or different treatment because of it.
Despite his undeniable good looks, at no point did I feel any attraction toward him, only respect and affection.
He was a sensitive man who wasn’t ashamed to reveal his weaknesses.
We said goodbye around noon and planned for more walks during the week.
Back at home, Piglet was pigging out on pepperoni pizza for lunch while watching Mr. Bean on TV.
Beside him on the sofa, Cora was content with a grilled chicken salad and didn’t seem at all interested in Mr. Bean’s antics: She repeatedly checked her phone between mouthfuls.
When he noticed me, Piglet turned off the TV, sat up on the couch, and signaled for me to come closer.
“I’ve got new info, handsome.”
“Me too.”
Cora didn’t even look up from her phone.
“Where were you?” Piglet asked.
“I went for a walk,” I said, not wanting to tell him about Arthur. Our meeting had a sort of hush-hush feel that I wanted to maintain. “Where’s Hugo?”
“He went out, didn’t say where,” Cora replied. “He was out all day yesterday, too.”
Since Miguel’s death, he’d been a different person, acting increasingly strange and distant.
He’d been growing out his blond beard, lumberjack-style, like he wanted to show he was a boss now and didn’t have to play by anyone’s rules.
He walked around with a snobbish attitude and rarely stopped to talk to us.
If it were up to him, we’d just look the other way and keep cashing in on the dinners.
There was no way I was going to do that, and neither was Piglet.
“I emailed you a list of all the people who’ve attended a dinner,” he said, gobbling another slice of pizza.
“There’s over three hundred total, but I was able to eliminate some of them.
At least twenty have died in recent months.
That’s over five percent. I guess considering all the old folks who’ve become regulars, that’s not surprising.
Apparently, it’s a prerequisite to have one foot in the grave. ”
I smiled at Piglet. It was rare for a young person to have that kind of money to spend on a dinner.
“Who else did you eliminate?”
“I hacked into some social media profiles and bank accounts. I eliminated everyone who’s broke and just living off the family name.”
“Like Umberto.”
“Right,” said Piglet. “By the way, I poked around in the old man’s bank records. He transfers a good portion of the money he earns from the dinners to an offshore account.”
“Whose account?”
“Probably Vladimir’s,” said Piglet, shrugging. “It’s our best shot … but it’s all under tight security. I’ve been trying to decrypt the data.”
“And…?”
“Nothing yet. But I mean yet. There’s some other less … conventional methods. I’ve got some contacts on the deep web. Sooner or later, we’ll get our answers.”
“Awesome. Can I have a slice?” I asked before he polished off the whole pizza.
“Okay,” he replied grudgingly. Piglet hated sharing food.
“I hitched a ride and went by the police station yesterday. That detective wasn’t around,” said Cora. “I made friends with the officers there, I’ve been flirting with one of them.”
She handed me her phone. She was texting with Paul?o, a guy with a round face and stocky build, judging by his profile picture.
I vaguely remembered seeing him in the middle of that horrific standoff.
The two of them were exchanging affectionate messages and spicy voice notes.
Unwittingly, the guy had been giving her information about how the station operated, but of course he hadn’t mentioned anything about taking bribes or that bloodbath.
“Did you see anyone named Antunes there?” I asked, taking a bite of pizza. It was cold and doughy, but it took the edge off my hunger.
“Yeah, but that guy’s a hard-ass. He barely looked at me.”
“He’s the one who controls the killing.”
“Soon I’ll have Paul?o eating out of my hand,” she said, licking her palm like a kitten. “I have my methods.”
Once, on the wall of a public restroom, I saw a poem:
HAVING TALENT ISN’T LUCK
LUCK REQUIRES TALENT
“What about you, Dante?” asked Piglet. “You put us to work and just kicked back?”
“I want to check who owns the house in Jardim Botanico. I have to pass by the property appraiser’s office.”
“Vladimir wouldn’t be that stupid.”
“I mean, eventually the guy has to mess up…”
“I made a list of the registered slaughterhouses in the area. There are six.”
“Do you have the list?”
“Also in your inbox, dopehead.”
Piglet never did anything by hand. His world operated along virtual paths; I should have been used to it already.
After I ate my slice of pizza, I tossed the greasy napkin and washed my hands.
I opened the file on my phone to check the names of the slaughterhouses, with their addresses listed beside them.
“I can go with you,” Cora offered.
To Piglet’s dismay, I asked for another slice. I scarfed it down without chewing properly while Cora left her dishes in the sink and put on her shoes. She tied her hair back and donned sunglasses and an orange cap, looking like a lifeguard at a country club pool.
“Shall we get a move on?”