"Quintin, Jardine - Fallen Gods" - читать интересную книгу автора (Quintin Jardine)

told her. "God!" she whispered at last.

"God had no hand in it," he said, grimly. "Mags's father, may he rot
in peace, was a real bastard. Rufus's mother was barely more than a
kid, but he liked them young .. . liked to hurt them too. Anyway, even
if the relationship wasn't there, we wouldn't have a problem with the
social workers. We're both detective superintendents of police, for
fuck's sake."

"How could I forget?" she muttered. "Okay, so you've told me. That's
how things are for you. So where does it leave you and me?"

He smiled at her. "It leaves us, cousin, as joint trustees of the
Viareggio family enterprises, with compelling business reasons to meet
regularly.. . even if I have given a bright young corporate lawyer my
power of attorney, because of my public position." He looked down at
her long body and grinned. "It's perfect cover for having it off as
well." He paused. "Talking about cover, you know my mum's moving to
Tuscany pretty soon? I was thinking about going out to help her settle
into her new place. Do you fancy coming?"

Paula managed to gasp and laugh at the same time. "Are you crazy?" she
exclaimed. "I may have lusted after your body for most of my adult
life, Mario, but the last thing I want is for my Auntie Christina to
find out that I've finally got it. The same goes for any other member
of our family, and maybe for anyone at all, if you value your job."

"It's a big house that my mother's bought," he pointed out. "And don't
forget; she's very clever and she's very, very shrewd. She knows about
you and me, I'll bet, even though she hasn't said anything."

"You serious?"

"Sure. I'm her only son; we don't need speech to communicate."

"But what'll she be thinking about it?"

"Same as me ... Keep it to yourselves ... which is, I suppose the best
advice we could have. I concede also that going to Italy together
would be taking it too far, from the family's point of view. So we
won't." He paused. "Not that the job is a consideration, though."

She looked surprised once again. "What? Is the police force not big
enough for you and Maggie any more?"

He shook his head. "No, that's not it. I'm not sure that I'm as
committed to it as I need to be: not any more, at any rate. We're all
still stunned by what happened to Bob Skinner; things just aren't what
they were without him around."