Impulse

by Catherine Coulter

  “Is DeLorio back?” he asked finally.

  Dominick shook his head. “I told him to remain in Miami, to have that meeting with Mario Calpas. He’s not needed here. Haymes says you’ll be just fine. The bullet tore muscle, but you’ll heal if you don’t overdo for a couple of weeks. He also said you’d get back all your rotation and your strength. I know it’ll be hard, but you’ve got to heal, Marcus.” He absently rubbed his wounded arm. Then, “The deal with the Dutchmen was set. You know that, you went to Boston to wrap up the final details with Pearlman. Their appearance today was primarily one of diplomacy, if you will. A show of our continued goodwill; their continued desire to do business with us. They were, supposedly, the consummate middlemen.” He shrugged.

  “Who or what is Bathsheba?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “That word was on the side of the helicopter. It was in green letters—Bathsheba.”

  “I don’t know. Painted on the side of the helicopter? Like a company name or logo?”

  At Marcus’s nod, Dominick said slowly, “Well, there was Queen Bathsheba, a woman I’m sure was nothing like Tulp. It’s interesting, though. A name of an organization. We’ll find out. I’ve already got contacts working on Tulp. Pearlman claims, ah, vociferously, that he doesn’t understand a thing. As for the phone number in Amsterdam, it’s disconnected. The two Dutchmen are in the tool shed, doubtless contemplating their sins.” Dominick fell silent a moment, then added, looking bewildered, “It’s amazing. They actually believed they’d get away with killing me and getting off this island.” He patted Marcus’s arm and rose. “You get some rest, my boy. Then, when you’re feeling up to it, we’ll question our guests and find out what the hell happened. But, you know, Marcus, I’d be very surprised if the two men know anything. A pity, but I hate coercion-forced persuasion, if you will.”

  “But there’s no need to wait, Dominick. Bring them in here, or I can go—”

  “No, Marcus.” Dominick shrugged. “Perhaps that’s why I’m content to wait. They won’t know anything. You know I’m right.”

  “All right, then, but at least tell me how three people managed to knock out all our men.”

  “It was cleverly done, yet very, very basic. They came in friendship, but Link, you know, is the most suspicious of men. He wanted them searched. I’d already sent Merkel to get you. Before any searching could begin, the woman, Tulp, after shaking my hand, stuck her nasty little automatic in my ribs. I knew, strangely enough, that she was fully prepared to kill me if the men didn’t drop their weapons and agree to be herded like donkeys into the dining room. They went, and Koerbogh gassed them. As for DeLorio, he’d already left for Miami. Paula was at the resort, and my poor Coco was locked in a cabana. Merkel would have been gassed too if I hadn’t sent him to find you just before they landed. I knew you were my only hope, and you didn’t disappoint me, Marcus. My thanks.”

  He took Marcus’s hand and lightly squeezed it. “I’m dining with Coco. She’s a bit on edge, as you can imagine. I’ll see you later. Merkel will bring your dinner and stay with you.” Then Dominick Giovanni was gone.

  There were so many more questions, so much more Marcus wanted to know. It was very quiet now. He felt the pain like an inexorable tide, ebbing briefly, only to gather momentum, rushing through him, tearing at his resistance. He had three scars now: one on the inside of his left thigh, a long thin scar over his belly, and now the souvenir on his shoulder. Two were from knives and one from Tulp’s bullet. He’d survived Navy intelligence and the CIA without a scratch. He’d gotten all his scars after he’d joined Dominick and become a criminal.

  Well, the pain was better than being dead. He was asleep again shortly after eating a bit of beef broth and homemade bread with Merkel. He suspected that the lemonade was drugged, and so it was. He slept soundly until late the following morning.

  It was then that Haymes appeared again and none too gently removed the bandage from his shoulder. Marcus, teeth gritted, heard Haymes grunt, and wondered what it meant.

  There was another grunt.

  “Think you could manage some words, like in English?”

  “Lie still, Devlin, and shut your trap. Your flesh looks pink, the wound is closing nicely, and it’s just your black soul that might cause infection and kill you off. Hold still.”

  Marcus yowled when the needle slammed into his left buttock. He felt Haymes’s hand hold him down.

  “More antibiotic. Most efficient in your butt.” The needle was pulled out, leaving a cold, shocked track, and Haymes rubbed a cool alcohol pad over the spot.

  “You sadistic butcher.”

  “I’ll take out the stitches in seven or eight days. Keep the shoulder immobile. You don’t have to stay in bed, but don’t run any marathons, and that includes up and down the stairs.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Have someone massage you to keep your muscles flexible. Oh, yeah, lover boy, no sex for another week at least. You tear that wound open, and I won’t send you a bill, I’ll bury you. You got that?”

  “I haven’t got a horny bone or muscle in my body, Haymes.”

  “I’m not worried about your bones or your muscles. And that’s not what I heard from a very nice girl named Susie Glanby.”

  Marcus groaned. “She seduced me, I swear it. I was innocent. I didn’t know she was married to a boxer, for God’s sake. You think I’ve got a death wish?”

  Haymes grinned, showing the wide space between his front teeth. “Old Marty’s a piece of work, isn’t he? He smacked Susie a couple of times, knocked her silly, got scared, and called me. And that’s how I know what happened. Ah, well, young lust. Stay celibate, Devlin.”

  “I can’t believe you were a Polo Lounge society doctor in Beverly Hills.”

  “Yeah, look how human a guy gets, surrounded by sterling characters like you and Merkel.”

  “Come on, Haymes, you’ve got all those rich guys at the resort to pander to.”

  “For the most part, they’re boring as hell. Do you know how prevalent syphilis is still? You’d think the fools would have more brains than to screw around with no protection.” He shook his head and rose. He paused a moment and looked down at the young man who now had his eyes closed against the pain.

  “Don’t be so bloody macho, Devlin. Oh, what the hell.”

  Then Marcus felt another deep jab in his right buttock and yelled.

  “It’s for pain,” Haymes said, and pulled the sheet back up.

  “You’re responsible for the pain.”

  But Haymes only waved at him and slipped out of the room. A redheaded leprechaun who was a sadist, curse him.

  But the pain was receding, almost at once, and it was wonderful not to have to concentrate on keeping it to himself. He fell asleep and slept deeply.

  Coco and Dominick appeared later that evening. Coco was the quintessence of a rich man’s mistress. She was just a bit older than Marcus, model-thin, with long legs and big breasts and ash-blond hair that hung long and perfectly straight to between her shoulder blades. She looked expensive, which she was, and she deferred to Dominick in the most charming way. She was a smart cookie, Coco was. She’d been a high fashion French model, just peaking in her career five years before when she’d met Dominick in St. Moritz on the slopes, both of them avid skiers. They’d shortly become an item, the French paparazzi going crazy over the power-broking mystery man, twice indicted, once on tax-evasion charges, once on organized-crime corruption, and both times acquitted, and the beautiful model. Then they’d become lovers.

  Marcus liked Coco. She was loyal, she was intelligent, and judging from the occasional yells from the fastidious Dominick when he’d chanced to be walking by their suite, Marcus imagined that she was incredible in bed.

  She didn’t seem to pay much attention when Dominick presented her with fabulous jewels. But his son, DeLorio, did, the greedy whining little jerk.

  “Hello, Marcus,” she said, her French accent quite absent this evenin
g, as it usually was around the compound. “Dr. Haymes said you needed to be massaged. Paula volunteered. I counter volunteered. Dominick has seconded the motion. Paula is, how do we French say it? Ah, peesed off but trying not to show it because she’s not sure when DeLorio will be back. I brought my Keri Lotion.” Coco Vivrieux, Marcus knew, was actually just as American as he was. But she did the French routine very well.

  Marcus eyed Dominick, who’d sat himself down on the wicker love seat and was reading through a sheaf of papers.

  “She won’t leave you bare-assed,” Dominick said, not looking up. Marcus saw his unholy grin before his face disappeared behind a Wall Street Journal.

  Marcus moaned when her long fingers smoothed deeply into his back muscles. Her fingers were incredibly strong and she hurt him, but it felt so good he couldn’t complain.

  “I’ll be well enough tomorrow to have a chat with the Dutchmen,” he said when Coco moved to his thighs.

  “All right,” Dominick said, still not looking up from the paper. There was, however, a sudden frown on his forehead. “Merkel tells me they’re not very happy with their, er, accommodations. I suspect that they expect the worst. I’m rather enjoying letting them sweat. And I’m more than certain they don’t know a damned thing. If they did, they’d be squealing loudly, hoping for a deal. They don’t know that I haven’t the taste for good old-fashioned torture.”

  “Ah, that’s wonderful, Coco. Who was that woman? Why was she going to kill you?”

  “Be quiet, my boy, and enjoy what Coco’s doing for you.”

  “I want to talk to those goons first thing in the morning, Dominick.”

  “Fine,” Dominick said just as Coco probed deep and long and Marcus moaned.

  Marcus spent a quiet night, heavily drugged, but he awoke to loud shouts early the following morning. He was struggling to get out of bed when his bedroom door opened and Link stuck his head in.

  “Mr. Giovanni told me to make sure you stayed put. The Dutchmen poisoned themselves.”

  Marcus fell back against the pillows. “They’re dead?”

  “Deader than week-old mackerel.”

  Margaret’s Journal

  Boston, Massachusetts

  July 1986

  I just kicked Gabe Tetweiler out of our house. God, I can’t believe I could ever be so wrong about a person, about a man in particular. Which sounds excessively dumb, doesn’t it, after Dominick Giovanni. But he was so sincere and appeared to be so rich, and that being the case, of course he wasn’t interested in my money.

  Will I be a fool for the rest of my life, Rafaella?

  You can’t answer that, of course, my darling. You won’t ever see this. You’re ten years old now, a skinny little kid and so bright it sometimes scares me. I’m no intellectual giant, God knows, and here you are as bright as the sun, as your teacher, Miss Cox, likes to say. It’s from him; I guess I’ll just have to admit it. Miss Cox also says you’ve got a real smart mouth, which I’ve mentioned to you. I tried to tell her that your one-liners are quite astounding for a ten-year-old. Dominick was amusing too, when he chose to be. His was a dry wit, I suppose you’d say, unlike yours, which is straightforward, open, guileless. His was also cruel, now that I remember it.

  I guess I’d forgotten just how smart Dominick was.

  He was brought before a Senate committee some weeks ago on an organized-crime probe. Senator Wilbur from Oregon spearheaded it. He wasn’t very bright. Dominick made him look like a fool. He looked so calm and controlled, but I could tell by his eyes that he was angry. Here I go again on Dominick! But sometimes it’s tough not to, because every time I look at you, Rafaella, I see his pale blue eyes. I’m so glad your hair isn’t dark like his. No, you have such lovely titian hair, like your grandmother’s, not like his or like my light hair.

  I digress. I was meaning to sort out my stupidity with Gabe.

  He was sincere. He was a good talker. He was an even better lover. You hated him. I realized that, but I didn’t want to see it, to accept it. And of course you were right.

  He wasn’t after my money, I was right about that. He was after you, which makes me want to slit his throat. I don’t understand why you never said anything. You just turned sullen whenever he was around, and were so rude when you had to speak to him that I wanted to smack you.

  But you knew. You felt he wasn’t right. Ah, I’m sorry, Rafaella. Please forgive me. I’ll never forget this night, never so long as I live. I wonder if you will. You didn’t cry, you didn’t reproach me at all. I wonder if I will ever understand you properly. There that bastard was, in your bedroom, trying to fondle you, and you were fighting him, so silent you were, not screaming, not making a sound, just fighting that bastard with all your strength.

  I realize now why he didn’t wait. He knew, guessed, that I was drawing back, and I guess he is so ill that he couldn’t help himself.

  He’s gone now. I’ve decided to hire a private detective to follow him. I want to know where he goes. I’ve decided to ruin him. It finally occurred to me that I’m very, very rich. And money can buy lots of things, like revenge. What do you think about that, Rafaella? Revenge tastes sweet. How I wish I had taken my revenge upon Dominick. Maybe that would have put it all to rest. Now he’s so far out of my reach. Perhaps he was already far out of my reach ten years ago.

  Do you know that he still looked so handsome on TV that I wanted to cry? How about that for a fool of a mother….

  Gabe’s gone but I’ll find him and I’ll make him pay for what he tried to do to you. And to me.

  And Dominick? I pray he will meet a rotten end, but I have become a cynic now and I tend to doubt—divine intervention in particular.

  I hope you will get over this thing, Rafaella. I’ve tried to talk to you about it. Please don’t freeze up on me, don’t repress this thing.

  It’s been over ten years and still Dominick haunts me. I’ve not written about him all that much, have I? Not more than perhaps fifteen percent of all my pages? Not more, truly. All right, then, maybe forty percent of my pages. Obsession perhaps? No, it isn’t true. It’s simply a deep hatred of a man with no moral instincts in his makeup, a man with no compassion, no empathy, a man who is completely and utterly immoral.

  No, please, I mustn’t still hate him. The whole purpose of this journal was to excoriate him, then to expunge him, to keep his ghost from touching you by cleansing myself of him. Lord, he doesn’t even know your name, or mine for that matter. He never cared enough to find out.

  I wonder if he ever got his precious son. I wonder if he’s got six precious sons. God, am I stupid. Here I’ve been talking about hiring a detective to get Gabe when I could hire a detective to get me all the information I ever wanted about Dominick Giovanni.

  Wait. Is that sick of me? Is it an obsession? I must think about it, truly think about my motives. What should such information mean to me? He’s nothing to me save the man who betrayed me, who took my innocence—doesn’t that sound Gothic?—the man who made me feel like dirt.

  The bitterness is still there, deep and grinding. And now another man has betrayed me. One a man who didn’t want you in any manner whatsoever, the other a man who wanted to molest you, a child. I have failed you twice, my darling Rafaella. I promise it will not happen again.

  The Bridges

  Long Island, New York

  February 2001

  Rafaella closed the journal, slowly fastening the clasp. It was a particularly fine Spanish red leather, intricately tooled, and just as finely locked.

  And she’d picked the lock. This was the second volume on which she’d picked the lock. She closed her eyes a moment, leaning back against her mother’s desk chair, the chair Margaret had very probably sat in to write in her journals since she’d married Charles Winston Rutledge III some eleven years before.

  Rafaella had come into her mother’s room several hours before, looking for some stationery, and searched through her desk. She’d found the stationery and she’d also found the
small latch that, when manipulated properly, released two hidden drawers. And in those two drawers she’d found the journals. She’d never known they existed. She’d hesitated only briefly, then begun reading.

  Rafaella remembered the phone call that had jerked her awake at midnight. Her stepfather, Charles, sounding calm and controlled, but Rafaella could make out the underlying fear and anxiety.

  “Your mother was struck by a drunk driver, Rafaella. You must come right away. The doctors don’t know. She’s in a coma. They don’t know.”

  His voice had broken and Rafaella had stared at the phone.

  “No,” she whispered.

  Charles, drawing in his breath, regained his poise. “Come right away, my dear. I’ll have Larkin meet you at JFK. Catch the seven-A.M. flight, all right?”

  “She’s alive?”

  “Yes, she’s alive. A coma.”

  Her mother was still in a coma two days later. Peaceful, her face not older, but strangely youthful, her lovely pale blond hair combed and fastened with barrettes behind her ears. And all those damnable lines running in and out of her arms.

  So quiet. Her mother lay there, so very quiet.

  “Rafaella!”

  It was Benjamin, her stepbrother, calling from the hallway.

  “Just a moment,” she called back. She rose stiffly, carefully laid the journal back in the desk drawer, re-locked it, and went to have dinner with the family.

  Four

  Pine Hill Hospital

  Long Island, New York

  February 2001

  Rafaella sat on one side of her mother’s bed, Charles on the other. She was looking at her mother, but her thoughts kept returning to the newspaper clippings that had been stacked in neat piles in one of the secret drawers. So many photos, some grainy, others quite clear. And she couldn’t stop telling herself over and over that her real father was a man whose name was Dominick Giovanni, and he was a crook.