Impulse (25 page)

And the other doctors would gather around and chant their litany. There’s always a chance, Mr. Rutledge, don’t give up. Always a chance.

It had become his litany as well. Margaret had to live. She would live. He literally couldn’t go on without her. He knew it, had known it for a very long time.

He punched in a call to B.J. Lewis, a private investigator in Manhattan. He identified himself and was put through instantly to the great man himself, a self-image that Charles found amusing at the best of times and ludicrous at the worst of times, like right now. But Lewis was good, more than good.

“Rutledge here. Anything?”

Charles prepared himself for disappointment, ready to grunt neutrally to cover his irritation, his annoyance with everyone around him who professed an expertise and didn’t come through. Not, of course, that there’d been much for B.J. Lewis to go on. A dark sedan, four-door; the driver probably drunk, a car that should be damaged on the passenger’s side, since it had hit Margaret’s car on her side.

But he wasn’t to be disappointed, not this time. He sat forward in his chair, clutching the phone. “My God, are you certain, B.J.?”

He listened again, his hand shaking with excitement. “Of course I don’t know.” Then, “Keep on it,” he said finally. “You know as well as I do that we can’t rush this. Keep gathering evidence. I’ve got to do
some thinking.” He listened for a few more moments, then rang off.

B. J. had very probably found the individual who’d struck down Margaret, then speeded off. At least he’d firmly identified the car and the owner, who’d probably been driving. Charles didn’t know what he’d expected, but it wasn’t this. A woman owned that car. A damned drunk woman had hit Margaret.

Her name was Sylvia Carlucci.

And B. J. had wondered rhetorically if Charles knew of this woman. She was infamous for the sheer number of dollars she flung about, the number of martinis she could belt down, and the number of young studs she took to bed.

Charles rose slowly to his feet. When he’d hired B. J., it was out of a need to do something, anything, to make him feel he had some modicum of control. But he hadn’t expected this. No, anything but this. A drunk kid, perhaps, scared and panicked. But not Sylvia Carlucci. Even if she’d been a nun, people would have known about her; she’d never been a low-profile lady, because her father was Carlo Carlucci of Chicago. Sylvia Carlucci—about fifty years old now, and still going strong, strong with the booze, strong with the young studs she hauled around, and there was her husband, of course, who’d kicked her out of his life many years before, not that they’d been close for a decade before that. But no divorce, of course no divorce, not the daughter of Carlo Carlucci, who still lived in a penthouse on Michigan Avenue, all of seventy-five years old now, still surrounded by his cronies, scores of parasites.

The irony of it nearly bowled him over.

The phone rang. It was his private line. He knew that no one in his household would answer this line. He walked back to his desk and picked up the phone. Only six people knew of this number. “Yes? Rutledge here.”

“I’ve missed you, Charles.”

This was all he needed. He pitched his voice low and filled it with false patience. “Listen to me, Claudia, I don’t know why you called, but I don’t need this. My wife is still in the hospital, still in a coma, and I’m rather busy, what with my business and worrying about her.”

“But it’s been so long, and I do miss you.”

Charles looked across the expanse of his library, through the bow windows that gave onto the east lawn. It was a lovely prospect even with the winter naked trees and the brown grass and the pruned rosebushes. Everything was dormant. Even Margaret.

But Claudia wasn’t dormant; beautiful talented Claudia. He couldn’t remember why the hell he’d even let her into his life. But then, of course, he did. It was her mouth. Quite simply, it was the lady’s mouth.

“Look, Claudia, I just can’t—we broke it off over six months ago. I meant it then, I still mean it. I’m sorry.”

She ignored his words and started talking to him, describing what she would do to him, in great and imaginative detail. She knew he was aroused in a flash when she did it, and he was now, only this time his brain was more in control than his cock. He waited until she finished her expert performance—another litany, this one designed to arouse him beyond thought.

Finally she paused and he said, “Claudia, I would very much like for you to accept a small token of my appreciation.” He forgot that he’d already given her quite a fancy token, many months before, when he’d finally broken with her. “Let’s say a diamond bracelet? From Cartier? I’ll have it delivered to you this afternoon. No, no, I can’t bring it myself.” As he said the words, he knew he was weakening, knew in his soul that he wanted the thoughtless release she would bring him. Just a moment out of time, just an hour out of twenty-four, with nothing in his consciousness,
nothing in his brain, just the sexual release of the appalling tension in his body. And afterward, she’d be so sweet, she’d listen to him, sympathize, be anything he wanted her to be….

He was weak and he hated himself, but he was a man, and his father had always said that men were strong in those things that counted. Men also needed sex, and they deserved pleasure for all their hard work. Men could stray. He’d used those arguments his entire married life with his first wife, Edith. But there’d been another reason with Margaret, a reason that made him furious and sick and frightened. But that wasn’t important now. Claudia was gone from his life, long gone, his decision made months before.

He remembered how several times he’d caught Margaret staring at him, worry and love in her eyes, and he’d wondered what she was thinking and wondered if she might have heard of Claudia, and then he’d taken her to bed and told her with his body how much he loved her, only her. Of course there was so much more now, always more to understand, more to be explained, to know and deal with.

Charles then called Clement, his chauffeur, and told him to drive to Manhattan, to Cartier, and pick up a package for him. Then he called Mr. Clifford, the manager of Cartier, and ordered up the small token of his appreciation.

When he hung up the phone, he found that he was thinking of his son’s wife, Susan. Susan with the soft white hands, the boomy deep voice, and the beautiful big breasts. Benjamin was such a bloody fool, such a nice boy, but with no guts, with no push or drive. If only Charles had sired Rafaella instead of Benjamin. Now, there was a child to be proud of. But no, he wasn’t her father and it wasn’t fair.

He should probably call her soon, find out how she was holding up. He shook his head at himself.

God, the irony of it, the blissful irony. Charles had
never been one to appreciate irony for the simple reason that he’d always had control in his life, until now. Irony hadn’t ever slipped in unnoticed, until now. Now he felt he was in an ocean of irony, floundering about like a helpless fool. But he wouldn’t be the one to drown. No indeed he wouldn’t.

All during his drive to New York City, he thought of the irony of Sylvia Carlucci hitting his wife.

Sylvia Carlucci
Giovanni
hitting his wife. But even as he thought about it, examined it, he found he just couldn’t bring himself to accept such a coincidence. Coincidence was just fine in fiction, but in his experience, coincidence just didn’t happen in real life. Did it?

Giovanni’s Island
March 2001

DeLorio held up the wet panties. “Isn’t this interesting?”

“They belong to that little slut,” Paula said, and tried to grab the panties from her husband.

“They could belong to Coco,” he said, raising them out of her reach.

“No, they’re hers. Where did you get them?”

“They were on the bottom of the swimming pool. The deep end. No, I think I’ll return them personally to the lady. I must say that Marcus has excellent taste.” He grinned at his wife, then touched the crotch of the panties to his mouth. “Wonderful.”

“What is? The chlorine?”

“You have no imagination, Paula. It didn’t take Marcus long, did it? I did wonder when they both showed up wet before dinner. Is she the one who’s the exhibitionist? Do you think she went after him on purpose?”

“Yes, to show me.”

DeLorio paused. Very slowly he laid the panties on the dresser top, smoothing them into shape. “Show you what, Paula?”

“That she could take, no, to prove to me that she was better than—”

“I know,” he said, and turned away from her. “It’s hard to explain, isn’t it? But all your little confusions and conceits—they only make me love you more. I’m going to Miami this afternoon. I have business meetings and arrangements to make. Do you want to come with me?”

“Yes, oh, yes, Del. Let me pack. How long?”

He turned and smiled at her. “Don’t you find it interesting that my father evidently didn’t mind Marcus screwing Rafaella Holland in the swimming pool? My civilized, well-bred father? No, he didn’t say a word. I’d like to see what he’ll do— First, Paula, I want you to change into a dress. That pretty blue sundress I bought you just last month. You know the one, it has a very full skirt and narrow straps over the shoulders?”

She nodded happily and turned to do as he’d bidden her, but he stopped her, his fingers curling around her forearm. He smiled down at her. She would love this. His fingers caressed her arm and his breath was warm against her temple.

“When you have the dress on, I want you to bend over the balcony with your arms balanced on the railing. I’ll just lift your skirt a bit and stand behind you. And while I push inside you I want you to wave to the gardeners and speak to whoever wanders by. If it’s Link, I want you to ask him all sorts of questions about his gruesome murderers of the past, keep him looking at you, until I come inside you.”

“But they’ll know—you’ll be behind me, pushing, and they’ll know—Link will know, and I—”

“But you’ll have your dress on. No one will see a thing,” but he was thinking,
Yes, I’ll just bet he’ll
know.
And the bastard would know what DeLorio was doing and that Paula belonged to him and that he’d better keep his sniffing distance of Paula or he, DeLorio, would castrate him.

Link didn’t come by, but Merkel did, dressed immaculately as always in his three-piece white linen suit and pale blue oxford shirt, and when he saw DeLorio standing behind his wife, his hands on her waist, he knew what he was doing, and it made him want to puke. But it was also powerfully erotic for all its crudity, and from the brief look he’d gotten at Paula’s face, it seemed to him that she was enjoying it as much as she was hating it. He shook his head. He would never understand the two of them.

And when Paula called out to him, her voice high and embarrassed and shaking with excitement, he refused to look up at her again, just nodded and kept walking.

He was vastly relieved when the two of them flew to Miami that afternoon. He himself had gone earlier to fetch Ms. Holland from the resort. She was in her room, changing, Coco with her.

And he remembered Marcus’s request just before he’d left him that morning at the airport in St. John’s. “Watch her, Merkel. She’s too unthinking, too impulsive, and that can be dangerous. And she has that talent to attract confidences, and that can be even more dangerous.”

Merkel wondered what he’d let himself in for. At least one worry was down—DeLorio. He’d said he’d be gone for a week. God willing, it would be longer. He wondered if Mr. Giovanni had sent DeLorio away. If he had, then did he want Rafaella Holland all to himself? Just to work? Or did he want all competition out of his way? Was that why he’d sent Marcus to France? No, no, he was being crazy. Marcus had to go to Marseilles to deal with Bertrand. And, after all,
Coco was still here, still the head mistress, and Rafaella was her friend. No, he had to be wrong.

When Mr. Giovanni requested his presence after lunch, Merkel was impatient to know what was in his boss’s mind. Hopefully, more than writing his biography with Rafaella Holland. Maybe he’d gotten information about the assassination attempt, about
Bathsheba.

“Both DeLorio and Marcus are gone,” Dominick said. He was sitting in a high-backed wicker chair, sipping a glass of lemonade laced with gin. “Now we will get Rafaella Holland settled in and everything back into, ah, balance.”

Merkel was smart enough to keep still. He simply stood there waiting for his boss to get on with it, and silently cursed.

“She likes Marcus. She knows it but she just isn’t ready to admit it.”

Merkel looked at the beautiful Picasso over Mr. Giovanni’s desk. It was from the artist’s Pink Period, Mr. Giovanni had told him once. He didn’t particularly like it. Most of Mr. Giovanni’s other paintings were in a private vault, located just off the master suite. He’d gotten the Picasso some twenty years before, he said, at an auction.

“As for my son, well, I wanted him out of the way so he wouldn’t be tempted by her. Also I wanted him to concentrate on other things. He will take my place in the future; he must learn about the responsibility, the strategy, all the tactics. He must learn the personalities of all the men he’ll be dealing with. He must learn humility.” He paused, and Merkel tried not to choke. Humility?

“Sometimes the boy shows so little breeding, so little class. He’s just like his mother, that stupid drunken woman, and his grandfather, the rotting old bastard.”

Merkel wasn’t about to tell Mr. Giovanni what DeLorio had done to Paula that morning, and how she, all red-faced with embarrassment, had probably had
the best orgasm of her short life. He shifted his attention to the Vermeer that was artfully hung exactly seventeen inches from the Picasso, with its own lighting, stolen from Sir Walter Wrentham’s collection three years before. He himself preferred the Egyptian stuff in the living room. You could touch the jewelry, pick it up and feel how warm it was, press it against your cheek, and know that real people had worn it, and still it was so old that you couldn’t even begin to understand how those people had felt, what those people had been.