The Testament, page 44
She laughed again and held on to him as they spun, her arms around his neck trembling slightly with the onrush of her emotions. With her mother's delicate features and cool, porcelain skin, she possessed a freshness that was appealing. Her long black hair was pulled back in a ponytail, which whipped this way and that as she whirled around.
For Cornadoro's part, it was easy for him to make her believe he liked her-he did like her, in the way he liked virtually all women: their animal scent set his blood to boiling. There resided in him a certain insatiability that was like an itch he'd long ago given up trying to scratch. He wanted what was between a woman's legs, simple as that. And as superb a lover as Camille Muhlmann was, what she demanded of him was difficult for him to maintain: monogamy. He had never complied, not really. At first, he'd tried, but he'd failed so quickly-who had it been with, the dirty-blond American teenager on holiday or the sinuous Taiwanese five years younger than he had guessed or possibly someone else altogether, he could never be certain-that he'd never attempted it again. Instead, he had perfected his lies-no easy feat with Camille, something of a human lie detector-so that he could remain in her bed. He didn't want to lose that pole position, for many reasons, both carnal and political.
Camille was brilliant, no question, but the basic problem with her was that she was old. What he craved most was fresh meat, young and dewy and luscious in its innocence. Like Irema. Plus, he didn't like Irema's father, which gave the act of seducing her a frisson that made him lick his chops with anticipation.
As their dancing progressed he could feel her falling under his spell. It was a physical thing he experienced in his throat and his arms and his groin; it was like sex, like death. The blackness of the abyss was where he drew his sexual energy, it was what made it so feral, so irresistible.
He danced with her and, as he did so, he could feel that old familiar feeling creeping along his skin. He loved Irema and he made her feel it, though, of course, the source of it remained unknown to her. He loved her for the information with which she would provide him.
No lights were on when he brought her to his hotel room. The glimmer of the city came through the jalousied window in pale horizontal stripes, illuminated her like a neon sign. He told her to strip and she did, slowly before his greedy, glittering eyes. Then he told her what else to do. She didn't seem to mind; in fact, she liked it. She was used to being ordered around, there was a high degree of comfort in the known, but he suspected from looking at her that wasn't what she wanted, not really. And tonight he was determined to give her what she really wanted.
Naked, she looked more like a girl, small breasts, slim hips, tiny waist. But her legs were long and nicely rounded, and her rump… He had her continue to stand with her back to him, her arms at her sides. She was wholly unself-conscious about her nakedness, unafraid about what he might do with her. He had her trust, and this, more than anything, inflamed him.
He popped the buttons on his shirt pulling it off, and he was already so rigid that his trousers gave him a struggle. She turned in response to his growl of frustration and used her nimble fingers to unbuckle his belt, unzip him. As his trousers came down so did she, until she was on her knees. He ripped the band from her ponytail, twined his fingers in her loosed hair.
When he lifted her, her legs opened, her thighs gripping his hips as she gave a little moan. He felt her skin against him, warm, smooth as ivory, the bony hardness of youth still upon her. Enough to tip any man over the edge, but he held on, leading her up the sexual arc until, shuddering and groaning, she reached the apex. One wasn't enough for her, he'd known that from the start. Hot little thing. Like a star, intent on burning to a cinder. He waited her out, he was adept at that; in fact, the denial fired his nerve endings to the fever pitch he longed for, had to have.
But he needed her to feel that, too. She didn't have his reserves, didn't understand what was happening, trembled uncontrollably as he brought her to the final brink, then pulled them both back, over and over. Tears came and she clasped him desperately, implored him to finish it.
It wasn't until she said, "Why are you waiting, it's torture, I'm dying," that he ended it for both of them, so that she crawled up onto him, over him, seeking a way to be inside him as he emptied himself inside her.
Afterward, she asked for it again so quickly he almost laughed. She had never come down from her last orgasm, she was soft and warm as taffy, the black pupils of her eyes as dilated as if he had given her opium. This was the moment he had been manufacturing all evening, the moment to ask her for what he wanted while she wasn't thinking clearly, or at all.
"Of course I'll help you." She guided him back into her with a deep-felt sigh. "No one has ever asked me for help before."
"Not even your brothers?"
"All I ever get from them are orders." Her fingers cupped him, caressing. "You'd think they'd be more enlightened." She maneuvered herself above him, straddling his girth, stretching her thighs to their limits. The slight pain made the pleasure all the sweeter. "That's what we were talking about in the bar when you came over."
"They all feel that way, don't they," he said, "all your girlfriends."
"Oh, yes," she moaned, but he couldn't be sure that was an answer to his question because she was trembling again from head to toe and her eyes were rolling in her head.
He held on to her as she let go, feeling the frantic bucking of wild youthful energy as if it were a shot of adrenaline into his own system.
At last she was spent, or as near as she could get, but still she wanted to hear the phrase he had pumped out all night long, "Whatever you want, Irema. Whatever you want." When had she ever heard that from a man? In her secret discussions with her girlfriends, sitting in front of a mirror while she applied lipstick, in her dreams at night as she tossed and turned in fretful sleep. But in real life, from a flesh-and-blood male-one who held her, kissed her, caressed her, entered her with such tenderness, until she screamed at him to do otherwise? This night, never before. This night only.
Which was why she would do anything to ensure that it never ended, including convincing herself that everything he told her was true, must be true because of how she felt about him, because of what he had given her freely, and would do so again whenever she wanted it.
"Your father and I work for the Order." He held her gently, rocking her, just as she liked. "The only difference is he works in the field-in his case, here in Trabzon-while I am stuck in an office in Rome. For the most part. Every so often, I'm asked to go into the field to check up on operatives. But anonymously, you know. So your father must never know that I was here or that I was asking about his activities. It would cost me my job, with no opportunity to explain myself, do you understand, Irema?"
She nodded. Her heart was thumping as hard as if he were still thrusting into her. She vaguely understood that her father was more than a rug merchant. For one thing, there were the men who sought him out-they came and never left with a rug. For another, her father was far richer than any rug merchant of her knowledge. Also, people-Georgian, Russian, Turkish, whatever-inclined their heads to him when they passed him in the street. He commanded respect. So, though she had never been allowed in the shop during business hours, her eyes and ears had been open, picking up bits and pieces here and there, far more, she suspected, than her father knew.
"I've been here three days now, talking to his associates," he said, "and everything seems in order, except for one thing."
Irema stared at him. The thumping of her heart had turned painful-something bad couldn't happen to her father, it couldn't.
"What is the one thing?" she asked in little more than a croak. The grit of fear had parched her throat.
"Earlier today your father had an… altercation with another member of" the Order." His face was stern, scaring her all the more. "This was a very important member of the Order, Irema, very high up in the ruling body."
"Very high up?"
He nodded. "Very. Your father sent him away, refused to give him the help he requested. I have to tell you that this is an extremely serious breach of protocol."
"Protocol?"
"My bosses are pissed off."
"Oh!" She put her hand over her mouth as she giggled delightedly.
"Irema." He took her hand away from her mouth. "This is no laughing matter, I assure you."
"Oh, but it is!" At last her heart was light, and she felt an exhilaration inside herself. She never could have believed it, but hers was the power to exonerate her father from false reports that would have doomed him with the Order. She had overheard enough, had pieced enough together to make a patchwork quilt, and although she had also heard her father tell her brothers numerous times never to tell outsiders family business, she knew this was different. She was helping her father with the people who paid him, who were the source of all the money, all the respect that he had worked so hard for. How could that be wrong? Also, this man and her father were allies. So she told her sweet lover what she knew:
"That altercation was a ruse."
"A ruse?" He rose up on one elbow, his shadowed face hard and craggy. "What do you mean?"
"My father would never be so rude to another member of the Order. I heard him talking on the phone to one of my brothers. It was all faked, in case someone was watching."
"All faked." Her lover lay back, his hand resting on her soft, soft belly. "Ah, Irema, my love. It was all faked."
Once he started to laugh he couldn't stop.
Chapter 27
Bravo saw Jenny on the split-level terrace of the Sumela Cafe', with the silver platter of the Black Sea spread out below them. Adem Khalif had taken him here for a late-night dinner. Bravo should have been exhausted, but he wasn't. He had read articles about the so-called adrenaline high soldiers experienced in the heat of battle, but until now he'd had no direct experience with the phenomenon.
Seeing her in profile, bathed in desolate moonlight, he recalled the stricken look on her face during their brief encounter in the bazaar. Then she turned and the nape of her neck was exposed to him, the long sweep, pale in the moonlight, the gentle slope leading to the base of her skull, the fine down of hair, the perfect vulnerable arc. For a moment all his anger, rage and urge for revenge slipped away, and he was left naked, as vulnerable as she seemed, with all his suppressed emotions exposed.
Not only to him, apparently, because Khalif, standing with him shoulder to shoulder, said, "Bravo, what is it? Do you know that woman?" He drew a gun. "She is one of your enemies."
At a table not far away, the bearded Glimmer Twins, still with them, raised their heads. They half rose off their chairs, their upper bodies tilted slightly forward as if they were sprinters at the starting line.
"Pot that away," Bravo said, without looking at Khalif, because Jenny had moved a pace and now he could see that she was with another woman: Camille, his Camille. What in the world was going on?
He began to walk toward the table where the two women sat, chatting as if they were friends-no, something in their attitude convinced him that the connection between them had become more intimate.
"Bravo, do you think this is wise?" Khalif said.
"Stand guard here," Bravo answered him. "Keep your hand on your gun, if you must, but don't try to stop me."
Khalif didn't, and though he was filled with foreboding he waved Mikhail's men to sit back down. He'd heard that tone of voice before, from Dexter Shaw, and he knew better than to interfere.
Camille paused in midsentence, and Jenny saw the woman's eyes shift to a spot behind and just to the right of her. She turned. At the sight of Bravo her heart thudded in her breast and the sudden quick rush of blood to her head made her dizzy. She wanted to rise and hit him, as surely she would have in the bazaar had the bullet from the assassin's gun not struck the merchant beside her. She tasted blood in her mouth, and realized that she had bitten her lip.
"I want to speak with you," he said as he came up. "Now." Her hands balled into fists, but then she realized that it was Camille he was looking at, Camille to whom he had directed his command. He hadn't looked at her, hadn't acknowledged her presence, as if she were a ghost occupying a place in another world.
Camille rose and said, "Of course, my love," leaving her without a backward glance.
Bravo stood with Camille at the edge of the terrace. Low clouds obscured the northern horizon. High above, there was a palely glowing ring around the moon. Down the length of the light-strung terrace he was aware of Adem Khalif slowly sipping a glass of raki, watching them, exuding worry like musk.
As for the Glimmer Twins, his image swam in their dark, avid eyes; they were itching to be needed.
"What the hell are you doing here?" he asked Camille in a ragged voice.
"What do you think? Keeping an eye on you, trying to keep you safe."
"It's you I'm worried about," he said angrily. "You shouldn't be anywhere near here. And certainly not with her."
"Who? Jenny?"
"Yes, Jenny. She's murdered three people: two priests and Uncle Tony. Are you out of your mind?"
"Listen to me, my love, you have to stop thinking of me as a helpless female." She shook out a cigarette, lit it, regarded him through the veil of aromatic smoke. "I wouldn't be here if I wasn't more than capable of taking care of myself." She blew out a spiral of smoke. "As for Jenny, you know what Sun Tzu wrote: 'Keep your friends close, your enemies closer.'" She looked at Jenny, smiled reassuringly into her face, before turning back.
"Sun Tzu had something else to say about the art of war," Bravo said. "Every battle is lost or won before it begins."
"Meaning?"
"If you don't know, you surely don't belong here."
"Ah, Bravo," she chuckled, "always testing me."
A breeze rose up from the coolness of the water, stirring her hair against her cheek. Music, trafficking in high spirits and a lover's touch, insinuated itself onto the terrace, reminding them how far removed they were from the rest of the world.
"I was prepared for this the moment I left Paris." She eyed him speculatively. "You think not?"
"I think it's damn odd you being here."
"Do you suspect me now? Of what?" She dropped her cigarette, ground it beneath her heel. "Dammit, Bravo, if I didn't love you so much I'd slap you. You're like a son to me. I mean to protect you, something Jenny only pretended to do."
Bravo rubbed the side of his head. He was exhausted, both physically and emotionally. His head pounded with a million different strands, possible paths he might take, he ought to take. The specters of what lay at the end of those paths haunted him day and night.
"Listen, we're friends now, Jenny and I," Camille said in a softer tone. "We're close, and getting closer. I know how to gain her trust, woman to woman. She tells me things."
"No doubt. Like she's innocent."
"Of course, but who's listening?"
"She's guilty as sin-and she's dangerous."
"I allow her to think I believe her, she lets down her guard. Perhaps tomorrow I'll know part of her plan."
"She'll never tell you what she's planning, Camille. She knows how close we are."
"She's been cut off from all her traditional sources, so she's slowly coming to rely on my advice. Why shouldn't she? I'll stay with her, I'll be your mole in the enemy camp." She put a hand on his arm, squeezed. "Let me do this for you, Bravo." She smiled and kissed his cheek. "Alors, don't worry so. She won't hurt me."
"She isn't the only one you have look out for," he said, lowering his voice. "That man Jordan hired, Michael Berio-his real name is Damon Cornadoro. He's a professional assassin."
"Mon dieu, non!" What a delicious thrill ran through her when she lied to him now; it was almost as deep a charge as lying to Dexter had been. "Are you sure?"
"Absolutely. He's been sent by enemies of my father to shadow me until I find what my father sent me to find. Then he means to kill me and take it."
"But what is it, my love? What could be so terribly valuable?"
"It doesn't matter. What matters is that you keep as far away from Cornadoro as you possibly can."
"I promise."
"Camille, for the love of God don't be flip. I have enough on my mind. I don't want to worry about you."
"Then don't," she said firmly. "I told you. I can take care of myself." She laughed softly, put her hand against his cheek. "I assure you, I will not become your damsel in distress."
He stared into her eyes and knew that she had made her decision; nothing he could say would sway her. He nodded, acquiescing, and pulled out his cell phone. "Then promise me you'll stay in touch, all right?"
She took out her own cell phone, nodded. "I promise." As he was about to turn away, she said with great concern in her voice, "Bravo, have you any idea yet where you're going next?"
"No," he lied. He didn't care what she said, he wasn't going to allow her to put herself any further in harm's way.
Midnight. Irema was home, safely tucked in bed, lips and breasts nicely bruised, drugged on sex and love, dreaming deeply of Michael. But Irema's father was far from home, far from the bed warmed by the lush body of his wife. Instead, he passed through the streets of Trabzon like a wraith. Music, reaching his cocked ears, failed to move him, drunken couples staggered by without seeing him. A solitary bicyclist crossed his path like a black cat. Smoking fiercely, he strode past two churches that had long ago been turned into mosques. Their magnificent Byzantine facades were dark as soot, faded now, as was almost everything in Trabzon. Cracks and crumbles showed everywhere. If he listened hard enough he could hear the buildings groan like the crippled veterans of long-ago wars.
His cell phone buzzed and he answered it. Adem Khalif's voice appeared in his ear like a djinn, talking of a plan to trap Damon Cornadoro. He was impressed by Braverman Shaw's plan, which, viewed objectively, had a certain merit. His mind spinning in several directions at once, he listened to the end, then agreed. "What route are you planning to use? All right, my people will be deployed before dawn."
