Forever (81 page)

Last but not least, he filled his canteen,
added a water purification tablet out of habit, and was done.

He was ready.

His gear was in order.

His hunter's instincts were roused.

He stripped naked, showered, and hit the
sack early. But he found he was still too wound up to sleep. The
excitement of tomorrow's hunt electrified his blood. His temples
throbbed with anticipation, and his penis was tumescent.

The scent of his quarry was strong in his
nostrils.

She is here, right here, locked up
downstairs - she and that boyfriend of hers with the phoney name
and cocky attitude! What an unexpected bonus he is. Now my game
preserve will be stocked with two human specimens instead of just
one.

His crazed eyes glowed silver in the
dark.

He had it all planned. He'd release and
stalk the woman first. The female of a species was always the most
fun to track - even if she tended to be the easiest to nail. But
when it came to males . . .now there was real sport!

Colonel Valerio thought, Her boyfriend's got
fighter blood in him, and it's not often such a challenge comes
along. But I'll get her out of the way first. Then I'll leave him -
the best-for last.

Mano a mano . . . man against man.

Just thinking about it was enough to set him
off. As he felt the torrent rise within him, he cried out
helplessly and his seed burst forth.

Spent, he lay breathing heavily on his cot
and then rolled over on his side and fell fast asleep.

TWENTY-TWO

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil • At Sea • Ilha da
Borboleta • Sitto da Veiga

As soon as Eduardo woke up, the first thing
he did was place another telephone call to Si'tto da Veiga. Once
again, Monica's number rang and rang. Finally, he left another
message with the main switchboard and then called his pilot to have
a jet standing by, and his chauffeur to have his car brought
around.

He showered, shaved, and dressed in record
time. His housekeeper brought him a cup of coffee, and he sipped it
while waiting restlessly for his car.

Suddenly, he couldn't shake the premonition
that something was terribly wrong.

He was on his second cup of coffee when the
doorman rang to announce his car had arrived.

Twice, he tried calling Monica from the
Mercedes's cellular phone, but there was still no answer.

At the airport, the jet waiting on the
tarmac was a medium-sized Sabreliner. By the time Eduardo hopped on
board, the pilot and co-pilot had already gone through the
preflight check. Four minutes later, the sleek aircraft screamed
down the runway and climbed steeply up into the cloud-banked sky.
Heading north-east. To Si'tto da Veiga.

The
Chrysalis
was cruising offshore,
just out of sight of land. With Brazil's Atlantic coastline of
4,603 miles, it was easy for the

high-speed yacht to virtually disappear
during the night. Still, though neither radar nor sonar had picked
up any vessels on their tail, Captain Falcao was taking no chances.
All security systems had been activated, and he had doubled the
number of armed sentries on deck.

Lili and Ernesto felt safe so long as they
remained on the move, even though they took threats of potential
terrorism very seriously.

Zaza scoffed at these precautions. If
somebody wants to get us badly enough, she opined, they will.

But she wisely kept this pessimistic view to
herself. There was no need to frighten Zarah . . . Lili . . . any
more than she already was. Besides which, Zaza was much too
occupied with other matters to waste time worrying about
terrorists: she was busy planning a luncheon.

At exactly eight-thirty that morning, she
had her favourite steward hand-carry invitations to Lili's,
Ernesto's, and Dr Vas- siltchikov's suites. Each thick, creamy
vellum envelope had a pink rosebud pinned to its flap.

The thick Cartier cards inside were engraved
with her name at the top; the rest she had handwritten in her
spidery, though still elegant, old-fashioned script:

ZAZA BOHM requests the pleasure of your
company for a special surprise announcement at lunch this noon in
the Cabinet de la Meridienne Formal attire requested

Ernesto thanked the steward, tore open the
invitation, and scanned it. He read the last sentence twice.

Formal attire for lunch? Whoever heard of
formal attire at noon?

He searched his mind. Had he forgotten a
birthday? Perhaps an anniversary?

He didn't think so . . .

*

Lili sliced open her invitation with a
malachite-handled letter opener which had once belonged to the last
czarina of all the Russias.

She read the card and tapped it against the
edge of her vanity table. A slight frown flitted across her face as
she wondered what on earth to wear. It had to be something she'd
never worn before: that went without saying - she never, ever, wore
the same thing twice, and it was no secret that she loved any
excuse to get dressed up.

How sweet of Zaza! she thought. And whatever
can the surprise announcement be?

'Now what is that crazy old woman up to?' Dr
Vassiltchikov grumbled under her breath. She tossed the invitation
aside in disgust. As if there is not enough to do, she thought, now
there's a formal lunch to attend! A formal lunch - here at sea!

However, it would be impolitic not to
attend. She thought: I'm only going for Zarah and Ernesto's
sake.

In the meantime, she had some experiments to
work on down in the shipboard lab. She'd knock off at
eleven-forty-five and give herself fifteen minutes to freshen up
and change.

At my age, and with my looks, fifteen hours
in a beauty parlour wouldn't make any difference . . .

It was just after nine A.M. when Colonel
Valerio brought Johnny's breakfast tray down to his cell.

The moment Johnny heard him coming, he
rushed to the steel bars and rattled them with all his might.
'Listen, you bastard!' he snarled. 'You've got no right to keep us
locked up! You get us out of here-how!'

Colonel Valerio unhurriedly bent down and
slid the tray under the bars of the cell. 'You better eat, boy,' he
advised Johnny coldly. 'You're gonna need all the energy you can
get.'

'Fuck you!' Johnny screamed. He kicked the
tray and scrambled eggs and cereal and bread and milk and coffee
slopped all over the cell.

'You're gonna wish you'd eaten it,' Colonel
Valerio predicted

calmly, and left without looking back.

*

Hearing approaching footfalls, Stephanie
hopped off the metal bunk and hurried to the bars of her cell. Her
heart skipped a beat and she looked out hopefully. Perhaps it was
Eduardo, come to rescue her and Johnny!

But her heart sank. It was Colonel Valerio
with a breakfast tray.

'Morning, Ms Merlin.' His smile was mocking
and his crazed eyes were hidden behind his mirrored shades. 'Hope
you found my hospitality to your liking?'

'How could I possibly not?' she asked
facetiously.

'Glad to have been able to accommodate you.
I take it the bugs and spiders didn't bother you too much?'

'Bother me!' She iced him with her eyes. 'I
love pets.'

He stared at her for a long moment. It was
as if he was seeing her, really seeing her, for the very first
time. Maybe stalking her will be more of a challenge than I
initially thought, he was thinking. She's certainly got more spirit
than I gave her credit for.

It will be a pleasure to break it.

Bending down, he slid the tray under the
bars, then straightened up and hooked his thumbs in his belt. 'I'd
really try to eat if I were you,' he advised her. 'Today, you're
gonna need all the energy you can get.'

Then he was gone.

Stephanie stared after him. The moment he
was out of sight, she allowed herself to slump listlessly against
the bars. Wearily she shut her eyes. Putting on a defiant front had
taxed her, and she could feel defeat spreading through every part
of her body, sapping her of energy. She shook her head quickly to
fight the lethargy. It was so easy to give in; she mustn't allow
herself to be trounced this early on.

Opening her eyes, she found herself staring
down at the breakfast tray. She did an inventory: congealed
scrambled eggs, bread, cereal in a metal bowl, coffee black as
midnight, milk.

She pondered: Should I eat? She remembered
the old saying: Nothing seems quite so bad when you've got
something in your stomach. She stooped down and started to pick up
the tray when she let go of it and jerked her hands back. What if
the food's drugged? Is that why he's so anxious I eat?

Damn! Tears pricked in the corners of her
eyes. What is he up to, the bastard?

She started to get up - but forced herself
to pick up the tray and carry it over to the cot.

You've got to eat, she told herself. Food is
energy . . . food is strength . . .

She made herself pick up the piece of bread,
nibbled it. Her throat felt dry. He wouldn't dare drug me, she
thought. He's only a sick bully out to scare me. He wouldn't dream
of laying a finger on me. Eduardo would never allow it.

And then a chilly thought made her go stone
cold inside: What if Eduardo doesn't know what's going on? How can
he help us then?

In the Cabinet de la Meridienne, Zaza
orchestrated every detail from her wheelchair. Part of her two-room
suite, the Cabinet de la Meridienne and her adjoining bedchamber
were the antithesis of everything the
Chrysalis
stood for:
both rooms were perfect time capsules of the eighteenth
century.

Now, in preparation for lunch, fine giltwood
fauteils were arranged around a beautifully set round table.

Zaza manoeuvred her wheelchair to the table
and cast her piercing perfectionist's eye around it. The damask
cloth from Porthault had been ironed seamlessly, the damask napkins
folded like bishops' mitres. Four ormolu candlesticks with beeswax
tapers waiting to be lit surrounded the large silver bowl filled
wih cut rubrum lilies. The heavy baroque cutlery, each piece
perfectly balanced and hand-carved from a single block of silver,
was spotless. And the plates . . . Ah! the plates! She had selected
her priceless hand-painted Sevres botanical plates, survivors of
the famous 'Salvandy Service', each a hand-painted, gold-rimmed
work of art.

For Lili, she had chosen a plate depicting,
appropriately, a rubrum lily and sprays of Fleur-de- Veuve.

For Ernesto, a plate rather more masculine,
with dahlia blossoms and sprays of Liseron des champs.

For herself, her favourite - the plate
depicting a cluster of bell-shaped Campanule a grosses fleurs so
delicately lifelike she had often expected them to move as in a
breeze.

And for Dr Vassiltchikov, she had expressly
selected the plate with the chrysanthemums: autumn's flowers, hardy
and rigid and stiff suitable for funeral wreaths and graves. Zaza
nodded to herself. Doubtless she thought, Dr Death will miss the
point.

is everything to your satisfaction,
Senhora?
' one of the young stewards enquired
solicitously.

Zaza turned to him and smiled. 'Everything
is just beautiful, Enrique, thank you.'

'I have put the music you requested on the
CD player. I will switch it on just before they arrive.'

Zaza nodded, backed up the wheelchair, and
rode over to the marble-topped gilt console. There, in two
ormolu-mounted agate bowls, were still more extravagant clusters of
vivid, pink-spotted rubrums. Rubrums, Lili's favourite . . .

And, under a dome of crystal, dessert. The
meal itself would be the kind of calorie-light menu Lili and
Ernesto favoured. But for a celebration, there had to be something
sweet. Zaza had had the chef bake a small but exceedingly rich
torte; she herself had personally prepared the marzipan icing.

The torte looked beautiful. Zaza nodded to
herself with satisfaction. Everything was perfect.

'Senhor de Veiga! Welcome back to Sitto da
Veiga! What a pleasant sur -' 'Have you seen Ms Williams?' 'Sim,
Senhor. She was here yes -' 'I don't care where she was yesterday.
Where is she nowT 'I—I don't know, Senhor.' 'Then find me someone
who does. NowV 'Sim, Senhor.'

'And get Dr Medrado in here, lmediatamente!'
'Sim, Senhor! Right away!'

'Senhor de Veiga! To what do we owe the
-'

'Dr Medrado, I am in a hurry and a bad mood,
so let's skip the formalities, shall we? I am looking for Ms
Williams.'

'I myself was not informed until five
minutes ago that she and a man left with Colonel Valerio yesterday
evening.'

'What do you mean - "left"?'

'The Colonel had both of them in
handcuffs.'

'Handcuffs?'

'Yes, Senhor. Regrettably, it seems the
charming Ms Williams is not who she claims to be.'

"Then perhaps, Dr Medrado, you can enlighten
me. Can you tell me who she is?'

'I'm afraid I am not privy to that
information.'

'I see. And under whose authority did
Colonel Valerio arrest Ms Williams?'

'I presume yours ... or your father's.'

'Tell me something, Dr Medrado. Does no one
first check anything with you, or my father, or myself?'

'But the Colonel has been given unlimited
authority.'

'The bounds of which he has obviously
overstepped! I suggest you find out where Colonel Valerio took Ms
Williams.' 'Yes, Senhor.'

'I will give you five minutes to get that
information, Dr Medrado.' 'Five -?'

'You had better hurry, Doctor. The clock has
already started ticking.'

Stephanie heard the approaching sound of
footsteps and the jingling of keys. She sat suddenly straighter and
then, with a fresh surge of hope, jumped up from the cot and rushed
to the bars of the cell, instinctively smoothing her hair with her
hands. 'Eduardo?' she called out. 'Eduardo, I'm in he -'