Eric Lustbader - The Testament

They crossed the garage, hurried past the vintage Mercedes and passed through a door on the far side, entering the gardener's shed. Jenny immediately went to one wall against which sat a collapsed wheelchair. She unfolded it and gestured.

"Take a seat."

Bravo stared at her for a moment, then he gave a low laugh. Shaking his head in wonderment, he settled himself into the wheelchair's leather seat.

"Hunch over, try to pull your shoulders up around your ears." Jenny pulled on a pair of fingerless driving gloves. "That's right. Think like an old man."

Bravo's hands on the armrests began to tremble.

"Nice touch," Jenny said as she wrapped him in a shawl. Then she pulled open a side door and wheeled him through. "Here we go."

Donatella, sitting behind the wheel of the delivery truck, did not expect a light to go on in the house; she was looking for movement. With the ATN PVS7-XR5 Night Vision goggles strapped to her head, she looked strange, like some sort of giant nocturnal sloth. While the infrared function couldn't penetrate walls or glass, it was providing an accurate reading. Apart from a single ghost reading as she was setting up the equipment-and that might have been a cat or a racoon-there had been no human movement around the house. That did not mean Braverman Shaw and his Guardian weren't inside-just the opposite, to her way of thinking. After all, how many places did they have to go?

Why this Guardian had been assigned to Shaw remained a mystery to Donatella, one that nagged at her. She did not like mysteries, especially when they applied to Dexter Shaw, who had been legendary for the mysteries with which he surrounded himself. His demise had been attempted three times since she had joined the Knights of St. Clement, all without success. The successful attack had been in the making for months, maybe even years-long before the crisis had come upon them and the timetable had been moved up. The desperate rush had necessitated that less competent people be utilized, and this had inevitably led to some mistakes. She was certain that Braverman Shaw's Guardian knew that the recent deaths of the five members of the Haute Cour was a concerted attack by the Knights, a push to finally gain the cache of secrets the heretical Order had been hoarding for centuries.

She shifted her head, so that another vector of the property was visible. Despite the fact that she was an enemy, Donatella felt a certain secret kinship with Braverman Shaw's Guardian that had nothing to do with philosophy and everything to do with gender. Ivo, like the male Guardians of the Order, hated Jenny's status, hiding that hatred behind a cruel and unjust derision. As a result, Ivo had consistently underestimated Jenny's abilities, and Donatella would not put it past Dexter Shaw to have assigned Jenny to guard his son for just this reason.

The infrared was picking up movement to her right, and she swiveled her head like a dog on point. The configuration was odd, and she switched to conventional night vision. An old man in a wheelchair was being pushed by a slim young man-possibly his son-in a baseball cap and windbreaker. But then again maybe not. Flicking open her cell phone, she pressed the first speed-dial numeral. When the voice answered, she asked for a list of all the residents on the street. Research was everything, and the resources of the Knights of St. Clement were vast. "I'm looking for an invalid, seventy years of age or above." Ninety seconds later, she had her answer and, her suspicions confirmed, fired the truck's ignition and drew her gun.

"See that black Lexus sedan on the next block?" Jenny said as she pushed Bravo along the sidewalk. "It belongs to my father, he kept it there for emergencies. That's our ticket out of here."

The rain came down in sheets, turning the walls of the houses black and menacing. A car engine coughed to life, and Bravo started. They were perhaps a hundred yards from the Lexus when he heard the deep, phlegmy cough of a truck's engine, saw movement out of the corner of his eye.

Apparently, Jenny had heard it, too, because she gave the wheelchair a huge push, sending it barreling at the Lexus. As she ran, she unlocked the doors electronically. Bravo had wrenched the door open even before the wheelchair smacked into the car's side.

The truck was roaring at them as Jenny launched herself in beside him. He scrambled over as she slammed home the key, fired up the Lexus. Putting it in gear, she stepped on the gas. Tires squealing, the Lexus sped down the street, the truck thrumming ominously behind it.

A single shot rang out, and then they were racing around the first curve, wind whistling, rain thick as sleet against the windshield, picking up speed with every second.

Bending low over the wheel, Jenny steered the Lexus through the road's sweeping curve. Ahead lay the first of the switchbacks as the road followed the steep contours of the hill. They flew past large houses, swaths of lawn and flower-bedecked side gardens. Here and there was the lush, heavily treed open space of a vacant lot, brief glimpses of the area's pristine beauty before the developers had unleashed their bulldozers.

A rising sound caused her to shout, "Take a look behind us!"

But Bravo had already swiveled around as far as he could. "The truck!" he shouted back. "I think it means to ram us!"

Jenny had more immediate things to worry about. Along this middle stretch, the road was pitched much more steeply, and with the slick asphalt and terrible visibility it was taking every ounce of her concentration to keep the Lexus from careening into a curb and overturning. Several times she came perilously close, and Bravo's heart rose up into his throat for fear that they would crash. Then, by some clever trick, she would right their course, and they'd be back on the middle of the deserted road again.

The deep roar of the pursuing truck echoed off the house facades. Bravo could see that it was gaining on them. It was so close now that a passing streetlight momentarily flared along the driver's face. Donatella! She didn't fire again; in this upscale residential neighborhood she wouldn't make the same mistake twice. Instead, she concentrated on devouring the space between them, until the engine became a roar in his ears and he thought he could feel its heat like the breath of a demon hound.

He wasn't far wrong. An instant later, he felt a tooth-rattling jar as the corner of the truck's front bumper struck them. The Lexus went skidding toward the curb, and he saw Jenny whip the wheel over, jerking the car to the left. For a heart-stopping moment, the car skidded, kept to its deadly course. Then it seemed to hesitate, as if unsure what had been asked of it. Just as they were about to hit the curb, the tires caught, the Lexus moved sharply to the left and the crisis was averted. But now the truck's throaty roar seemed to redouble as Donatella drove in for the kill.

Up ahead, a BMW sedan with a teenager behind the wheel was coming toward them with only its parking lights on. Hardcore rap poured out of the open windows. The kid, drunk on beers and music, was going too fast for the road, even if it had been dry and the car had been less powerful. The BMW slewed slightly this way and that as its inexperienced driver tried to deal with the effects of wet leaves and slick patches on the tarmac. His lips were pulled back in a manic grin, but his eyes were wide and staring-it seemed clear that he had not yet seen them.

Jenny checked either side of the road, then taking advantage of his near-panic, maneuvered the Lexus directly toward him. In a flash, the kid saw them, and immediately the BMW changed course. The kid stepped hard on the brakes, sending the car into an uncontrollable skid. In a heartbeat, it had flashed by the Lexus and glanced off the high fender of the oncoming truck.