Eric Lustbader - The Testament

Rule held fast to his northwest course, even with the launch gaining on them. More shots were fired, and then Bravo had drawn his SIG Sauer and was returning the fire.

"Forget that," Rule shouted, "and hold on."

An instant later, he had turned the wheel hard to starboard. At the same time he shoved the throttle all the way forward, asking for and getting every ounce of speed the engine was able to generate. The bow, and then the entire front end of the motoscafo, lifted free of the water.

Bravo tossed this way and that, could see that they were headed directly at the first of the two barene. The clammers, having caught sight of the chase, now stood, staring transfixed as the boats roared toward them. No one-Bravo included-believed that Rule would allow the motoscafo to ground itself. Surely, they reasoned, he'd break off, as he had when he'd made the run at the police launch, feinting at the last possible instant.

But that moment came and went-Bravo could feel it, and he braced himself against the polished wood. Three seconds later, the keel of the boat grazed the rise of the sandbar. Instead of grounding on the barene, Rule used it as a launchpad for the boat. The motoscafo took off into the air, rising in a graceful arc that took them over both sandbars.

"Yahoo!" Rule shouted as they struck the lagoon beyond both sandbars. The double screws bit into the water, and with a massive blast the boat took off, heading straight for Venice.

Bravo, looking behind them, saw Zorzi's launch had broken off and was bobbing at idle beyond the barene.

Rule fumbled in his clothes. "Where's that damn pack of cigarettes when I need it?" He laughed, half-giddy with their spectacular success.

"Guess I can't bum one off you, can I? " There was a slight pause. "So where shall I head this thing? You must know by now where we need to go."

Camille, on a sleek black and white motoscafo on the Grand Canal, held the cell phone to her ear and waited, her blood humming in her ear. She was aware of a slight sensation of anxiety, which she put down to anticipation. The call from Anthony Rule had come in just as he promised, everything was falling nicely into place.

"Castello," Bravo's voice said in her ear. "The Church of San Giorgio dei Greci."

"All right." Rule's voice now. "We'll make our way from the lagoon side via canals to the Fondamenta della Pieta`. We'll be there, I estimate, in fifteen minutes. That suit you?"

Camille, having heard enough, put her cell phone away and gave orders to the captain to take her with all due speed to Fondamenta della Pieta` in Castello. Then she moved away to where Damon Cornadoro stood, a deep scowl on his handsome face.

"My dear Damon, you look positively sullen," she said brightly. "Please don't tell me you've succumbed to jealousy."

"Can you blame me? Rule was your lover."

Camille took out a cigarette and lit it. "What of it?"

"The affair went on for years. It has occurred to me more than once that you still have feelings for him."

"If I do, it's none of your business."

"But your son-"

"What about my son?" she said sharply.

"I always wondered…" He let her hang there suspended for a moment, her eyes riveted on him, her breath stilled, a small victory, to be sure, but a victory nonetheless. "I always wondered whether Rule was Jordan's father."

She turned away, her eyes dark, unfathomable.

The topic of her son's father was taboo, he knew that, so he came after her, almost as a supplicant. "I'm your lover now, Camille. Do you think I would share you?"

Camille blew smoke out through her half-open lips as she contemplated the magnificent palazzi passing by on either side of the Grand Canal.

"Camille?"

She wouldn't think of Jordan's father, she wouldn't. So, to calm herself, she turned her mind to other matters. It both fascinated and depressed her that men thought only in terms of possession. I don't have that, I want it. Now that I have it, I will never let it go. Of course, what made them predictable made them susceptible to her. So. What should she tell this lover of hers? Certainly not why she had taken Rule as her lover, certainly not that she still loved him in the manner she loved any object precious to her. In truth, Camille was never so lonely as when she was with a man. They were so easily satisfied, so quickly sated, and then what happened? Their quick-shift attention turned elsewhere, you could tell them to go fuck themselves and they never even heard it.

Inevitably, however, there were men who presented her with something of a challenge. Anthony Rule, for one. Turning him away from the Order of Gnostic Observatines had been a long, slow, arduous and often perilous path. It had been a deeply considered and meticulously planned military campaign. For all those reasons-and, of course, others-it was without question a crowning achievement in her life, and a stunning success coming on the heels of such a devastating disappointment. Over the years, the intelligence he had provided had been invaluable to her and to Jordan. And the most satisfying aspect was that it was he who had passed her this ultrasensitive intelligence.

"You have nothing to worry about, my love," she said now. "Anthony Rule is my past. You are my present."

Even over the noise of the engine she could hear Cornadoro's released breath. She almost laughed at how immediately he responded to the stroking. It was, by this time, something of a Pavlovian response. He wanted-no, needed-to believe her. Men, obsessed with proving to each other how strong they were, were essentially weak. She had proved this maxim time and again even with the hard cases like Rule and Cornadoro. Then there was Dexter Shaw-but there was bound to be one, she told herself in a quick gloss of the past. What was he but the exception that proved the rule? She consoled herself with the thought that men had such a narrow definition of coercion. What did men-who after all were most comfortable with a cudgel in their hand-know of coercion? The velvet glove was anathema to them. Though they responded to it beautifully, even, she might say, movingly, they continued to deny its existence. All the better for me, Camille thought. Which was why throughout history there always had been successful women, clever and resourceful, who used their forced servitude as a cloak of anonymity behind which they wielded their own form of velvet glove to devastating effect.

Camille held no sympathy for women who took a beating from their men, whether physical or emotional. Hardly surprising, since she had nothing but the deepest contempt for weakness of any kind. It was her opinion that weakness was what got them into the abusive situation and it was weakness that chained them there. There was no situation that the human mind couldn't work itself out of. She believed this with the single-minded fervor of a religious zealot. It was, in fact, for her a form of religion, so closely did she adhere to the tenet. It was the one idea she could accept as gospel.

They approached the Fondamenta della Pieta`, and Cornadoro leapt ashore before the captain even tied up the boat.

"I will come to you soon," she crooned to Cornadoro as if he were a baby longing to suck at her breast. "In the meantime, make your way to the church. And for the love of God be on your guard for Zorzi and his Guardians. I have no doubt that he will kill you on sight, if you give him the opportunity, just as he will now kill Anthony Rule."

Walking south from the Fondamenta della Pieta`, Bravo and Rule found the Church of San Georgio dei Greci without difficulty. Three times, they had paused or taken small detours to ensure themselves that no one was following them. Though still early, the day was already hot and sticky. White clouds hung motionless against the sky as if nailed in place.