Scott Mariani - The Armada Legacy

The rest of the long, hot afternoon was spent strolling around the enormous house. Serrato guided her attentively from room to room, opening doors for her and ushering her about in a self-consciously gentlemanlike fashion. He loved to talk proudly about his possessions, and he had a great many to talk about: the antique furniture pieces that had come from such and such a boutique in New York, London or Rome; the history of each painting and its artist; a detailed account of the design of every architectural feature. He was knowledgeable, even passionate, and despite the hatred that intensified with every minute she had to spend in his company, Brooke had to concede that the man had excellent taste. As the guided tour went on, she took feverish note of as many details of the place’s layout as she could cram into her memory. By the time he led her to the stairs to show her the top floor, she knew exactly how to get from her room to the main entrance.

Serrato had saved the best for last. At the top of the stairs he pushed open a door and led her inside a set of rooms that could have passed for the Presidential Suite in the world’s most opulent hotel. ‘My humble quarters,’ he said with a glow in his eye. ‘Does the style please you? Be honest with me. I can have the décor remodelled any way you like. After all, one day …’

She caught his meaning and wanted to throw up. ‘I wouldn’t change a thing, Ramon,’ she said, extremely careful with her words.

Serrato’s smile suddenly disappeared. He stepped closer to her, reached out and clasped her arms to draw her towards him. The urge to back away from him was overwhelming, but she knew that to give in to it would be fatal.

‘You are so special to me,’ his voice murmured in her ear as he held her tight. ‘More special than I could ever explain to you.’ He drew back from her so that he could look into her eyes. ‘Do you think, Brooke, that you could ever love me?’

Brooke’s heart was thumping hard. ‘Let’s play it by ear, Ramon. All right? See how it goes.’

‘But you … you like me?’

She could see the dangerous light in his eyes. ‘You’re a very charming man,’ she forced herself to say. ‘It’s just that I’ve never been the kind of woman who …’ She hesitated. ‘Who rushes into things. You know what I’m saying, don’t you?’

‘Yes. You are saying you would refuse me.’

Brooke said nothing.

‘I will give you everything, Brooke. Do anything to please you. But you cannot refuse me. I could not bear that.’

She swallowed hard. ‘I won’t refuse you.’

‘Tonight, I regret to say that you must dine without me. I have some business to attend to. Afterwards, when I return … will you come to me? Here, in my personal quarters?’

‘Tonight?’

‘I will send for you,’ he said. ‘Will you be ready for me then?’

Brooke was suddenly very cold.

‘You and I,’ he whispered, holding her tightly again. ‘You have no idea how much I have longed for it.’

The guards led Brooke back to her room. She leaned against the door, heard the click of the lock sliding home. Footsteps padded away and the guards’ voices faded into the distance.

And only then did all the pent-up tension burst out of her in a sobbing gasp. So this was it. Serrato had finally made his move. That night she’d be summoned to him, like the slave girl to the master. To be claimed. To be made his kept whore.

And if she refused, he’d kill her. There was no doubt whatsoever about that.

Slowly, she peeled herself away from the door and crossed the room. That was when she noticed that the windows looked different. Where before they’d been unopenable, now they had latch handles. She tried one. It glided smoothly open as far as the steel bars would allow, letting the breeze into the room.

Brooke nodded to herself. Her plan couldn’t have started coming together any later now that the clock was truly ticking. But it wasn’t fresh air she was interested in. She went through into the bedroom and saw to her relief that the men who’d fixed the windows had also obeyed their instructions to fit a mosquito net to the four-poster. The translucent micro-netting hung down from the canopy almost to the floor.

Perfect. Now for a small experiment.

In the bathroom, she picked up one of the Chanel perfume bottles. She unscrewed the cap of the spray nozzle and poured a few drops of the liquid into the sink. Then, slipping two fingers into the cup of her bra, she took out the slim lighter she’d stolen from the cigar-smoking guard on the stairs when she’d pretended to stumble. A bra was the only place you could quickly hide anything when you were forced to wear such impractical clothing all the time. As frightened as she’d been that Serrato was going to try to touch her earlier, she’d been even more terrified that he might find the lighter there.

She pressed the little piezo switch and an inch-long tongue of yellow flame darted from the lighter. She lowered it into the sink, touched the flame to the tiny pool of perfume, and drew her hand away quickly as it flared up with a brief but spectacular whoosh . That was what just a few drops of the stuff could produce. There was about a litre of it sitting on her bathroom shelf.

She squirted a load more perfume into the air and then sprayed hairspray all over the place to cover up any smell of burning that might have escaped the bathroom. Then, shaking with nerves now that her plan was finally about to become a reality, she started attending to the rest of her arrangements.

Time passed. Dinner was served to her in her room: a plate of cold meats and salad on a tray together with a half-bottle of chilled wine. She was too anxious to touch any of it. Instead she emptied a pack of cotton makeup-remover pads into the bin in the bathroom and used the empty plastic packaging to wrap up the cold meats.

Then all she could do was wait quietly in the bedroom, going over and over in her mind all that she needed to do. There was no going back any more. The alternative was unthinkable.

It was sometime before midnight when she heard the door unlock. Moments later, Hatchet Face appeared in the bedroom doorway. She was carrying a slim white box like the one Consuela had brought to Brooke’s room on the first night.

Hatchet Face laid the box down on the bed. Her lips drew back into a sly smile, revealing the gaps in her teeth. She reached her big, coarse hands into the box and pulled out a silky garment that she held up for Brooke to see.

The negligee was so insubstantial and transparent that it made the nightdress Serrato had given her before look like something a prude would wear. There was something else in the box: Brooke peered inside and saw the flimsy colour-matched stockings and suspenders.

‘You put on,’ Hatchet Face said. ‘Señor Serrato, he wait for you.’

Chapter Forty-Two

The torrid heat of a South American summer wrapped itself around Ben and Nico like a damp towel as they stepped off the overnight Iberia jet that had left wintry Madrid almost exactly twelve hours earlier, and crossed the tarmac at Jorge Chávez International Airport, Lima, Peru. By the time they’d got into arrivals their shirts were already sticking to them, and it was still early morning.

‘Two days ago I was worried about fucking frostbite,’ Nico muttered, taking off his jacket and rolling up his sleeves, going easy with the left one as the arm was bandaged to the elbow and still tender. Underneath the bandage were the dozen stitches that Ben had put into him back in Montefrio, using the little soldier-repair kit that always rattled around in the bottom of his bag. He winced.

‘You’ll live,’ Ben said.

‘You always say that. Question is, how long for?’