Impulse

by Catherine Coulter

  Rafaella watched, silently, praying with all her might.

  Marcus saw the trail again, some two hundred yards to the left. “Ah, there’s a trail, thank the good Lord. We’re going down, my dear girl. Start praying and make sure your seat belt is tight.”

  The helicopter was French and thus had fiberglass rotor blades that spun counterclockwise. Without the tail rotor, the helicopter was dragging violently clockwise.

  Marcus fought it with all his experience, which hadn’t been much in recent years. “We’re in deep shit,” he said finally. “The deepest. Hold on, we’re going down.”

  He cut the engine power even more. Turn just a bit more to the left, just a bit, down slowly, hold that stick steady—Jesus, the cabin was spinning wildly again. About twenty feet above the trail, he cut the engine. The main rotor kept turning, but he couldn’t help that, any more than he could help—

  There was a sharp rending sound and Rafaella saw the main rotor slice into the undergrowth beside the trail and break cleanly, ripping loose from the fuselage. The nose of the helicopter was pointed down, and when they hit the trail, the skids collapsed, ramming up into the cabin, gashing through the floor beside her feet. The cabin shuddered wildly.

  Rafaella thought her feet would be shoved up into her shoulders; her teeth clinked loudly together, sending pain through her head.

  Incredibly, Marcus was still whistling. He calmly unfastened his seat belt. The helicopter became suddenly silent.

  “Thank God there was enough moonlight to see the trail. Thank God Dominick keeps them cleared. Thank God you had me. Now, Rafaella—”

  The cabin gave one final shudder and suddenly kicked up on one side when the right-side skid pushed through the floor on the pilot’s side of the cabin.

  “Well, how about that?” he said, more to himself than to Rafaella, who hadn’t moved, hadn’t said a word. He saw that she’d opened her eyes.

  “Hi, we’re safe.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  He pulled loose his seat belt, leaned over, and hugged her, squeezing her until she grunted. “I promise we’re safe. See, you squeaked, you’re alive.” He kissed her cheek and flipped open the clasp on her seat belt.

  “I squeak, therefore I am. You’re blessedly literate, you know that?”

  “Let’s clear out of this thing. I don’t think it’s going to blow, mind you, but I’d just feel better if—

  She was out of the helicopter in a flash. He followed her, coming around the back of the helicopter, laughing, but just for a moment. The main rotor had ripped cleanly from the fuselage and it lay against the tail-bone like a broken ice-cream stick.

  He paused only a moment to look at the tail rotor.

  He took Rafaella’s hand and ran toward the side of the trail.

  “I didn’t think that trail would be wide enough,” she said, staring back at the helicopter.

  “It wasn’t. We were lucky as hell. That, and, you see, it’s a French helicopter, and the main rotor is fiberglass. It breaks clean usually and doesn’t do much fussing around.” He pulled her against him and hugged her tight. “It’s all right. It’s over now.”

  Rafaella pulled back. “Are you talking to yourself? I’m not the one in danger of nervous collapse here.”

  “Even though your eyes were closed tighter than a corpse’s?”

  “That’s what I thought I was going to be.” She shuddered and made no further move to get away from him. Comfort, whatever the source, wasn’t to be scorned at this particular moment.

  “Was that an accident?”

  “I can’t be sure until I go over it,” Marcus said, his voice sounding oddly cheerful to Rafaella. “Sometimes even careful examination can’t tell you what went wrong. Maybe it was an accident, maybe not. If someone did tamper with the helicopter, they were very good and very precise, calculating that it would go out of control exactly when it did, right over the highest point of the island.”

  “What do you mean you might not be able to tell? It’s just a damned machine.”

  “Yeah, and it’s got literally thousands of bolts and nuts. I think that a bolt came loose in the tail rotor, because I lost all control with the pedals after that loud banging sound. Did someone loosen it? Probably. Merkel is a sterling mechanic, fanatic about preflight checks with the helicopter.

  “This sucks.”

  “No argument out of me on that one. Now, Ms. Holland, we have a couple of choices. We can either stay—”

  “Let’s go home.”

  “All right.”

  At that instant there came a loud roaring sound. Rafaella jerked back, hitting Marcus in the stomach. “What was that?”

  “A wild boar, perhaps. Maybe a lion or a cougar.”

  The sound came again.

  “Actually, I haven’t the foggiest idea.”

  “I think I’d like to spend the night in the helicopter.”

  “All right. But you know, I can’t be sure what brought it down. It could, I suppose, still blow, but—”

  Rafaella turned, her hands on her hips. “Just look at my outfit—it’s Lagerfeld, dammit. It cost me nine hundred and fifty dollars and it’s bloody well ruined, all because you can’t drive a damned helicopter. And now you tell me we can’t do anything, that we’re—”

  “Nine hundred and fifty dollars? You spent nearly a thousand dollars on those pants?”

  Her once-pristine white slacks were stained with dirt, sweat, and oil. Where the oil had come from, she hadn’t the remotest idea. She looked up at Marcus. In a move reminiscent of the previous night, she braced herself, grabbed his arm just above his elbow, and flipped him onto the middle of the dirt trail on his back.

  He just lay there sprawled out, arms and legs flung away from his body, and looked up at her. “I think I would have preferred another bowl of fruit in my face.”

  “Oh, to hell with you,” Rafaella said, and offered him her hand. She tried to jerk it back, remembering how he’d pulled her down the previous evening, but she was too late. Down she went, sprawling over him.

  “Hi. How’s tricks? You kept your head. I like that. I’ll tell you something. I do think someone tried to do me in again. With you in attendance, which means that your popularity is at an all-time low, along with mine. Who do you think it was?”

  She pushed upward so she could see his face. “During the evening when I was oohing and aahing over Dominick’s Egyptian collection, someone sneaked out and sabotaged the helicopter?”

  “Nicely put. Yes, that’s what would have happened if someone did sabotage us. Whoever it was probably removed a bolt on the tail-rotor control. Who? You’re the hotshot reporter.”

  “Paula. She’s vicious and she hates me.”

  “Yes, but she adores me. And since I was the pilot, she wouldn’t have chosen that way to rid herself of you. Arsenic in your wine, perhaps. But she wouldn’t off me, not when she wants me in her bed. Besides, what Paula probably knows about tampering with a helicopter wouldn’t fill a thimble. No, all her knowledge involves men and their vices and urges, and her own, of course.”

  “You sound like you know all about it.”

  “I do, sort of. She caught me once when I was in bed, helpless. I’d been laid out with a bullet—” Marcus broke it off. Here he was spilling his guts to this damned woman, just like everyone else. He was as weak in the head as they were.

  “What bullet? When?”

  He didn’t answer, merely jerked upward, rolling her off him. “You should see your nearly thousand-dollar slacks now.”

  “The whole outfit was nine hundred and fifty dollars. The slacks can’t be more than six hundred. When we find out who did it, that jerk can buy me a new pair. How about DeLorio? Now, he doesn’t adore you. He hates your guts.

  “That’s my guess. The kid’s—”

  “Oh, come on, Marcus. You’re not exactly an old man. What are you, thirty-two?”

  “Nearly thirty-three, and DeLorio is twenty-five. He is a kid to me. He
’s spoiled, sadistic, probably verging on being psychopathic, and he hates and fears authority. He likes to dominate women completely—probably something to do with his mother—”

  “Who was his mother? What did she do to him?”

  He opened his mouth to tell her, then clamped it shut. Spilling his guts again, dammit. “Here.” He gave her his hand, careful to brace himself, and pulled her to her feet.

  Rafaella was looking at the helicopter. “We could have died.”

  “Maybe, but I don’t think we were meant to croak. If I wanted to kill someone, I wouldn’t take the chance with a helicopter—you just can’t be certain enough of the outcome. Anyway, I like the notion of DeLorio doing something, but then again, I don’t think he knows anything about sabotaging a helicopter.”

  “Do you think he was the one who tried to scare you off—his own words from this evening—or very nearly?”

  “It was like a confession of intent, wasn’t it? Who the hell knows? In his case I suppose you have to believe in bad genes. His grandfather, his mother—”

  “More likely from his father’s side.”

  “What’s this? Some unexpected bile? I thought you were overflowing with feminine reverence and awe for Dominick. Admiration shone from your beady little eyes this evening.” He turned away and kicked at the helicopter. “Of course,” he added, not turning, “you are very possibly not at all what you claim to be.”

  “I thought you checked me out thoroughly, as did Mr. Giovanni. What could I be hiding?”

  He turned and grinned at her. “No, I won’t say it. I’ll be the soul of discretion.”

  Rafaella didn’t attack. “Go to hell,” she said, and stomped off down the trail.

  “Careful of the mountain lions!”

  Ten

  Rafaella took two steps. She turned around very slowly, to see Marcus standing in the middle of the trail, his arms crossed, grinning.

  “There aren’t any mountain lions in the Caribbean,” she yelled. Unable to help herself, she actually shook her fist at him. “They would have had to swim here, that or be brought over like the mongoose.”

  Marcus knocked a clod of dirt off his arm. “Dominick is a very wealthy man. He also likes his privacy. He brought over lions and wild pigs, boars, and a couple of snakes—boa constrictors—and other assorted intimidating creatures to discourage foot communication between the eastern side of the island and the western. There’s a sign posted on the resort side.”

  Despite herself, Rafaella began walking back toward him. “You’re lying. That’s absurd. He could just post No Trespassing signs. He wouldn’t bring in wild animals.”

  “That’s exactly what the signs do say. The wild animal warning is in the fine print at the bottom of the signs. Dominick likes uncertainty in life.”

  “That’s absurd,” she said again, but sounded less certain this time. “What if the animals decided to wander all over the island? What if an animal attacked a guest? Just think of the liability. And besides, even if the animals stayed put, who in his right mind would even want to walk from the resort to his compound?”

  “You’re on your feet, aren’t you?”

  “Buffoon,” she said under her breath, then turned on her heel and started away from him again.

  “Do be careful to stay on the trail,” he called after her. “Those boas are fat and are perfectly willing to get even fatter. You’d be a succulent morsel, particularly in that snazzy outfit. A dirty but classy meal.”

  There was another horrendous snorting sound, just off to Rafaella’s left. A wild pig? A wild boar?

  Rafaella froze in her tracks, then sighed. “Better the tame bore,” she said, and chuckled. It was better than gnashing her teeth. She turned around and walked back to Marcus.

  “Do you have a gun?”

  “Yep. In the helicopter.”

  He didn’t move.

  “I’m obviously in your power. What do you want to do? It’s still early—…well, maybe not all that early. Do you want to stay here or go back to the resort?”

  All right, he thought, it was time to stop screwing around; it was time to get serious. There were wild animals, but not a single one of them was loose. Dominick kept a private zoo just about a half-mile to the south. The animals had lots of territory to roam, but they were watched and fed and fenced in. And Rafaella had believed him. She hadn’t wanted to, but she had. He was hard pressed not to laugh. He wasn’t about to tell her the truth about the animals, not yet.

  He said, his face as serious as his voice, “Let’s stay here. I want to examine the helicopter in the morning. If someone did tamper with it, I don’t want to give him or her the opportunity to come and try to cover it up.”

  She shrugged. “Okay.”

  He opened the door to the passenger side of the cabin. “Would you like to go in and slip into something more comfortable?”

  “I’d rather cozy up to any other reptile than you.”

  “Reptile?” He looked startled, then laughed and helped her inside. When he joined her in the pilot’s seat, he pulled her against his shoulder. “Go to sleep if you can.”

  “Will someone realize you didn’t come back and get worried?”

  “No. Will some guy miss you?”

  “Don’t be an ass. Well, maybe five or six guys.”

  “Tough not being an ass, but I’ll try. Go to sleep.”

  She tried for about five minutes. “Marcus?”

  “Yeah?”

  “No one’s ever tried to kill me before. I don’t like the way it feels.”

  “I don’t like the way it feels either. At least you don’t have to worry right now, we’re safe and snug. All we need is a fire and some marshmallows and it would be just like camp.”

  He never lost his humor for long, she thought, and wanted to poke him in the ribs, but didn’t. “I liked summer camp when I was a kid. I could row a canoe really well and start fires and hit a target pretty consistently from twenty-five feet with my bow and arrow.”

  “I liked camp too. My mom sent me to a Boy Scout camp when I was thirteen. I got poison ivy but it was still fun. I had sex for the first time. Her name was Darleen and she had huge breasts and she was seventeen and a counselor for the Girl Scouts just across the lake.”

  “I had my first crush at camp when I was twelve. His name was Marty Reynolds and he was the only cute guy who didn’t wear braces. I only let him kiss me, but it wasn’t fun. How did you get the poison ivy?”

  “In the woods, collecting wildflowers with Janie Winters. She didn’t wear braces either, but I did. It isn’t much fun kissing when you’ve got a mouth full of steel. Darleen didn’t wear braces, obviously.”

  “My mom didn’t like camping, so to be perverse, I went to camp until I was sixteen. Did you camp out with your dad?”

  He stiffened and all the fun went out of his voice.

  “No. My dad died when I was eleven. Even before, he wasn’t the kind of man to take off his glasses and get dirty.”

  “I’m sorry.” A raw nerve, she thought, and kept the rest of her questions to herself. “I never had a dad.”

  “I know. At least you didn’t until your mom married Charles Rutledge III when you were sixteen.”

  She jerked away from him, pulling on his arm to make him face her. “What do you mean, you know?”

  “You’re illegitimate, so what? We both spent our teenage years without a father and we both survived. You’re awfully pushy, you’ve got a smart mouth, and perhaps a father would have curtailed that in you, but who knows?”

  “Did you tell Mr. Giovanni?”

  He frowned at her even as he shook his head. “I didn’t think it was relevant.” He shrugged. “If he does a check on you, he’ll find out anyway.”

  “Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

  “Would you like to tell me something incriminating, Ms. Holland? Any little thing I could use to get you off this island and back to your safe little harbor in Boston?”

  “No. And Bo
ston’s anything but a safe little harbor. Forget it, Marcus. I don’t have a single skeleton in my closet.”

  “Sure, and we’ll see pigs flying overhead any minute. Go to sleep, Ms. Holland.”

  “I’ll bet you still dream about Darleen.”

  “To a boy of thirteen, she was the best, the most wonderful, the sweetest—”

  “Go to sleep, Marcus.”

  Marcus tried to get comfortable, and he did, but still sleep wouldn’t come. He was worried, but more than that, he found himself thinking that he quite liked her smart mouth. She was sleeping deeply, her breathing even and deep. He should have asked her if she still liked to camp out. Perhaps, someday, he could ask her that, once his life was his own again.

  Marcus stood up and wiped his hands on his dirty pants. “I can’t tell,” he said. “I really can’t. We need an expert, and that, unfortunately, isn’t possible.”

  “How about Merkel?”

  “He could take a look, but he’s just good, like me, not an expert. We might as well get going. You up for a long walk?”

  It wasn’t, in fact, such a long walk. They reached the resort at seven-thirty in the morning, sweaty, dirty, their clothing ripped, but otherwise, in Marcus’s opinion, they just looked like a couple of lovers who’d gotten carried away. Not a couple who’d walked away from a crashed helicopter on the middle ridge, one half of the couple worried that a lion was going to pounce at any moment, and the other half of the couple thinking he should tell her the truth about the animals, but not doing so.

  Marcus stopped her before she turned off the path to her villa. “You’re a good sport,” he said. “Do I smell as rank as you do?”

  “As rank as a mountain goat. Lord, it’s hot. I feel like the humidity’s eaten through my skin.”

  Rafaella was walking across the pale gold-and-white marble floor in the bathroom to pour Chanel bubble bath into the Jacuzzi within three minutes of closing the front door. She turned on the gold faucets full blast. In another two minutes she was sprawled in the hot water, her mother’s journal in her hand, open to a September 1997 entry.

  I’ve always loved Christmas. So many of my happy memories are of you and me on Christmas morning, me with my coffee and croissant, you with your huge bowl of Cap’n Crunch and hot cocoa. Remember that year I got you that huge stuffed giraffe? I think it was 1981. You named him Alvin, as I recall.