The Scorpio Illusion by Robert Ludlum Read Free Book Online

exercise.”
    “I once did.” As they began the climb, the memories of those early weeks with the
padrone
came back to her, and recalling them, there was a great deal to laugh about. At first, when she became mobile, they were like twocircling, suspicious cats, she outraged by the luxury he permitted himself, he frustrated by her interference with his opulent way of life. Then, quite accidentally, she invaded his kitchen when he was displeased with the cook’s cannelloni Sambuca Florentine—the same cook who now lay dead thirty feet behind them at the water’s edge. With great apologies to the servant, Bajaratt prepared her own; it pleased the unpleasant owner of the island. Next came chess. The
padrone
claimed he was a master; the young mistress beat him twice, then quite obviously let him win the third time. He roared with laughter, knowing what she had done and appreciating her charity.
    “You are a lovely woman,” he had said, “but never do that again.”
    “Then I shall beat you every time, and you’ll be angry.”
    “No, my child, I will learn from you. It’s the story of my life. I learn from everyone.… I once wanted to be a big movie star, believing my height and my body and my shining yellow hair would be loved by the camera. Do you know what happened? Never mind, I’ll tell you. Rossellini saw a test I made for Cinecittà in Rome; guess what he said?… Never mind, I’ll tell you. He said there was an ugliness in my blue eyes, an evil he could not explain. He was right, I went elsewhere.”
    From that night on they spent hours together, the two on equal footing, each recognizing the obsessions of the other, each accepting the other’s genius. Finally, one late afternoon, sitting on the veranda, looking at a magenta sun, the
padrone
said, “You are the daughter I could never have.”
    “You are my only real father,” Bajaratt had replied.
    Nicolo, a step ahead of the Baj, held out his arm as they reached the top step. A flagstone path in front of them led to a huge, wide engraved door at least three inches thick. “I think it’s open, Cabi.”
    “It is,” agreed Bajaratt. “Hectra must have been in a hurry and forgot to close it.”
    “Who?”
    “It’s not important. Give me the rifle in case a dog is loose.” They approached the half-closed door. “Kick it open, Nicolo,” she said.
    Suddenly, as they walked inside, from nowhere and everywhere explosions filled the great hall. The blasts of powerful, short-barreled shotguns echoed off the stone walls as Bajaratt and the boy sprang to the marble floor, Amaya firing indiscriminately—again nowhere and everywhere—until she was out of shells. Then, as the billows of smoke began to rise to the high ceiling, there was silence, a sudden quiet that found both intruders without harm. And both raised their heads as the smoke disappeared through the shafts of the setting sun, streaking through the small windows; each was alive and neither knew why. Then, revealed through the rising smoke was the figure of an old man in a wheelchair propelling himself forward from a recess at the far end of the hall. On the semicircular balcony above the curving staircase stood two men holding the Sicilian weapon of choice—the short-barreled
lupo
shotgun. They were smiling; their ammunition had been false, shells without lethal contents—blanks.
    “Oh,
my
, Annie!” cried the frail voice from the wheelchair, the language English but with the rasp of an accent. “I never thought you would do it.”
    “You’re in Miami—you’re always in Miami! For your treatments!”
    “Come now, Baj, how much more good can they do for me?… But to kill your old friend Hectra, who nursed you back to health five years ago, that killing was an act of commitment.… Incidentally, you owe me a woman of like loyalty. Shall it be you?”
    Bajaratt got slowly to her feet. “I needed this place for only a few days and no one,
no
one, could know where I was or what I was