Susan Johnson - Hot Streak

“Some friends,” Egon said, the inflection so perfectly Naples, Gennaro was startled anew.

“Are they still alive?” The answer would satisfy several more unasked questions.

“No.”

Drug smuggling, Gennaro understood with clarity. “Do you want to go on the coast road or on A-1,” he asked, a faint deference in his tone now. One never offended the Camora and lived long.

Egon felt for the kit in his breast pocket. He had four points left. Enough till Nice, and then some. “Whatever's fastest, and turn the radio down.” He was feeling better already, beginning to tune out, and the music was distracting. Reaching over, he rolled down the window. Warm evening air rushed against his face, fanning his silky hair back in ruffled waves. He could feel the tenseness leave his neck and shoulders, the heroin come to the fore again. Glancing out at the landscape, he took in Siumiciano's peaceful expanse. Flat and featureless, it fit his current mood. His mind began to withdraw to its own internal landscape, and he stared unfocusing for several minutes. But just as he began to forget, the music was interrupted by a sharp news report. The airport attack had already been attributed to Shakin Rifat. Egon stiffened. Had they been after him? Were they still after him? He began shaking again, the fresh surge of fear more powerful than the opiates.

I t was eight in the morning in Minneapolis. Margaret Rose Darian, known as Molly to everyone but the remotest stranger, flipped on the TV before she set her daughter's breakfast on the table. “Hurry, Carrie, your eggs are getting cold.” Hearing a muffled response from the direction of the bedroom, she poured the milk and slid the jam jar closer to the plate.

“Morning, Mom, and don't say anything until I explain,” her daughter said in a rush of words.

That snapped Molly's head around from the morning newscast. “Good God! When did you do that?”

“Last evening.”

“That's why you had a scarf on when you came in from Lucy's.” Her young daughter stood before her with pinkened earlobes and small pearl studs in her previously unblemished ears… looking too grown up. “You're too young.”

“I'm eight, almost nine,” Carrie replied matter-of-factly, dropping into her chair. “Amy's had pierced ears since she was four. And Tammy's had them since-”

“I know the list, honey, by heart. You couldn't wait-”

“I waited five years for you, Mom. Look at it that way,” she said, her huge, dark eyes watchful.

Molly laughed, an abrupt, spontaneous helplessness at her daughter's curious logic.

Feeling a little braver, Carrie added, “I promise not to wear really long, dangly earrings until I'm older.”

“The way your peer group's going, that'll be next week,” Molly said with a heartfelt sigh, not in the mood for discipline. Her blue eyes took on a sudden maternal directness. “But I want your word of honor, on one thing.”

“Sure, Mom.” Carrie was magnanimous in her victory.

“I don't want to see three earrings on each ear. Never. Understand, Munchkin?”

“Promise.” A radiant smile shone back at her.

Molly sighed one more time, a reflex action to their somewhat disparate notions of childhood. Did every eight-year-old girl in America have holes in her ears, a closet full of designer clothes, and the knowledge that rockabilly didn't mean what rockabilly used to mean? One glance at the clock reminded her that the riddles of the universe would have to wait. In the tone that all mothers acquire after watching children dawdle through three thousand and nineteen mealtimes, Molly admonished, “Now eat. You're going to be-” Her sentence was interrupted by a news bulletin flashing across the TV in stark black letters.

TERRORIST ATTACK! it proclaimed, and then the announcer's face replaced the clamoring headline. “Terrorist attack at the Rome airport!” The newsman's voice was excited. “Only minutes ago, four gunmen opened fire on passengers at the air terminal. We don't have all the details, but twelve people are known dead, two of them children. The death toll could-”

Molly switched the set off. “Lord, it's happening all the time. No one's safe.” Regret and resentment blended oddly in her voice.

“We are in Minneapolis,” Carrie replied with the calm innocence of insulated youth. “No terrorists have ever killed anyone in Minneapolis. Do I have time for hot chocolate?” And with that, terrorist attacks were dismissed from Carrie's mind.

“'Fraid not, dear. Are you sure your ears aren't infected? They look pinkish.”

“They're fine. Relax, Mom. Lucy says if they begin to throb, to take a Tylenol.”

“A professional opinion is always appreciated,” Molly said dryly, “but if they're not paler by this evening, I'm taking you to the clinic for a second opinion. Lucy's not my idea of trustworthy expertise.”

“Okay, okay,” Carrie mumbled with a mouthful of muffin and jam. “You're the boss.”

“I don't want to be the boss,” Molly replied on a quiet exhalation. “I just want us to get along. And I don't want problems… like your ears falling off,” she went on, slipping her arms into an Irish tweed jacket in an unusual lavender tone. “I don't want you looking like an eighteen-year-old starlet when you're eight either. And why the hell do terrorists keep killing innocent people?”

“I think they don't have land or food or something.”

“It was a rhetorical question,” Molly murmured half to herself as she searched through her purse for her car keys which were misplaced again. “Have you seen the car keys?”

“On the counter in the bathroom.”

“In the bathroom?”

“Face it, Mom, you're not organized.”

“Don't get smart, kid, at eight o'clock in the morning or I'll-”

“What, Mom?” Carrie teased.

“Just eat now,” she muttered. Intimidating threats were not part of her repertoire with her daughter. She loved her too much. “I'm leaving in five minutes, and if you're not ready you'll have to take the bus to school.”

“Mommmmm!” It was a long, drawn-out wail. “Don't be cruel.”

Molly paused in the doorway, remembering the unwritten code apropos bus riding. No one ever rode the bus unless every other possible option for transportation to school had been wrung dry and discarded. Inadvertently, she'd struck a raw nerve of childhood protocol. “Don't panic, I'll wait. I'm the owner, right? I can come in when I want. But hurry,” she reminded her daughter. Owner or not, if she didn't put in long hours every day her fledgling business, which seemed to be creeping into the black after two precarious years, could just as easily go under. That would make her ex-husband Bart happy as hell. And she'd resist that happening with the last breath in her body.

Her high heels clicked on the parquet floor as she walked down the hall to the bathroom to get her car keys. There shouldn't be people like Bart, she thought, her long-legged stride causing her blond shoulder-length hair to sway gently from side to side. There shouldn't be hunters and victims. There shouldn't be terrorists killing innocent children. It was so damned Machiavellian. So barbaric. Hadn't civilization progressed at all? Oh, damn, she silently swore, glancing out the terrace door next to her bedroom, the rain still hadn't let up. Her hair would frizz up like crazy again.

I t was an appalling day to be out. His father had warned him in his customary quiet way. His stable master had been less polite. “Day for a damned fool to kill himself,” he'd said.

“Shorten the leathers a shade then, Leon. That'll keep me alive.”

“Shit. Take more than that today,” Leon muttered, but he'd seen the restrained fire in his employer's eyes, and had done as he was told. When Charles Fersten's mouth clamped shut in that thin straight line, everyone did his bidding or stayed out of sight.

For the fifth day in succession, cold, driving rain swept the northern Minnesota countryside. There were pools of water on the practice track near the stables, and the first curve of the private steeplechase course visible from the paddock resembled a snipe bog.

“Positive you want Tarrytown?” Leon tried one last time to dissuade his employer.

“He's surefooted in heavy going,” was the curt reply.

Also had a bad mouth, which combined with his phenomenal strength, made him a difficult horse to hold, Leon thought. But maybe that was a masochistic fire in those black eyes and the count was out to match his temper against Tarrytown's gigantic strength.

Leon wasn't so far off the truth, although Charles Bernadotte Carrville Fersten, a count if he chose to acknowledge his father's lineage, normally didn't scrutinize his motives too closely. He just needed to ride.

His father had seen the morning news, too. As they watched, the death toll had mounted from the terrorist attack in Rome. Sixteen dead last count. The attack, reporters said, had Shakin Rifat's mark.

Whenever Shakin Rifat struck, Egon fell apart.

And then the phone would ring, and Sylvie would make demands.

Charles swore and swung himself up into the saddle.

Tarrytown jumped the first two timber fences beautifully, even under the adverse conditions. He was a massive horse of remarkable power, and a smile flashed briefly across Charles's mouth in appreciation. A half mile into the three-mile course, both horse and rider were thoroughly soaked and splashed with mud. Tarrytown took the first water turn without breathing hard and cleared the third and fourth hurdles like a leaper. Then, his head stretched out like a racer on the straight, his hooves scarcely touching the dark ground, Tarrytown flew down the treelined course. The pines were dark against the gray northern sky, in contrast to the silvery birches wet with rain, their tiny buds still tightly curled, waiting for a warm spring sun. Charles's spirits soared with Tarrytown's burst of speed and, despite the cold driving rain, he felt a warm surge of pleasure, a familiar elation synonymous with reckless wild rides.

But at the next water jump thoughts of Sylvie intruded like unwelcome messengers of doom, and he inadvertently tightened his grip on the reins. Tarrytown had already launched himself before the unexpected tug at his mouth. He cleared the water, but not with his usual rise, having faltered midair with the cut of the bit. The huge bay slipped on landing, slithering for several yards. It was touch and go for several breathless seconds before he recovered his legs. But his formidable strength pulled him through, and he managed to struggle upright, leaving both horse's and rider's hearts pumping furiously. A rider had to give his horse its head going over a jump; a rule Charles knew instinctively. Bending over, he apologized softly to Tarrytown, stroking him gently beneath his ear. “Sorry,” he murmured, “my fault…” and added a few pithy comments concerning his ex-wife.

Dismounting, Charles walked Tarrytown back to the stables, talking aloud to his old companion… about Sylvie and her stupidity, about Sylvie and her arrogance, about Sylvie and her weak-willed brother. During the mucky walk back the rush of adrenaline slowly subsided and, like a cleansing tonic, it washed away much of his tension. Or maybe it was the wild ride that eased the tension. Since boyhood, a horse and speed had been comfort, therapy, intoxication-all things to Count Charles Fersten.

“Didn't go the whole,” Leon laconically remarked when they returned.

“You were right, Leon,” Charles replied with his familiar smile, the fire gone from his eyes. “Damn near got killed out there.” He even felt restored enough after the exhilarating ride to ask, “Any phone calls?”

“Nope.”

She hadn't called yet. Maybe this time she wouldn't, Charles thought, his normal cheerfulness renewed.

Bitch must not be able to get a call through, Leon uncharitably thought. And a cable wouldn't do her much good. If you're going to threaten and plead, it loses impact somehow on paper.

“See you tomorrow,” Charles said, turning to go, the light from the open door silhouetting his powerful frame and the spiky outline of wet windswept hair.

“If the rain lets up.” Leon was busy wiping Tarrytown down.

Charles's dark brows quirked like the grin lifting one corner of his mouth. “Can't take care of me forever.”

“Someone has to. Besides all the eager women, that is.”

“I don't know, Leon. You might lose against that kind of competition.”

And he had on numerous occasions. But not for long. “Any woman last more than a week?” his stable master bluntly asked. “Besides the bitch, I mean. And from the looks of it, you might never shake her loose.”