Destiny

FIFTY-FOUR

Back at his hotel, Marcus looked at the phone log on Layla’s cell. He memorized the number that she’d last called, a number that appeared on the log five hours earlier. He hid her phone behind a potted plant in his room and went in the bathroom to shower. He turned the water as hot as he could stand it, letting the torrent beat down on his neck and shoulders. He closed his eyes, the steam rising around him, like the mist in the Garden of Gethsemane. He heard the man’s voice. ‘The blade itself will unseal it. Deliver its message and then release the spear into the fire of Etna. Destroy it.’ Marcus shook his head under the water and opened his eyes wide.

Images of the woman’s face popped in his mind like rapid-fire pictures. Layla getting out of the taxi at the hotel. Her wide smile. Turning to him at the front desk. Sipping wine at a corner table, the Tower of David in the background. Her body when she dropped the robe. Her kiss. Her face at death. That image melted into the macabre face of the man who killed his family. That heinous expression liquefied and was replaced by the iconic figure of Christ on the cross from the Church of All Nations. Marcus held both his hands to the side of his spinning head, Layla’s final words echoing through his skull. “The one that killed your wife and daughter. Don’t look so surprised. We’ve known about your talents for quite a while, and we knew it was just a matter of time before Israel recruited you to slow or destroy our nuclear capabilities. That wasn’t and isn’t about to happen. I won’t miss where my colleague failed.”

After a few seconds, he opened his eyes, turned the water off, towel-dried, slipped on shorts and a loose shirt. He started to walk out on the balcony and stopped. He shut off the light in his room and slowly opened the sliding glass door. The breeze teased the curtains. He could see the moon rising over the Old City. He was mentally and physically exhausted. Yet, he felt alive, believed in a sense of purpose for the first time since the deaths of his family. He thought about the sunset view of the valley when he’d climbed a hill off the Burma Road and sat on the outcropping of rock. Tonight he wanted to step out on the balcony and howl at the damn moon. But something stopped him.

Was someone out there with a night scope on a rifle?

He closed and locked the doors, then sat at the table in his room and turned on his laptop. His fingers flew through the Newton data, centuries of Biblical statistics and correlating passages weaving in the story of Esther and the Hebrew spelling of her name and the myrtle flower. Marcus whispered, “Esther…Myrtus…Revelation…John…” A hero vehemently tints juror s…

…the blade itself shall open that which was sealed…and not to be revealed to the wicked, who meet secretly, conspire, become the rule behind the throne…and covet the forged supremacy of evil in which domination of my people is their purpose…’

Marcus pushed back from the desk, his eyes burning into the screen, thoughts racing. He paced the room for a moment, his lips dry, blood, charged with adrenaline, surging through his veins. He listened to the night sounds, the rhythm of the Old City in harmony. He walked into the bathroom, ran cold water and splashed it on his face, dried off and stood back over his computer.

Marcus looked at the mobile phone he’d taken from Layla’s body. He picked up his phone, emailed the photo of Layla to Alicia and wrote:

This woman tried to put a bullet in my head tonight. Alias — Layla Koury. The one I mentioned to you. Run a face scan for an ID. Thanks –

Marcus picked up the pistol and placed it under his pillow. He stretched out on the bed. “No dreams tonight,” he mumbled. “No damn nightmares tonight.” Marcus closed his eyes and felt the subconscious ebb of sleep just as his phone buzzed.

UNKNOWN. He pressed the button.

“Paul, it’s Alicia. Are you okay? Were you hurt?”

“I’m okay.”

“What happened?”

Marcus told her and added. “She said the murders of Jennifer and Tiffany, the killer leaving me for dead, was a planned assassination. It was carried out by Iran to prevent me from being recruited by Israel to impact Iran’s nuclear effort.”

“Dear God, Paul…I’m so very, very sorry.”

“Listen to me, Alicia. Bill Gray told me they arrested a local suspect. He wants me back immediately. He’s lying. Why?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, Paul. Please, believe me. I’m telling you the truth.”

Marcus was silent for a long moment. He said, “Try to find out what’s going on there? Be careful.”

“I will.”

Marcus blew air out of his cheeks and looked at the drapes across his balcony window. “Layla said it was her colleague who killed Jen and Tiff. I want to find him. I’m assuming she killed herself because she would have been questioned — questioned damn hard, maybe tortured by the Mossad.”

“You go to the Holy Land to decipher Newton and biblical passages and you get caught in an international cyber war and learn your wife and daughter were murdered in an attempt on your life to prevent you from going exactly where you are today. That must have been really tough to hear. Are you all right, Paul?” she asked softly.

Marcus sat farther up in his bed, pillows bracing his back, the moonlight spilling into his room, and the smell of gun oil from the pistol under the pillow next to him. “No, not really. I’m a bundle of emotions — angry, confused, sad…too damn many feelings to explain and not sure what to believe. But, Alicia, something else happened to me tonight. Something that I can’t explain in any rational terms, so I won’t even try. But it’s affected me. I thought I might have hallucinated in the olive grove, but I heard a voice. No, I spoke with a voice. It was real. Do you understand me? ”

“What voice?”

“A man. He told me to find the spear — to destroy it. It’s the key to—”

“To what, Paul?”

“To the destiny of a perfect home that’s been given to us, maybe the fate of planet earth.”

“You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Find it…destroy it. I have no other option unless I’m really suffering from some horrible psychosis. But I feel, at least I think, all of this is very real.”

“Let me help you.”

“Alicia, do some research. Go back to the time John Kennedy Junior was killed. Who had the most to lose or win in the event of his death? Clinton was president, and his wife was warming up for the New York Senate seat, the same race where Kennedy Junior could have run for the same office had he decided to so—”

“Paul, what does this have to do with the—”

“Look at who was running for president in 2000. Could Kennedy have been in the mix? As it was, George W. Bush and Al Gore became locked in the most contentious presidential race in U.S. history. It was the only election decided by a majority vote in the Supreme Court. If Kennedy had run for the Senate in New York, beat Hillary Clinton, he may have decided to face Bush in 2004, assuming Kennedy wanted the office. Would he have even wanted the office? We’ll never know.”

“Paul, I’ve looked under plenty of rocks before, but this one might be a boulder.”

“Dig for anything classified under the accident investigation. Any witnesses? Can you find military or rescue personnel who worked the scene when Kennedy’s plane went down? On a larger scope, look for the money trail or trails. See where they intersect. Find the bits and pieces that make investments, mergers and buyouts more than a twist of fate. Look for subtle things that eventually become more than coincidental, the people on the director’s boards, their political alliances. Start to see if a pattern emerges from Wall Street firms, defense contractors, global banks, hedge funds, and private equity investments. Look at multinational corporations tied to lobby groups financed by government vendors who’ve managed to fly under the general radar with non-compete contracts. And the most important thing—”

“What, Paul?”

“See if any of it has a history or even a remote political or financial connection back to World War II, General Patton, or maybe the Nuremburg Trials.”

“This is a big job — it could take some time.”

“Alicia, you’re the best I’ve ever seen at research, hacking, gathering and correlating cyber data. There may not be any connections — no smoking guns. But dirty money has a way of staining the fingers of those who spend it. Find the fingerprints.”

“You know something don’t you, Paul?”

“I know the best chance we have of getting your niece, Brandi, out of that hell hole is finding information we can control if we have to…and maybe dealing a hand the Iranians can’t resist. Call me soon as you get something.”

“Goodnight, Paul.”

“Be very careful in your digging and watch your steps.”

Marcus disconnected and got out of bed. He knew that it was just a matter of time before whomever was on Layla’s phone log would know she’d died. After that, they’d know that a call coming from her phone was a trap. Marcus retrieved the dead woman’s phone from behind the potted plant, scrolled to the last entry and pressed the button.