The Atlantis revelation

41

Conrad waited behind three cars in line at the Liberty Gate to Old Town. Two armored trucks flanked the gate while Greek Evzones in tights with submachine guns inspected every vehicle entering the fortress.

He looked at his watch: it was already three-fifteen. By now Serena had probably delivered the globes, blowing his chance to see them. Worse, he had been seen by that Dei disciple of hers, who may have warned her to exit through a different gate.

A soldier waved him up to the gate, and he handed over his license and registration slip. While the soldier ran them through a card reader, a police officer asked him questions. "Where are you going?"

"Church of St. John," Conrad lied, referring to the church across the Street of Knights from the Palace of the Grandmaster. "I'm delivering this to the icon exhibit." He glanced over his shoulder at the globe strapped precariously to the back of his seat.

"You call that an icon?" the officer said gruffly.

Conrad recovered quickly and smiled. "A replica of an icon."

The officer was still grim. "I call that an accident if it fell off your bike onto the road."

"But it didn't," Conrad said when the soldier came back with his ID.

"Firat Kayda?" the soldier said as four others circled him with their machine guns.

"Yes," Conrad said quietly.

"You're under arrest."

Conrad thought quickly as he saw a car approaching from the opposite side of the gate. "I didn't mean to steal it," he said, reaching back to the icon as he heard more than one bolt click. "I just wanted to bring it back."

He pulled the string, and the icon fell to the ground and cracked open. "Oh no!" he said.

While all eyes were diverted to the ground for a moment, he twisted the accelerator and burst through the open gate and took a sharp left behind the tower.

There were shouts and the squeal of brakes and then a delayed spray of bullets that raked the tower. Conrad hit the straightaway down the Street of Knights but saw trouble up ahead: a black S-class Mercedes sedan coming his way, leaving him little room to maneuver on either side. He'd have to cut down one of the two hundred narrow cobblestone streets and lose the police without getting lost himself.

But then he saw a second car-a silver Mercedes G-class SUV-turning out from a gate at the Palace of the Grandmaster and onto the street toward him. As it turned, he saw her in the backseat.

Serena!

Sirens blared behind him, and he glanced at his mirror to see the lights of a police car flashing from behind.

He looked back up the Street of Knights in time to swerve away from the oncoming black Mercedes, taking out the driver's-side mirror as he whooshed by.

Dead ahead was the silver Mercedes SUV. Conrad could glimpse Benito's astonished face as it passed a parked Peugeot in front of the Inn of Provence. Everything seemed to go slow-motion as Conrad considered the police behind him, the silver Mercedes ahead of him, and the parked Peugeot.

It didn't belong there.

And before he could warn Benito, the Peugeot exploded in a ball of fire and blew the Mercedes apart.

"Serena!" he shouted before the shock wave sent him flying through the air.