The Vatican Knights

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

“There were three men,” said Isaiah. “One was waiting across the street hidden among the trees.”

“Which puts the count to a minimum of four,” said Kimball. “Obviously he was maintaining watch.”

Kimball moved to the couch where Gary sat with an ice wrap on his broken arm. Shari sat beside him, patting his forehead and jaw with a damp cloth. The body of Dark Lord lay on the floor covered with a sheet.

“Ms. Cohen, if I may, I think it would be best that your family be taken out of harm’s way as soon as possible,” said Kimball.

“I agree.” She pointed to Gary. “Perhaps to his mother’s home in California—”

“No, ma’am. If your attackers are who I think they are, then you’ll only place them in jeopardy as well. These people will stop at nothing to gain whatever it is they want.”

“I don’t have anything.”

“Obviously you do.”

“Then where would my family go?”

“To the archdiocese,” said Isaiah. “Your husband will be treated for his injuries, and your children will be absolutely safe.”

Shari turned to Gary. “I’m sorry you’re in this mess, but I think it best that you and the children are in a safe place.”

“You won‘t get no argument out of me,” he told her. He turned to Kimball. “So when do we leave?”

“Isaiah will take you there as soon as you’re ready.”

“And what about you?” asked Gary, turning to his wife.

She looked at the contoured sheet stained with the dead man’s blood. “I’ve got to find out why this happened.”

“Mr. Cohen, I don’t know why, but for some reason they’re trying to kill your wife. And I believe the answer is here in this apartment. Obviously she possesses threatening information of some kind.”

The bulb of enlightenment went off in Shari’s head as she turned to the smashed PC. “And I think I know where.”

Kimball followed her gaze to the floor, at the computer. Good girl, he thought.

With Gary and the children safely on their way to the archdiocese, Kimball lifted the PC back to the tabletop and strengthened his alliance with Shari by telling her untold secrets.

“His name was Shady Tippet,” he said, examining the crack in the casing. “He was somebody I used to work with a long time ago.”

“Worked with? Where?”

Kimball gave a sidelong glance to Dark Lord, and then turned away. “With the government,” he replied. “And should the truth be told, The White House.”

“The White House! Doing what exactly?”

He knew she was pressing him for as much information as possible, which was fine. Brutal honesty, regardless of its content, was the first step toward trust. “We were assassins,” he told her, “working specifically under the orders of the White House, most notably the president.”

Shari remained quiet, her mind theorizing, and then she understood that Dark Lord, was sent to kill her by the most powerful man on Earth. But why?

Her voice began to shake. “Is he still…” And then her words trailed.

“An assassin for the Force Elite? I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Is that what they’re called? The Force Elite.”

“They are.”

Kimball gave a brief synopsis of the history and development of the Force, the nature of its existence and the targets involved, including a statesman who posed a threat to a one-time incumbent during his term of office, a political local.

Shari suddenly felt overwhelmed and had to fight back the sting of tears. “How do I fight against something like this? How do I fight the president of the United States? I can’t!”

Kimball gently gripped the triceps of her left arm. His voice was soft and soothing, his touch tender and supportive. “You can do this,” he told her. “You’ll never be alone in this. The Vatican is behind you. And believe me; I don’t think the United States government will want to take on the Roman Catholic Church. Do you?”

“But why? Why come after me?”

He released her arm and placed a hand on top of the PC. “I guess that’s what we’re about to find out.”

A distant chime, hardly perceptible, the incessant ringing finally gaining strength and awakening Pappandopolous from a dream that he forgot the moment he opened his eyes. Slowly, and awkwardly, he grabbed the receiver and placed it against his ear. The digital clock read 3:49 a.m. “What?”

“It’s Judas.”

Pappandopolous propped himself on his elbow. “This isn’t a secured line. You should have waited until tomorrow.”

“Don’t be paranoid. Nobody’s tapping your line.”

“Do you know what time it is?”

“Shut up and listen,” he demanded. “Have you ever heard the name Kimball Hayden?”

“No… never.”

“The name Kimball Hayden is synonymous with a ‘one-man wrecking machine.’”

“Why are you telling me this?” Pappandopolous lay back down on the pillow.

“I’m telling you this because he just took out half of Omega Team by himself… And Dark Lord is dead.”

Pappandopolous was back onto an elbow. “What about Cohen and the disc?”

“She’s very much alive and still in possession of the CD.”

“Why is this Hayden guy in the picture anyway? Who is he?”

“He’s bad news.”

Pappandopolous sat up on the edge of the bed. The bottoms of his feet touched the cold, hardwood floor. “Use whatever is left of Omega Team to get that CD. And don’t fail me again, Judas. Managing the ground troops in this matter is your responsibility.”

“I know my responsibility,” he stated defensively. “But nobody expected Kimball Hayden to be involved.”

“How much of a problem can one man be?”

Judas shook his head. It must be nice to be stupid and ignorant at the same time, he thought. If you knew Kimball Hayden, then you would know he was more than just one man. “A lot,” he finally said.

Pappandopolous sighed in obvious frustration. “You know what you have to do.” He stared briefly at the receiver before placing it back onto its cradle. For the rest of the night sleep eluded him. He lay there wondering why the cause was teetering on the balance, when it seemed to work without deficiency on paper. The answer simply escaped him. He didn’t know the name Kimball Hayden or the danger he presented.

Expelling a long, drawn out sigh, Pappandopolous picked up the phone and dialed another unsecured line. “Mr. Obadiah? George Pappandopolous. I’m afraid I have some bad news,” he said. And then he began to explain in earnest.

The PC was cracked and not in good shape. The monitor came on, but the unit did not fire up. Working his knife blade into a seam on the computer case, Kimball was able to force the CD tray from the plastic cabinet.

After extracting the CD, he held it up. “Bingo.”

Shari took the disc from Kimball. “I hope it’s not damaged,” she said, sensing something of a loss. “Everything was on this CD.”

“What about backup files?”

“Nothing,” she said. “Whatever is sent to us by colluding agencies is copied then deleted for fear that the information might be hacked by foreign entities. This is the only hard copy available.”

“Isn’t it standard policy to make more than one copy?”

“If the information is classified and graded for high level — always. And per protocol we did burn a backup CD that had been placed in the vault. But it was either improperly burned or the disc was appropriated and replaced with a bogus one. I’m not sure which. But when my people get a chance, they’ll look into it.”

“Then re-contact the source.”

She shook her head. “I did. But Mossad resent the information minus the encryptions,” she told him. “When I contacted their director, I got nothing but excuses and denials. And since the original CD was not classified as important due to it being labeled as dossiers, it wasn’t copied since dossiers can be copied anytime. Mossad knew that when I contacted them.” Shari looked at the disc. “This CD is unique, Kimball. Any information that came with it may be lost.”

Kimball laid a hand on the broken computer. “Is there any way you can take information from what’s left on the PC?”

She surveyed the large hole broken into the side of the machine. The circuit boards inside were clearly cracked. “Maybe, but I doubt it.” She pointed to a circuit board inside the computer. “The memory board is busted. All we can do is hope that the CD wasn’t damaged.”

She fell back into the couch and tried to keep her chin from quivering and her eyes from welling, but the stress became overpowering. In a sudden mood shift that took her from being totally composed to a totally fragile state of mind, Shari broke, which shocked Kimball.

“And what the hell are we going to do with him?” she said, pointing to the body. “We can’t leave him here, you know!” And she quickly cracked, almost without warning as her hands flew to her face.

Kimball was at a sudden loss. He was never one to provide emotional comfort with a hug or cooing words. To him, showing emotion was somehow a vulgar display. Nevertheless, he took the seat beside her. “Ms. Cohen, I need you to be at your best,” he said. “I’ll take care of the body, but we need to take care of business.”

She turned to him, tears streaming down her cheeks. “You’re expecting me to conduct business as usual knowing that the most powerful man on this planet has just sent his goon squad to kill me?”

“We’re only guessing that Shady Tippet may be from the Force Elite,” he said. “This really doesn’t make sense since the president wants you to find information regarding the Soldiers of Islam. So why send somebody after you when you’re making progress? Because on one hand, we know that the principal of Israeli’s Defense Attaché was resistant to your efforts — at least to a degree — which may mean that he had more motive than anybody else. But on the other hand, it doesn’t make sense that Shady would leave the umbrella shield of the Force Elite to join a league attached to Mossad. He wouldn’t work as a mercenary for foreign liaisons after fighting against them for so many years.”

“So what you’re saying is you really don’t know where he comes from?”

“I can only tell you where he came from. Right now the pieces of the puzzle aren’t fitting properly. Maybe the Force Elite folded or maybe the stove got too hot in the political kitchen for the White House to keep it going, forcing him to apply his skills elsewhere.”

For a moment she said nothing, then, “I’m scared, Kimball. I’m really scared.”

“I know,” he said. “The fear comes from not knowing who or what is out there.”

She placed a hand on his forearm. “Have you ever been afraid, Kimball? I mean, really afraid?”

Kimball appeared wounded by the question. “I’m afraid every day of my life,” he admitted. “I barely sleep because I’m afraid of what I see in my dreams. I’m afraid because of the horrible things I’ve done in the past. And I’m afraid that on Judgment Day He’s going to turn me away… I’m afraid of not knowing.”

She squeezed his forearm. “You’re a good man, Kimball Hayden. Whatever darkness you inherited from your past is gone… I can see the light in your eyes.”

Kimball doubted her, but nodded his appreciation regardless. “We can beat this,” he told her. “But I need you to keep on doing what the president has asked.”

“Kimball, we’re right where we started. We’re at squat. The information may be totally lost.”

“Did you download the CD into the PC?”

“It was the first thing I did after putting the girls to bed.”

“Then perhaps we’re not at squat after all,” he said.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He remembered the Logger placed to the circuitry by Leviticus. “It means that an opportunity may still exist, after all.”

She gave him a dumbfounded stare.

Team Leader fumed after finding out that Omega Team failed in its task to remove the target. There was no doubt Yahweh would be displeased. But even more so, his international constituencies would grow increasingly uneasy knowing that slight bumps in the road were forming into formidable knolls.

The name Kimball Hayden meant nothing to Team Leader. But apparently it threw tremors into Judas. If this man Kimball Hayden posed a threat to the cause, Team Leader would apply his own skill set as an elite killer to take out Ms. Cohen’s champion.

Fail me one more time, Judas, and I’ll run my own blade across your throat as testament to your repeated failures, so that everyone can see that failing is not an option.

He turned the cargo truck onto the New Jersey Turnpike, his anger lasting until he arrived in Boston.