Veil of Civility

Chapter Seventy-Seven

After going to ground for two days, Declan had finally been able to make his way out of the United States with the help of Fintan McGuire. With both the media and the law enforcement communities completely occupied by the foiled hostage crisis and the fear of other attempts around the country, Declan had been able to slip away undetected. Now as Fintan's Embraer Legacy 500 banked sharply to the left, he looked down on the mid-sized Irish town of Sligo, the crisp, navy blue waters of Ballysadare Bay and the North Atlantic Ocean beyond as the plane began its final approach from the east. Once the plane straightened out and descended, it bounced forcefully onto the runway and the engines screamed as they reversed to slow the corporate jet. Declan could see a line of four black Range Rovers waiting just off the runway, and as the craft taxied to a stop, the vehicles moved forward.

The cockpit door opened and the captain walked out. Declan stood as the man smiled and nodded at him and continued on towards the plane's rear exit. When the captain had opened the door and lowered the plane's wheelchair ramp, Declan thanked him, and descended to the pavement where the grouping of Range Rovers was now waiting.

"There's my old son," Fintan said with a huge smile, as Dean Lynch opened the rear door of one of the Range Rovers and the mop-haired entrepreneur exited the vehicle on his forearm crutches.

"What's all this?" Declan asked, as Fintan arrived at the edge of the ramp.

"You can't do everything you've done in the last week and a half and not expect a bit of a fanfare, mate," Fintan said, as the doors to several of the Range Rovers opened and people began to step out. Declan scanned the gathering group with a smile as Lord Dennis Allardyce, Tom Gordon and Shane O'Reilly arrived at the ramp. Declan smiled the biggest at the sight of Shane hobbling along on a set of crutches. "Now you two can have a race," he said, nodding towards Fintan.

"The hell with that, and these things, too," Shane said, in mock anger.

"Well done, Mr. McIver, very well done indeed," Lord Allardyce said, as he extended his hand and slapped Declan on the shoulder like a father would a son. "A lot of people are going to be very grateful when the dust settles and everything that's happened is revealed in its entirety."

Declan smiled. "I'll settle for a glass of iced tea and no one shooting at me for a while."

He looked past the small group at the sound of more doors opening and closing. Altair Nazari and Okan Osman exited the third Range Rover in the row of four.

"Now, here's two guys I didn't think I would see again for quite a while," he said, as the two approached and they all shook hands. "I thought you'd both be laid up on a beach in Eilat soaking up the sun and drinking martinis."

"And we will be, very soon," Osman said with a laugh. "We just had to make a brief pit stop first." He nodded in the direction of the Range Rover they'd just gotten out of. A tall man with thinning gray hair and a chubby face had left the SUV and was walking towards them.

"Prime Minister," Declan said as Asher Harel arrived and they shook hands firmly.

"Our meeting at airports is becoming a habit, Mr. McIver. I'm glad this time it's under better circumstances," the aged Israeli said.

"Yes sir. So am I."

"I don't want to bring your reunion to a halt, but there's a lot that needs to be discussed. Have you heard the latest news out of the United States?"

Declan shook his head. "No, sir. I've been in the air until just a little while ago. We made a two hour stop in Reykjavik, but I never left the plane."

Harel nodded. "The story developing out of the United States is quite frankly bizarre, to say the least. Senator David Kemiss has apparently committed suicide after meeting with a television reporter." Harel continued to catch Declan up on all of the claims Kemiss had made in the interview that was now being played throughout the world's major media.

"That lyin' bogtrotter," Shane said, when Harel had finished. "He actually took credit for what Declan and your men did?"

Declan grimaced as the Senator's statements from two nights prior flashed through his mind. Had Kemiss really had a partner? If so, was the man Kemiss had identified a further danger or had the events in Virginia been the culmination of his threats? At the time Declan had thought it was all just another desperate attempt by Kemiss to keep people from learning the truth, but now he wasn't so sure.

"I guess my point is," Harel continued, when no one else spoke, "that while your actions certainly saved a lot of lives, it doesn't seem to have done much to end the manhunt for you. You're still very much a wanted man."

Declan nodded. "Maybe this will help," he said, as he withdrew a red flash drive from his coat pocket. "It's the confession Kemiss gave us at his house the other night, the confession that led us to Baktayev. That should help the authorities piece everything together if we can get it into the right hands."

Harel took the drive and turned it over in his hand for a moment. "I'm sure it will. I'll make some calls to my contacts in Washington right away and a copy of this will be in the President's hands by tomorrow morning."

"That will certainly help in the long term," Allardyce said, "but we need to worry about the short term."

"Lynch and I are returning to Dublin as soon as we're done here," Fintan said. "Mullaghmore is your home for as long as you need. I would think you and the missus will be plenty safe there."

"Aye, that's grand," Declan said, "but what we'd really like is to go home, back to our old lives before all of this happened."

"I'm afraid," Lord Allardyce said, "that that is the one thing nobody can give you."

Everyone looked up at the aged aristocrat.

"The cat is out of the bag, as the Americans say," he continued. "Even if, God willing, the truth is discovered among all of the obfuscation Kemiss has put out, the media will not soon forget what they've learned about you. There's a new ripple in their reality and I don't think their fascination with it will go away for quite some time."

"You're saying that even when I'm proven innocent, the stigma of my past isn't going to leave us alone, that we can't return to the way things were, no matter what?"

Allardyce nodded. "I'm afraid that's exactly what I'm saying. While I believe your heroic actions in having brought this terrible plan to a happy ending will play very well for us all in the eyes of the government, I don't think the same can be said for your friends and business associates. Even if you're completely exonerated, and I'm certain you will be, what's their reaction going to be to all of this, to the news that you're a Russian trained terrorist that can probably kill them in more ways with a plastic fork than they can ever imagine?"

Declan shook his head and smiled. "I don't know. When you put it like that, I guess I don't see us getting many trick-or-treaters for the next few years."

The group of men laughed. In all honesty, Declan really didn't care how other people looked at him right now. There was no going back to undo past mistakes and if he'd learned one thing throughout the last week and a half, it was that every cloud had a silver lining. His training had saved both his and Constance's lives, in addition to hundreds of others, and he was confident that they would move on, together, and rebuild their lives.

He looked around the group towards the SUVs.

"We didn't tell her you were coming in, old son," Fintan said. "With the covert nature of your movements, we thought it wouldn't be very nice to get her hopes up in case we had to stash you away again or something."

Declan nodded.

"That's Mr. Hogan," Fintan said pointing to an older gentleman in the driver's seat of the fourth Range Rover. "He's the head of the staff at the estate and he'll take you home or to anywhere else you want to go. I'm sure your missus will be pleasantly surprised when you roll up to the front door."

As the black Range Rover made a sharp turn onto a roughly paved driveway and waited for a set of wrought iron gates supported by two stone columns to open, Declan finally felt as though he could stop running. In decades past the two-hundred year old estate he was entering had been a safe haven and he hoped it could remain that way for a while longer.

The SUV pulled through the gates and rumbled up the driveway past three large cottages until it arrived in the motor court of a three story stone house, its walls covered in dark green ivy. "All set then, Mr. McIver?" Alan Hogan said, as he left the driver's side and opened the rear door.

"Grand," Declan said, as he took hold of a small duffel bag and exited the vehicle.

The heavy wooden door of the house opened with a thunk and Constance startled both of them as she rushed out of the doorway. Declan dropped the duffel bag as she threw herself at him in a wide embrace, her long auburn hair spilling over his head as he lifted her off the ground. After rubbing his face and kissing him several times she said, "Hi," with a sheepish grin.

"Hi," he said, as he put her down and beamed at her. "Did you miss me much?"

She gave a small, nervous laugh and stood beside him as a portly woman in a white apron appeared in the doorway.

"Good evening, dear," Alan Hogan said, as he picked up Declan's duffel bag and moved to where his wife stood in the doorway. He gave the rosy faced woman a quick peck on the cheek and said, "It'll be grand to have a family around again, won't it?"

Inside, Declan and Constance followed the Hogans through the home's elegant foyer and into a large den where three brown leather sofas stood around a fireplace. A green area rug with multiple colors and designs woven into it covered the stone floor and it was obvious that the home had been unoccupied for quite some time. The surfaces near the fireplace and the window sills had been recently cleaned but the haste of the job was evident in the streaks made by the cleaners as they'd done the best they could in short notice.

Declan looked around the room as memories came rushing back at him. This house had once belonged to Eamon McGuire and he had used it as a base of operations for the Black Shuck team. Though it had at one time been the closest thing Declan had to a home as a young adult, he hadn't returned in many years. The last time he had seen the house was the night that he and Shane had discovered the murdered bodies of their teammates and officer commanding.

Declan walked to one of the wide windows beside the fireplace. He looked out over the expansive Irish countryside for a moment before turning back. Constance held her hand out and as he reached out and took hold of it, she pulled him into a tight embrace.

"Dinner's at eight, sir," Alan Hogan said, as he and his wife left the room, closing the door behind them.

"There are still a lot of things coming down the pipe at us," Declan said, returning Constance's embrace. "I wish I could say that it's all one hundred percent over and done with, but there's still going to be a lot of questions that need answering."

"I don't care about any of that right now. I only care about the fact that you're here with me and that we're both safe. Tomorrow we'll do whatever we have to, but tonight, right now, I just want to enjoy a few moments with you, alone."

Declan smiled. "Aye, that sounds grand. You know," he said, as he motioned out the window to the east where the last rays of the sun were shining on the rolling hills Ireland was so famous for, "I was born in a farmhouse just sixty miles from here."

"Funny you should mention being born," Constance said.

He looked back at her suddenly, suspicion rising in him and giving way to excitement as he saw her small smile get wider.

"I'm pregnant," she said. "You're going to be a father."

Ian Graham was born in New Hampshire on July 4th, the third generation of his family to share a birthday with the United States of America. His three main interests have always been politics, religion and history. The stories and characters he writes about are centered on the explosive conflicts created when the three intersect.

His writing has previously appeared in Action Pulse Pounding Tales Volumes 1 & 2 alongside best selling thriller authors Matt Hilton, Stephen Leather, Adrian Magson, and Zoe Sharpe. He lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains of the eastern United States with his wife and two daughters.