American Heroes Series - 01 - Resurrection (41 page)

Ethan’s lips twitched with a smile. “And you think I had something to do with it?”

“I didn’t say you did. But I want to know what happened with that woman in the interrogation room.”

Ethan crossed his powerful arms, averting his gaze as he thought of what to tell J.D. “I didn’t tell her to murder the cardinal,” he said. “You’ve known me a long time. I would hope you would know me better than that.”

J.D. nodded after a moment. “I do,” he said. “But I still want to know what went on after I left.”

Ethan looked at him a moment before leaning over and whispering something in his ear.  J.D. closed his eyes tightly as Ethan straightened up and walked away, heading towards the ambulance where Christophe and Olivia were now laughing. J.D. opened his eyes and watched the man as he moved towards the rescue vehicle.

“Oh, Jesus,” J.D. muttered. “Ethan, please tell me you didn’t.”

I took it all off….

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

Their flight out of Rome was delayed by two hours due to bad weather. Seated in the AirFrance terminal on a stormy afternoon, J.D. was already snoring in one of the seats while Christophe, Olivia and Tyler played Gin Rummy a few seats down from him.  Christophe was betting his chocolate candies against Tyler’s red-hot jelly beans and Tyler seemed to be winning. Olivia was wise enough not to bet, but she wasn’t beyond eating Christophe’s chocolate candies when he wasn’t looking.

Ethan and Cydney sat together opposite the kids and Christophe; she was reading a book, her feet draped over the arm rest and into Ethan’s lap while he gently rubbed her feet.  He was watching Olivia and Tyler as they stole all of Christophe’s candy.

“They’re going to be wired up on sugar for the flight,” he commented.

Cydney looked up from her romance novel. “Huh?” she noticed where he was looking. “Oh, right. But I think Olivia might actually sleep; she hasn’t slept very well the past couple of nights. I think she just needs to get out of Rome and away from everything that’s happened here. Then she can relax.”

He looked at her. “How does she seem to you?”

Cydney closed the book. “All right,” she shrugged. “Tough, like it doesn’t really matter when we all know it does. But you know what I think bothers her the most? The death of Joe. That really seems to upset her.”

Ethan nodded, his gaze moving back to the young lady seated with his son. She was dressed in new clothes her mom had bought her and brand new shoes from Ethan.  Her hair was in a ponytail high on top of her head and she acted and laughed just like any other normal American teenager, not like a girl who had spent the past week in fear of her life. Tyler seemed particularly attentive to her which had Cydney’s motherly intuition in overdrive. Ethan convinced her that it was just natural brotherly instincts; Mr. Fun Bags had been a complete gentleman.

“From what Olivia said, Joe was more of an ally than a kidnapper,” he commented. “She related to him and a bond was forged. So to her, it’s like losing a friend. It’s all very psychologically explainable.”

“Maybe,” Cydney said.  Then her attention shifted to Ethan. “And you? How are you feeling about all of this?”

He looked down at her pretty feet as his hands rubbed at the flesh. “I’ve got a bruise the size of a softball on my gut from that hit I took to the Kevlar.”

“I know; I saw it. But that’s not what I meant.”

“I know what you meant.” He looked at her. “I feel okay, I guess. We got Olivia back and that’s the main thing. But the Robe is still missing and I don’t think we’ll ever get it back. It’s weird, but I feel a strange sense of personal loss. I can’t begin to describe it.”

Cydney sighed faintly. “It wasn’t in the Cardinal’s offices when they were searched after his murder. It’s like it just vanished.”

Ethan nodded with resignation. “We’re going to have to go back to Square One and start from scratch. We’ve got agents in the Vatican interviewing some people that we’ve been allowed access to. But, being the Vatican, we’ve got to go through their security for everything. I just don’t know how far we’re going to get. We may never find the thing.”

He seemed genuinely distressed and Cydney reached out, grasping his hand.  He lifted her fingers to his lips and kissed them.

“You’ll figure it out,” she said softly. “Meanwhile, we go home. I go back to work, you go back to work, and….”

“And we get married,” he reminded her

She smiled. “I hope you don’t mind that I don’t want anything big. I’d be happy going to the County Clerk’s office.  To me, it’s more about who I’m marrying, not how I marry him. I don’t need a big splashy wedding.  I just need you.”

He smiled at her and kissed her fingers again. “You’ve got me forever.”

She returned his smile, distracted from their warm moment when Christophe figured out that the kids were cheating. He threatened Tyler, who leapt over the seat back and went to hide behind the snoring J.D.. Olivia just sat there and laughed. Cydney grinned at the antics while Ethan just shook his head.

“I’m raising a card sharp,” he said, lifting her feet off his lap and standing up. “I’ll be right back.”

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“Les toilettes,” he told her.

She blew him a kiss and he was off, making his way out of the seating area and into the main hallway crowded with people. The restrooms were about half way down the terminal, across from a couple of gift shops and a coffee house.  Just as he was nearing them, a figure suddenly bumped into him and he turned, irritably, to find himself gazing into gaudy raccoon-made up eyes.

Shocked, Ethan realized he was looking at Coral. He instinctively reached out and grabbed her.

“What in the hell are you doing here?” he couldn’t think of anything else to say.

Coral smiled at him. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

“Waiting for…?” he shook his head, perplexed. “What are you talking about? How did you know I was here?”

Coral was dressed in a white pant suit with a bright yellow shirt.  With her big white hat and bug-eyed sunglasses, she looked like another tourist just passing through. She suddenly thrust a backpack at him and Ethan scrambled to catch it.

“This is for you,” she said simply.

Ethan was deeply confused.  He looked at the backpack warily and tried to hand it back to her. “Coral, I can’t accept….”

She was already walking away from him. “Take it,” she commanded softly. “It’s what you’ve been looking for. Now you have it. And I … I am truly free.”

His confusion didn’t ease. “What?”

She paused and turned to him. “You did me a favor,” she said softly. “When you rescued Olivia, you really did me a huge favor.”

“I don’t get it.”

She lowered her glasses, peering at him from over the top of the rims. “You got rid of Nat and Joe. So I did something for you. And now you have your Robe. Good day, Special Agent Serreaux.”

He watched her disappear into the crowds of travelers, a slight woman in a brilliant white suit.  Stunned by her abrupt appearance and disappearance, Ethan gazed down at the black backpack. After a moment, curiosity demanded he open it.  Shifting his grip, he unzipped the bag.

The faded, brittle material of The Lucius Robe came into view.  Shocked, Ethan zipped the bag up and stood there a moment, his heart racing.  Although he’d risked his integrity to persuade her to return to Wildegrav and find the Robe, he never actually believed she would do it. But here it was, something of such religious and historical significance that he could hardly believe he actually had it.  But the proof was in his hands.     

“
Enfin, c'est arrière où il appartient
,” he murmured.

Odd; he didn’t know why he uttered those words, only that they seemed appropriate. They were accompanied by a weird sense if déjà vu, something he had a hell of a time shaking off.  But something deep inside him demanded he utter those few words. Like the closure of a book or the end of a great quest, those words signified the end of something.  Like a curtain closing, he felt it. It was finally over.

Ethan’s thoughts shifted from the Robe and back to Coral. He thought he’d seen the last of her and, consequently, the Robe.  But she had done as he’d asked; she’d retrieved the Robe.  As Ethan had told her during his private interrogation, she was the only person in the world that could have gotten into Wildegrav’s offices without suspicion. Who would have suspected the scatter-brained televangelist to be capable of such cunning and deceit? And, as he suspected, of murder. 

Whatever she did to Wildegrav had been on her own.  Even if she was guilty for the murder of the Cardinal, Ethan wouldn’t turn her in. From what Olivia had told him about Wildegrav, the man was evil to the bone. Perhaps what Coral dispensed was justice. Perhaps she had done the world a favor. Ethan considered the score even.

Cydney nearly had a heart attack when he handed her the backpack with the Robe in it.  Ethan told her the truth about how he had gotten it back, although J.D. had suspicions that it wasn’t the entire story. Still, he never voiced his reserve. The return of The Lucius Robe was something he would have to chalk up to one of Life’s great mysteries even though it was evident that Ethan knew more than he was telling.  J.D. would let the man have his secrets, at least for now.

Later on as the fight from Paris to Los Angeles glided over the dark north Atlantic and everyone was fast asleep, Ethan found himself gazing out of the window and into the moonlit sky.  Cydney’s head was on his chest as he held her, glancing down at her every so often just to watch her sleep. She was so beautiful when she slept.  Next to Cydney, Olivia lay on her mother’s torso, sleeping the sleep of the dead. She was snoring louder than J.D.. Ethan smiled, reaching out to gently touch Olivia’s blond head, grateful that she was finally able to sleep.  He was grateful that she finally felt safe enough to.

But it was impossible for Ethan to sleep at the moment with his thoughts in turmoil.  The Robe, Cydney, Olivia, Coral… all of it was swirling through his mind.  He was relieved that there was closure on so many issues.  But there was still one thing that bothered him, an ominous feeling that he couldn’t seem to shake.

They tooth wasn’t returned with the Robe. It was still out there, somewhere. Either the person who had it didn’t know what, exactly, they had, or there was the more chilling thought that they knew
exactly
what they had. As long as the tooth was still out there, fate unknown, there was always the possibility that someone else might try to finish what Cardinal Wildegrav started. He wondered if Coral had kept it.  Perhaps they would never know.

Eventually, sleep claimed Ethan. When he dreamt, it was of beautiful museum directors and rock stars.

EPILOGUE

As Ethan and his group flew over the north Atlantic, somewhere in Brazil a small plane was landing. A woman in a bright white suit disembarked with two massive suitcases and was shuttled in a Jeep from the small landing field to a heavily-guarded compound about an hour outside of the town of Cuiaba, near the edge of the Amazon Basin. It had been a private flight on an unregistered jet with an unfiled flight plan. 

It was hot, humid and sticky as the woman removed her big white hat and began to fan herself furiously as she emerged from the Jeep.  The sky was brilliant overhead and the scent of flowers filled the early morning air. As the woman stood there and observed her surroundings, an extremely elderly man with thin gray hair emerged from the white-washed ranch house.  He took the steps from the porch slowly, approaching the woman with his hand outstretched.  He greeted her with a sloppy kiss to each cheek.

“So you are here,” he said in a thick Germanic accent. “Your father called and said you were coming. I am so glad you made it.”

“Absolutely,” the woman said enthusiastically. “Thank you for arranging the flight. I knew you could help me.”

The man’s white-blue eyes twinkled. “Indeed I can,” he replied. “Your father told me what you wanted. I must say, I am quite surprised.”

“Really? You shouldn’t be. This should be right up your alley, after all.”

The old man nodded his head. “I have been doing this sort of thing for sixty years.”

“Then you believe you can help me?”

“I know I can. Did you bring it?”

The woman dug around in her massive sack-like purse. After a moment, she pulled out what looked like a ring box and extended it to the elderly man.  He took it and carefully popped open the top.  His pale eyes glittered as he lifted out the contents.

“Ah,” he murmured, studying it. “It’s perfect.”

The woman watched him anxiously. “Are you sure? Do you think you can extract DNA from it?”

“Most likely,” he said. “Come; let’s go inside and out of this hot sun.  We shall speak more of our plans for this remarkable find.”

The elderly man with the heavy German accent put the tooth back inside the ring box.  Coral Chastity Aames, formerly of Southern California’s Izan Enterprises, smiled fondly at her father’s former compatriot as she followed him into the house.

Dr. Aribert Heim was a well-known Nazi war criminal with thousands of hours spent experimenting on humans in the death camps of Buchenwald and Mathausen. He was still a wanted man. He very much had the knowledge to complete one more atrocious experiment. 

He had the Lucius Tooth and he intended to use it.