Sacred Flesh (23 page)

“My regular street contacts have all panned out. No one knows these guys,” Jill says as they sit at a small round table outside a downtown café.

“Just two bit punks holding up people at the airport,” Eric says.

“There’s so much security at the airport. That’s not the best place to hold people up.”

“No, it isn’t that part doesn’t make sense.”

“Unless—,” she says.

“Unless what?” Eric asks.

“Unless they weren’t really punks,” she says with a mysterious look on her face.

“What are you talking about?” Eric says.

“It’s just a theory but what if they weren’t punks but hired guns,” Jill says.

“What?”

“I am thinking Tom Hanson’s daughter looks kind of fishy in this whole thing.”

“How so?” he asks.

“Her role in this is very odd at best. Going to London, getting engaged, her father finding the box hidden in the church, her taking it to London then back again to Boston in an effort to sell it to your mother, something’s not right.”

“Yeah, now that you mention it,” Eric says.

“She has her hands all over the place, why?”

“Yes she does.”

“I’m thinking if we get to her we’re closer to the sample.”

“But she doesn’t have it. She was robbed.”

“Was she really?”

“What are you getting at?” Eric asks.

“I’ve done my homework,” Jill says.

“That’s one of us.”

“Stacy Hanson’s fiancée is currently sitting in a London jail.”

“Really, what for?” Eric asks.

“He is claiming that she sit him up, that he was prepared to sell the sample to agents as of yet unidentified and that at the last moment she switched the sample with an empty box. The London police aren’t buying it but I am,” Jill says.

“Why?”

“If this is true then she’s playing one hell of a game double crossing her own fiancée. She’s going to a lot of trouble to get things to turn out her way. She claims to be a victim but I doubt it. I think our young lady set herself up and your mother too.”

“How?”

“My theory is that she was fully prepared to sell the sample to your mother but something happened, someone else appeared on the scene offering more money.”

“Rome?”

“Maybe, most likely, they would certainly have more money to offer. Now she has to get out of the deal with your mother and make herself look innocence, how better than to hire a couple of punks to hold her up,” Jill says.

“Not punks, more like employees.”

“Exactly, they were working for her.”

“What makes you so sure?” Eric asks.

“I don’t reveal my sources but maybe I will for you. Stacy Hanson’s fiancée had a jail mate who is free now. People often talk while in jail, usually saying more than they realize. I know some people who work there and that lead me to the jail mate. I had a feeling he would try to find Stacy so I found him. Anyway, while together he told him his predicament and the mate agreed to help. They made a jail house deal.”

“A jail house deal.”

“Is there ever any better? So the mate made a deal and once freed began looking for Stacy Hanson. He was there at the airport when the so called ‘robbery’ occurred. He suspected Stacy all along so he tagged the punks to find out who they really are. He got close, lost them, and then got close again, close enough to talk. Of course, they denied everything until he threatened to bring in the police then they admitted it. Stacy Hanson paid them to hold her up take the sample and then return it to her later,” Jill says.

“Wow! What a deal maker.”

“Yeah, she’s good.”

“Well, that’s it there’s no chance that we’ll ever find it if it’s gone to the landfill,” Antone says.

“Then we don’t have anything to worry about, no one will ever find it. Now there will never be any doubt as to the authority of our clone. We can install him as the new Pope. No one will ever know,” Belo says.

“I guess you’re right, no one will be able to question the DNA of our clone.”

“There’s only one problem.”

“I know. We have to find him,” Antone says.

“No, we’ve found him. I received a call this morning from—.”

“Great! Let’s go get him.”

“We can’t,” Belo says.

“Why?” Antone asks.

“Because he’s dying,” he answers.

“If he’s dying then we
have
to get the sample because if it is His then that’s our only hope if our clone dies we will be left with nothing.”

“All is not lost we have some hope. I think I may have found the woman who has the sample,” Belo tells him.

“I’m amazed at what you find. How do you do it?”

“She found
us
although I did make it easy for her.”

“What do you mean?” Antone asks.

“I knew the sample was out there somewhere and that the
Elite
probably were looking for it too. My man behind the scenes informed me that the
Elite
clone mother was in the market for it so we tagged her closely and soon found her source: a young woman greedy and confused enough to accept a more lucrative offer which she did of course, but she had to get out of her deal with
Elite
Clone mother which apparently she did because she claims to have the sample.”

“Great, now we are set.”

“Yes, but there’s only one thing that causes me concern,” Belo says.

“What’s that?”

“She is asking for the money up front.”

“Really? So she thinks she has us does she?” Antone says.

“She has us no question about that and I’m not in the mood to play games. We have no choice but to trust her,” Belo says.

“What if she double crosses us?”

“We just can’t think like that: faith brother faith.”

“I didn’t know we could use faith for such matters,” Antone says.

“I’m going to give her the money,” Belo tells him.

“Where?”

“This is what I meant about playing games I don’t know why she just doesn’t do the deal. She must have people looking for her, nevertheless – the money in cash is to be delivered to three different Post Office Boxes in different locations all within a thirty three mile radius of each other. I guess she figures no one can watch all three at the same time.”

“Sounds as if she’s thought this out,” Antone says.

“Yes, she’s certainly a planning little devil isn’t she? So, she receives the money and then she notifies us of the location of the sample – somewhere nearby. Oh, my stomach hurts,” Belo clutches his mid section.

“The pains again?” Antone asks.

“Yes,” Belo nods.

“She’s rented an apartment, that’s why we’re here to look around,” Jill says.

“Breaking and entering,” Eric says while sitting in Jill’s car.

“The doctor called this morning, Roland is getting worse quickly.”

“Then let’s go,” Eric says.

“Wait a second,” she says.

“What?”

“That’s her car pulling out lets follow and see what she’s up to now.”

They follow her to a local post office with death for Roland lingering in the wings they fear she may just be on a stamp run. “My brother is dying and she’s out there getting stamps this is a waste can’t you get a search warrant or something?”

“It may not be such a waste I have a feeling she’s not just getting stamps.”

“How so?” Eric asks.

“Well, look there she is coming out with a package, that isn’t just stamps.”

“Cookies from her Aunt.”

“I doubt it, my sixth sense is sending up some red flags,” she says.

“Why?’

“She’s receiving a package for what? An exchange, an exchange but for what? The sample maybe. This could very well mean we’re too late. She’s sold the sample already,” Jill says.

“This is useless. We should just go back and see Roland before he dies.”

“We have it!” Belo says, feeling better having recovered from the recent onslaught of stomach pain and returned to the hotel room. He walks around quickly, having always prided himself that despite having turned grey and bald early in life he can still conjure up a quick and resourceful spring in his step.

“We do?” Antone asks.

“Well, almost, it’s as good as ours the DNA sacred flesh sample of the Lord Himself!”

“She came through then?”

“Yes, she has all of her money and she has left us instructions as to the location of the sample. It’s ours finally. We just have to pick it up,” Belo says.

“If it’s there and if it’s really His.”

“Sure it’s there, of course it’s there, it has to be there.”

“Where exactly is there?”

“According to her instructions the sacred flesh sample is in a location within a three mile radius downtown,” Belo tells him.

“Oh that’s easy enough.”

“No, wait there’s more.”

“More?” Antone asks.

“Yes, a location within a three mile radius where we will find it above time and to the right of the cross,” Belo says.

“Well, let’s get going.”

Jill and Eric decide to drive around downtown. Jill tells him it helps her think, she used to do it all the time when she worked for the FBI and had a difficult case.

“This is awful. There’s no hope here we’ve lost it. The game is up now what am I going to do?” Eric says.

“I can talk to some people and bring her in for questioning,” Jill says.

“That’s just grabbing at straws she’s not going to admit to anything. We have no proof of anything anyway. It’s gone, the whole thing is gone,” Eric says.

“I can at least try,” she says.

“Do what you want. I’m going back to the hospital.”

“The hospital is right here downtown,” she says.

“Before I go up to see my brother and say goodbye I’m going to stop by the chapel downstairs, it seems appropriate to pray at a time like this.”

“Yes, I guess it does,” she says while pulling the car into the hospital parking lot.

“Above time and to the right of the cross, that’s got to be a church and there’s no churches within a three mile radius downtown. She lied to you. Can’t you see that? She took the money and still has the sample. She’s going to sell it to the
Elite
and collect both ways,” Antone says while sitting in the passenger seat of the car Belo rented.

“Not so fast, you jump to conclusions too rapidly,” Belo says.

“What are you talking about?’ he asks.

“I could be wrong about this but I’ve been to that hospital chapel and if they haven’t changed things around there was one wall that had a clock and a cross on it,” Belo answers.

“And?”

“Above time and to the right of the Cross, don’t you see time is a clock she put the sample box above the clock and on the right side of the cross, come on let’s go it’s as good as ours now!” Belo says as they speed toward the hospital.

“I’ve been praying for so long, do you think it really does any good?” Eric says as they sit in the wooden pews of the hospital chapel.

“That’s an odd statement coming from a young man once destined to lead a world church,” Jill says.

“I’m sure it does but I can’t help it I would do anything if all of this never happened, if we could all just run around and have normal lives. I wish I could do something more for my brother. I feel like I’ve let him down and now I can’t do anything but wait for him to died. I’m completely powerless.”

“None of us have the power we let ourselves believe we do. Listen, it’s easy to talk yourself into depths here, but the fact is you’ve done a lot for Roland and you should be proud of that and thankful for what little time the two of you did have together,” she says.

“Maybe we should go up and see him,” Eric says while looking up to the clock on the wall.

“Sure, why don’t we go up, what are you looking at?” she asks.

“Up there, above the clock, next to the cross, something is hanging on a hook it wasn’t there yesterday when I was in here by myself. I know because I stared at that cross for an hour, there wasn’t anything else on that wall but the clock and the cross. Come on over with me let’s see what it is,” Eric says standing up.

“It looks like a box, maybe somebody forgot it,” she says as they walk over to the wall.

“No, it had to have been put up there on purpose,” he says reaching up and carefully taking it off the hook.

She watches as he brings the small brown metal box up to his face looking at it closely, turning it around and around in his hand for a few moments until she says, “Well, aren’t you going to open it?”