The Cleric's Vault (4 page)

Chapter 6

Atlanta, GA

Professor
Terrance Nichols never had a chance.
 

Dark
crimson oozed down the hole in the front corner of his drooped head, a
splattering of it decorated the thin carpet on the other side.
 

His
body still sat in his desk chair in front of a computer monitor.
 
The screen was on, casting an eerie
glow in the dark laboratory.
 
Tommy
surveyed the scene in shock.

Crime
scene investigators were all over the place working busily to gather any
fragments of evidence they could.
  
Others were taking pictures with their digital cameras trying to piece
together the event.
 
Police tape
lined the doors and walls of the laboratory.
 

“Looks
like it happened this morning,” Will said standing slightly behind Tommy.
 
“We’re doing everything we can to find
out who did this and why.”

Tommy
could only muster a slight nod.
 

“Tommy.
 
We need your help here.
 
You were friends with Nichols.
 
Do you have any idea why anyone would
do something like this?”

Inside,
Tommy wondered.
 
Surely it wasn’t
happening again.
 
Professor
Borringer had been murdered because Tommy had gotten him involved.
 
What had originally been a simple favor
of translating some ancient text had gotten Borringer murdered.
 
Was Nichols the second?

Will
broke his thoughts.
 
“Tommy, had
you been working with Dr. Nichols on anything lately?”

Tommy
snapped back to the moment and nodded.
 
“Yeah,” he began sullenly.
 
“I brought him a copy of the stone disc we found a few weeks ago.
 
There was a code on the back of it, a
sequence of letters and symbols unlike anything I’ve ever seen before.
 
Terrance told me he had some software
that he believed could decipher the meaning of sequence.”

“Is
there anyone else that knows that you were working on this with him?”

“No.”
 
Tommy shook his head.
 
“Sean knows, but he is in Las Vegas.”

“He’s
the only other one?
 
McElroy
doesn’t know?”

Joe
McElroy had been instrumental in the discovery of the first chamber.
 
His knowledge of ancient Native
American history was staggering and had actually surprised Tommy at first.
 
He’d been shot during the events
leading up to the discovery and was taking a little time off to recover.
 
Tommy was going to offer McElroy a job
with IAA as soon as he felt better.
 
They could use a person with his level of learning.
 
But Joe wasn’t aware that Tommy had
been in contact with Dr. Nichols.

“No.
 
He doesn’t know.
 
He’s been taking it easy the last few
weeks.
 
Pretty sure his wife won’t
let him leave the house either.”

Will
chuckled slightly at the thought.

Tommy’s
face was filled with regret.
 
He
somehow felt responsible for the death of his friend.
 
Then it changed to curiosity.
 
“Do you know what was on the computer?”

Will
shook his head.
 
“Not yet.
 
We have been trying to get the scene
swept and make sure there is nothing we missed.
 
You think whatever they were looking for might be on the
hard drive?”

A
group of men in sterile-looking outfits gently removed the body from the chair
and placed it in an ordinary coroner’s bag.
 
Tommy watched as the men carefully zipped the cocoon closed.

“Probably.
 
Have you already done what you need to
do to the area?”
 
He looked at Will
blankly.

“You
want to take a look, don’t you?”
 
Will seemed apprehensive.

“It’s
my fault Terrance is dead.
 
I need
to know what he died for.”

Chapter 7

Las Vegas, Nevada

Emily
cast Wyatt a worried glance.
 
“Whoever that is, isn’t with me” she hissed.
 
The fumbling noise at the door continued.

Sean
stepped close to her and whispered in her ear, “Take off your clothes.”

“Excuse
me?”
 
She looked incredulous.
 

“Trust
me.
 
Just do it.
 
Hurry up.”
 
Sean said and undid the buttons on her blouse with a quick
yank.

“You
better know what you’re doing,” she said angrily under her breath.

“Lay
down on the couch there,” he pointed to the sofa.
 
“And try to look sexy.”

She
shot him a sarcastic stare, while she hurriedly finished undressing down to her
black bra and underwear, a move that only took her a few seconds with the
outfit she wore.
 
Then she laid
down on the couch, propping her head up on her hand in an effort to look casual
yet alluring.

Sean
had slipped over to the dresser and removed his gun from the drawer and taken
up a position in the corner near the bed.
 
He would be out of the intruders’ sight until they moved beyond the wall
that separated the bedroom from the foyer and bathroom.
 
Whoever was entering the room would
first see a half-naked woman before they would catch a glimpse of his hiding
place.
 
He hoped that moment of
distraction would give him the advantage.

The
sound of the door opening echoed through the room.
 
Sean held his breath.
 
He couldn’t see Emily from his crouching position but imagined she was
struggling to stay calm.
 
She’d
been a great agent but sometimes fieldwork wasn’t her forte.

For
a moment, there was no sign of the intruder.
 
They were probably checking the bathroom first.
 
Then, Emily’s voice interrupted the
tense silence.
 
“Come in,” she said
seductively.

The
man stepped into view wearing a tight, long-sleeved black shirt and matching
pants.
 
He looked like he was in
his mid-thirties.

In
his hand he carried a Glock with a sound suppressor attached, which he lowered
slightly at the sight of the nearly-naked middle-aged woman on the sofa.

Sean
squeezed the trigger twice, sending two rounds into the left side of the man’s
chest.
 
The intruder gasped as he
fell against the wall and crumpled on the floor.
 
Suddenly, a muffled popping of shots came from behind the
corner creating spider webs of cracked glass through the large window at the
other side of the room and sending Emily diving to the floor in-between the
coffee table and the couch.
 
There
was more than one of them.

*****

James
Collack was sipping a cup of coffee he’d purchased downstairs at The Coffee
Bean when he heard the distant pop of shots being fired.
 
Something had gone wrong.
 
Both of his men had been sent into the
room with silenced weapons.
 
The
sound of normal gunfire meant that the idiots had somehow alerted Wyatt to
their presence.

He
stood from his seat in the Venezia Tower Bridge and straightened his black suit
and tie.

“Do
you hear that?”
 
The female voice
came through his earpiece.

“Yeah, I hear it.”
 
He
paused.
 
“Which is why we planned
for this.”

*****

From his position, Sean couldn’t tell what Emily was doing.
 
She was pinned down on the other side
of the room behind the sofa.
 
Fortunately, she had a little extra cover because the living room
portion of the suite was sunken in, about three steps lower than the bed area.

The
silent pops ceased for a moment.
 

Sean
wasn’t sure if he should move in to attack or wait for the assailant to come
around the corner.

Before
he could decide, three loud retorts pierced through the silence from Emily’s
position.

He
was glad she still had her gun
.

Sean
used the new swath of cover fire to take a chance and go on the offensive.
 
He hoped that her shots had momentarily
thrown the intruder off guard.
 
Deftly, he lurched over to the corner and looked down at Emily.
 
With his hand he motioned for her to
fire another shot in the vicinity where she’d been aiming.
 
She accommodated by popping one more
round into a painting that hung opposite of the bathroom door.
 
As soon as she had, Sean turned the
corner and unleashed two shots of his own at the man crouching by the bathroom
door.
 
The invader never had a
chance.
 
Emily’s shots had done
exactly what Wyatt had hoped.
 
He
didn’t even get his weapon raised before bullets pierced the center of his
chest and lower neck.

The
body slumped to the floor, shocked eyes staring wide at the ceiling as the last
few moments of life slipped away.
 
Sean reached down and found an earpiece on the dead man.
 
He pulled it up to his own ear in time
to hear the instructions, “cover the elevators and the end of the hall.”
 
He turned his attention to Emily who
was already getting her clothes back on.
 
“We have to go.”

She
passed him an understanding glance and slipped on her shoes.
 
Her blouse remained only half buttoned
and now her hair was tousled.
 
As
she reached the railing of the three steps leading to the bed area, she turned
around for a moment.

“Hurry,”
Sean said.

She
reached down and grabbed the glass and finished off the last of the cold drink.

“No
sense in wasting good whiskey,” she said nervously.

He
just shook his head.

“Ok,
what’s the plan?”

“I
just heard on the second guy’s radio that they are covering the end of the hall
and the elevators.
 
I say we go for
the elevators.”

“But
you just said there will be men there.”
 
She looked dubious.

“There’s
only two ways to go from this room.
 
Towards the elevators provides more options of exit.
 
And we’re going to have a fight either
way we go.”

He had a point
.

She
gave a quick nod.

Sean
stepped to the door quickly and eased it open, taking a quick glance at the
immediate setting in front of his room.
 
Then, leading with his gun, he aimed first down the hall to the right
towards the elevators and then to the left.
 
Closed doors lined the vast, empty hallway.
  

“Clear
both ways.
 
I’ll cover you,” he
said.
 
“Go.”

She
ducked underneath him as he continued looking both directions and darted across
the hall to a doorway about two rooms down.
 
He did the same and wedged in a portal across the hall from
her.
 
A muffled shot came from the
other end of the hall, tearing into the wall next to Sean.
 
Seconds later, a barrage of more rounds
were sent their way.

Emily
tucked into the doorway as far as possible.
 
Fortunately, they’d chosen a spot where the walls jutted out
slightly, perhaps for load bearing.
 
But that little extra construction provided them safe refuge for the
moment.

Sean
peeked around the corner and sent a volley of three shots back down the hall,
sending the four men at the other end, reeling behind the corner.
 
He looked back towards the
elevators.
 
Nothing yet.
 

She
saw him flick his head to move and obeyed while he fired two more shots.
 
Sean gave a quick glance back to make
sure Emily had made it to the roundabout where the elevators met four
dispersing hallways.
 
She kept her
gun trained into the large area and motioned for him to continue.

Why weren’t the men at the end shooting?
 
He didn’t have time to ponder and took off, letting one more shot
loose into the vacant hallway behind him as he sprinted into the intersecting
hall.

Sean
quickly slid a new magazine into his gun.

“You
always carry extra ammo on vacation?” she said sarcastically.

He
ignored the cynicism and pointed straight ahead beyond a circular, vinyl couch.

“Tower
bridge,” he ordered.
 
Just as he
did, an elevator dinged.
 
“I don’t
think that’s our ride,” he said.

*****

Angela
Weaver stood against the wall calmly holding her Glock with both hands.
 
The new box-style sound suppressor
looked bulky but was actually quite light.

She’d
ordered her four men to flush Wyatt out of his hotel room and down the hall
towards Venezia Tower.
 
If they got lucky and made the kill?
 
Bonus.
 
She hadn’t expected that, though.
 
Not from these mercenaries.
 
She’d also not expected the woman who accompanied
Wyatt.
 
The face seemed familiar,
but she couldn’t’ place it.
 
Of
course, in the confusion, one of the four men had taken a bullet to the leg and
was writhing in agony.
 
Blood
trickled from his thigh.
 

Professional killers?
 
Barely.

“Can
you walk?” she asked, coldly.

The
man shook his head while he clutched the wound.
 
“I don’t think so.”

She
lowered her weapon and squeezed the trigger, sending a bullet into the man’s
head.
 
The body went limp as the
other three looked on without emotion.
 
“Don’t get shot,” she said plainly.
 
“I don’t pay you to stop bullets.”

The
others nodded grimly.

The
elevator doors began to open as Sean and Emily jolted across the room and two
men in similar attire to the ones from before stepped out with weapons raised.
 
Slightly surprised to see their targets
so soon, they only got off a few wild shots as Sean and Emily fired first,
pounding them with several rounds.
 
One man dropped to the floor while the other slinked back into the
elevator.

The
doors closed quickly, something that had irritated Sean on a few occasions
during his stay.
 
This time,
though, he was grateful as it bought them a few extra moments to clear the
circular room and get into the tower bridge.
 
He scooped up the fallen enemy’s handgun and kept moving.

As
they turned a corner and entered the skyway at a full sprint, it was then he
realized why the attack thus far had been somewhat half-assed.
 
At the other end of the corridor stood
a tall, young-looking man in a black suit and tie with four other men dressed
in the matching long-sleeved shirts and black pants, all holding guns aimed in
their direction.
 
Three of the men
were standing, two others crouched down on one knee, poised to fire.
 
They were being herded to a place with
no escape.