The Constantine Conspiracy (38 page)

“No reason to go back through what I did and didn’t do,” he said without introduction. “And I don’t see much use in defending myself. You all know my loyalty, how hard I work.”

His allies nodded in agreement while the others remained noncommittal. “My momma used to say, ‘The future’s got a blanket over it so nobody can see it.’ That’s how it is with any operation, even one as well-thought-out as the one we just tried. So we failed. Wasn’t the first time, won’t be the last.”

“Failure is not an option!” Mohammed called.

Charbeau glanced quickly at him, then faced the rest of the group again. “I agree with Mr. Mohammed there,” he said. “So that’s why I’m giving up my chance to sit in the head man’s seat. I don’t want it, not today anyway.”

He saw the eyes widen around him, and he paused to let his words sink in, to let them wonder why he wasn’t fighting for the Master’s seat. He glanced at Mohammed, a man he barely knew and liked even less. Almost eighty and in less than tip-top health, Mohammed provided only a temporary solution, an interim to make the shift from Augustine to the next Master. So what if he lived eight to ten years? Charbeau could wait that long. Let the dust settle from Operation Domino, give each person in the room time to reflect, to move past their present disappointment in his efforts.

“So you will refuse the Succession even if the Council offers it to you?” Mohammed asked.

Charbeau almost laughed. He and Mohammed had already agreed to this scenario. He would refuse, hand Constantine’s sword to the Arab, then stand back and wait. For this gesture, Mohammed had offered him two things: first, the payment of the one hundred million that Augustine had promised; and second, the continued role as the chief assassin of the Master, none other than Mohammed himself.

“I will refuse,” Charbeau said, bowing slightly.

“You are gracious,” Mohammed said.

“And you are wise. I pledge my allegiance to you today and I urge the rest of you to do the same.” Charbeau waved his hand over the group and the Council looked to each other, then all eyes shifted to Mohammed, who bowed at them. Then the man moved to the head of the table as Charbeau stepped back. Without another word, Mohammed lifted Constantine’s sword from its perch, hefted it with both hands, and held it aloft. The twelve around him left their seats, strode to the front, and took up places around him. Then they reached toward the sword, touched their hands to its handle.

Charbeau stood and watched, his heart at rest. For the moment he had all he wanted. Plenty of money and a position that allowed him to finish the one job he most wanted to complete. He smiled as Mohammed led the Council in their centuries-old commitment, the one first made nearly two thousand years ago.

“What Caesar declared of Christ will not stand!” The conclave shouted, their fervor strong, their commitment not lessened by their recent failure.

Big deal, Charbeau thought, caring little for the ancient declaration. He had another commitment he’d made, one far more important to him than anything held over for hundreds of years.

Rick Carson and Shannon Bridge, Golden Boy and his Lady. The two of them had made him look the fool and that toasted his onions.

“I’m coming for you and your sweetheart, Carson,” Charbeau almost whispered. “Like Momma always said, ‘When a man starts a job, he ought to finish it.’”

46

R
ick and Shannon sat in an ice cream shop in North Atlanta that Rick had rented for the evening, each of them holding a scoop of gelato in a sugar cone. A horde of media, held at bay by a slew of security personnel, milled about outside. The security team had closed the blinds, giving Shannon and Rick some much-sought privacy. The past three days had created a zoo of publicity, something Rick knew how to handle but Shannon did not.

“Your gelato okay?” Rick asked.

“Better than anything the hospital served.”

“You refused to stay at my house, so it serves you right.”

“Appearances, Rick. Staying in your house might have caused people to jump to certain conclusions. But thanks for visiting me at the hospital.”

“That’s the kind of guy I am.”

They both licked their ice cream. “I’m glad you’re okay,” Rick said. “I really am.”

“I’m glad you’re glad.”

They took another bite of ice cream. “I’m sorry I couldn’t come to your granddad’s funeral today,” Shannon said.

Rick took a deep breath. “No problem. Everything was crazy, media hanging from the trees outside the house, no reason for you to get mixed up in it.”

“You didn’t tell the authorities about your grandfather’s role in the bombing, did you?”

“Nope and nothing about the Conspiracy. Cops wouldn’t have believed me anyway. As far as the police are concerned, you and I are just two of the people who went to pay our respects to Justice Toliver and got hurt in the attack.”

“But you yelled the warning at the graveside. Didn’t they wonder about that?”

“I told them I had a feeling, nothing else, and they had no proof to contradict me.”

“What about the guy they’re accusing?”

“I hate that, but again, who’s going to accept anything I say? Or you either? We have absolutely no evidence it wasn’t him. If I could help the poor guy I would, but I don’t see it, do you?”

She licked her ice cream, then nodded in agreement. “Are you trying to find Charbeau?” she asked.

“I put a crew of private investigators on it, but they’ve come up empty so far and I expect it’ll stay that way. No sign of him in a hospital, at the police department, anywhere. He’s vanished into thin air.”

“You assume he’s alive?”

“No other explanation. He had the helicopter in place, his people on it, just in case he needed it. He’s a smart man.”

“You think he’ll come for you again?”

“It’s possible.”

“He’s afraid you’ll eventually claim your place in the Council.”

“Probably.”

Silence fell between them as they worked on their gelato.

“You know this war isn’t over, don’t you?” Shannon asked, breaking the quiet. “The Conspiracy is still out there.”

“Let’s not worry about that today,” he said.

“We could use a guy like you on our side,” she suggested.

“I finally contacted Tony and Luisa, got them home from Mexico,” Rick said, changing the subject. “And I brought my mom home too. Hired a doctor, around-the-clock staff. Looking back, I think she must have learned at least part of the truth about Pops. That’s when she suffered the psychotic break, about the time Pops found out he had cancer.”

“The cancer probably caused your granddad to press forward with his plans to wipe out the Court.”

“That’s my guess too. Mom and Dad learned something, then Dad set up the clues for me to find if anything happened to him.”

“How’s your mom adjusting?”

“Seems better, calmer, but the doctor says we’ll have to keep a close eye on her.”

“I know you’re happy to have her home.”

“Best thing I’ve done in a while.”

Quiet came to them again, then Shannon asked, “What’s next for you? Movie? Book? Back to the limelight? The celebrity everybody wants to see, talk to?”

Rick leaned over the table, placed his elbows on it. “What if the celebrity doesn’t want the movie, the book? What if he wants to disappear?”

“Don’t you need the money?”

Rick smiled. “Funny thing about that. Pops emptied my accounts, Dad’s too, I discovered. But Mom has over eight hundred million in her name and I’m her guardian per the papers my dad had drawn up when she went into Rolling Hills. If anything happened to him, he set it up for me to become trustee of her affairs.”

“So you can use the money however you see fit.”

“So long as I care for her I’m entitled to living expenses to maintain my lifestyle. Since I already lived a pretty lavish lifestyle, that’s the one by which they measure how I should live now—so long as I provide for Mom as well.”

“So your life doesn’t have to change.”

“Not unless I want it to.”

“Why would you want it to change?”

“For one reason. One person, more accurately.”

“Who’s that?”

“You.”

“Me?”

“None other.”

Shannon held her cone still and slowly shook her head. “We’re still so different, Rick. I wish it wasn’t that way, wish it with my whole heart, but . . .”

A single tear appeared in each of her eyes and Rick wiped them away with a finger.

“I can’t lie about it,” he whispered. “I’d like to believe . . . be able to do that for you, for us, at least give us a chance. But faking it doesn’t count, least I don’t think it does.”

“No, you’re right, it doesn’t. At least you understand that.”

“So we’re at square one.”

Shannon leaned back, lifted her purse from the floor, and set it on the table. “Maybe not,” she said. “But it’s up to you.”

“What do you mean?”

She opened her purse. “I want to show you something.”

Rick waited as she hauled out a photo book and placed it between them. “You remember the night you told your guards to hold me, the phone call you made just before you drove to Missouri?”

“I vaguely recall that evening,” he teased.

She opened the folder to a picture and pointed him to it. He stared at the picture for a moment, then his mouth dropped open.

“You told me about the photo of you and your folks in Washington,” Shannon said.

“Yes, I did.”

“I told you I’d spent a lot of time in Washington too.”

“You did.”

“Look at this.” She flipped the picture over. Scraggly handwriting identified the photo, the people in it, their ages, and the date and time.

Shannon smiled and held up the picture. “I stood at the same spot you did on Constitution Avenue,” she whispered. She pointed to the date and time on the photo. “We were there about five minutes after twelve according to what my mom noted—the day before my birthday. I remembered this visit, barely, the night you called me. So I contacted Mabel and she sent this photo.”

Rick studied the photo. “So you were there on my birthday, about five minutes or so after me.”

“Yes.”

“And what time were you born?”

“My baby book says 11:55 p.m.,” Shannon said.

“I was born exactly at 12:01.”

“So I was just after you again.”

“You’ve been after me your whole life.”

She smiled again. “It’s like we were destined to meet.”

“Or to constantly miss each other by a small margin.”

“Or that.”

Rick laid the picture down. “You said before that it was all coincidence, superstition,” he said. “Our middle names, the tattoos with matched meanings, now this . . . picture, plus our birthdates, so close together.”

“Maybe it is all coincidence. But I’m beginning to think otherwise. A girl can change her mind, can’t she?”

“It is peculiar.”

“I’m thinking providential.”

“Or coincidental.”

“One or the other, we can safely say that.”

Neither spoke for several minutes. Shannon finished her ice cream and placed her hands on the table. Rick draped his hands over hers and rubbed them gently.

“So it’s up to you, like I said,” she offered softly. “I want us to have a chance but . . .” She paused, unable to go further.

“I can’t promise anything, Shannon,” Rick said. “But all this . . .” He pointed at the picture. “I have to admit, it’s amazing, confusing, makes me wonder about it all, what’s real, what’s not, what I believe, what I don’t. Maybe it is providence.” He looked at the picture again.

“Wonder is a good word,” she said.

“So I’ll begin there,” he said. “I’ll do some wondering. Will that give us a chance?”

“It’s certainly a good start. Who knows where it will lead?”

“Will you be patient with me?”

“Just don’t wander as you wonder.”

“What?”

“It’s from a hymn. I’m teasing you.”

He smiled, his mood suddenly lighter, like he’d lost ten pounds of emotional weight. “You’re telling me I can’t see other women while I’m wondering, right?”

“You catch on real fast. You’re not the only fish in the sea, you know.”

“But I am the sexiest man alive, haven’t you heard?”

She leaned close and kissed him on the lips. “I can’t argue with that,” she whispered. “I really can’t.”

Acknowledgments

W
henever an author succeeds in bringing a work to completion, said author always has many others alongside for the effort. This author acknowledges the constant encouragement of agent Lee Hough, with Alive Communications; the always-gentle story editing of Lonnie Hull-Dupont; and the collaborative work of the Revell publishing team. I appreciate their efforts to make this manuscript worthy of a reader’s attention.

Gary E. Parker
is the author of four nonfiction books and multiple articles, as well as twenty-three novels and novellas. He and his family live in Suwanee, Georgia.