The Shadow of Death (Psalm 23 Mysteries Book 9) (20 page)

Alone, that’s exactly what she was.

“What about the shrine? We still have to stop the attack.”

“Trust me, lots of people are working on that. You don’t need to be one of them. You’re not a professional, Cindy. It’s best you go home.”

“I saved Jeremiah’s life on the plane ride to Tel Aviv,” she said as the plane continued to taxi.

“Excuse me?”

“They’d sent a man to kill him. He drugged Jeremiah and was going to poison him, but I caught him in time. I stopped him and Jeremiah woke up just in time to kill him with his own poison. I wasn’t a professional, but he needed me then. And, as much as I don’t want to look at you ever again, I think you’re going to need me, too.”

She knew she must sound crazy, and she could scarcely believe the words that she was saying herself. She was the one who had always hidden from danger, fleeing it at every opportunity, avoiding risk whenever possible. Jeremiah had changed that for her. And if he had sacrificed his life to stop this terror attack then she saw no better way that she could honor him and his sacrifice than by sticking around to see his work through. She could do that for him, at least. If she was killed in the process then God would have spared her a lifetime of living without the man she loved.

“We’ve got more than enough-”

“What you’ve got are turncoats on every side. Jeremiah used to be able to trust Omar and Omar betrayed him. One or more people inside the Mossad have betrayed him and are part of this plot. Who do you know other than me that you can trust without question?” she asked, her voice raising as she spoke.

She turned and locked eyes with him, defying him to say otherwise.

“Truthfully,
noone.”

“And given that you murdered the man I love, what does that tell you?”

Martin took a deep breath. “That I’m in a whole lot of trouble.”

“Exactly. I’m not leaving until this thing is finished.”

“I’m afraid that’s going to cause no end of problems.”

“Deal with it,” Cindy said before turning away.

She gripped the armrests of her seat, wishing that she could tear through them with her bare hands. One way or another she would see Jeremiah’s work through to the end.

“I didn’t know the two of you had gotten married,” Martin said, glancing at the wedding ring she was still wearing.

“Just before we had to come here,” she said, preserving the cover story. What did it matter now anyway? She felt like a widow, she might as well be treated like one.

“If you truly wish to help, then you need to back up the story I’ll be telling once we get off the plane. No one can know that Jeremiah gave his life willingly or the reason why. Do you understand?”

“I do,” she said through tight lips. “Don’t worry about me.” If there was one thing she’d learned on this trip it was how to lie.

The plane came to a stop at last. Martin unfastened his seatbelt and stood up and she did the same. She followed him to the front of the plane. A minute later they were descending down stairs onto the tarmac. At the bottom a couple of cars were waiting. One of them was a hearse. She
nearly tripped on the stair when she saw it and her breath caught in her throat.

The doors to the first car opened and Solomon and his driver exited. She reached the bottom and walked over to the man who had been Jeremiah’s handler. He reached out to her and took her hands and the pain in his eyes mirrored hers. “I am so sorry for your loss. It is never good to lose a husband, but to lose one so soon after having been married is unthinkable.”

She didn’t have to think of anything to say, she just nodded and let the tears that were flowing again speak for themselves. Solomon’s eyes moved past her and she turned to see four men carrying Jeremiah’s coffin off the plane.

17

Cindy’s knees started to give way and Solomon caught her before she fell. Her head was spinning as she watched the coffin being carried to the back of the hearse. It wasn’t a fancy coffin, the kind you’d see at funerals, but a rather plain wooden box. It seemed so hard to believe that it carried her heart inside it.

“Excuse me a moment,” Solomon said, propping her up against his car. “Will you be alright?”

She managed to nod. He headed toward the hearse. After a moment she pushed off from the car and followed.

“You shouldn’t look, it won’t be pretty,” Martin said, his face twisting in concern.

“I have to look.”

She had seen Jeremiah’s body in the alley, but even now that seemed like some hideous nightmare that was fading with the light. She had to see for herself.

She arrived behind the hearse just in time to hear Solomon order the men to open the coffin. She braced herself with a hand on the vehicle and placed her other over her heart.

She waited as the coffin lid opened and then crumpled over in pain. There was Jeremiah, his skin was a bluish-grey and the blood around the bullet holes in his chest had dried.

Solomon bowed his head. “Seal it back up,” he said, his voice hoarse.

They did so and they placed the coffin in the back of the vehicle. She managed to pull herself back up to a standing position and she turned to see Martin staring at her with such compassion in his eyes that it physically hurt her to look at him. He had no right to look at her that way, not when he was the cause of her grief.

Solomon opened the back door of his car for Martin and Cindy and indicated that they should get inside. “We need to go somewhere to talk,” he said.

Moments later they were inside the car and on their way. No one spoke during the ride which was just as well. Cindy had always wanted to see Jerusalem, but now she didn’t even bother looking out the window.

She didn’t know how much time passed but eventually the car stopped. The driver opened the door and they all got out. The hearse parked behind them. They were underground somewhere. Solomon led them to an elevator and after a short ride they emerged on a floor with no windows. Cindy figured they must still be underground.

A moment later they were all taking seats in a small conference room with dark paneling and a table that could seat six. Light was provided by four different wall sconces and a low hanging chandelier, shaped like the bottom half of a globe, which was over the table. Cindy fought the urge to put her head down on the table. The last time she’d gotten any sleep it had been back in Tel Aviv when she’d woken up beside Jeremiah. If only she could go back downstairs and shake him awake now.

If she was going to help, though, she needed to pay attention and focus.

“What happened?” Solomon asked without preamble.

“We were alerted to the fact that...Malachi... had killed his contact in Tehran. We’re still trying to figure out why. By the time I reached him he was...unwilling to listen to reason. He refused to put down his weapon and he was talking nonsense about Russians recruiting Israeli and C.I.A. operatives. He killed two of my best men before I was able to take him down,” Martin said gravely. He glanced at Cindy. “Unfortunately she saw the whole thing.”

“Is this true?” Solomon asked Cindy.

She nodded and she did not have to fake the look of misery on her face. “I don’t know what Omar said to him. They weren’t speaking English. But Malachi just killed him, shot him twice in the head. The man was supposed to be his friend! He wasn’t even carrying a weapon.” She began to cry but kept going. “Then we were running for so long. He told me that he had lied to me about the work he did for you. He told me he was an assassin and that he hadn’t quit because he wanted to be a rabbi. He told me that he wouldn’t follow orders anymore and you fired him.”

“Regrettably, this is all true,” Solomon said, glancing from her to Martin. “He had a problem following orders at the end. I recalled him because of his knowledge, his contacts. Clearly that was my mistake.”

“Why did he lie to me?” Cindy asked.

Solomon averted his eyes.

“My guess is that he was afraid of what you would think of him if you knew the truth,” Martin said after a minute.

She nodded. She was struggling to keep in mind that she was acting a part on top of living a nightmare. Martin
needed her help right now, and if she was going to be a part of this thing then she needed his.

“That makes sense,” she forced herself to say.

“We still have to stop the terrorists from completing their mission,” Solomon said.

“Yes, we do,” Martin said. “If you don’t mind, though, I’d like to talk someplace a little less apt to be bugged.”

“I can assure you that there are no listening devices in this room,” Solomon said, bristling as though he had just been insulted.

“Really?” Martin asked, sarcasm thick in his voice. He stood up abruptly and grasped the tiny metal knob on the bottom of the chandelier. “Then what do you call this?” he asked.

He yanked it off and it fell a foot then dangled from a wire that was still attached to the chandelier.

Solomon cursed and leaped to his feet, hand reaching for his gun. Martin had his gun out first. “This is not my doing,” Solomon hissed.

“Then we’d better move fast,” Martin said. “Come on Cindy.”

She staggered to her feet, stunned at the sudden revelation. She ran after them. They bypassed the elevator and hit a stairwell, and she scrambled to keep up as the men took the stairs at a breakneck pace. They burst into the parking garage and ran toward Solomon’s car.

His driver got out. “Is something wrong?” the man asked.

“Everything’s wrong,” Solomon said.

“You have that right.”

Several men emerged from the shadows, all pointing guns at them. Martin positioned himself in front of her.
Solomon’s driver pulled a gun out of his jacket and he, too, trained it on them.

“You?” Solomon demanded, turning red.

The man shrugged, but did not say anything.

Martin looked at him. “You lying dog. You told me that Malachi had gone rogue.”

“Thank you for believing it. When a friend in Tehran alerted me to his proximity I knew he was getting too close to uncovering our plan,” the man said.

“You won’t get away with this,” Solomon said.

“Actually, by the time anyone sorts out what happened here it will all be over,” the man said with a sneer.

Suddenly the entire parking garage was plunged into darkness. Martin reached out and pushed Cindy to the ground as the men started firing at them. “How many of them are there?” Martin hissed.

“Too many,” someone else whispered.

A hand grabbed Cindy’s arm and she struggled to see as she got to her feet. Then they were moving swiftly to the left. After a moment the shooting stopped.

“Find them!” someone ordered.

Now she could hear her own running steps and those of the men beside her. She just hoped that whoever had her arm knew where he was going. A few moments later her eyes perceived a dim light. It was a door. She pushed on it when she reached it and could see a dimly lit staircase leading upward. A hand in the middle of her back urged her forward and she ran as fast as she could.

The stairs seemed to go on forever in a straight line upward and her legs were slowing. She tripped and caught herself and pressed forward. Finally the stairwell appeared to be getting brighter and at last she could see a door above her. With a sob of relief she crashed through it a few seconds later and out onto a street.

She twisted her head left and right, looking for men with guns. She didn’t see any. She had no idea where she was, but hopefully Solomon or Martin would know.

A hand on her shoulder steered her to run down the street to the left and she heard the others’ footsteps racing behind her. She came to an intersection. “Which way?” she shouted.

“Left!”

She turned. They kept running, making three more quick turns and then she found herself in a park. Someone grabbed her arm and pulled her down behind a row of bushes. She turned just in time to see Solomon and Martin follow her and drop into crouched positions. She blinked at them. This entire time she had assumed it was Martin’s hand on her, guiding her.

“Martin?”

He shook his head.

She turned and saw a ghost.

As Cindy screamed Jeremiah clamped a hand down over her mouth. “Ssh, it’s me,” he said, realizing belatedly that it was probably not the most reassuring thing he could have said to her at the moment, especially since he was still covered in makeup to make him appear dead.

“I’m not dead, I’m alive,” he tried saying instead.

Her eyes were wide and her nostrils were flaring as she struggled to catch her breath and recover from the shock. Slowly he removed his hand from her mouth.

“You’re not dead?” she whispered.

“No. But, I had to appear to be.”

She hit him so fast that he never even saw her hand moving, just felt the explosive impact of it against his cheek.

“You deserved that,” Martin said.