Crown of Serpents (25 page)

“I see. Your judgment. Interesting,” Nero commented, frowning as he turned the rifle upside down to closely inspect the scuffed wooden stock.

“Yes sir. Listen, he was tipped off. It’s obvious.”

Nero’s eyes found a small symbol on the bottom of the stock. Without looking at Kantiio he asked if the thief had in any way touched or removed any item from the rifle. He was assured he had not. Kantiio said he followed his orders not to tamper with anything either.

“Once I confronted this loser at the motel and got the rifle from his car, I stuck it in my Navigator. Then I walked him back up to his room and finished the job. He never brought that piece up there.”

“Never took it out of his car?” asked Nero. “Did he make any long stops on his ride up to New York? Fill up for gas? Take a piss? Pull over to rest? Was he ever out of your sight?”

“Ah, yeah he was,” said the contractor. “Just for a moment though. He pulled over once and I had to drive past him. I waited way up ahead so he wouldn’t notice me. I thought he made me at that point but he took off after that and I kept up the tail. He made a gas station stop a little later then drove non-stop to Dansville and checked into his room. The rifle never left his car.”

“Mr. Rousseau, your knife if you will,” ordered Nero.

Kantiio flinched. “Listen boss, I didn’t do anything wrong, okay? I got the piece for you. I did the job.” He stepped away as Rousseau unleashed a folding lock blade knife from his pocket and walked towards the table.

Nero extended his hand. “Did I say you did anything wrong? Yet?” Rousseau placed the blade, handle first, into his boss’s palm. Nero laid the rifle on the table and flipped it over. He ordered Kantiio and Rousseau to each hold one end while he pried at what looked like a tiny round plug the size of a dime.

Kantiio leaned forward for a closer inspection. “Hey, I know that symbol,” he said. “It’s the Rotary Club.”

“No, you idiot,” mumbled Nero without looking up. “It’s the symbol of the oldest and largest fraternity in the world, the Freemasons. The square, the compasses, and the letter G for Geometry.”

The plug popped out rather too easily, rattling on the table. Kantiio caught it before it rolled off. Nero bent closer and looked into the narrow hole it had concealed.

Empty.

He blinked. He looked up into his contractor’s eyes. But before he took action his cell phone rang. He snatched it out of his tuxedo’s inner breast pocket.

“What!”

“Sir, I have some new information on that murder in Dansville you wanted me to check out,” stated his collection’s director, Anne Stanton.

“Go on.”

“They released the victim’s name. It’s Doctor Stephen Ashland of the Army’s Military History Institute. Same place that Cranberry Marsh rescuer guy was from. You think there’s a link?”

Nero’s eyes fixed on Kantiio. They pulsated. The large contractor looked down. “Not sure. Continue.” Nero then reached for his cigar, placed it at his lips and drew in a deep breath of sweet smoke. It calmed him ever so slightly. He replaced the cigar back on the edge of the table, a thin line of smoke tapering upward in a haze.

“The report said the victim was shot once in the back of the head execution style, in his motel room. The suspect was described as a Native American male, large frame. Driving a dark colored SUV.”

“Hmmmm.” Nero groaned in fury and bit his lower lip. A drop of blood seeped into his mouth.

“One more thing,” continued Stanton. “There are some confusing reports about additional shots fired too — outside of the room. I’m sure they’ll release more information later this morning so I’ll keep my ears open, okay?”

Nero tuned her out.

“Mr. Nero?” asked the director. “Are you there?”

Nero had heard enough. He pressed what he thought was the
End
button on his cell phone to disconnect the call. He slid the cell phone face up on the table next to his cigar and faced Ray Kantiio.

Stanton heard a click, thinking Nero hung up on her. She almost asked again if he was there, but then heard a loud slap and a man grunt. Then the shouting began.

18

Same time. Strathallan Hotel, downtown Rochester.

A
FTER RAE WAS ordered to the local hospital as a precaution, Jake caught a ride back up to Rochester with a state trooper. He then checked into the closest available hotel at four in the morning — the ritzy Strathallan on East Avenue. He was mentally spent. Collapsing in his new hotel room bed, he could not purge the image of Ashland’s scalped head out of his mind. Combined with what he had learned of the mind controlling power behind the Crown of Serpents, he knew what memories the scalping would trigger and had fought to keep that dark scene suppressed. But as he lay staring at the ceiling the exhaustion slowly opened the doors of a incident he did not want to relive.

The year was 2001 while deployed under Operation Enduring Freedom in Central Asia. As a young 10th Mountain company commander Jake faced his first combat test in an enemy prisoner revolt at the Qala-i Jangi fortress ten miles west of their Army base in Mazar-i-Sharif in Northern Afghanistan. Eight hundred captured Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters had overpowered their Northern Alliance guards, tortured and killed a CIA operative, and stormed the fort armory seizing weapons. A dozen U.S. and British Special Forces and later an eight-man Quick Reaction Force from Jake’s 10th Mountain unit were called in to reinforce the Northern Alliance counterattack. They fought a three-day battle against the prisoners by coordinating air strikes, tank fire, and infantry assaults.

He keenly remembered the adrenaline rush during the battle. It was his first thrilling taste of combat and he reveled in it. He blinked hard as he stared at the hotel room ceiling. He seemed to be floating in his bed, the vivid images playing a movie in his mind.

Just before Jake’s column of armored Humvees attacked a Taliban position inside the fort, a stray U.S. Air Force bomb missed its mark and landed almost on top of the U.S. spotters who had called it in. Six Northern Alliance soldiers were killed instantly. Dozens more, including five Special Forces soldiers, were injured. Jake changed the order from an assault to a rescue operation. Leading the way, his Humvee column raced in under heavy enemy fire and evacuated the wounded troops. Jake personally stood in his command Humvee’s turret and provided a devastating rain of .50 caliber covering fire. He took down ten enemy combatants himself and was the last vehicle out of the compound. It was a personal high point in the battle.

But the low point, the moment when he lost all self-control, came a day later. With over seven hundred of the prisoners already dead and the enemy reduced to just a handful of hard-nosed Taliban and al-Qaeda hold-outs, Jake found himself spearheading an assault team down into the underground cells of the fortress. Separated from his men after several booby-trapped grenade detonations had collapsed a wall, he was literally blown into the laps of three enemy combatants. They immediately engaged in close quarters hand-to-hand combat. He knocked the first fighter out cold with the butt of his rifle. The second shot at and missed him. Jake returned fire and killed him. The third attacked with a knife. After wrestling the knife away in several quick moves he killed the man with a thrust through his heart.

But then in an adrenaline-filled rage, as if some Seneca warrior spirit from a past life had taken his mind over, Jake ended up scalping the two dead bodies. He had even let loose a war whoop during the act.

As he was about to render the same atrocity on the unconscious fighter the spirit who possessed him exited his body. Jake spared the wounded prisoner and dragged him out with the knife to his throat. He then collapsed in a fellow 10th Mountain soldier’s arms not knowing he had sustained a severe cut in his side from the knife fight. That wound would lead to his first Purple Heart.

It was learned later that the prisoner Jake spared was identified as an al-Qaeda American traitor. Ultimately, the turncoat divulged key intelligence before being incarcerated in an American prison. For Jake’s actions that day and for leading the previous day’s rescue efforts he earned a Silver Star and legendary status within the ranks of the infantry. He was rewarded with a Special Forces assignment on a secret task force in the mountains to continue hunting al-Qaeda. The nicknames soon followed — honorable names associated with his scalping and the war whoops that were overheard by his men.

For Jake though, that dark moment of possession struck fear into him. The loss of reason while watching someone else act inside your body shook him to the core. To have some other soul inside your head, some other voice that took over your actions, was like, well—

“Insanity,” he said out loud.

It was a feeling he had wrestled with every day to keep from reliving again. He disciplined himself and had turned into the cold-blooded, calm and collective intellectual killer the Army most desired. Afterward, he killed the enemy often enough in both Afghanistan and Iraq and had not felt that same possession or loss of control again, albeit he killed at a distance and never up close as he did in that basement.

But now, in light of the supposed power behind Atotarho’s crown and those who would go to any length to get it, Jake knew if he let that relic fall into the wrong hands there would be much chaos sown in people’s minds. He had tasted that feeling of possession and it had left him utterly hopeless. To have a man of Nero’s character use it for gain was something he could not let happen.

He looked at the clock. 6:15 A.M. He closed his eyes and let sleep finally overtake him.

19

Same time. The Scalp Room.

I
N A BLUR, Nero reached across the table and backhand smacked his trusted contractor across the face. The sound of flesh being whacked reverberated inside of the stone chamber.

Kantiio touched his lip, exposing blood on his finger. “Goddamn Alex, what the hell was that for? You losing your mind or something?”

“For failing me you lazy fat piece of shit! For allowing this thief to steal the rifle first and finding what was inside of this plug.” He pointed to the concealed shaft in the rifle. “Now you tell me everything that happened and then I’ll decide what to do with you. I want to know about the shots fired outside the room.”

Kantiio had to let the entire story out now and hope for the best. He knew firsthand of Nero’s ruthlessness if crossed. “They surprised me,” he said in a shaking voice. “I just popped the thief in the head and scalped him and then was searching his room for other shit that might benefit you when I heard a car door slam. I looked in the parking lot and saw an undercover cop drawing her weapon, and some Army dude coming up with her. I knew they had to be after that rifle. Hell, the thief was like the only person in the damn motel—”

“Wait a second,” Nero interjected. “An Army dude?”

“Yeah, I guess so. Listen, this was a botched op from the beginning. They had to be after the thief is all I can figure. So I ran out of the room and popped the bitch cop twice. She went down. Couldn’t get a shot off at the soldier. Then I got the hell out of there. I drove nonstop to get here. That’s it. That’s the whole truth.”

Nero dipped his chin and leaned both arms on the table. He shook his head slowly.

“So, you killed a cop?”

“Wouldn’t be the first time, right? Listen, nothing will come back to you, sir.” Kantiio tried to keep his voice steady. “I did as you ordered. I retrieved the rifle as asked. I didn’t know anything about that secret plug or anything inside of it. You also said if anyone gets in my way take care of ‘em. So I did.”

Nero extracted a gold butane lighter from his breast pocket and nonchalantly reached for his cigar. He relit it and coughed. He inhaled then blew a patch of smoke into his contractor’s face. Kantiio’s eyes fluttered. Nero coughed again then said, “You broke procedure by not communicating with me when the thief initially interfered at the library. Your actions thereafter botched the job.”

“But I got the rifle like you asked didn’t I?”

“Why did you wait until what, fours hours later, to dispatch him?”

“He was on the road the whole time,” pleaded the contractor. “Stopped once and pulled over on the shoulder like I said. I couldn’t do the mark since we were in public. I couldn’t risk being seen. So, I waited until dark. Pulled a recon on his motel room for a few hours and then faked him at his room door, told him that I was the night shift manager and his car had been broken into.”

Nero let out a disdainful laugh. “Wait a minute. You pulled recon for a few hours?”

“Sir, I have to be thorough.”

Rousseau interrupted. “Ask him if he fell asleep.”

“Is that true?” Nero demanded. “Is it?”

“Ah, yes, sir. It is. I did sleep a little bit.” Kantiio glanced at the thug who just signed his death warrant. Rousseau smirked back.

Nero cut in, his deep voice like a rough saw. “We all know you have problems staying awake. That is why you allowed the thief to steal the rifle first. That is why you took a few hours to recon the motel. I bet you literally fell asleep at the wheel and botched everything up. You have twisted the path of my destiny because of your incompetence. There was a note hidden inside that plug which held a key to a great legacy from my ancestor.” Nero sucked hard on his expensive cigar and blew more smoke on his contractor.