Histories of the Void Garden, Book 1: Pyre of Dreams (46 page)

“Brad, I could
give you something to help with your nerves if you want, but I’m
not sure you’ll want to forget tonight.”

He became very
aware of his hands, dead weight dangling uselessly at his sides. It
had been a while since he’d shared in any kind of physical intimacy
with a woman. There was his dentist of course, but that was a very
one sided relationship. He snapped to, trying to block out the
visual of the dentist’s office when he realized that his idle hands
had set about doing the devil’s work of their own accord, the index
finger of each hand stroking tremulously over the curve of
Stanwick’s hips. She leaned in closer and touched her lips to his,
gently, her right hand pressing on the small of his back while her
left hand stroked the back of his neck, her fingers pushing up into
his hair. From out of nowhere, Cobb heard faint applause and
cheering, followed by the refrain of a gently strumming guitar, and
finally, the unmistakable voice of Elvis, singing soulfully that he
wished he was in the land of cotton.

“God damn.”
Stanwick pulled away suddenly, allowing Cobb to collapse onto the
bed behind him.

It had taken
her moment to remember the significance of the particular alert
she’d set on her phone, because it had been one of the first
thing’s she’d done after purchasing the phone, which had been more
than a year ago. The king.

West and Charlene were
still sitting in the lounge when Stanwick came pell-mell, running
back downstairs. She paused on the bottom step and pushed the alert
from her phone to the home network. Over the fireplace at the far
end of the lounge, a huge mirror suddenly erupted into life, with
several news stations.

“Forty seven.”
She yelled, her hand shaking as she brushed her hair away from her
face.

Kassidi Stein
was flustered, and unusually for her, it showed. She fanned her
face and giggled, pursing her lips and shaking her head “I am so,
so sorry.”

She looked off
camera in the hopes that one of the producers would be able to
offer assistance, “Is this for real? You guys are pranking me
right?”

Her co-anchor,
looked into the camera and shrugged, “Well folks, Kassidi appears
to be experiencing some, uh … technical difficulties right now.” He
looked at Kassidi and grinned, “You want me to get this?”

Kassidi ducked
behind the news desk laughing uncontrollably, then she peaked her
head back into view of the camera, “This is really happening? Shut
up.”

Prompted by one
of the producers, she looked over to the other side of the set and
saw an unmistakable silhouette. She gripped the edge of the desk
and tried to regain her composure, then breathing in deeply, with
quavering voice, she read the auto-cue, “It’s our…” She corrected
herself, glaring comically at her co-anchor, “It’s my real, real
pleasure to welcome our special, surprise guest,” deep breath,
“Action hero, super hero,” she covered her eyes with her hands,
index fingers wiping under her eyes, spiraling into full-fledged
dorkgasm, and failing completely to annunciate their guest’s
name.

Co-anchor Gill
Hibbert threw up his hands in despair and finished for her,
glancing off camera, “Sam, I’ve got to apologize, but there’s no
studio audience, so this is going to be a smidge anti-climactic.”
He looked back to the camera, “Surprise guest, Sam Cushing.”

Off camera, the
floor-crew applauded and wolf-whistled as the British superstar
walked onto the set, waving and smiling in the direction of the
cameras. By the time he made it to his seat, Kassidi Stein had
finally mustered the courage to walk around the front of the desk
so she could shake his hand, a gesture which she managed to bate
and switch into an over-enthusiastic hug. Sam was more than Kassidi
had bargained for. He picked her up off her feet and wrangled her
onto his knee as he sat in the seat they had provided for him. She
kicked her ankles, then grinning at the camera, she jumped up,
running back to the safety of her own seat.

“Sam. Sam, Sam,
Sam, Sam, Sam.”

“Kassidi.” He
nodded, smiling warmly, licking his lips as he reached across the
desk to shake hands with Gill Hibbert.

Kassidi Stein
looked at her tablet, reading the prompts which had been flashing
up for her, but she was still too flustered to read them, so she
continued off script.

“How on earth?
How did they get you here?”

His shoulders
bobbed up and down as if he was still stifling laughter. He wasn’t,
but his eyes and mouth told that same lie. Settling back into his
chair, his posture opened up, “I came of my own accord.”

“For my
birthday?” Kassidi’s eyes wide with child like glee.

Sam Cushing
pouted apologetically, “It’s your birthday?”

She couldn’t
even. She took a sip of water and tried her best not to drool into
her own lap.

“Happy birthday
Kassidi. I’d have brought a present if I’d known.

Gill Hibbert
laughed, “You make up for the rest of us not buying her anything
Sam.”

“They didn’t
get you anything?”

Kassidi slammed
her glass of water down on the desk a little too hard, “They did
too. Just ignore him.”

Sam nodded,
folding his hands on his lap, “I’ve heard it’s the best
policy.”

With the sound
of her producer screaming in her ear, Kassidi’s attention was drawn
momentarily to the auto-cue, “So Sam, to what do we owe the
pleasure?”

Sam Cushing
held a quizzical hand up, “Well, no surprise, I’m here to promote a
new film I’m working on.”

Kassidi gave a
little fist pump, cheering silently.

“It’s based on
a book called ‘The Kings Mosaic.’”

Kassidi
repeated the title, “The Kings Mosaic … Should I be embarrassed? I
don’t think I’ve heard of that one.”

Sam waved off
her concern, “No, no. It’s really not a book most people have heard
of, but it’s a book that’s really close to me.”

Gill Hibbert
shuffled in his seat, “You mind telling us a little bit about it
Sam?

“Not at all.
It’s a book about a pretty vast conspiracy to cover up the
identities of a certain group of individuals who have been lurking
in the shadows throughout human history.”

Kassidi looked
enthusiastic, “Templars, Illuminati, that kind of thing?”

Sam laughed,
“Not entirely. I mean, this is more like,” he paused, looking for a
better example, “Let’s say that President Tiernan was actually way
older than he looks.”

“How old are we
talking?” Kassidi asked, attempting to buy into the conceit.

“Much, much
older. Like, let’s say President Tiernan is thousands of years
old.”

Kassidi
shrugged, “Okay…”

Sam continued,
“And let’s say that all of the leaders involved in the Economic
Unification Council are just as old, sort of all playing in the
background of human affairs for centuries.”

Kassidi
laughed, “How have I not read this book?”

Gill Hibbert’s
nose wrinkled, “I’ve got to be honest, this does not sound like my
cup of tea Sam. Can I ask, why this book in particular?”

Sam raised his
hand, “Mea culpa.”

“You wrote it?”
Hibbert leaned back in his seat, shocked.

Kassidi could
barely contain her excitement, “Oh my gosh. How did you slip this
one past everyone?”

“Well, to start
with, I wrote the book twenty years ago.”

Gill snorted,
“You can’t have been more than ten years old then?”

“Unless…” Sam
waived a finger in the air.

Kassidi quickly
shuffled all of the pieces in her brain, mentally scribbled out the
obvious answer, then blurted out, “You’re one of them!”

Sam fired
rock-star fingers at his new best friend.

Stanwick had the phone
in her hand, finger poised over the redial. Calling in to the
station was proving to be ridiculously frustrating.

“You’ve got to
admit, it was a stroke of genius.” She pointed at the screen,
“Asshole has certainly played Tiernan at his own game.”

Charlene was
almost afraid to ask, “It is Beach isn’t it?”

West nodded,
“Pretty sure.”

“Should we not
get David down here?”

West’s eyes
lowered, “Stan, can you record the last fifteen minutes? Charlene’s
right; David and Stephanie deserve to see this.”

Stanwick barked
a command at the TV, then stabbed at her phone’s screen again, “Why
the hell is it so hard to get through?”

“Are you
kidding?” West asked, “You saw how she nerded out over him. I would
imagine half of the women in America are trying to get through to
the station right now.” He thought about the many films he’d
watched with Cushing in starring roles, “Possibly even more
men.”

Stanwick looked
up from the phone, her face contorted in confusion, “Really?”

West threw up
his hands defensively, “I’m a fan, what can I say?”

“You watch that
shit?” She hit redial again.

“You
don’t?”

“How do you
find the time?”

“We literally
have all the time in the world. Until this week, I’ve made a habit
of watching at least two movies per day,” Stanwick held up a
finger, eyes wide with anticipation. She waved her hand in the air,
giddily.

“FVTRX, this is
Paul, you’re wanting to talk to Sam Cushing?”

Stanwick was dubious
about Paul’s abilities to take a message, and even more doubtful
that she’d be put through while Sam Cushing was still on air. Now
that David had joined them, she walked away from the others so they
could turn the volume back up on the TV. She could still hear him,
answering a lot of fluff questions from fans, and occasional
convoluted and confused queries from conspiracy theorists. Once she
was put into the hold queue, she realized she could hear the audio
from the broadcast over the phone, and because the TV broadcast
appeared to be on a ten second delay, this quickly became
confusing, so she left the huge entrance area altogether and walked
into a private study.

She sat down
into a recliner and pushed her back into it so that the mechanism
triggered. She eyed the bookcase which ran the length of the room,
and noticed a shelf which held thirty copies of Dr. Beach’s book.
She pulled her legs back in and grabbed a copy off the shelf, then
launched herself back into the comfort of the recliner, thumbing
through the pages.

There was a
click on the phone line, “Miss Thrass, you’re the next caller.”

David stood a couple
of feet from the huge TV screen, rocking back and forth on the
spot. The man on the screen certainly wasn’t the father he
remembered. More worryingly, he had watched Sam Cushing’s films.
All of them. Several of them with overly gratuitous sex scenes. It
was all too much for him to contemplate.

“I’ve got to
call Hannah.”

Cobb swallowed
hard, trying to quickly force down a fistful of jerky, “You can’t.
Her phone’s bugged.” He swallowed again, “Your sister’s a real
classy lady by the way.”

David grunted,
“I don’t see what difference it’s going to make calling her.”

He spun around
excited, pointing back at the screen. West nodded, gently mocking
David’s childlike enthusiasm, pointing at the screen, smiling open
mouthed.

“Hello
caller.”

“Hi Kassidi,
long time viewer, first time caller.”

“Stanwick, am I
saying that right?”

Stanwick
chuckled politely, “No ma’am, silent W”

“I’m so sorry.
Hi Stanwick. You’re on the air, and you’ve got a question for
Sam?”

“Hi Sam.”
Stanwick sparkled, “Such a fan of your work.”

Sam smiled at
the camera, “That’s so kind.”

“So I’ve got a
copy of your book here, and in chapter fourteen,
A Family to
Fear,
you talk about Allan Tiernan, Lucas Miller and Petra
Miller. Specifically, you make a lot of very compelling connections
between those three and a large number of families going back over
six hundred years.”

Sam Cushing
leaned forward, smiling straight into the camera, the fingers of
his hands meshing together gleefully,

“You talk about
the lengths that you went to to follow paper trails, from banking
records to forged birth certificates and university credentials,
and I have to say, your research is flawless.”

On screen,
Kassidi Stein clapped her hands together, “This is amazing stuff
caller. I’m going to have to rush you to your question.”

Cushing waved
his hand, “No no Kass, please. It’s really so rare that I get to
talk to anyone who is a fan of my written work.” His smile thinned
by degrees and he leaned his elbows onto his knees, “I wonder if
the caller minds if I ask her a question?”

“Of course not
Sam.” Stanwick’s voice bubbled with enthusiasm.

“So you were on
the campaign trail with Tiernan right?”

“Um, yes I
was.”

Confused,
Kassidi reached across the desk, “You know the caller?”

Sam threw his
head back, running his fingers through his designer buzz-cut. He
turned to look at his host, contemplating how best to answer, “No I
don’t know her personally Kass, but I’ve been aware of her for some
time. Like I say, not many people got a chance to read my book.” He
looked back at the Camera, “Caller, as a fan, perhaps you’d be able
to shed some light on why the book reached such a small
audience?”

“Well Sam, it
kind of read like a death wish. It was like you were deliberately
calling out every one of the most dangerous people in the world,
and revealing all of their dirty little secrets. At that particular
point in time, concerned parties took it as their duty to protect
you from yourself.”

Kassidi Stein
looked crestfallen, “Hang on, I’m so confused. You’re saying this
is true? I mean this is all a publicity stunt for your film
right?”