Irrefutable Proof: Mars Origin "I" Series Book II (21 page)

Chapter Forty-Two

University
Heights
, Ohio

“I
have to be reasonable about this,” Hannah Abelson said. “I can’t keep thinking
I’m up for all of these shenanigans.”

I
am just going to have to hire someone to kill Justin Dickerson
.

Hannah
Abelson sat in her green Lay-Z-Boy recliner in her small living room after
flying in that morning from Tel-Aviv. She had spent a restless night in her
hotel room, and was up and ready to go by 4 am for her 9 am flight. And finally
home, she was coming to the realization that she might no longer be up to the
task.

Writhing
in her chair, she felt itchy all over. Her mouth was dry, and she felt dizzy.
“I don’t even know who I shot.
If,
I shot anyone.” She slammed her hands
down on the arms of the chair, but even the cushiony upholstery couldn’t
prevent the shock waves that funneled under the cast into her arm.”

“Eww.”
Tears stung in her eyes.
I can’t understand why the doctor wanted to leave
this thing on longer.
Taking in a deep breath she pulled herself up from
the chair, and went to the bathroom medicine cabinet to find something for the
pain.

And
what if I hadn’t put a stop to her sinister activities?

Dread
crept in as she closed the medicine cabinet. Twisting off the cap of the Advil
bottle, she turned on the water, cupping her hand to catch some to down the
pills.

“What
were they doing at that tree?” she spoke to herself. “What could Justin be
looking for underneath a tree in Israel, for God’s sake? It had been so dark I
couldn’t get a good shot.”

Trying
to follow them from the hotel had been hard enough, much harder than following
them all day had been. She was still fairly familiar with the city, but once it
got dark, especially since she wasn’t used to driving all that much, it got
more difficult. She had been was waiting for an opportunity to get Justin
alone. But Justin had kept those people around her the whole time.

Hannah
had stayed in a room at the Mamilla Hotel on Shlomo HaMelech. It was just down
the street from the David Citadel Hotel on King David Street where Justin had
stayed.

That
hotel, Hannah had found out, was very expensive. Only rich people stayed there.
Tuh
, she had thought. Justin acting all hoity-toity.

She
had been so nervous after she shot that gun. Oh, not because she was afraid
that she may have hurt someone. That thought never had crossed her mind. She
hoped she had. She hoped it was Justin. She wanted to kill Justin. Kill her
dead. But being unsure of not getting the job done was wearing on her nerves.
Not being able to stop Justin . . .

She
closed the medicine cabinet and looked at her reflection in the mirror. Tucking
strands of her hair into the French twist on the back of her head, she left the
bathroom and returned to her chair.

She
should have enlisted help. She hadn’t been able to think of anyone, though.
And, she had taken care of Ghazi herself. But this hadn’t been as easy as
killing him.

She
had been clever, though. No doubt about that. She smiled at just how clever she’d
been in planning Justin’s death. Doing it all on her own. Getting the gun.
Going down to the post office and mailing the gun in one package. The
ammunition in another. She wiggled down in her chair and crossed her arms over
her chest. A great big grin spread over her face.

Yes.
She had known she’d never get the gun on the plane with her. And, after being
gone from Israel for so long, she had doubted whether she could get a gun once
she got there. That’s when she thought of how to get the gun there without any
problems.

“Does
your package contain anything liquid, perishable, fragile or potentially hazardous?”
The postal clerk had asked her.

“Oh,
my goodness, no,” she had answered, brushing her hair aside. She had made her hands
tremble, slightly, just so he would notice her age. So they could see that it
was
she
who was fragile. Innocent. Truthful. Elderly. It would make them
unsuspecting, she had reasoned. And by saying no to their question of it being
“
potentially
hazardous,” she hadn’t lied. The gun was
actually
hazardous. Nothing potential about it.

Not
too clever though, were you, Hannah?
She heard a voice in her head mocking her.
Didn’t think to try firing it
first, did you? Not like the old days when you used to shoot with your father’s
rifle.

The
grin faded, and she rocked herself back and forth, scratching the casted arm.

Then,
that little twit had had the nerve to call me
, Hannah frowned at the thought.
To tell me she suspected
me of killing people.
What she needs to worry about is me killing
her
.

Well,
you certainly aren’t doing a good job of it,
the voice hissed in her head.
And how are you going to kill
her now and she’s on to you
?

“Oh,
shit!” Hannah grabbed her forehead. “Will you leave me the hell alone?” she
yelled out. Her heart was racing, she needed to calm down.

She thought of how she should have killed Justin way back
then, when she had left Israel looking for her. But there had been nothing to
say that Justin had done anything with Sabir’s untranslated copy in the
notebook. She hadn’t written any scholarly articles. Hadn’t made any
announcements. Hannah had thought that she perhaps had killed Ghazi too
hastily. Now she was upset because she’d hadn’t been just as quick to kill
Justin.

Instead she had recruited help to find out if Justin did know
anything. He was supposed to be watching her all those years. But that little
chicken-shit had been no help.

Closing her eyes, she thought about how it all started.

She
remembered it like it had just happened yesterday.

“You
must look at this carefully. Study it. Can you do that for me?” she remembered
Dr. Samuel Yeoman had said to her. It was back in 1949 when she had first
started to work for him.
For her Samuel
.

It
was at the request of her father. Rather at her father’s
orders
. He had
insisted after Benjamin had tricked her and had become engaged to someone else.
But her working with Samuel had been her saving grace. She knew that just as
sure as she knew she would keep her promise to help him until the day she died.
Just like a marriage vow.

And
although he was married, she knew that he loved her more than Benjamin ever
could have. That’s why she had done what she had. It was for Samuel.

Samuel
Yeoman had needed her. He told her he couldn’t trust anyone but her. There were
manuscripts that needed to be found, if indeed they existed. “You must help me
find them. Keep a look out for them.”

He
had explained that Dr. Amos Sabir, someone he had thought a very good friend and
fellow interpreter, had tried to trick him. Translate lies about the
manuscripts. Then he died. “Just. Like. That.” He had snapped his finger. “Struck
by lightning. A sure sign from God, no doubt.” He looked her straight in the
eyes. “You understand?” She nodded her head vigorously. Surely she could help
him.

“There
are manuscripts that must never get out. I need to have anything that may have been
written, translated or not,” he had said, firmly. “It must be dealt with.”

 “Yes,”
she remembered answering him eagerly. “Sure. But, I can’t read any of it. How
will I know if I see it?”

“You’ll
know. See. Here. You can read Hebrew. But the other words, the Aramaic and the
Latin . . .” He pointed his fingers at the page. “You won’t know. Correct?”

“Yes.
I mean no. I-I won’t know them. That’s right.”

“Like
this one here.” He pointed to a word in Latin. “Or, this one, and this one, or
this one. It’s Aramaic.”

“No.
I don’t know those.” Her face brightened as she understood. “Although, I have
seen Latin words before.”

“But
you can’t read them, can you? You don’t know the words.”

“No.
No, I don’t.”

“That’s
how you will know. When you see all these languages jumbled up together. You’ll
know those will be the ones I need. The ones no one must ever see. But you must
be very secretive about this. This is very important to me.” She felt her heart
ache for him. He had smiled at her and touched her cheek with his hand.

She
had whispered her promise to help him.

Now,
she rubbed that cheek and smiled. Yes, Samuel. My promise.

Back
all those years ago, he had asked her to take the scrolls back to caves. She
would have to go alone, he had told her. No one would could know she’d gone there.
She needed to be careful. He gave her the scrolls in a clay pot. It was a clay
pot that had actually held the secrets of those manuscripts for more than two
thousand years.

He
never knew she kept that clay pot. He never knew she put those manuscripts in a
metal box. She shook her head at the memory.
I’m sorry, Samuel.
And, now
she just could not do anything else wrong. She had to fix this.

Justin
had to die.

There
could be no other way. He had been so generous in showing his appreciation for
her helping him. She couldn’t let him down. Not now. Not ever again. He had
bought her a bottle of Rosewater Eau de Toilette. She thought back on how she
had fingered the bottle. Stroked it. She had run her fingers gently down the side
of the glass. It was beautiful. With her head bowed, she raised her eyes up to
look at him.

“Try
it,” he bent over, and had whispered to her. “I know you will love it.” He
stepped back. “When I smelled it the first time, I knew it was for you. I just
want you to know how much you mean to me.”

There
he had said it.
Love.
He loved her.

“I
will always cherish it.” She had looked in his eyes. She wanted to tell him how
much she loved him too, but she didn’t dare. “And I will wear it every day.
Every day for the rest of my life.”

With
thoughts of Samuel, and the promise she made, a calmness came over her. She closed
her eyes, only to have to jerk them open again when she heard a knock at the side
door.

Chapter
Forty-Three

Robert
Kevron sat in his dark blue Taurus across the street from Dr. Justin
Dickerson’s house. The same as he had done off and on for the past two or three
months. He’d found out about her job. Her family. The books she wrote. Rubbing
his hand over the side of his leather gun holster laying on the passenger seat,
which held his Glock, he thought about how he’d even taken a stroll through her
big colonial-styled house. She and her husband should be more careful about
security when they’re away.

He
had a meeting with someone at the Pentagon tomorrow. So he was heading out, but
he’d stop back through, to check on her again before he headed back home to
wait for their final decision.

He
watched her pull in her driveway in her burgundy Buick LaCrosse, and park next
to her husband’s black Cadillac SRX. She never got right out of the car. She’d
sit there for a moment or two. Put up her glasses she needed for driving, finish
listening to a song on the radio, and then gather up her satchel she used for
work and her purse. He’d wait for her to go in before he left.

Kevron
knew that he wasn’t a part of this world any longer. He had retired. But, he
felt it might be insurance. Scratch my back and I scratch yours kind of thing.
If he brought this to the powers that be, and it was worth something, no matter
how small, maybe he wouldn’t have to look over his shoulder. He wouldn’t have
to worry that someone wanted to make sure
he
didn’t share information he
wasn’t supposed to share. And from all the years he had spent as a
counterintelligence officer, he had gleaned a lot.

Once
she went in, he started up the car, took a sip of his coffee, and headed for
I-90 East. His meeting was to discuss Justin Dickerson.

NASA
had discovered something interesting in the soil samples they had taken from
Mars. It seemingly was more than its radioactive properties. Something up there
that right now they didn’t want anyone else to know about. Something that might
put the United States ahead in the game, permanently. Of course no one could be
sure now, but they didn’t want anyone else trying to sneak a peek at what they
were doing.

They
didn’t want the information of their work leaked and maybe sabotaged or stolen.
The U.S. wanted to be first, and if someone connected dots with Dickerson’s
books and real happenings on Mars, and they had an inkling of what NASA’s
project was, it might get them a little more curious than they ought to be.
Nowadays, all of the U.S.’s secrets, no matter how small or trivial, had some
value to someone, somewhere.

Dickerson
wasn’t the flame, but she just might ignite the fire. And a little interest had
been shown in possibly figuring out what she was trying to do. He’d help them,
and maybe get rid of the threat, however that could be achieved. Whatever the
reason for it, wasn’t his concern. He’d give the information he had. And do
whatever they needed him to do. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time.

He
picked up his gun, stuck it under the seat, and put on his blinkers to merge
onto the freeway.