Soul Thief (Blue Light Series) (31 page)

The memorial service was held on the Thursday following the crash. There was nothing substantive to grieve over, nothing to touch or to look upon, as though the man Annie had known and loved had been a rumor, and all of this formality was merely theater. Four players becoming three, three becoming two, and then one, until the stage was empty . . .

The service was held in Doug’s hometown Congregational church. Friends and acquaintances
attended in droves. Doug had no family. He was the last of the breed, so to speak, an only child of an only child. His mother had had a twin sister, Tessa, the woman who’d raised him, but she’d never married, and she’d died of cancer while Doug was still in college. There would be no more McArthurs. Annie sighed at the realization. But at that moment the child within her gave a strong kick, as if reminding her how wrong she was.

Daddy and his entourage a
ccompanied Annie to the service, which was lovely, befitting for a man who had been loved and respected by many. There were lots of tears and hugs, exclamations of sorrow and words of hope and salvation. Although Annie appreciated the kindness, she could not make sense of it. There was no sense to be made of her life now, only contradictions. There hadn’t even been a house to come home to, that gone just as surely as Doug was gone, her life here wiped clean like it had been a chalk drawing at the whim of some macabre eraser.

There were droves of reporters outside, vying to get in, but security was tight and people with cell phones and cameras were not allowed in.

Throughout the service Annie sat, stood, nodded and smiled politely, looking but not seeing, listening but not hearing, touching but not feeling. When it was over she knew that her life here in Doug’s world was over. She had been here because Doug was here, no other reason than to be with the man she loved. Now, without him, it all seemed somehow absurd, as if none of it was real. Not this place, not this life. The friends and acquaintances she’d made as a result of Doug were now little more than cardboard characters, actors in the drama of their lives, leaving the stage for the final time.

Later, at the reception, Rick Jennings approached Annie and her father.

After Annie had introduced the two men
Jennings asked if he could have a word with Annie in private.

“Of course,” De Roché said, stepping away, looking pained. He went to where Theo and Greta stood at the refreshment table and began talking in
a low tone.

Jennings
embraced Annie, and it was the first time that Annie had allowed herself to cry since she’d learned of the tragedy, breaking into sobs so deep and painful that Jennings thought she might break in his arms. “I’m so sorry, Annie,” Jennings said to her. “I don’t know what else to say. I loved Doug like a son.”

“I’m still trying to accept it, Rick,” Annie sobbed. “I can’t believe he’s gone.”

“Annie,” Jennings said gently. “There are some things I need to discuss with you.”

“I know.”

“Do you?”

“Yes, we didn’t exactly leave town quietly.”

Jennings nodded. “That’s part of it, but there’s more.”

Annie stared.

Jennings said, “I know that you and Doug were being pursued on the morning your house was destroyed.”

Annie nodded.

“Doug called me from the airport on the morning of the crash.”

Annie closed her eyes as a sob
shook her. Jennings saw that she was incapable of speaking.

“He told me everything, Annie,”
Jennings said. “He told me about the baby, his fears about your father. He said he had a strong premonition . . .” Jennings hesitated. “I think he somehow knew he was doomed, Annie.”

“I knew it too, Rick. God, I
knew
it, and I could have kept him but I didn’t. I let him go. Does that make any sense?”

“I don’t know, Annie.”

“Maybe I’m some kind of . . . monster?”

“Annie, don’t do this.”

“I can’t explain it,” Annie said. “It was almost like I couldn’t help it.”

“It only reinforces some of Doug’s suspicions.”

“What do you mean?”

“He believe
d your father was using some sort of mind control on you.”

Annie searched
Jennings’ face for a long moment, knowing that he was right but knowing also that it did not matter. She was not strong enough to resist De Roché’s control. At least not yet. Everything was too screwed up. She needed a place to heal, to hide and to plan her next move. And she had nowhere else to go. Finally she said, more as a defense than anything else, “Doug was wrong.” She turned away but Jennings grabbed her arm. De Roché and Theo saw the move and began making their way through the crowd toward them.

“Please, Annie, there’s something else, something Doug could never talk to you about.”

She turned back to Jennings, her face drawn and white, her eyes dull with grief.

“He told me that your father wants the baby.” Annie did not reply but
Jennings saw the acquiescence in Annie’s eyes. “My God,” he said. “You know, don’t you?”

Still Annie did not speak or move. Something she did not understand was trying to gain access to her thoughts, to control her emotions. It felt slippery, like cold oil, and it was causing her head to ache dully. Her legs weakened and for a moment she thought her knees might buckle. Greta was staring fixedly at her.

“Listen,” Jennings said. “Will you at least think about what I’ve said and consider the ramifications?” He stared into Annie’s eyes. “Don’t let anybody keep you from making the right choices.”

Annie nodded.

“Annie, Doug’s death might not have been an accident.”

Annie stared, her eyes dull
with shock.

“I can’t talk about it now,”
Jennings said. “But I want you to call me just as soon as you can. And call me from a secure line.”

“I’ll try,” Annie said.

“It’s important, Annie. Your life and the life of your child may be in jeopardy.” Annie continued staring silently into Jennings’ eyes, her white face slack and lifeless.
This isn’t Doug’s wife,
Jennings thought.
This isn’t the Annie I’ve known for a decade, so vital and alive.
Something has happened to her. She’s no longer in control.

Jennings
saw that De Roché and his muscle had stopped and were talking to the woman. Earlier Annie had introduced her as Greta, but Jennings didn’t like her. She had hard, greedy eyes and she never took them off Annie.

The woman approached Annie and took her by the arm. “Come now, child,” she said. “It’s time for us to leave.” Annie shook her free and did not reply; she was still staring at
Jennings.

That’s when
De Roché’s muscle stepped forward, reached out and tried to take hold of Annie’s arm.

In
the blink of an eye Jennings grabbed the man’s arm and twisted it behind his back. In the next instant Jennings’s other arm was around Theo’s throat. The act was so swift and adroit that it was just a blur of motion. “I don’t know who you think you are,” Jennings whispered into Theo’s ear. “But if you know what’s good for you, you’ll step away until I’ve finished talking to my friend.” Jennings released his captive, giving him a shove as he did so. Theo staggered and came to a lurching halt glaring savagely back at Jennings.

“You just made a big mistake.” Theo said.

Jennings pulled his badge from the pocket of his overcoat and showed it to Theo. “How’d you like to spend the next twenty-four hours in lockup, asshole?”

De Roché
gestured for Theo to drop it and Theo reluctantly obeyed.

“This isn’t over,” Theo said a
s he walked away.

“You’re right, it isn’t,
” Jennings said. He took Annie in his arms and fiercely hugged her. “Please, Annie,” he whispered. “Don’t let them win. Call me.” He released Annie, turned and made his way across the reception hall floor to the door and his car beyond.

“Why didn’t you
just grab him at the airport when you had the chance?” Jennings asked. They were in Jennings’s office and he was pacing the floor in front of a seated and relaxed looking Zach Spencer, his frustration palpable. “He’d be alive right now if you had.”

It was the Monday following Doug’s memorial service and Spencer had shown up in
Portland, explaining that he was in town on some sort of phony assignment. But Jennings knew exactly why he was here.

“
Because we didn’t realize then that the object had already been passed to him,” Spencer said. “We were afraid if we’d shown ourselves at the wrong time they’d have been onto us and the object might have disappeared for another five hundred years. We decided to let him go. See if he would lead us to it.”

For the past half hour Spencer had stunned
Jennings with a story about an object said to have supernatural properties that had been passed in secret through generations of keepers and that it was the government’s belief that the object would eventually be passed to McArthur for reasons that were still not entirely clear to Jennings. Jennings remembered what Doug had told him on the phone before boarding the plane in Tampa:
“I have this thing . . . this artifact. It was given to me by the man who shot De Roché. I may be crazy but I think it has some kind of power.”

Jennings
thought for a minute about what he should do, and decided he was not going to mention the conversation to Spencer. He was not going to give Spencer anything. He’d just play dumb and see what Spencer had. Spencer was a slippery bastard and Jennings didn’t like him nor did he trust him. After that debacle last year on Apocalypse Island he would never trust him again.

“
So, he didn’t have the object?” Jennings said.

“
Damn right he had it. We just didn’t know it.”

Jennings
frowned. “I don’t get it,” he said.

“Airport security took him off that first plane,
” Spencer said. “They searched him and found the object. Took it directly to their boss. When I talked to the security guy he had McArthur sitting right in front of him and said the only thing McArthur had in his possession was a wallet.”

“
So why didn’t he mention it?” Jennings asked.

Spencer shook his head. “
I know this is difficult to swallow but that object somehow has the ability to . . . persuade minds. Why do you think the government wants to get its hands on it?”

“How can an object persuade minds?”

“We don’t know. But we’d certainly like to find out.”

Jennings
gave Spencer a hard stare.

“
Listen, Rick. In a later interview with the security team we found out that the guy was looking right at it when I asked him what McArthur had in his possession. He told me just a wallet. I asked him again and he said the same thing. Now he says he doesn’t know what happened. It was like his mind went blank or something.”

“
So you assholes let Doug get on that plane knowing that something was screwy,” Jennings said. “Hoping he would lead you to that object?”

“That’s right.
We figured he’d lead us to it eventually and we didn’t want to spook him. We didn’t put agents on the plane but we had them waiting in Boston. We were just as shocked about the crash as everyone else, and we thought we’d lost our chance. But then something interesting came to our attention.” Spencer paused. His eyes were gleaming and he had a small conspiratorial smile on his thin lips.

Jennings
stopped pacing, staring down at Spencer waiting for him to continue.

“W
e’re not absolutely sure McArthur was on that plane,” Spencer said.

“What?
” A strange and absurd hope blossomed in Jennings. “You just said . . .”

“
Yes, his name was on the manifest, and someone with his name boarded that plane, but we have reason to believe it wasn’t him.”

“Are you
sure?”

“
As sure as we can be.”

“Well, if he wasn’t on that plane then
where the hell is he?”

“
Good question. It’s possible he’s being helped by someone.”

“Who?”

“We don’t know yet but I promise you we’ll find out. The crash site is under heavy security,” Spencer continued. “Our best people are combing the wreckage looking for the artifact.”

“Wouldn’t the crash have destroyed it? It destroyed everything else.”

“We don’t think so.
We think it has properties that defy logic. If it’s there we’ll find it. We don’t think it’s there. And that would mean McArthur isn’t there either.”

“
Christ,” Jennings muttered. “This is crazy.”

Spencer smiled.
“You bet it is.”

“Why are you
telling me this?” Jennings said. “You know goddamn well that when it comes to Doug I’m your worst enemy.”

“
Yeah, we know. You were closer to McArthur than anybody, and you want to protect him. And that’s
exactly
why I’m talking to you.”

Jennings
stared.

“
Listen, Rick, McArthur is being hunted by much more dangerous factions than the U.S. Government. Lots of people would like to get their hands on that artifact. If he is still alive we’re his only hope of survival and I think you know it.”

Jennings
knew nothing of the kind but he wasn’t about to admit that to Spencer. He knew from experience that Spencer would not hesitate to sacrifice anyone for what his superiors considered to be the greater good. He nodded. “Tell me about these other variables. Tell me who’s hunting him and why.”

Spencer s
ighed. “This is what we do know. The priest that made the attempt on De Roché’s life at his wife’s funeral, a Father Paul Redington, talked to McArthur just before he died. There are witnesses that saw them and it’s extremely likely that he’s the one who passed the object to him. He belonged to a cult known as the Brotherhood of the Order. Rumor is that they’re descended from the Knights Templar but we don’t know that for sure. They’re an ultra secret Jesuit organization with offices around the world. They’re big, they’re old and they’re well funded. The night before Redington shows up at the funeral, his rural Ohio church burns to the ground. People died in that fire. We don’t know how many yet or who they were. We’re all over it trying to find answers but the fire burned hot and completely destroyed the church and everyone in it. There were some limos in the vicinity and some other bodies. We’re tracing flights in and out of the country. It’s only a matter of time before we know something. It’s possible that someone within their own organization betrayed them. We’re still working on it.”

“So you think they’re the ones protecting him
? I mean the Brotherhood of the Order?”

“It’s very likely.”

“You say they’re Jesuits?” Jennings said. “Aren’t Jesuits traditionally more interested in science than religion?”

“
Fifty-fifty. They’ve always had a keen interest in science, astronomy, physics, stuff like that. This particular branch of Jesuits is heavily invested in the belief that the world is headed for some terrible cataclysm and that some sort of prophet is going to come along and save the world.”

“So
unds like the same shit fanatics have been spewing for centuries,” Jennings said.

“
Exactly. We don’t take it too seriously.”

“So
, who brought that plane down, Spencer? Who wants Doug dead that bad?”

“
We don’t know but we have a theory. De Roché hated McArthur, that’s no secret, and it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that he wanted the object for himself.”

“
Jesus,” Jennings said. He went to his desk and fell into his chair.

“There’s something weird and mysterious about that
man,” Spencer went on. “Ever since he threw his hat into the presidential ring the press has had a field day trying to find information on him. Records show that he was born in Boston in 1945 to unknown parents and that he was raised in an orphanage. And although the records are there, and they appear to be totally authentic, no one from his childhood seems to remember him. Very strange if you ask me, especially when you consider that he’s perpetuating the story that he came from a line of French royalty. Now how would he know that if he was raised in an orphanage and no one knows who his parents are? His rise in financial and political circles was nothing short of astonishing. He’s made friends in some very high places, and those friends don’t seem to care that his background is shaky.” Spencer paused for effect before continuing in a quietly reverent voice. “But what’s really surprising is his interest in science.”

“What do you mean?”

“We’ve discovered that he’s been funneling huge amounts of money into various scientific research projects.”

“
Explain.”

“
His dealings are mostly out of the country, places where US law has no jurisdiction. He’s working with genetics and stem cell research and cloning, something he refers to as the ‘guided evolution of man’. He believes that for the race to survive we have to purify it.”

“Sounds
like a Hitler complex to me,” Jennings said.

“
Exactly, but that’s not all. He’s putting a lot of money into different kinds of rocket propulsion systems. He believes the earth is on some sort of collision course with disaster and supposedly he’s devising a system whereby the select few will be able to safely leave.”

“So he’s bought into the same doomsday scenario as that
brotherhood organization?”

“
They’re not the only ones. Religions and cults all over the world are becoming all hysterical about it. There’s talk about a new messiah. You know the drill. Like I said, we aren’t taking it very seriously.”

“So why are you all over
it then?”

“
The people I work for want the artifact.” 

Jennings
thought of what Doug had told him about his fears that De Roché wanted him dead and that De Roché, for some strange reason, wanted Doug’s and Annie’s unborn child. And he thought about the way Annie had acted at Doug’s memorial service and about De Roché and his strange entourage, and how he’d seemed more like a gangster than a presidential candidate. “So, what do you know about this supposed prophet or messiah or whatever you want to call it?” Jennings asked.

“Nothing,” Spencer said, and
Jennings could tell by Spencer’s body language that he was lying. “We think it’s fiction.”

“Spencer, I know when you’re bull shitting me.
You want my help, level with me.”

“Listen
, the only thing I know is the cults believe it hasn’t been born yet.”

Jennings
stared long and hard at Spencer. “I have an idea,” he said. “Why don’t you just go to Florida and interview De Roché and Annie?”

“A lot tougher than you might think,” Spencer
said. “We’ve tried, believe me we have, but he refuses to be interviewed. He’s got a lot going for him, money, influence, rich and powerful friends. For one thing he’s protected because he’s a presidential candidate. For another, he just lost his wife to a brutal murder and now it seems he’s lost his son-in-law in that crash. And none of it points directly to him. When he travels he surrounds himself with muscle, he lives in a well-protected compound and there’s not a judge in the world who will issue a warrant for us to go there and look around. Unless we can find something substantial that points to him, our hands are tied.”

Jennings
sat in stunned silence, his mind trying to absorb it all.

“There’s another variable we haven’t yet talked about, Rick,” Spencer said, breaking the silence.

“Yeah, what’s that?”

“McArthur
’s connection to everything. His . . . sight.”

Jennings
stared. “I don’t know how that could possibly be connected.”

Spencer held
up his hand. “Hear me out, Rick. That supernatural creature McArthur sees in his visions. The creature that calls itself Collector. Whenever he murders he writes
Lost, Forsaken, Forgotten
somewhere nearby in Aramaic.”

“Yeah
, so?”

“You remember what else he left on the wall at the
last crime scene in New Hampshire?”

Jennings
did remember, and ever since then he’d been trying to figure out what the hell it was, what the hell it meant. Now a light bulb came on in his head. “It’s the same thing, isn’t it?” he said. “It’s that . . . artifact you’re looking for?”

Spencer smiled
. “That’s right, Rick. It appears that McArthur has been connected to this . . . murdering creature, whatever the hell it is, since he was a child. And now we believe he is in possession of an artifact that’s somehow connected to the creature.”