the 13th Hour (12 page)

Gunfire whizzed by his ears, peppering the stone wall, shattering the bark of the tree, a shredding fusillade of bullets inching down toward his position. He was pinned tight. To his left was the eight-foot wall, behind him the tree. His only ways out were over the hood of the crashed car on his right, into the open, or back out the way he came. Either way led square into the killer's sights.

Nick lay flat on the ground, pressing his body into the torn dirt and grass, and looked underneath the vehicle. On the other side, by the rear left tire, he could clearly see the man's muddy loafers squared off in a shooting stance, and without hesitation, Nick aimed and fired three shots, hitting the man square in the shin.

The shooter tumbled to the ground, screaming in agony. Nick leaped up and raced out of his captive position, taking cover behind Julia's Lexus.

The killer fired haphazardly at him, six shots in rapid succession, until Nick heard the telltale click: out of ammo. He had him.

As Nick rounded the car, he saw a small, metal pick-gun lying in the mud by the driver's-side door, looking like a cross between a staple gun and a toothbrush, Nick realized how the man had opened the locked door into his mudroom without a key.

Beside it was the Colt Peacemaker, its six cylinders smoldering and spent. With Nick chasing him down, the killer had had no time to plant the weapon, to set Nick up.

The sight of the ornate weapon angered him. That this man would set him up for the murder of his own wife infuriated Nick no end, but as he thought on the moment, he knew the future was already changing, there would be no gun in Nick's car to tie him to the murder, and soon, there would be no murder at all.

Nick approached the man, finding him on his belly next to the wrecked Impala, his back rising in deep wounded breaths. The man's dark hair, caked in blood, poked out from underneath a New York Mets baseball cap, his left arm broken from the car crash, cantilevered out at an odd angle. He gripped his now-useless nine-millimeter pistol in his right hand, as his left leg extended out bullet-shattered and bloody.

Nick slowly knelt beside him. He reached out and grabbed him by the back collar of his shirt, catching a silver chain between his fingers, the holy medal of St. Christopher now dangling from his clenched fist.

Nick did everything he could to restrain himself from killing the man, breathing a sigh of relief with the first completed step toward saving Julia. And for the moment he felt hope rise up. Against all logic, he knew that he just might be able to bring Julia back.

Nick tilted the killer's head toward him, to finally lay eyes on the man who had just killed his wife . . .

But before his face came into view, before he could identify Julia's assassin . . .

Nick's world went black.

CHAPTER
8

5:00
P.M.

N
ICK STOOD IN HIS
library, heaving, out of breath, swirling his tongue about in his mouth to rid it of the metallic taste. He felt the chill, more pronounced this time due to his sweat-covered body. His pants and shirt were muddy and torn from the accident and from crawling around on the ground. His hands shook from the adrenaline still coursing through his system. With a white-knuckled grip, he still held tight to his pistol. And . . .

He still held tight to the St. Christopher medal. Like the other inanimate objects in his possession, the gold watch, his cell phone, his clothes, it had leaped back with him, still dangling from his clenched fist. He held it up, looking at its chipped surface, the engraved message on the back ironically seeming to call to him.
Miracles do happen.

An overwhelming frustration rose up in Nick as he realized how close he had been. He had literally held Julia's killer in his hand, but his hesitation had cost him. He had never seen his face, never learned his identity . . .

But as he looked again at the silver medal, he realized that he did have a piece of him, and more important, he did remember the license plate: Z8JP9.

Nick looked again at his condition, his clothes, his banged-up face, and bolted out of his library, through the living room, across the foyer, and up the stairs. He couldn't let Julia see him like this.

"Nick?" Julia called out from the kitchen. "Are you done with all your work?"

"Just going to take a quick shower," he called out as he continued his sprint to their bedroom, happy to hear her voice once again.

"Wait, I haven't seen you all day," she yelled.

Without a response, Nick went straight to his bathroom and shut the door, stripping out of his clothes and turning on the water, thankful that there was hot water in the tank before the power went out. He opened the shutters to let some light in and looked out the window. Against all logic, he saw Julia's Lexus, which he had taken out of the driveway and rammed into the blue Chevy, destroying the front end of the Japanese SUV. It sat in the driveway, its black waxed finish without even a scratch.

Unfortunately, he realized as he turned, looked into the mirror, and saw the damage, that wasn't the case for him.

He had two small burns above his left eyebrow from the airbag, along with a cut on his right cheek. The small scrapes, dirt, and grime made him appear as if he had just emerged from battle, which was how his body actually felt.

He hid his pistol underneath the stack of dark-blue towels and hopped into the shower. He was suddenly aware of his host of injuries as the hot water hit his raw skin. His body felt far worse than after a hockey game full of major checking and fights. As he chased Julia's killer, as he rolled from the car and became pinned by the gunfire, he had felt not a moment of fear for his safety. He had never been so determined, never fought harder in his life. Hope had focused him; his love for Julia had driven him.

He soaped up, rinsed quickly, and was out of the shower in less than two minutes. He realized that he literally had no time to waste, he had only eight hours left to figure out a way to stop Julia's killer, and the only way he was going to be able to do that was by finding out why he was after her in the first place.

"Care to explain?" Julia stood in the open doorway as she pointed at the muddy and bloody clothes on the floor.

Nick wrapped a thick white towel around his waist.

"My God, what happened?" she said as she saw the burns and the cut on his cheek.

"No big deal." Nick tried to slough it off.

"No big deal? It looks like someone made a big deal about your face."

"You should see the Mets fan in the baseball cap."

"What happened to you?"

"Car accident."

"Car accident? Whose car?"

He had no idea how to answer as he glanced out the window at her car in the driveway. Life was running backward, everything was resetting timewise, but as he felt the ache with his movement, he knew everything was resetting except him.

"I stopped to help someone who dumped their car in a ditch; I slipped a bit."

She looked deep into his eyes, not buying a word he said.

He quickly walked by her to his closet. "Tell me again, why weren't you on the plane?"

"You're changing the subject."

Nick threw off his towel as he quickly put on a pair of briefs and Levi's 501 jeans. He was amazed to find his wallet on his dresser. It had been taken by the police at 9:00
P.M.
, but here it was now, four hours earlier, where it had been for most of the day before he grabbed it at 5:30 in order to get a credit card number. He shook off the warped deja-vu moment and turned to Julia with the most serious of looks. "Julia, I need to know what pulled you off that plane."

Julia stared for a moment, though she finally relented, annoyance coloring her voice. "I got on the plane this morning; I had to run up to Boston for a short meeting. I had settled into my seat and gotten lost in a conversation with a lovely old lady." Julia paused with a sudden realization. Her angry tone vanished, replaced with the sound of sorrow. "Her name . . . her name was Katherine and she was going to see her husband, who was sick. She didn't say it, but I think he was dying. And despite her hardship, the pain she was in, she asked about me, my life, with such sincere interest, with such green, honest eyes."

Julia paused, tears welling up. Nick gently laid his hand on her face, stroking it, pulling her into a reassuring hug as she began to sob.

"All those people. They all sat on that plane with such hope in their eyes," Julia said, her voice cracking. "Heading off to see friends and family; a business trip that they promised their kid they'd hurry back from; people going on vacation. None of them ever imagining they would all soon be . . ."

"Julia," Nick gently said, trying to bring her back to the moment. "Why did you get off the plane?"

"There was a robbery." She looked up at him.

"A robbery? What kind of robbery?"

Julia pulled away from Nick. She briefly went into his bathroom, returning with a tissue, dabbing her eyes, wiping away her grief.

"There's a large colonial home over on Maple Avenue called Washington House. It belongs to a man by the name of Shamus Hennicot. It's been in his family for three generations. He's at least ninety so, as you can imagine, it's rather old. The outside has that white clapboard New England look with the black shutters, wood shake roof--"

"I know the house, Julia." Nick said, trying to hurry her along.

"Well, it's a bit more than some colonial remnant. They have kept the insides updated and reinforced with concrete and steel. While it is Hennicot's home, it also contains not only his office but a rather elaborate storage and display warehouse on the lower level."

"Warehouse for what?"

"The Hennicots have been clients of Aitkens, Lerner, & Isles since 1886. Shamus's grandfather, Ian Hennicot, was this wealthy Irish land baron and whiskey manufacturer. He was also a purveyor of antiques with an affinity for warfare. He had a collection of exotic weapons from around the world. Bejeweled daggers from Sri Lanka, diamond-encrusted sabers from Turkey, katanas from the feudal era of Japan, Chinese lances, English and Spanish swords from the age of knights. It was his true passion. He had a collection of pistols and rifles, with intricate engravings. The contradiction was bizarre: weapons of elegance and beauty whose only purpose was death.

"The tastes of Ian's son, Stephan Francis, were a bit more traditional. He collected fine art and statuary, jewelry and sculptures. And his son, Shamus, his passions are more benevolent. He would loan certain pieces of their collections out to museums around the world but always refused to sell them.

"I'm not sure if you remember, but a few years back, I was assigned as not only the junior attorney appointed to handle Hennicot's business affairs but also the emergency point person, which included being contacted any time the security system at the Maple Avenue building was breached."

"So, while you were waiting to take off, you were beeped?" Nick asked in confusion.

"It's quite a bit more than a beep." She smiled. "But yeah. A text message, actually."

"What did they take?"

"There was a velvet pouch with over two hundred diamonds, four gold swords and two silver rapiers, three sabers, five jewel-encrusted daggers, three gold-inlaid pistols along with their silver ammunition. All told, over $25 million."

Nick listened to her every word convinced that her future death was 100 percent related to what she had just told him. "What did you do when you got off the plane?"

"Headed over there, straight away. I wasn't sure yet if there had been a robbery; I thought it might have been a false alarm."

"What about the police?"

"The Hennicots weren't too trusting of the police. The procedure is we are contacted first, an automatic email and text message is sent for any unscheduled access to the lower-level vault, then, once we deem it necessary, we call the police. Hennicot's philosophy was the police were just one step above the criminals and who was to know if they didn't line their pockets during the investigation while pointing their fingers at the thieves?"

"A little cynical," Nick said. "Don't you think?"

"They call it eccentric."

"You mean high-class crazy?"

"If you ever met him, you'd think differently. He's probably the sanest, nicest man I've ever met. When I was first assigned to him, he sent me the kindest note. He has taken me to lunch dozens of times. He's so charming and wise. He's given me such great advice about my career, business, life . . ."

"Should I be worried?" Nick asked facetiously.

"Well, he's worth over $4 billion. And for a gentleman of ninety, he couldn't be more handsome. He doesn't get around too well, hasn't left his New England summer home in over a month. Everyone thinks he's this man of mystery, an anonymous donor to countless charities. When large donations are made and no one can track down the originator, many think it has to be Shamus trying to give away his fortune."