The Book of Names (28 page)

“Your business here is to do one thing and only one thing, my dear Serpent.” DiStefano's words dripped like acid. “You're to find the last Hidden One, not waste precious minutes slithering around the one who's here. We could have already dispensed with her had you focused on finding the last name. Jack Cherle will be dead this afternoon once his pleasure ship docks at Southampton. We are so damned close,” he spat, “and yet you dawdle.”

Crispin opened his mouth to retort, but DiStefano cut him off before he could utter a syllable.

“Sit back down at that computer and find the last damned name.”

Crispin flushed the color of new wine. As his hand clenched tighter around his cane he imagined how it would feel to thwack it across DiStefano's face. More than once.

“You heard the Head of the Circle.” His father's voice
was tight and wooden. Erik Mueller jerked the door open, his eyes shuttered as he looked back at his son. “Take your seat and finish the job you were assigned.”

The door slammed behind him.

“The Lamed Vovniks
are
my damned assignment,” Crispin bit out, limping in fury toward DiStefano. “After all I've done I have more right than anyone to see what's so special about these so-called righteous ones.”

“Dealings with the Hidden Ones are the exclusive duties of the Dark Angels.” The gray hair at DiStefano's temples was darkened with sweat. “If you can't find the final name, we'll have to pry it from David Shepherd's journal. Is that how you want to be remembered? As the Serpent who choked in the final moments? Who failed to deliver at the brink of victory? Or as the one man who single-handedly uncloaked each of the thirty-six hidden ones?”

Crispin slammed his cane against the floor. “Get out so I can work.”

DiStefano's eyes held his for an endless moment.

“Don't think to leave this room until you have the name.”

A vein in Crispin's neck throbbed as DiStefano left him alone.

Who in bloody hell does he think he is, confining me to this room like a child? It's my work that has taken us this far in a single generation. When has anyone else ever identified even half as many Hidden Ones? The world is disintegrating because of what I've achieved. And because of my contribution, the end is inevitable.

Leaning his cane against the file drawers, Crispin called up his calculation log. It didn't matter that he wouldn't be going to the surface anymore. He didn't need to. His plan was already in place. He could accomplish everything he yearned for down here in the Ark.

When Shepherd reached Trinity Square Memorial Gardens and dialed up his precious little girl's phone, it would be Raoul who scrutinized the caller ID. Raoul who would be lying in wait with Enrique at the seafarers' memorial—mere steps away, hidden behind the curved garden wall.

They didn't know their orders had come from him and not DiStefano. It had taken no more than a few knowing keystrokes to hack in to DiStefano's secure server and send the Dark Angels the text-mail instructions. Momentarily, Raoul and Enrique would bring Shepherd, his journal, and the gemstone down into the Ark.

Soon it would be time for a much anticipated—and very private—reunion.

Once Shepherd gets here, the game is mine. He'll be trapped. Helpless to save his daughter. Helpless to save the world. Or himself. Then I'll publicly reveal the final name, and the Circle—everyone in the Ark—will cheer me for bringing about our triumph.

He gazed at the calculation log where the final name was highlighted in red.

If his father and DiStefano had treated him with the deference he deserved, he would have handed them the name on the spot. Now they could squirm and worry. And they'd welcome David Shepherd when the Dark Angels delivered him, thinking they still needed him.

But it was Crispin who needed Shepherd—who needed the satisfaction of closure, final closure. Before the Ascension, he needed to see Shepherd suffer. As he had suffered, locked in the darkness all those years.

With a few keystrokes, he once more logged into DiStefano's server and typed an official order that would set the end in motion.

The thirty-sixth name—and the command to find him.
Guillermo Torres.

HEATHROW AIRPORT

Dillon stared at his reflection in the mirror above the sinks in the congested restroom. He looked like hell, and without doubt that was where he was going. And there was a good chance he'd be there sooner rather than later.

He was very conscious of the snug fit of the gemstone ring as he washed his hands. Was it his imagination, or was it really as heavy as it felt?

There was no time now for guilt or second thoughts, he told himself as he checked his watch. He had a connection to make within the hour.

But as he started toward the door, a man barreled through it, obviously frantic to answer the call of nature. He crashed into Dillon, his briefcase and umbrella sent flying as his suitcase slammed against Dillon's hip.

Wincing, Dillon stooped to retrieve the man's umbrella as the sweating, broad-shouldered stranger began to scoop up the scattered contents of his briefcase from the tile floor.

Dillon froze as he spotted a Tower card seconds before the man shoved it back into his briefcase along with a passport wallet and grooming kit.

“Here you go, my friend,” Dillon said with a smile, handing over the umbrella.

“My fault, sorry, eh? In a bit of a hurry.” The man with the thick German accent was already striding urgently toward the urinals.

Dillon leaned against the wall outside the restroom. When the German bustled out a minute later, he fell into step with him.

“It seems we have something in common.” He flashed the colorful tarot card he pulled from his breast pocket, identical to the one in the German's briefcase.

The other man's deep-set eyes lit with recognition. His jowly cheeks relaxed into a smile. “Exciting times we're living in, eh?”

“To say the least.” Dillon shortened his stride to keep even with his new acquaintance.

“Since we're both going to the same place, why don't we share a cab?” Dillon offered. He pushed open the door and stepped out into the faint gray drizzle misting the London streets.

“I was thinking exactly the same thing.”

A porter lifted a hand to summon them a waiting cab from the queue, then thumped the German's bulky green suitcase into the boot. Dillon's new friend leaned forward and told the driver their destination as Dillon slammed the cab door.

“Tower Hill. Drop us at the monument.”

 

He couldn't stop thinking about her as he wandered the lower tunnels.
Elizabeth.

Perhaps it was the dankness down here, the smell of the earth and bedrock, the endless trickle of water dripping grooves into the rock wall behind the rear staircase.

Or was it the faint cries of the women he could hear as he skirted their holding area?

He thought of Anne Boleyn, locked in the Tower of London, which rose so famously on the surface high above the Ark. She had been a prisoner, too.

As he neared the rear staircase, he suddenly turned, drawn toward the chasm hidden deep within the shadows. He picked his way down a darkened tunnel to the underground well. Running his hand along the moisture-slicked guardrail rimming it, he felt an odd thrill. Even he had no idea how deep it dropped.

No matter, he reminded himself. He wasn't going down. He and the others were going up. To a new world high above, finally unfettered and reunited with their spiritual Source.

It was what he'd wanted and worked for as far back as he remembered. What his ancestors had striven for without success.

He ought to be overjoyed that this miracle was happening during his lifetime. He thought of his wife, meticulously storing their scant belongings in the room they'd been assigned on the upper level. And felt nothing.

Perhaps if Elizabeth were down here with him . . .

Never once had he questioned his faith. The search for inner knowing, for ascension, was something he'd been raised with, something he'd yearned for since his youth.

But now that it was imminent and he was about to leave the physical world, he found himself strangely reluctant to leave everything he knew. And he knew he loved Elizabeth.

She was more real to him than this subterranean Ark, more real than all the plans and plots and murders it had taken to reach this day. Gazing into the blackness of the
chasm, he could see once more the uncertainty Elizabeth had tried to mask when he told her he was going away.

It was too late to change things. Reaching into his pocket, he palmed the small silver charm Elizabeth had taken from her bracelet one morning at dawn. A champagne-glass charm her older sister had given her on her twenty-first birthday. Elizabeth had said she wanted him to have it because he'd taught her how to drink in life. He'd kept it with the loose change in his pocket, the jingling sound a constant reminder of their love.

Opening his hand, he stared at the miniature champagne glass. It was of this world, the evil physical realm, he reminded himself. There would be no place for champagne in the next world. And there would be no place for Elizabeth.

With a sharp snap of his wrist, he hurled the charm into the gaping blackness and listened for it to be swallowed up. He never heard it touch bottom.

MEXICO CITY

Guillermo Torres paced up and down the surgical wing of the maternity floor, his breath coming faster as each moment passed.

He'd been waiting for this day for nine long months, praying for a healthy baby. Now his prayers were about to be answered, and his heart was overflowing with anticipation and joy.

Rosa had miscarried twice before, but thanks to the Virgin Mother the bleeding this time had stopped during the second month and their baby was now full term. Today he would hold his child in his arms.

He paused for a moment and sent up a fervent prayer for the doctors performing the C-section, for his wife's swift healing, and above all, for a healthy child to finally bless their home.

Tears pricked his eyes and he wiped them away with the back of his sleeve. He was only twenty-two, the baby of the family, and his brothers had always teased him for being sentimental. He laughed at them instead of being insulted. He was glad he felt so deeply about everything
and couldn't understand why more people didn't feel touched by life the way he did.

Guillermo peered up at the clock above the nurse's station.
When?
It had been thirty-five minutes since he'd kissed Rosa good-bye as they wheeled her into the operating room. When would they come get him to put on his gown, allow him to stand beside his wife as the miracle happened?

When would his mother get here to see her new grandchild? Half the family was on their way from Toluca.

Downstairs, two doctors carrying clipboards strolled through the emergency room of Nuevo Hospital Juarez and stepped into the elevator.

They didn't exchange any words as the car lifted them toward the third floor. They didn't need to. Stepping off the elevator, they walked through the maze of polished, antiseptic hallways with the ease of men who belonged there.

But neither of them had ever sworn an oath to save lives.

5,900 MILES AWAY
BARCELONA, SPAIN

Guillermo Torres owned the stage. As he crooned “What a Wonderful World,” he could feel the warmth of the audience caress him like a generous lover. They were with him, this tapas bar crowd, and they applauded long and hard as he finished the first set.

He glanced over at Armando, the owner of the bar, who kept promising him a nightime gig. If today didn't convince his boss that he could keep an audience riveted to
their seats, drinking and applauding all night long, nothing could.

Guillermo loved singing almost as much as he loved teaching. Music was his passion. The language of his soul. And it gave him almost as much pleasure to impart its complex lushness to his students, as it did to bring an appreciative audience to its feet.

As the applause at last faded, he slid onto a barstool. As usual, a shot of Pernod and a small plate of vinegary
boquerones
, a chunk of
Cabrales
cheese, and a glass filled with olives were waiting for him. Claudia knew his tastes.

But as he tossed an olive in his mouth, it was a slim mustachioed bartender who came from the kitchen balancing serving plates of garlic mushrooms, fried cheese, and cumin chicken.

Guillermo had never seen him before in his life. “Where's Claudia? She was here earlier.”

“Sick.” The man shrugged his slim shoulders. “Female problems.” He nodded toward Guillermo's empty shot glass.

“Another?”

Why not?
Guillermo thought, pushing the glass across the bar.

A woman from the audience sauntered over just then, sliding a hand along his arm, standing a little too close as she told him in a breathy voice how much she enjoyed his singing. He never saw the bartender refill his glass, nor did he see him flick a droplet of liquid from a tiny silver flask that was swiftly repocketed.

He only knew that the tapas were good, the Pernod was excellent and the woman smiling so invitingly into his eyes wore a low-cut red dress and an intoxicating perfume.

Guillermo drank deeply. Life was good.

 

ATLANTA, GEORGIA
4,600 MILES AWAY

Guillermo Torres lived for baseball. He'd come up from the farm clubs in Puerto Rico, slugged his way out of the bush leagues and into the majors, and now was closing in on 3,000 hits.

But he was not at his best today. He was still sore from sliding into home yesterday and slamming his hip hard against the plate. Good thing this was only a charity exhibition game against local policemen, raising money for victims of domestic abuse.

Guillermo sat on the boards of a half dozen national charities, but this cause meant the most to him because he'd spent his childhood helplessly watching his own mother being beaten by his stepfather. Now his mother was perched proudly just behind the dugout with his wife and two children as the police officers ran out onto the field.