The Breath of God

by Jeffrey Small

  Who was the lowlife reporter’s anonymous source? Brady fumed. Then it came to him; he hadn’t trusted that Carla woman for one second. She was one of those typical accounting types. They never understood the bigger picture, and yet they had access to his most personal data—his checkbook. He hadn’t heard from Jennings about how she’d taken being let go, but he imagined it hadn’t been pretty. She was one of those uppity MBA women, the type of woman Brady simply couldn’t tolerate. Brady’s other employees had more respectful attitudes. They saw him for what he was: the visionary leader of the church. She just didn’t fit in.

  A knock echoed through the mahogany office door. “Enter,” Brady said.

  Jennings hurried inside without saying hello. He thrust several printouts in front of the reverend. Brady looked at his number two without glancing at the papers. Brady noticed that Jennings had opted today for his ill-fitting charcoal Brooks Brothers suit instead of the frayed blue one.

  “Yes, William. I’ve read the article already. What are you going to do about it?” Brady tossed the newspaper to the floor in disgust.

  “The article?” Jennings said, momentarily confused. “Oh, that trash? Our attorneys already called the editor and threatened a libel suit. Your partnership interests are completely legal.”

  “Legal or not, it’s the perception of unbecoming behavior we need to fight. The last thing we need is this kind of publicity.”

  “It’ll blow over,” Jennings said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “The paper won’t risk a follow-up story after our attorneys finish with them. Not why I’m here, though. Have you read your email today?” Jennings jabbed a clawlike finger at the first sheet of paper he’d tossed at Brady.

  Brady surveyed the printed copy from an academic website of a society of biblical scholars. “Why do I care what these egghead professors have to say? You know that most seminaries today don’t teach the true word of our Lord. That’s why we’re building the New Hope Seminary—to teach the literal word of God, not some unbeliever’s wishful thinking about what he wants God to say.”

  “I know that, Brian, but to fight these types, we need to understand their positions.” Jennings rolled a ballpoint pen from one finger to the next in rhythm with his rapid speech. “These professors are more dangerous than the atheists and agnostics. Every time one of them writes a new historical Jesus book, it sets us back. People who should be listening to you are intoxicated by these professors’ academic credentials and the pseudoscience behind their distorted views.”

  Now Jennings was speaking his language, Brady thought. The reverend understood better than most that once the mystery and the magic were taken away from the Bible and people were allowed to interpret it in any way they chose, the Good Book lost its power and authority. That was why his own book was so effective: it took the dire predictions in the Book of Revelation and showed how these predictions clearly were coming true today. Brady reluctantly began to scan the article.

  “What the ...” Turning the page, Brady’s eyes widened. “But this is preposterous,” he sputtered when he’d finished. The article described a discovery by an Emory graduate student, Grant Matthews, in a country Brady had never heard of. The manuscripts found by this student purported to explain the missing years in the life of Jesus in a way that Brady immediately understood was very un-Christian. A chill crept up his spine. The claims being made by this kid were much more serious than any of the drivel he’d seen published about Jesus in the past few years.

  “Who’s going to read, much less believe, this crap?”

  “This article has been online less than a day and over two hundred sites have already linked to it.” Jennings handed Brady another printout of an email message. “Even your parishioners are beginning to ask about it.”

  The reverend glanced at the email’s from line: Tim Huntley.

  “Tim Huntley? The man who sends me all that conspiracy theory nonsense from the Internet? I delete his messages without opening them.” Brady recalled something he’d scanned not too long ago from Huntley about Americans being the real lost tribe of Israel. Huntley made him uncomfortable—the way he sat ramrod straight in the front row every single Sunday, the awful rashes that distracted Brady during his sermons each week, the way the man didn’t seem to get that his minister wouldn’t want to be troubled with conspiracy theories. After the man began to send him daily messages, each one more strident than the last, Brady added his name to his junk mail filter. Tim Huntley was one of those parishioners who took Brady’s sermons about becoming a soldier in God’s army of the righteous too literally.

  “Read this one.”

  Brady sighed and glanced at the page from Huntley. The tone was similar to his previous emails: urgent, as if the church’s very existence depended on the lunatic’s theories. As Brady reached the middle of the page, however, he began to fear that the church’s future, his future, might indeed be threatened. Tim Huntley outlined how the discovery of the texts called into question the very nature of Jesus Christ. If the texts were to be believed, Jesus was a man with fears, insecurities, and questions, a man who developed his own view of God after studying other religions in India, where he spent a majority of his life traveling. For once, Brady agreed with Tim. This view of Jesus was wholly incompatible with the teachings of the Bible, with his own teachings, that Jesus was divine from birth, sent to earth as the incarnation of God himself to judge and to save us. These texts call into question the very nature of the divinity of Jesus, Brady realized, fuming.

  The hairs on Brady’s neck stood up when he reached the part of the email where Tim set forth his concerns about how this discovery, were it to be accepted by the public, would also directly refute Brady’s recent book. People would claim that the influence of other religions was not the cause of the country’s current problems, as Brady wrote, but that Jesus himself became who he was because of his contact with other religions.

  “Brian, this story will spread and come out big.” Jennings continued to click his pen through his fingers in time with his speech. “If this kid’s story pans out, the media will portray this find as far greater than the Dead Sea Scrolls.”

  God almighty, Brady thought. If the media seized on this story, the negative effect it could have on Christians everywhere was frightening. He knew that few Christians had the strength of faith that he had—a faith that could stand up to ridiculous claims like this. He flipped back to the first printout. Halfway down the page his eyes caught the reference to the “secret teachings” that Jesus had supposedly learned during his travels. Brady knew that every New Age flake would seize upon the idea of ancient texts containing secret teachings and make a big deal of it. He shook his head. The only ancient text with true teachings was the Holy Bible.

  “But,” Brady said, “certainly this has to be a hoax. There’s no way these texts could have remained undiscovered for centuries. They simply can’t be real.”

  “Brian, this is the opportunity you’ve been praying for.” Jennings finally stopped twirling his pen and instead began to pace around the office. “We should preempt the news. God is giving you the chance to stand up and speak, not just to your congregation, but to the country as a whole.”

  Brady held his thick fingers to his chin, studying Jennings. He rarely saw his number two excited. Brady felt that Jennings lacked a certain spark, as if the Holy Spirit was having a bad day when it touched him. Jennings’s emotions were about as upbeat as his wardrobe—old, tired, conservative. But the reverend recognized that he would never have made it this far without Jennings’s ability to see opportunities that others could not.

  “We could use some positive publicity right now,” Brady said, more to himself than to Jennings.

  “This story will dwarf anything about the financial situation at New Hope.”

  “But my book—”

  Jennings grinned, something he rarely did. “If you take the lead on this, your book sales will go through the roof. Our financial stresses will be solved
.”

  “You think so?” Usually the optimist, Brady had become increasingly disturbed by the tone of the last few development meetings. Even Jennings now spoke of delaying certain phases until they received the rest of the funding from the banks.

  “I do, but we need to move quickly and control this story ourselves. We will establish you as the voice of opposition—the voice of the believers.”

  The voice of the believers, Brady thought. He liked the sound of that. Someone needed to protect the true Christians from the threat to their faith that academics like Grant Matthews posed. “How do you propose I do it?”

  “I have a few ideas.”

  Brady glanced at the page in his hand. The final paragraph contained an offer of help from Tim Huntley, who suggested that with his military background and his faith, he was the perfect soldier for Brady’s and God’s army. The man suggested that the world would be better off if the texts just disappeared.

  “You aren’t going to rely on this nut job?” Brady held up the page. Although Huntley had outlined the dangers of the texts accurately, everything about the man made Brady cringe. With the endless emails and the intensity with which the man stared at him on Sundays, Brady felt as if he were being stalked, like a woman trying to escape a jealous lover. Brady conjured up the image of Huntley in the first row and involuntarily recoiled at the thought. His face was always peeling, scaly, like a sunburned serpent. He again thanked God for his own flawless complexion.

  Jennings began to rotate the pen between his fingers again. He shook his head. “I have something better in mind. Something public.”

  CHAPTER 18

  ATLANTA, GEORGIA

  TIM CLICKED THE CAR door closed and scanned the parking lot. Two in the morning on a weeknight. The apartment complex was quiet and dark. Dressed in black cargo pants and a black sweater just as he was a week earlier for his op at the CDC a few miles from here, he blended into the shadows. He pulled a black stocking cap over his ears and strode to a staircase at the end building. An abundance of landscaping, particularly the freshly planted annuals, diverted attention from the cheap construction of the vinyl-sided, three-story building.

  Although it was late, Tim was alert without being jittery—as if he’d consumed just the right amount of caffeine, although he never touched the stuff. Didn’t believe in putting any drugs into his system, legal or not. His rush came from being back in the game. Tim was now part of something bigger than himself. He thought his missions with Johnny and the bombings they had planned throughout the Southeast would make a difference, but now he heard a clearer message from above. As he’d suspected, Johnny Meckle wasn’t cut out for this type of work. Johnny had avoided Tim for two days after the bombing, and when Tim finally cornered him in the parking lot, Johnny broke down.

  “No one was supposed to be hurt,” he’d cried.

  “Johnny, every war has its casualties.”

  “I’m sorry, I just can’t do this.”

  They’d parted and hadn’t spoken since. Tim wondered whether he should let Johnny live. He was a loose cannon, capable of turning himself in over guilt. In the end, Tim decided that Johnny was too much a wimp to take responsibility. Plus, he could never handle jail. Only Tim had the requisite faith and strength for the plans God had.

  Tim’s discovery on one of his favorite blogs had changed everything. Now he understood that the bombing had been a warm-up. The danger presented by this new discovery was much greater than that posed by the scientists in their labs. Tim had heard how the CDC scientists experimented with viruses like Ebola and AIDS. They claimed that they did this to learn about the diseases, but Tim knew better. His new discovery, however, revealed a danger more deadly than the potential to use a virus as a weapon: the research being done by Grant Matthews was aimed at attacking not people’s bodies but their souls. He’d sat in disbelief, staring at the article that described the texts Matthews found in the Himalayas. How can this guy make such a claim? he’d wondered.

  Reverend Brady’s sermons came to mind: this was precisely how Satan worked. Just as Satan periodically threw temptations his way that he struggled to resist, the Dark Lord sent people like Grant Matthews to undermine people’s beliefs. Tim took two hours to calm down after reading the article and then began to hatch his plan. First he’d emailed the reverend. He recalled the words from Brady’s short reply, “My son,”—Tim must have read the salutation fifty times—“I deeply appreciate your commitment to the Lord and our community at New Hope. Fondly, Rev. Brady.” Then Tim began his preparations.

  Returning to Atlanta so soon after the bombing carried certain risks, but he’d covered his earlier tracks well, and implementing God’s will wasn’t supposed to be easy. He had to move quickly. Tim would play a role in history—God’s history. He would find salvation for his sins.

  Tim located the tarnished brass numbers on the second floor. Apartment 208. From his right pocket he produced a small leather case containing the lock pick set he’d kept from years earlier during his spec ops training. It had served him well during his brief job at the hospital, but now he understood that God had been paving the road for this mission all along. He worked quickly until he felt the pins click into place. The door swung open with only a slight creak.

  After replacing the lock pick into the long cargo pocket, he pulled his Glock forty-caliber semiautomatic pistol from the nylon holster hidden under his sweater. The Glock, with its extended fifteen-round magazine, was his favorite close combat weapon. While the 9mm model was widely used by police forces, Tim had heard enough stories of amped-up perpetrators taking multiple body shots without falling that he preferred the more powerful forty. The gun’s composite parts made it lightweight and easy to handle. In addition to being simply camouflaged when disassembled, the gun had no safety to disengage, which ensured that lethal seconds wouldn’t be lost during a firefight.

  Tim stepped into the apartment and closed the door behind him to keep the cold air from waking the sleeping occupant. A small foyer opened to a living room, which was dimly lit from the kitchen to the left. He advanced with the Glock in front of him.

  Approaching a futon in the living room, he noted that it had been pulled out into a bed, a pile of laundry scattered on top.

  The pile of laundry shifted.

  A surge of adrenaline pulsed through Tim’s veins. He swung the pistol toward the futon and froze.

  For the next two minutes, neither Tim nor the laundry budged. He crept to the edge of the futon without letting the gun barrel waver.

  Grant Matthews lay sleeping on his side. Matthews had bunched a heavy comforter over his legs and waist, giving the illusion of laundry from across the dark room. He slept alone. But why was he in the living room? Tim glanced to the closed door ahead of him. Maybe Matthews had a guest.

  Tim studied the profile of the man who had discovered the heresy that Tim knew, from the moment he read it, it would be his mission to stop before it could spread like a virus through his country. The various articles he’d read online were essentially the same: each contained a forwarded copy of an email that Grant Matthews had sent to a professor at Emory. In addition to a translation of the heretical texts, the email had information that Tim would exploit this evening. Matthews had written that the texts were still in Bhutan but he was bringing back photographic proof. Since no photos had been posted and Matthews’s flight had arrived earlier that evening, Tim hoped that he was in time. One of the rules of combat was that acting first gave you the upper hand. Now Tim was acting first.

  Although the face on the pillow was relaxed in sleep, Matthews had a strong jawline that terminated in a cleft chin partially obscured by a couple of days’ worth of stubble. Tim recognized the grad student from his Facebook page. He slept shirtless, and Tim’s eyes traced the twist of his torso, which accentuated the V shape of his lat muscle as it tapered to his trim waist.

  Tim’s right arm began to tingle. The feeling was almost pleasurable. He bit his lip. What was he doing?


  Then he understood. He was being tested. Tempted. Underneath his sweater the tingling became an itch and quickly a burning. For once, he relished the burn: the distraction from his sinful thoughts. Instead of scratching, he extended the arm until the muzzle of the gun was only a foot from the luxurious dark hair on Matthews’s head.

  Tim caressed the trigger with his index finger. Just a slight pressure would splatter chunks of brain matter and shards of skull onto the white pillowcase. He savored the image of this quick solution to his problems. Then he crept away.

  Confident that Matthews slept soundly, Tim silently searched the apartment. He found the first two items on the kitchen counter—an expensive Nikon camera and Matthews’s cell phone, which was plugged into a charger. Before taking them, Tim studied their exact positions on the countertop. Then he switched the phone to vibrate, stuck it in his pocket, and slung the camera over his shoulder.

  Not seeing the third item anywhere in the kitchen or living room, he inched the bedroom door open and stepped inside. As he expected, he saw the outline of a body on the bed. Matthews had company. Then he spotted what he’d come for: Matthews’s laptop, on a chair to the right of the door. He should have taken it then and left the apartment, but a force out of his control drew him further into the room.

  She lay sleeping, tangled in the bedsheets. He shuffled to within inches of the bed. Her long, black hair fanned out over her pillow like the plumage displayed by a peacock. From her facial features he guessed that she was a half-breed. He studied the roundness of her breasts, outlined against the fabric of an oversized T-shirt. Her bare right leg was draped on top of the sheets while she grasped at the rest of the bedcovers like a child holding on to her blanket. Tim followed the sweep of her leg from the arch of her foot, along the line of her calf muscle, up to the taut skin of her thigh.