Killer Reads: A Collection of the Best in Inspirational Suspense

by Luana Ehrlich

  However, the Bible I found in the nightstand at the Comfort Inn had no such modifications, and I picked it up and read a random chapter.

  It didn’t make much sense, but I was very tired.

  At nine o’clock the next morning, I was standing in the lobby of the Dylard Group Real Estate Agency waiting for Eric Hawley. The moment the receptionist assured me that Hawley was on his way, a tall man with sandy hair, wearing a crisp white shirt and blue slacks, entered the building.

  He gave me a big smile. “Hi, I’m Eric Hawley.”

  “I’m Titus Ray. I’m leasing the Ortega property on East Tecumseh Road.”

  “Oh, right. Let’s go up to my office.”

  We took the elevator up to his office on the second floor where I signed all the necessary paperwork.

  After handing me a copy of the lease, he said, “Now, if you want to follow me out to the house, I’ll show you around the property.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” I quickly replied. “I’ll be able to find it.”

  “Oh, I’m sure you could locate it, but Phillip had some extra security installed on the property this week, and when the installers came by the office to drop off the security codes, they left this manual.” He picked up a thick book. “The instructions are pretty detailed. I was barely able to figure them out.”

  “I don’t want you to go to any trouble,” I said. “I could call you if I have any difficulty.”

  “No, no, it’s no trouble. Phillip Ortega is an old friend of mine, and I’ve been out to his house plenty of times. I’ll enjoy showing you around.”

  It was obvious he’d made up his mind, so I got in my car and followed him out to my new home.

  On the way out there, I did a little belly-button gazing and asked myself why I was so reluctant to have him take me out to the property. Maybe it was simply the nature of my business to be guarded, holding even friendly people at a distance, or perhaps it was my loner personality—I don’t need much social contact to be content.

  Realizing I was going to be leading a different kind of life in Norman, I decided to view my new civilian life as if I were on assignment. To survive, I needed to adapt to the culture and environment of the area. Eric Hawley was a friendly guy. I needed to be friendly too.

  I suddenly realized I might be embarking on a difficult assignment.

  I had no real need to follow Eric Hawley in order to find Tecumseh Road. Since I’d lived in Norman before, I knew there were four main roads into Norman from I-35: Tecumseh Road, Robinson, Main, and Lindsey. With the expressway virtually splitting the town into two parts, each street was labeled east or west depending on its location from I-35.

  Within two minutes of leaving the real estate office, we were on Tecumseh Road. After crossing over I-35 and travelling east for almost ten miles, we arrived at Phillip Ortega’s residence.

  The aerial photo from Kellerman’s presentation made the Ortega property appear isolated, but now I saw several other homes situated nearby. Each of them, like the Ortega property, had plenty of acreage surrounding a residence. Nevertheless, despite the acreage, I realized I had some neighbors living in close proximity to me.

  Hawley stopped his Cadillac Escalade outside a brick wall fence and exited the car. By referring to an index card in his hand, he entered some numbers onto a key pad. He gave me a thumbs up when the gate swung open.

  A tree-lined paved access road led up to a large modern-looking farmhouse with a wrap-around front porch. A second paved road curved south to the barn. Hawley stopped his car in front of the three-car garage attached to the residence by a breezeway.

  When I walked up beside him on the driveway, he gestured expansively around the grounds and asked, “Isn’t this a great place?”

  “It’s absolutely amazing.”

  I meant every word.

  Several massive oak trees shaded the front lawn. About fifty yards beyond the house was the lake I had seen on Kellerman’s slides. The early morning sun was shimmering off its surface, making it sparkle like a brilliant diamond. Trees and bushes lined the banks, and there was a small, wooden dock extending out over the water.

  Once again, Hawley consulted his index card so he could enter the necessary numbers on a keypad at the entrance to the garage. He shook his head and said, “I really don’t know why Phillip thought the property needed all this extra security. I’ll have to ask him about that.”

  I realized he thought Philip Ortega had requested the extra security—something Danny Jarrar had probably told him. So, what was going to happen when Ortega called Hawley to check on things at home, and Hawley questioned him about why he’d added all the extra protection on his property?

  This potential disaster was of Danny’s own making.

  Whenever we’d worked together, I’d noticed Danny had a propensity to spin a more elaborate story than was really necessary. While Danny was a great storyteller, this operational flaw had gotten him into trouble more than once, and he had a bullet hole in his right upper thigh attesting to that.

  I decided I’d better clean up Danny’s mess—yet again.

  “Actually, Eric, you must have misunderstood the installation guys. I was the person who called up the security company and requested all this extra stuff.”

  He gave me an astonished look. “But, why? Our little city has to be one of the safest places on earth to live, and, as far as I know, Phillip has never had a problem out here.”

  I laughed, trying to sound embarrassed. “Well, Eric, I’ve never lived anywhere but a big city. Where I’m from, there’s a burglary happening every night.”

  As we entered the house, he assured me, “You’ll find things are much different here.”

  Hawley took me into every room of the house, turning on the lights, pointing out the different features and having me admire the beautiful furnishings. I agreed it was perfect for me, and that’s when he started asking me some personal questions.

  “Your secretary said you were writing a book with someone from the University. If I remember correctly, it was about China.”

  I wondered if April Snyder had made a rookie mistake and told him I was writing about the Far East. “No, the Middle East,” I said.

  “Oh, the Middle East,” he said, nodding his head up and down as if he knew it well. “You mean Israel, the Palestinians, that sort of thing?”

  “Yes, that sort of thing.”

  “And you’re with a think tank in Washington?”

  “Actually, we’re located in Maryland, but we do consulting work everywhere. Here,” I said, reaching inside my wallet for a business card, “let me give you one of my cards.”

  He glanced at it and then dropped the personal questions.

  He probably noticed I was a Senior Fellow.

  “Let’s go out to the garage. I want to show you one last thing.”

  I followed him through the breezeway and out to the three-bay garage.

  Pointing down at his feet where a steel door was built into the garage floor, he said, “Since you’ve never lived in Oklahoma before, you’ve probably never seen one of these.”

  I immediately thought I was seeing some sort of underground safe room.

  “No, I’ve never seen anything like that.”

  “It’s a storm shelter.”

  “A storm shelter.”

  “Here, let me show you.”

  He unlatched the door and slid it open on its metal rollers. After he reached down and clicked on a light, I peered inside and saw a deep gray box with two padded benches positioned opposite each other. Maybe six skinny people could fit inside.

  “Wow, that’s a tight fit,” I said.

  “When tornado season hits in about two weeks, you’ll be happy Phillip decided to install it.”

  “I’m happy already.”

  After Hawley left, I took the all-terrain vehicle from one of the garage bays and drove it up to the barn. Inside, I found Ortega’s tractor and riding lawnmower, along with a workshop with plenty
of carpentry tools and gardening equipment.

  Professor Ortega appeared to be an industrious kind of guy.

  The security company had also wired the barn—which I didn’t think was necessary—so I drove around the perimeter of the property to make sure the rest of the security setup wasn’t a job of overkill. Pleased with my findings, I returned to the house and unloaded my belongings from the Range Rover.

  I had to assume there had been a Mrs. Ortega in the house at one time because there were several feminine touches around the place. One of the guest rooms was even wallpapered in pink flowers.

  After looking over the guest bedrooms, I deposited my duffel bag in the master suite. It was decorated with dark, heavy furnishings and dominated by a king-sized bed. Two well-used, black leather lounge chairs faced a large television screen on the west wall, and there was a bookcase with a good supply of paperback books—mostly westerns—located next to a mirrored dresser on the opposite wall.

  Once I put away my few belongings, I went into the main living area of the house. The living room had a massive stone fireplace with a wide-screen television mounted over it. Two recliners, an armchair, and a dark brown, oversized leather sofa were positioned around a rectangular coffee table made of distressed wood. An archway from the living room led directly into the dining room, where a wide picture window afforded a picturesque view of Ortega’s lake. When I explored the kitchen, I found it was well stocked with everything I needed for cooking—except the food part.

  After unpacking my telescope and putting it in the sunroom, I booted up my Agency computer to see if I had any new messages from Carlton in my inbox.

  It was empty.

  Around noon, I drove back into Norman. While drinking a glass of lemonade and devouring a chicken sandwich at a Chick-fil-A on Main Street, I noticed a large store in the shopping center across from the restaurant. The signage advertised it as a Mardel’s store and indicated it sold books, Bibles, and gifts. I decided to check out the store before running the rest of my errands.

  I needed to buy a Bible.

  At the Comfort Inn the night before, since I didn’t have a Bible of my own, I’d considered just slipping the hotel Bible inside my duffel bag and taking it with me. Thinking about this didn’t really surprise me because some of my assignments required taking things that didn’t belong to me. What surprised me was the sense of guilt I experienced when I contemplated stealing the Bible.

  I could sense my world changing since that decision-making night in Tehran. It was as if I’d been dropped into an alternate universe, where using any means—moral or immoral—to achieve an objective no longer seemed as natural to me as it once was. Now, instead of doing what years of living in the shadows had taught me, I found myself looking at my actions with a different set of eyes. I was confused at times, and I wondered if I could operate effectively when I had to go back inside that shadowy world again.

  It never occurred to me buying a Bible could be intimidating, but as soon as I entered the Mardel store, I almost turned around and walked out.

  On one side of the store were aisles crammed with buttons, mugs, calendars, everything from clothing to kitchenware, all with a Christian message. On the other side of the store were displays of Christian videos and worship music CD’s. The center aisle contained bookshelves overflowing with Christian devotional books and religious fiction.

  A smiling, silver-haired lady asked if she could assist me, and, when I mumbled something about a Bible, she led me off to an area the size of a racquetball court, where Bibles were stacked almost to the ceiling.

  I wasn’t able to answer any of her questions about what kind of Bible I wanted. Instead, I thought of the tiny worn Bible hidden away in Javad’s living room, and I suddenly found myself wishing for one exactly like it.

  Another customer drew the sales clerk away, and I was left alone to make my decision.

  I muttered a quick prayer and asked for guidance.

  As I continued looking at the choices, I noticed a young woman standing about six feet away from me with two opened Bibles. She had placed both on a shelf in front of her, and she looked as if she were reading from both of them at the same time.

  I surprised myself by asking, “What are you doing?”

  She looked up at me and laughed. “I guess I must look pretty strange,” she said. “I was comparing the size of the print and trying to decide which one of these would be easier for me to read if I were standing at a lectern.”

  She pointed to the shelf where she’d placed the Bibles. “This is about the height of the lectern I teach from on Sunday morning.”

  “I see.”

  “Are you looking for a new Bible?”

  “Yes, but I didn’t realize there would be so many choices.”

  “You’ve never been to a Mardel’s store before? Are you new to Norman?”

  She had an air of innocence about her I found both refreshing and disconcerting at the same time.

  “I just moved here.”

  “From where?”

  “Maryland.”

  “Well, welcome to Norman. I’m Kristi Stellars.”

  “Titus Ray.”

  “Titus is a wonderful New Testament name. Are you attending church somewhere here in Norman, Titus?”

  “Uh . . . no.”

  “We’d love to have you visit our church. It’s Bethel Church on Lindsey Street, across from the Hollywood Shopping Center.”

  “Thanks, maybe I will.”

  “If you’re looking for a Bible that is easy to read and understand, I’d recommend the English Standard Version.”

  “Sounds exactly like what I need.”

  She took one of the Bibles from the shelf and showed it to me. “I’ve decided to get this one,” she said. “It also has notes at the bottom of the page explaining the verses. The ladies I teach are always asking me things I don’t know, so I just glance down and read the study notes.”

  “You teach the Bible?”

  “I try, but I’m not so sure I do a very good job.” She took her new Bible and placed it back in its box. “It was nice talking to you. Come visit our church. It’s a real friendly place.”

  With members like Kristi, I knew she couldn’t be exaggerating.

  I grabbed a Bible exactly like the one Kristi was buying and followed her to the cash register.

  Also, for the first time in my life, I considered attending a church.

  CHAPTER 12

  The next morning I woke up to the sound of a dog barking. It was more like a yap than a true bark, and when I looked out the patio doors toward the lake, I spotted a yellow-haired puppy chasing a squirrel around the trees bordering the water. When I opened the door and yelled, he scampered away toward the tree line.

  Phillip Ortega’s coffeemaker was a Keurig single-serve machine and used a small plastic cup of ground coffee. These “K-cups,” as they were called, came in different brews. I chose Sumatra, brewed myself a cup, and went out to the sunroom.

  While I was making a mental “To Do” list, my Agency satphone rang. The caller screen displayed Danny Jarrar’s name.

  “Hello, Danny,” I said.

  “I cannot believe you’ve come back to Norman.”

  “You know how much I loved it here.”

  “You were like a fish out of water, and you know it. Say, listen, I thought I’d run by and see you this morning before going into the office.”

  “Sure, come on over. I’ll fix us some breakfast.”

  I’m not a great cook, maybe not even a good cook, but I like to cook.

  As Carla and I were growing up, we used to fight over which one of us would get to help our mother in the kitchen. Our motivation for doing so was to avoid being stuck in the family room with my dad when he came home from work. Consequently, both Carla and I had learned to cook up some pretty decent meals.

  Now, however, I simply fried up some bacon and eggs and threw a couple of slices of bread in the toaster.

  When Dann
y called from outside the security fence, I keyed in the code for the gate. Then, five minutes later, we were sitting down at the dining room table together.

  Danny was stocky, muscled up like a bodybuilder, but several inches shy of six foot. His once luxurious black hair had thinned and flecks of gray were showing up in what hair he had left. He had dark brown, almost black eyes, and beneath his generous nose was a pencil-thin moustache. Because of his Lebanese heritage, he looked as if he belonged on a sidewalk in Beirut playing checkers and discussing politics with the old-timers.

  Unlike me, Danny liked to talk.

  The moment he entered the house, he started talking about his job with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. Working for OSBI meant he was dealing with Oklahoma’s security issues in much the same way the FBI handled national security issues. Ever since 9/11, though, state agencies and the FBI operated with a greater level of cooperation—at least on the surface—so, essentially, the FBI and OSBI worked together as one big happy family.

  “So we prosecuted the guy for a computer crime, and he walked out of prison within six months,” he said, finishing his story and finally digging into his plate of food.

  “Sounds like you love this job.”

  “Well, I love being at home with my family. Michelle was lonely living out east, and she hated my Agency lifestyle. When she got pregnant, I felt I had to find employment back here. It’s not as exciting for me, but it’s a lot better for the three of us now.”

  “I have to admit I was surprised when I heard you were married.”

  He leaned over and punched me on my arm. “You thought I was kidding about falling in love with Michelle. See! You can be wrong sometimes.”