The Fifth Kingdom

by Caridad Piñeiro

“If someone other than your mother had made this breakthrough—”

  “I’d be all over it like beans on rice? Maybe, but I try not to let my personal sentiments interfere with my work. I still believe whatever is in the find is not a physical weapon.”

  Bill gazed across the room at the photos. Each of them was alive because of the emotion she had invested in every shot. It occurred to him that while she liked to play the role of the conservative and rigid professor, the real Deanna was more like her mother than she would possibly acknowledge. Passionate and alive. Wounded.

  He hoped he wouldn’t make the latter worse by having her participate in this mission.

  “I would appreciate it if you could keep an open mind about all aspects of this investigation since I’ll be relying on your expertise on the subject.”

  She gave him a jaunty salute and her lips quirked with amusement. “Yes, sir. So what do we do next?”

  “We head to Mexico in a few days. Does that work for you?”

  She nodded. “I have to grade the final essays, but can work tonight so I’ll be done by tomorrow. Is there anything I can do in the meantime?”

  He shook his head. “I’ll be contacting your father to see what additional information he can offer. I’ll phone you tomorrow afternoon with any news I may get.”

  Placing his nearly full glass of wine on the coffee table before the couch, he rose and then offered her his hand, but she ignored it and stood on her own.

  Possibly better that way, he thought, imagining that the smoothness of her hand in his might be too much temptation.

  She walked him to the foyer, unplugged the answering machine and handed it to him. At the door they stood awkwardly for a moment, both aware of each other physically once again until he finally opened the door. With a dip of his head, he said, “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow,” she said and after he walked out, she closed the door and leaned against it. Considered the room, which before his arrival had seemed spacious, until his bulk had filled it, making it impossible to ignore his presence both physically and emotionally.

  She couldn’t deny she found him attractive. He was handsome in that dark and deadly kind of way. She was wet just thinking about what it would be like to have that amazing body beneath her, beside her, above her. Add to that the compassion he had shown her during the short snippets of discussion about her mother. She knew he had held back when he should have possibly pressed for more revelations, but she told herself that when the time was right he would push for the information he needed no matter what.

  His one and only job was to determine if there was a real risk to national security based on whatever Miranda had become involved in. When it was necessary, he would hurt her or Miranda or anyone else in order to accomplish that objective. That realization doused the temptation that had kindled during their discussion.

  With a quick peek at her watch, she reminded herself of all she had to do if it turned out she had to take a trip with him.

  Her first goal: Start grading the twenty or so papers her students had turned in that day.

  Chapter Five

  “I want to commend you all on the fine work you did on your final essays,” Deanna said as she walked up and down the aisles in her classroom, handing out the papers she had stayed up a good part of the night to review. By tomorrow night, she would enter these scores and those for her other classes into the school’s database, calculate the final grades and then she was free.

  Free, she thought, feeling exhilarated as she did at the end of each school year. Ironic given that she had told Special Agent Santana that she loved the hallowed halls of academia when the reality was that she lived for the time off. It was in those weeks and months that she would grab her camera, passport and basic necessities, and go exploring. If she had been at a big university like her father, she would have the added burdens of having to publish or perish in addition to the demands on doing lectures during her free time.

  Which made her wonder again if she wasn’t more like her mother than was good, she thought, handing out the last essay and headed for the front of the classroom.

  “Since it’s the last day of the semester, we’re going to do something a little more relaxed today. I want to go around the room and have each of you tell me what you found most interesting about the topic you selected for your report.”

  Leaning against the edge of her desk, she motioned to the first student in the farthest row and one by one, each of her pupils expounded on their work. Some more erudite than others, but all were intelligent. Halcyon was one of Manhattan’s premiere prep schools and there were few students who weren’t Ivy League material.

  As the bell to signal the end of class rang out just seconds after the last student had spoken, Deanna took that as a harbinger that the rest of the day was going to go smoothly.

  Wishing the students a nice summer as they filed out, she strode out of the class and toward the main office to check for any last messages before the break. When she entered, Pat the receptionist waved to her and held up what looked like a courier delivery. Puzzled, she walked over and Pat handed her the envelope. The airbill on the pouch indicated it was from a law firm in Mexico City, creating a knot of unease in her center.

  “Bad news?” Pat rose and leaned across her desk, inquisitive as always. Rumor had it that Pat knew about everything that went on at the prep school, but Deanna wasn’t about to add fodder about her mother to the list of things being discussed on campus.

  “Nothing important,” she lied and tucked the unopened courier pouch into her briefcase. Hurrying to her room, she closed the door and plopped down at her desk before yanking the mail from her briefcase. She pulled the strip on the envelope to open it and discovered a key and letter from the Mexican law firm.

  The comments in the letter were straightforward which didn’t make them any less troublesome. The law firm had been instructed to mail Deanna the key if her mother had not returned to their offices by a certain date to speak with a ministry official. The purpose of the meeting was to obtain approval to commence an archaeological excavation.

  If Deanna had possessed any doubts about her mother’s supposed disappearance, the key in her hand dispelled them. Her mother had sacrificed way too much to just not show up when she was so close to her lifelong goal. Squeezing the key in her hand so tightly the notches cut into her palm, she picked up the phone and called Special Agent Santana.

  He picked up on the first ring, but the noise in the background was loud. He was out on the street.

  “Good afternoon, professor. I was just headed your way,” he advised.

  “Do you have news for me?” She wondered if he already knew about the key or if it was some other bit of information he intended to impart.

  “Just more chatter we picked up last night and this morning. I’m right outside the school building if you have the time to talk.”

  “I just finished with my last class. I’ll be out in a second,” she advised and quickly packed up her things, stuffing the letter from the law firm into her briefcase, but tucking the key into her front pants pocket for safekeeping.

  She closed up her office and experienced that buzz of excitement once more at the thought of the impending school break. She had planned on expanding her horizons with a trip to Europe to rummage through various castles since next semester she was teaching a Western Civilization class in addition to the one on the Americas which she currently taught. Until her mother was safe, those plans would be on hold.

  Special Agent Santana was waiting about twenty feet away from the front door of the school building, leaning against the bumper of a midsized dark blue sedan. His arms were folded against that massive chest, straining the fabric of the dark suit and painfully white shirt he wore. Dark sunglasses completed the look that said, “Don’t mess with me.”

  She had taken no more than a step or two away from the entrance to the school when someone bumped her. It was followed by a strong tug on the
handle of her briefcase.

  Whipping her gaze away from Santana, she realized she was trapped between two Hispanic men. They were both not much bigger than she was, but they had whipcord lean muscles bearing a mosaic of crude prison-style tattoos. One of the men leered at her, displaying an ornately carved golden tooth.

  “Vas a venir con nosotros,” the gold-toothed man said, advising her to go with them. He then pulled aside the black leather vest he wore to display the grip of a gun and reinforce that there was no denying his request.

  She quickly looked away toward Santana and realized he was already on his way, his hand reaching beneath his suit jacket as he called out, “CIA. Step away from the woman.”

  What happened next seemed to last a lifetime although she knew that in reality it took just seconds.

  The two men whirled, one grabbing her around the throat while the other pulled a weapon, which he aimed at Santana. But the CIA agent kept on advancing even as the man opened fire on him.

  Santana recoiled from the shot and grunted, but immediately returned fire. The man beside her flinched and stumbled back before dropping to the ground. The pressure around her throat lessened for a second as the other man realized his companion had been hit. In that moment of distraction, her brain flashed through all the moves she had learned in a self-defense class years earlier and urged her into action.

  Bending her knees, she slipped down, loosening his grip even more and providing enough space that she was able to ram her elbow upwards into his rib cage. That broke his hold on her and she dropped to her knees to try and escape him. But when she did, he reached for the gun beneath his vest.

  “Drop it,” she heard from just feet away. The command was not enough to dissuade her attacker, who smiled with his gold-capped tooth and fearlessly drew his weapon from the holster.

  A burst of gunfire rang near her ear. Bright red blossomed on the white of her attacker’s T-shirt and yet he still fired his weapon until another shot, dead center of his chest, dropped him to the ground.

  She fell back from the two bodies and suddenly a hand slipped around her waist, offering support. “Are you all right?” Santana asked, his voice tight with a hint of pain.

  Glancing at him, Deanna noticed the hole in his shirt and worry slammed into her. She ran her hand along the spot and the warmth of the bullet embedded in the bulletproof vest heated her palm. “Are you okay, Bill?”

  “I’ll be fine,” he said and releasing her, he retrieved the weapons from the hands of the two men on the ground. He didn’t check the one, sure he was dead, but the other man moaned as Bill touched him.

  The murmurs of the crowd around them and the sound of an approaching siren finally filtered into her consciousness. One of the school’s security guards stood at the door to the building, speaking into a walkie-talkie which squawked back in response. A number of students and passersby had gathered around the scene and were beginning to crowd more closely.

  Bill rose stiffly, obviously in pain from the impact of the shot his vest had stopped. Flashing his credentials at the security guard, he instructed the man to keep the crowd away and then walked back to where she stood, a shuttered expression on his face.

  “The one man’s still alive, but I don’t know for how long.”

  The siren blared loudly as an NYPD squad car pulled up. Bill left her side, his badge raised to identify himself as the officers stepped out of the car. He spoke to them and they immediately went into action, relaying instructions for paramedics while they stood guard over the two men.

  When Bill returned to where she was now leaning along a low wall that surrounded the school, he pulled out his phone and began issuing commands of his own. “I need a security detail dispatched immediately to cover Dr. Gonzalo Vasquez and take him to a safe house. I’ll also need another detail to meet me at the home of Dr. Deanna Vasquez and a third at Halcyon Prep to escort a possible suspect to the hospital.”

  He paused for a moment and stood before her, hand braced on one hip, pulling aside his suit jacket to once again display the hole in his shirt where metal glinted beneath the fabric. Her brain focused on that spot as thought after thought pummeled her brain.

  Someone had tried to kill him and all because of her.

  Or rather, because of her mother. Whatever Miranda had become involved in had clearly stirred up more trouble than even she had likely imagined. And if the group that had taken her—Primera Mexica—was as violent as the two men who had just attacked them, she wondered if she might ever see her mother alive again.

  She even wondered why that thought caused a curl of dismay in her gut.

  Bill was instantly at her side once again, his hand brushing along her arm. “You look pale. Maybe you should go sit down in the car.”

  She jerked her arm away, annoyed with herself and her sudden weakness toward Miranda. “I’m fine. What about my father? Will he be okay?”

  His features hardened at her apparent dismissal and he replied, “I have a detail headed his way. They should report to me shortly.”

  A moment later, one of the police officers came up to him. “I’m sorry, Special Agent. The suspect just died.”

  With a curt nod, Bill said, “I have a crew coming to escort him. I guess it’ll be to the morgue.”

  “We’ll assist in any way we can,” the officer replied and with a deferential dip of his head, walked away.

  Bill muttered a curse beneath his breath before he glanced at her again. “You’ll need to stay in a safe house until we have a better idea of what’s happening. I’ll run you by your apartment so you can pick up some things.”

  Two men dead and she and her father were headed to a safe house. Bill’s wince when he moved to put his credentials back into his suit jacket reminded her that he had could also have been killed just moments earlier.

  The concern which had begun moments earlier escalated, but she forced down her fear. She had to be strong. Too many lives might depend on whatever information she could provide.

  “I’m ready when you are,” she said, stiffening her spine and meeting Bill’s gaze directly.

  A flash of some emotion, possibly pride, skittered across his face for only a moment before his taciturn agent’s face slipped back into place.

  “Let’s go then,” he said and ushered her to his car.

  The security detail that Bill had requested was waiting at the door to her apartment building by the time they arrived. The two large men in the dark suits loitered beneath the awning for the entrance to her building, avoiding the late afternoon sun.

  The four of them headed to her apartment only to find that her front door had been jimmied open. Bill blocked her body with his and drew his weapon as did the other agents. With precise, almost choreographed movements, the two agents entered and swept the various rooms of her apartment while she and Bill waited at the door.

  After the all clear, they entered and Deanna gasped at the destruction someone had wreaked in her home. Wooden tables and chairs were tossed about and in pieces. Someone had taken a knife to her sofa. Its foam guts spilled out of the slashes and bled onto the floor. The books and knickknacks on the wall units had been pulled off the shelves, torn apart and broken. Pages and shards of pottery and glass were strewn across the floor. Red spray paint spurted along one wall like blood and defaced most of the photos from her trips, as if to warn her of the violence that might follow if they didn’t get what they wanted.

  “I’m sorry, Deanna,” Bill said and laid a comforting hand on her shoulder, but she jerked away, refusing to allow him to see her pain at the violation of her home.

  “I’ll get my things,” she said with little emotion and whirled to go to her bedroom.

  The devastation there was not so great, maybe because they had feared discovery if they lingered for too long. Although the mattress and sheets had been pulled off the bed, they were relatively intact. They had pulled out the large leather backpack from beneath her bed and tossed the contents on the floor. Her pass
port, camera, basic supplies and a first aid kit lay on the rug. Then she knelt and reached beneath her bed. Felt farther back for her ballistic nylon satchel. They had not found it and she yanked it out and tossed it onto the mattress.

  Here and there, drawers had been pulled from her dresser and highboy, but she told herself that only made packing easier. She grabbed clothes and other items that would do for one of her exploring trips, stuffing them into the backpack and satchel with little wasted motion while Bill stood by, offering silent support. When both bags were zipped and ready to go, she tossed the backpack over her shoulder and demurred when Bill went to reach for the satchel. “I can handle this on my own.”

  Bill examined the determined set of her features and the way she tossed her shoulders back the way a bantam rooster might puff itself up against a larger opponent. He suspected Deanna had handled quite a lot on her own since her mother had left her, but that didn’t mean she had to continue to go it alone.

  “It’s okay to get help on occasion,” he advised, worried that if she held too much in, it would be even worse when she eventually released all that pent up emotion.

  Her sole response was to tighten her grip on her bag and stride past him as if she was on a forced march.

  With a shrug, he followed her into the hall where she waited for him by the door as he gave final instructions to his men. “Process the scene. Hopefully someone left a print. Call me with any developments.”

  When he was done, he met her gaze and said, “Normally it’s ladies first, but—”

  “I understand. I’ll follow your lead, Special Agent.”

  Despite her conciliatory tone, there was nothing demur about her demeanor. Nodding, he made sure the hall was clear and they left. As they waited at the elevator, he hoped there would be no more surprises before they reached the safe house.

  Chapter Six

  Deanna’s father and two other agents were waiting for them when they arrived at the apartment building that contained the safe house. The building was located along the West Side in the mid-Sixties in an area that was relatively residential and easier to protect.