The Phoenix Apostles

by Lynn Sholes

  "Oh, for Christ's sake." Seneca groaned. "You're unbelievable. Why don't you just talk straight and stop with all this mumbojumbo vagueness. I think I deserve that."

  Al sipped his drink again, taking his time. "You're right." He stood and faced her. "I spent my life working for the government. Intelligence gathering."

  "CIA?" Matt said.

  "Not exactly, but close enough."

  Seneca put her face in her hands, shaking her head. "Unbelievable." Looking up, she rolled her eyes. "What does not exactly mean?"

  "In pedestrian terms, I worked for an organization not known to the public."

  "Black op?" Matt said.

  "You could say that."

  "I hate to feel stupid," she said, "but covert operations aren't my forte. What is black op?"

  "Black ops are highly secret covert operations," Matt said before turning to Al. "Correct me if I'm off base and have put the wrong spin on this, but black ops are usually ultra secretive because they often involve activities that are questionable in regards to ethics and legality."

  Al confirmed with a half-nod half-shrug and raised brows. "No, no, you've got the spin right. But unlike the black operations of the military, my group was strictly into gathering information, conducting research, and putting the results into a form that could be used by the government."

  Seneca laughed. "I don't believe you. No way could you and my mother have ever had a relationship. She'd have never gotten involved with someone who had that kind of background. Impossible."

  Al cupped his drink with both hands. "In a way you're dead on. Guess I'm going to have to do a little more explaining."

  "Guess so."

  "I first met your mother at Woodstock. The decade of the sixties was a strange time for the country. A time of upheaval and turbulence. The Civil Rights Movement, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Cold War, nuclear arms race, the Chicago 7, Charles Manson, Students for a Democratic Society, the assassinations of JFK, Bobby Kennedy, and Martin Luther King, Jr. It was a time of enormous contrast. The Peace Corps, the Bay of Pigs. Vietnam, the Beatles. The Texas tower sniper, the first artificial heart, landing a man on the moon.

  "I was a few years older than Brenda and had already graduated from college. Not only had I graduated, but I'd been recruited by the FBI. My job at Woodstock was to pose as just another hippie and keep a watchful eye. There were quite a few of us there for surveillance. The government had reason to be on the paranoid side with all the unrest. So much was going on back then. Anyway, I met Brenda while undercover. I really liked her, which to me came as a surprise since she was so far left and I was so far to the right. Maybe there's truth in the saying that opposites attract. But of course she didn't know my real mission. I didn't tell her. We spent three days together, then it was over. She went back to school, and I went back to the New York field office.

  "Seven years later we met up again, quite by accident, at the Democratic National Convention in seventy-six. Again, I was on the job, but not with the FBI. A year earlier I'd become a part of the organization I remained with until retirement." Al smiled at his daughter. "Brenda and I got pretty serious over the next several months. She possessed such a remarkable free spirit, like some kind of real-life sprite. It was impossible not to be drawn to her. I was so spellbound by her that our political differences didn't matter to me. For what it's worth to you, I loved your mother. Always have. And you're the best thing that came out of that. I wanted to marry her, but before I could do that, I knew I had to tell her the truth about me." He sat back down. "I did, and you can imagine her response. She accused me of betraying and lying to her. She wanted no part of me-refused to identify me as the father on your birth certificate. Refused any and all of my pleas to have some part in your life. And that's the way it's been ever since."

  A sudden wooziness crept over Seneca, and she closed her eyes recalling all those memories of reading and treasuring his letters, sleeping with them under her pillow, holding them close as if she were embracing the father she didn't know.

  "Are you okay?" Matt asked.

  She opened her eyes and nodded, then turned to Al. "Is that what you meant by me not knowing the whole story?"

  Al gave her a warm smile. "That's most of it."

  IT WAS CLOSE TO midnight as Seneca looked out over the dark water from Matt's veranda. The evening had been an eventful one, to put it mildly. At last she felt herself unwinding a little at a time.

  The gentle breeze was enough to keep the temperature comfortable, and the calming sounds of the surf were welcome to her ears. She brushed a strand of hair from her eyes. Al Palermo had made a good case. Knowing her mother like she did, Seneca could find truth in his story about Brenda not wanting anything to do with him after learning he had been lying to her. And her mother never would have tolerated a man whose political ideals were directly opposed to hers, whether she was in love with him or not. Maybe that's what had soured and sealed Brenda's opinion of men.

  She turned to Al sitting beside her. "I still don't understand why you've decided to force yourself into my life now."

  "The last time we met I asked you how your mother was doing. I knew she wasn't well. It was a question of concern, not small talk drivel. I thought I should step up and try to fill in for her in some small way. I could never replace her, nor would I want to. Your mother was a unique woman in so many ways. Her quirkiness and uniqueness were part of her allure. I've never known anyone like her."

  "You could have stepped up when I was a kid. This reconnection you want seems like no, more like guilt. Surely you've got to understand why I feel the way I do." Seneca stroked her upper arms as if chilled. "It's almost like you've gone from one extreme to the other-having nothing to do with me for years and suddenly stalking me the next. And how did you know I'd come down here, anyway? Were you following me?"

  Al took the last swallow of his drink. "No. But if I had been tailing you, you wouldn't have known it unless I wanted you to. I'm good at what I do."

  "So I take it that you wanted me to see you when you followed me from MIA?"

  "Let's just say I was building up to our first meeting. And when I left your apartment the day I showed up uninvited, I attached a small homing device on your car."

  Seneca's face flushed. "You did what? You've got no right-father or no father. I'm a grown woman." She blew out a frustrated breath, shaking her head. "I can't believe it."

  "What I don't get is how you knew the boat was in trouble." Matt leaned against the veranda's banister.

  "I didn't." Al glanced up and pointed into the night sky. "The stars told me." He smiled at them, then seemed to realize neither understood. "Okay, let me back up a bit." He looked at Seneca. "While I was waiting for you in your apartment that day, I took the liberty of listening to your answering machine. I noted Matt's phone number. So, when you left the Lorelei's parking lot earlier tonight, I ran a reverse phone number check and got Matt's address." Al waved his hand in the air. "I know, I know, Matt, you're going to tell me that your number is unlisted. Trust me, nobody's number is truly unlisted. Then I gave the address to a friend, he got the GPS coordinates, fed it to the satellite, and presto, he's got a bird's-eye view of your house. He sees your floodlights come on, then follows your boat's running lights. He tracks you out the channel into the bay. When he notified me that the boat was on fire, I jumped in the car, put in a call to Admiral Burke, and hauled my ass to the Coast Guard station. The rest you know."

  "Seems a little excessive," Seneca said. "Not the best way to establish a great relationship with your daughter. Way too much drama and cloak and dagger?"

  Al stood and walked through the open sliding glass doors to the bar. "May I?" He lifted the bottle of Jack Daniels and motioned to Matt.

  "Help yourself."

  Al poured a shot in his glass and drank it down, then poured one more before rejoining the two on the deck. "Because of the position I held at my... job, the names of my immediate family are always on a security watch l
ist. Even though your last name isn't Palermo, you're still listed as my daughter."

  "Why am I on a watch list?"

  Al brushed the pad of his thumb over his lips. "Well, there's always a slim chance that my family might be at a slight risk of retaliation against me for some things I've done."

  "This just keeps getting better." Seneca shook her head. "I don't see you for thirty-three years, and yet the whole time, I'm at risk because you pissed off some terrorists or Communist or whoever?"

  "I said the risk was slight."

  Al gave Seneca a smile like the one a dentist gives a patient when he says there may be a slight discomfort in what happens next.

  "Gee, that's reassuring."

  "We randomly monitor Internet chatter. We don't always know who the individuals are, but certain chatrooms are hangouts for some very unsavory characters. In one of those rooms, your name came up.

  "Came up? In what way?"

  Al knocked back the Jack Daniels. "Can you think of anyone who would want you dead?"

  TWO THORNS 2012, MOSCOW

  "APPARENTLY, THE GUARD WAS on drugs." The mayor of Moscow sat beside Scarrow in the VIP box of the Bolshoi Theatre. His English was perfect, and Scarrow could only detect the slightest accent.

  "When they found him," the mayor continued, "he was barely conscious and hallucinating, prattling on about the president himself being the one who defaced the tomb of the tsar. Such an embarrassing state of affairs that we can't get dependable young people to perform even the most simple of tasks."

  "Drug abuse is rampant across the world, not just here." Scarrow watched the last of the two thousand patrons of the arts enter the grand Russian theater and take their seats. "So all that was missing were the last remains of Ivan the Terrible?" He turned to Coyotl beside him. "Can you imagine?"

  "Yes," the mayor said. "Seems odd doesn't it? Almost deviant." He waved a finger in the air. "But you can be assured the police will get to the bottom of this and recover all that was stolen. Desecrating the final resting place of our great tsars will not be tolerated."

  As the house lights dimmed, he turned to the man next to him, the one Scarrow had introduced to the mayor as the Phoenix Ministry Brazilian liaison. "You know, speaking of the Russian president, without your mustache and glasses, and perhaps a shorter hairstyle, you might bear a close resemblance to our president."

  Dr. Mengele smiled. "You're not the first to say so."

  The long-range Gulfstream G650 with the Phoenix Ministry insignia on its side streaked across Poland en route to Paris, its twin Rolls-Royce engines pushing it at just under Mach 1. The setting sun cast a fiery blanket across the tops of the clouds as Scarrow drummed his fingers on the small mahogany desk.

  "I'm confused." He spoke to Coyotl, who sat facing him. "You were able to locate, attack, and destroy the boat using the Groves Avionics stealth helicopter drone, and yet the woman and her friend escaped?"

  "We don't have all the details yet."

  "The only detail that's important to me is that she is still alive." He shook his head in frustration. "We already knew she was going to meet this novelist so they could compare their knowledge of the tomb robberies. Now, to make matters worse, you tell me that while monitoring the emergency channels, we confirmed that someone alerted the authorities to rush to their rescue. This is becoming a bad dream. If you had done your job to begin with, there would be no surviving witnesses from Mexico City and hence no collaboration with this other writer. Now we are faced with multiple problems instead of just one. I'm starting to have my doubts about you and your talents."

  "Forgive me, Javier."

  "You must understand that there's no room for errors, poor judgment, or failure at this stage. The very idea that this insignificant woman could stand in the way of averting the most earthchanging event in human history is beyond belief." Scarrow rubbed the back of his neck to relieve tension. "What was her name again?"

  "Seneca Hunt. I'm sure we can take care of this minor distraction and move on.

  "First, I want to know everything there is to know about her and her writer friend-past history, acquaintances, habits, everything. We must find a way to eliminate these two thorns in my side as quickly and discretely as we can. We must see to it that no one else surfaces to threaten the Ministry. We can't be sidetracked again. This woman and the writer must be dealt with. And if there is someone else involved that might be helping them, then we need to find that out as well. The bottom line is that they need to disappear."

  From across the narrow aisle of the eight-passenger executive jet, Dr. Mengele folded the copy of Berliner Zeitung and set it aside. He glanced over at Scarrow. "Perhaps I could be of service."

  TARGET 2012, FLORIDA KEYS

  MATT RAPPED ON THE guestroom door. "Do you have everything you need?"

  "Yes, thanks." Seneca answered from inside the bedroom as she fastened the last button of Matt's striped pajama top. "This works great as a sleeping shirt. Looks brand new."

  "It was a gift. See you in the morning."

  "Good night." As she listened to his footsteps fade down the hall, she was casually curious as to who might have given him the pajamas. He hadn't mentioned anyone special.

  Matt was generous to put her and Al up for the rest of the night-what there was left of it. She was exhausted and ready to grab a couple of hours sleep before driving back to Miami. Once home, she figured she would research on the Internet and do some hustling, then in a day or two she might have a lead, a small thread to follow, to get to the bottom of who was responsible for Daniel's death, and she might also have something to pitch to her editor. But her father was going to have to leave her alone.

  Al told Matt earlier that he would get a hotel room, but Matt talked him out of it.

  She hadn't fancied going back to the Key Lantern. Not that she was afraid; it was just that she was on edge with everything that had happened. She would be better off with the security of knowing others were there with her rather than driving to the motel in the middle of the night and staying alone in the room. And Al asking who might want to kill her had rattled Seneca. When she pressed why he would ask such a question, her father had been vague, blowing it off. So when Matt insisted on her staying the night in one of the guestrooms, and after she uttered an unconvincing excuse to decline the offer, she readily gave in to his prodding.

  Seneca pulled down the spread and slid into the double bed. The sheets were wonderfully cool and soft. She had showered and washed the salt off her body and out of her panties and bra, hanging them both on the deck railing outside the guestroom in the warm night breeze. There wasn't much to them, so she was sure her undergarments would be dry in no time.

  As her head nestled into the down pillow, she breathed in a clean, sun-drenched fragrance as if the linens had been line dried, but the pillowcase was much too soft for that-line drying added a fresh scent, but sometimes made the fabric stiff. Slowly her eyes closed, letting the scent saturate her, coaxing forth trickles of childhood memories of running and hiding between the billowing sheets on the backyard line before helping her mother bring them in to fold. The past was full of such treasured moments.

  Seneca's eyes opened as another thought skidded into the spotlight on the stage inside her head-thoughts about another time in her more recent past. Not hidden nuggets of childhood moments, but more like poisoned darts stabbing her every time they shot into view. Daniel dying in her arms, so desperately trying to breathe, fighting back the pain, his shuddering as the icy fingers of death slowly and torturously took him.

  Those were the images and thoughts that persisted until she finally fell into a dreamless sleep.

  The sun sparkling through the slats in the plantation shutters awoke Seneca. The light was bright, way beyond the light of dawn. "Oh, damn." She kicked off the sheets and sat up. Overslept!

  The wood plank flooring creaked as she stepped from the bed. She glanced at the clock radio on the way to the deck outside her room. Six minutes after
eight. She'd wanted to be on the road way before now.

  Seneca grabbed her underclothes and scrambled into them and the orange jumpsuit. Still shoeless, she padded to the kitchen already hearing Matt's and Al's voices. She finger-combed her hair, doing her best to look less of a mess. She couldn't wait to get back to the motel, brush her teeth and change into her real clothes.

  Al sighted Seneca as she made her way into the room. "Ah, good morning, sunshine."

  "Morning."

  Al and Matt sat at the table sipping what smelled like a strong coffee blend, The Miami Herald divvied up between them.

  "Like a cup?" Matt looked up from his reading.

  "Any chance of a Diet Coke? That's my morning eye-opener of choice."

  "Maybe." He got to his feet. "Let me check the pantry."

  "Want the headlines or the food section?" Al scooted two folded sections of the newspaper across the table. "Sit a minute. I'm surprised the phone didn't wake you earlier."