Forsaken

by James David Jordan

  I dropped to my stomach. The wall above me exploded with a spray of automatic weapon fire. I covered my head with my gun hand and unclipped the grenade from my belt with the other. Chunks of drywall rained on my back. I was practically kissing the floor as I lowered my hands in front of my face and pulled the pin on the grenade. The firing from inside the room stopped.

  Stretching my left hand out in front of me, I rolled the grenade around the corner, then curled into a ball on my side and covered my ears. The explosion lifted me an inch off the floor.

  Popping up to my knees, I held my pistol in both hands and lunged sideways. I skidded in front of the open doorway. The first thing I saw was Simon. He was kneeling, on the far side of the room, his back to the doorway. Several feet to his right, sitting dazed on the floor, was my target. His beard was thick and dark, and he cradled an AK-47 to his chest. I squeezed off two shots. One entered the wall next to his head. The other entered his heart.

  I stood up just as Joe and Pierre ran into the hallway from the living room. “Paul and Samir are down. Back there!” I pointed toward the kitchen. They ran past me.

  I looked back at Simon. He was still kneeling, his head leaning against the side of the desk. I walked into the room. As I approached, he still didn’t move.

  Then I understood, and I began to cry.

  When I reached him, I knelt beside him and put my arm around his shoulder. I touched my cheek against his. It was cool and dry. I leaned forward and looked at his face. His eyes were closed. His throat was slit from side to side. Blood soaked the front of his shirt, and dull red blotches were already forming on his face and neck. We had been hours too late.

  I stood up and hid my face in my arm. My shoulders shook, and I wanted to run, to fly out of the house. Something, though, made me turn back.

  I looked down at Simon’s hands. His fingers were clasped and resting in his lap, the way that a child would hold his hands to kneel and pray. I smiled, then raised my hand and ran it over his bald head, just as I’d seen him do so many times.

  We had tried our best, Paul and the team, but Simon had done better. He got what he wanted.

  He’d found peace.

  CHAPTER

  FORTY-FOUR

  IF IT HADN’T BEEN ten o’clock in the morning, I’d have been far more tempted to have a bourbon. Sitting alone in the private jet that Elise had chartered to bring Simon’s body home, I watched out the window as Beirut disappeared behind me. I was in no hurry ever to return.

  The authorities in Beirut took three days to sort out the situation and conduct an autopsy. By the time they were finished, much of the international media— including many outlets in the Middle East—were loud and persistent in their condemnation of the unwillingness of fundamental Islamic groups to accept an open competition of religious ideas. Simon was right. His death had mattered.

  While waiting in Beirut for the release of Simon’s body, I’d been tormented each time I passed the hotel bar. Two things kept me straight. First, I owed it to Simon not to take that first drink. And second, I leaned on the principles of the twelve-step program. One of those principles was reliance on a spiritual power greater than I am.

  I began to pray in Beirut, not just for me, but for Kacey. I wasn’t very good at it, but I figured no one was awarding style points. I just stumbled along in a beginner’s dialogue with God, assuming this was one area of life in which it was okay to learn as I went. I can’t honestly say I’ve been overwhelmed by the spirit, but I’m keeping an open mind. I owe that to Simon too.

  Paul was hurt worse than Samir, but both would be okay. I invited them to Dallas and promised the entire team that I’d send them custom-made cowboy hats. They seemed to be more interested in Dallas Cowboys jerseys, so I promised those too. Their willingness to risk so much for a man they didn’t even know was something that would have been more difficult for me to understand had I never known Simon and my father. Dad was not the only person who believed that some things were more important than living.

  When I called Kacey to give her the news of her father’s death, her voice broke but she didn’t cry. I think she expected it as much as I did. She would have to grieve in her own way, but I worried that she would hold her emotions too close. If she’d been my own sister, I couldn’t have been any more eager to get home to her. She was my family now. Simon had wanted it that way, and so did I.

  During the past few days I’d pulled out Simon’s envelope several times, but I hadn’t opened it. Beirut hadn’t seemed the right place. Now, as I folded a leg beneath me and settled in for the long flight, I reached into my purse, found the envelope, and held it in front of me with both hands. I pictured the evening when Simon gave it to me. Already the details were receding, leaving more of a sense than a verbatim transcript of what he’d said. I pictured his face, focused hard on it. It was the one thing I wanted to burn so deep into my memory that it would never blur.

  I slid my fingernail beneath the flap of the envelope and pulled out two folded sheets of computer paper that contained Simon’s crisp handwriting in black ink. I flicked on the light above me and began to read:

  Dear Taylor,

  If you’re reading this, I’m not around anymore

  (assuming you kept your word . . . ).

  I nodded. “I did, Simon.” I said aloud.

  I told you once that I knew more about you than you thought. That’s because I’ve followed your life from a distance for a number of years. Doing the math in my head, you must have been about ten years old when I met your mother. I’ll let the shock of that settle in for a moment. Yes, I met your mother just before I learned that Marie had had an affair. We worked together at the auto plant in St. Louis.

  Your mother was a brilliant woman. In the beginning I didn’t understand why she was working on an assembly line. As I came to know her better, I realized that she was troubled in ways I could not hope to sort out.

  You probably can see where this is going. The boy referred to in the note that you found— my son—is your mother’s son also. Our affair was brief, but long enough that she mentioned you a number of times. It was not until I read in the newspaper about a teenage girl who shot her father’s killers at a campsite in West Texas that I recognized your name and learned where you were and what you were doing. I told you the truth when I said that a friend referred me to you after I received the threats. I just didn’t tell you the rest of the story.

  Your mother left the auto plant soon after I broke off the affair. I don’t know where she is now. We’ve not been in touch since she told me about my son shortly after he was born. She didn’t ask for anything. She said she was calling from New Mexico and just thought I should know.

  I do know that your and Kacey’s brother’s name is Chase Franklin. He lives in Katy, Texas. I hope you and Kacey will decide to meet him. I hope you’ll find your mother too.

  If I had more courage, I’d have gone public about Chase and accepted the consequences. But if I had more courage, I’d have done many things differently. When you meet him, please tell him that I love him. I don’t expect him to believe that, but I wouldn’t want him to go through his life without at least hearing it from me, even if secondhand.

  Now, a word for you. You’re strong, Taylor, much stronger than you know. If you had been my own daughter, I couldn’t have been more proud of you. There is a goodness in you that is as beautiful as you are, and you’ve maintained that even though you’ve had more than your share of bad breaks. I have one thought for you, to help you in your life, I hope. This is more important than anything else I could tell you. Invite God into your life, as I did. Then rely on him. Don’t be put off by flaws in men like me. Our flaws are not God’s flaws. If you follow this advice, you will never be alone again.

  I am glad to have known you. When you remember me, I hope you will forget the bad and think of the good. If it’s possible to miss someone in heaven, I will miss you until I see you there.

  Love,

  Simo
n

  I read it again, and then again. The news about my mother was almost beyond belief. Despite that shock, though, my focus kept drifting to the last sentence of the letter. If there was a heaven, could Simon really see me from there? And miss me? If he could, then maybe Dad could too.

  I looked out the window. Beneath the plane the sun glinted off the whitecaps in the Mediterranean. Everything sparkled, just like a star. I closed my eyes and pictured Dad and Simon, both of them looking down at me from up among the stars. Watching me. Missing me. From the one place where Dad had always wanted to be—the one place where there was peace.

  I leaned my head against the window. And for the first time in a long time, I smiled.

  CHAPTER

  FORTY-FIVE

  THE AIR WAS UNSEASONABLY warm for mid-November in Dallas, and the wind flipped and snapped our hair as I slid my Camaro onto the ramp toward I-45 south. The top was down and the stereo was up. Kacey tapped her fingers on her leg as Duane Allman and Dickey Betts slung guitar runs back and forth in “One Way Out.” It was good to see her forget for a while. Watching her out of the corner of my eye, I felt young,

  I hadn’t felt that way for a long, long time.

  I pressed my foot on the accelerator.

  I’d contacted a private investigator about my mother a couple of weeks after I returned from Beirut. He was a friend and was happy to see what he could dig up about her. I was confident he would find her soon. It’s more difficult to disappear than people think.

  I was still debating whether to give him another assignment—to look into who wrote the note that was in Simon’s Bible. I talked to Brandon about the missing money, and he was preparing a comprehensive review of the ministry’s books. For now, I intended to handle that investigation myself. That’s the way Simon wanted it.

  I’d only seen Elise once since the funeral. She left town for a few weeks and returned with a tan. When she dropped by to pick up Simon’s files, she didn’t have much to say to me. She told Kacey that she’d taken a vacation to clear her mind. Since then she’d thrown herself into winding up the business affairs of the ministry. I thought that someday maybe we should talk, clear the air. I wasn’t ready for that yet, though, and it was a safe bet she wasn’t either.

  With Meg’s encouragement I moved into Simon’s house for a while. Kacey was living at home for the fall semester. She was doing okay—better than could be expected. Though she missed Simon terribly, she was proud of the way her father died, proud of what he did. I was proud too.

  Kacey and I continued to shoot together regularly. Michael Harrison had taken an interest in her welfare and had met us several times at the gun range. He was becoming a good friend to us both. Kacey had already developed into a better-than-average shot. After Simon’s death, she became even more insistent about learning self-defense, so I signed her up for a Krav Maga class. With her athletic ability, she was sure to be a quick study.

  Traffic was light, and as I merged onto the highway, I looked over at Kacey. She was bobbing her head to the music. She turned to me and smiled—that smile that starts in her eyes and illuminates her entire face. I saw so much of Simon in that smile.

  My eyes began to mist, and I turned away. This was not the time for that. This was a happy time.

  We were going to meet our brother in Katy, Texas. He was waiting for us there.