Jonathan Maberry - Assassin's code

However, when I ran the scanner over the front and back of the case there was no electronic signature. I smiled a larcenous little smile and set the case on the closed lid of the toilet seat and pulled my RRF. The blade flicked into place with hardly a sound, and I took a breath and then stabbed the case. Not all the way through, only enough to cut through the side, then I sawed a line through the leather and compressed cardboard. Nothing blew up.

“Amateurs,” I sneered.

This sort of thing was typical of people who didn’t quite grasp the philosophy of security. These are the kinds of people who will spend ten thousand dollars on security alarms and locks for every door and window on the first floor and completely ignore the windows on the second or third floor. Crooks count on that kind of thinking.

So do guys like me.

I cut a rectangular piece out of the center of the case, making sure to stay well clear of the locks and the trip wires; then I lifted out the panel and tossed it into the trash can. The resulting hole revealed several file folders and a few assorted items. A pack of cigarettes and a lighter. Passports for each of the people I’d killed at the CIA safe house, and IDs for four more men whom I had not seen.

I set those aside and removed the folders and flipped open the top one. There was a sheaf of documents held together with a clunky metal clip. I removed the clip and put it in my shirt pocket. The top sheet had an official seal that matched the tattoo on Krystos’s arm. The seal of the Holy Inquisition. The content of the letter and all of the attached papers were written in Greek. I can speak a little of the language, but I can’t read a word of it.

It was a speed bump but not a dead end. The field computer had a detachable wand scanner. I ran it over every page in the top folder and set it aside. The second folder had more of the same, as did the third. It wasn’t until I opened the fourth folder that I realized that I had found something that literally took my breath away.

Beneath the same sort of official-looking cover letter was a series of eight-by-ten glossy surveillance photos of me, Top, Bunny, Khalid, Lydia, and John Smith. On the back of each was a handwritten note in English that included a brief physical description and a summary of our military or police training.

I recognized the handwriting. I’d seen it a million times on reports from Terror Town and on evaluations of potential staff members being vetted for top secret clearance.

Hugo Vox.

“Shit,” I said aloud.

There was more, and it was worse. Much worse. A thick sheaf of printed pages held together by a heavy binder clip. I stared at the information on the lists and felt an icy hand punch through my chest and close its fingers around my heart.

I dropped everything and called Church right away.

Interlude Ten

The Kingdom of Shadows

Beneath the Sands

April 1231 C.E.

Sister Sophia clutched at the tatters of her habit, pulling them to her to try to hide her nakedness. It was a hopeless task. Her clothes were little more than streamers of black and white. Grimed with dirt and filth, caked with blood.

A metal grate in the iron door clanged open and a pale hand shoved in a bundle wrapped in cloth and a leather pitcher. Immediately she could smell bread and cooked meat. The grate slammed shut and she listened to hear the soft footsteps fade into silence. Then Sophia sobbed and crawled across the floor toward the food and tore open the bundle. A small loaf of coarse black bread and a leg of something-she could not tell what animal it had come from. The meat was bloody raw inside and charred outside, but it was the first food they had given her in three days. She wept hysterically as she tore at it with her teeth.

After she’d eaten as much of the meat as she could stomach, she drank from the pitcher. The water was cold but it smelled of sulfur. Then she sagged back, once more trying to hide herself with her rags. It did not matter that there was no one there to see her uncovered skin. She was ashamed in the eyes of God. Ashamed for what she had become.

She closed her eyes and prayed to Mary, to Jesus, to the angels and saints. Not for rescue-Sister Sophia did not believe that she could be rescued. No, she prayed for death. If it were not a mortal sin she would have taken her own life, or at least tried. She contemplated smashing her head against the rocks, or taking her rags and making a rope of them.

But that would be suicide, and she would slide further down into the pit if she did that, her soul lost and unredeemable.

And… worse still, it would be murder.

She could not bear to touch her stomach, but she could feel it growing, day by day.

In the other cells along the hall, she could hear babies crying. She could hear the mothers. Some crying, others praying. A few cackling in nonsensical words, their minds broken by the horrors.

“Mother Mary,” she prayed, “please…”

Inside her womb, her baby kicked.

It was sharp and sudden. Vicious. But what else would it be? How could she expect anything but that from a child of a monster?

Mustapha’s Daily Goods

Tehran, Iran

June 15, 7:31 p.m.

“Go,” said Church.

“I think Hugo Vox is working with the Sabbatarians.”

“What makes you think so?”

“I opened the briefcase I took from Krystos and found some stuff. Two things in particular and you are not going to like them. The first is a directory of safe houses all through the Middle East. Nothing newer than January first, though, so it fits with what he might have known before he went into the wind.”

“I figured as much. I sent out a network-wide warning after your ‘adventures’ today. The CIA has confirmed two other compromised locations, ditto for Barrier, and the Israelis lost one. Right now you’re sitting in the only safe house in Iran that we know for sure was never on Hugo’s radar. As bad as this is, it could be worse. Most of the houses are untouched, so staff was able to evac safely. We might be in the clear there and-”

“There’s something else,” I said. “Something a whole lot worse.”

I could hear Church take a breath. After today he was probably wishing he could change his number. “Tell me.”

I didn’t actually want to tell him. It would be like dropping a hand grenade into his lap.

“I found a printed list. Fifteen pages of it. Names, social security numbers, home addresses, family members. The works.”

“Who is on the list?”

“Everyone who works for the Department of Military Sciences,” I said. “And their families. Rudy’s on that list. My father and brother are on that list. And, Church-?” I said softly, “Circe is on that list, and it says that she’s your daughter.”

“God…” Church breathed. “Oh my God.”

The silence became huge, filled with flying debris.

Church disconnected without another word.

Mustapha’s Daily Goods

Tehran, Iran

June 15, 7:36 p.m.

I sat on the edge of the tub and stared at the list. My father. My brother and his wife. My nephew. My best friend. Everyone I cared about.

Hugo Vox. The desire to find and kill him was unbearable.

If I were in Vox’s place I’d be hiding from Church. Vox seemed to be doing the opposite; he was on the offensive. But to what end? Pissing Church off even more than he already was would not seem to have a happy ending.

Vox loved chaos, but this seemed like something else. It was vindictive, it was needlessly cruel. What had happened to twist Vox into that kind of monster? Or was this another layer of the real Vox that we were only now seeing? If so, how deep did his corruption go? How deep could it go?