C. Palov - Templar's Quest

Extending a hand towards Finn’s chest, Kate lightly fingered the silver Celtic cross that he wore around his neck. ‘I’ve always thought that a Celtic cross on a treeless hillside was a hauntingly beautiful sight.’

‘The cheilteach belonged to my da.’ Finn stopped what he was doing, a red apple ribbon dangling from his knife blade. ‘Only keepsake I have. He died when I was fifteen years old. The Guinness finally got the better of him.’

‘I’m sorry.’

Finn sliced a wedge of peeled apple and offered it to her. ‘When we were at the houseboat in Washington, you mentioned that you were divorced.’

She dug her toes into the thick carpet pile, the conversation having just skidded off the runway.

Perturbed, Kate stared at the piece of fruit. She didn’t like to think, let alone talk, about her marriage to the soft-spoken, brilliant, boyishly handsome Jeffrey Zeller. A fellow cultural anthropologist, they’d met at a symposium at Johns Hopkins University. On the surface, they were the perfect couple. Behind closed doors, it was a different story entirely.

‘My marriage didn’t work out. I won’t bore you with the details,’ she intoned woodenly, head downcast, gaze still focused on the apple wedge.

‘Kate, don’t take this the wrong way, but …’ Finn’s brow furrowed slightly. ‘I noticed that you have a couple of stretch marks on your –’

‘That usually happens to a woman who’s given birth,’ she interjected, beating him to the punchline.

‘I know. That’s why I brought it up.’

A heaviness, like late-afternoon thunder, hung between them.

Finn gently nudged her forearm. ‘Hey, Katie, y’okay?’

Defensively crossing her arms under her breasts, Kate hitched her hips, twisting her upper body away from him. ‘No, I am not okay. My infant son died two years ago because his negligent father was busy screwing a twenty-four-year-old graduate student and he couldn’t be bothered with checking the baby monitor.’ The confession, unplanned and uncensored, slipped from her lips before she could slam on the brakes.

‘Christ, Kate. I had no idea.’

‘He died from SIDS … sudden infant death syndrome. Which means that no one could ever tell me the reason why he –’

Kate closed her eyes, the horrible night replaying in her mind’s eye. White crib. Blue-eyed baby boy. Heart pounding. Limbs shaking. She opened her mouth to scream. Oh, God! There is no God. If there is, I hate him.

Suddenly dizzy, she grabbed the edge of the bureau. In that same instant, a muscular arm slid around her waist, Finn lifting her out of her chair and on to his lap, protectively tucking her under his wing. His pity more than she could handle, Kate struggled. Finn simply wrapped his arms around her that much tighter.

‘Don’t let your thoughts go there,’ he whispered.

Flattening her hands against his chest, Kate rigidly permitted the embrace.

Surrender , a voice in her head chided. Just for a few moments. He can’t take your pain away. And, not having any children of his own, chances are Finn can’t comprehend the depth of your despair. It doesn’t matter. He’s offering you some much-needed comfort. Take it.

With a shuddering sigh, she sagged towards him, leaning her head on Finn’s shoulder.

In the days and months following her son’s death, she’d been like an airborne bird in a slow-motion death spiral. No one knew how to console her. Her parents tried, but Kate refused to accept that her suffering was due to her attachment to the ego, the tenets of Buddhism cold solace to a mother who had just lost her only child. Her husband, Jeffrey, was too busy excusing his complicity in the tragedy. Her friends, many of whom were new parents, began to shy away once they realized that she couldn’t bear to be around their children. Although wary, she attended a SIDS support group meeting. She lasted ten minutes. While they meant well, their heartbreaking stories only compounded her own grief.

Propping a curled hand under her chin, Finn coaxed her into looking at him. ‘I’m curious. What was your son’s name?’

Kate blinked, surprised; very few people ever thought to ask. ‘His name was Samuel,’ she replied in a strained voice, a husky whisper the best she could manage. ‘But from the day he was born, everyone called him Sammy. Had he lived, he’d now be two and a half years old.’

‘Samuel … that’s a nice name.’

‘The first year after he died, I’d sometimes wake up in the middle of the night and, for a brief infinitesimal second, I could smell baby powder. I thought I was losing my mind.’ Glancing at Finn, she grimaced self-consciously. ‘The jury’s still out on that one. What I did lose was my interest in just about everything, including my career at Johns Hopkins. Suddenly, I no longer cared about getting tenure. “Publish or perish” –’ she shrugged her shoulders – ‘it no longer mattered to me.’

‘Death has a way of rearranging our priorities.’

‘It’s true. Jeffrey’s adultery became inconsequential. Although it contributed to my leaving academia. Cultural anthropology is a close-knit clan.’ She snorted at the pun. ‘I certainly didn’t want to run into her. And I never again wanted to see him. That’s how I ended up as a subject-matter expert working at the Pentagon.’

‘Want me to pay the bastard a visit?’

‘Yes. No ,’ she amended a split-second later. She’d long ago closed the book on Jeffrey Zeller.

‘I can’t imagine the heartache of losing a child. That said, over the years I’ve lost some really close friends and … it takes a long time before you can think about them and maintain any semblance of composure.’ As he spoke, Finn absently combed his fingers through her hair. ‘When I do remember them, I never think about that last day.’

‘The fact that Sammy only exists in the past tense is what hurts so much.’ She paused, letting the pain wash over her. ‘It’s why I have such a hard time envisioning the future.’

‘You just have to concentrate on the present. If you start living in the now, the future will eventually come into focus.’

She glanced at the Celtic cross. ‘I thought you were a Catholic, not a Buddhist.’

‘Honestly? I don’t know what the hell I am.’ Warm lips nuzzled the side of her neck, his left hand sliding from her waist to her hip. ‘Happy to be with you, Katie. That’s what I am.’

‘I’m happy, too, Finn.’

They’d spent the last four days together. Hardly the makings of a lifetime commitment.

But could it be the beginning of one?

To tell the truth, she didn’t know. But she was willing to find out, Finn having proved himself a far better man than her ex-husband.

A far better man that most, I’ll warrant.

Just then, Finn’s palm pilot began to vibrate loudly against the bureau.

‘I programmed it to alert me when the Benz left the garage.’ Finn picked up the device and scrolled through the menus. A few seconds later, he turned the display screen so that she could see the tracking map. ‘Uhlemann’s headed this way. Time to do the Hustle.’

59

Mont de la Lune, The Languedoc

2315 hours

I’ve just found the Lapis Exillis! The Stone in Exile.

The Grail!

Astounded, Cædmon stared at the gold pyramid-shaped object cached inside the limestone aumbry.

‘First an Isis idol and now this ,’ he marvelled, flabbergasted that the Grail of legend was actually the Benben stone, one of ancient Egypt’s most sacred relics. To have unearthed the artefact in Egypt would have been noteworthy. To find it in the south of France was mind-boggling.