Sean Chercover - The Trinity Game

Conrad said, “Also knows better than to let him be seen in public, but there they are on television.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Maybe Daniel’s not calling the shots.”

“Maybe not,” said Nick. “All right, you head for Greenville, then on to New Orleans. Stay on the rural highways, and keep your eyes open for any tents. Maybe he’ll feel compelled to stop at another one.”

“Call me if anything develops,” said Conrad. He broke the connection.

Nick put the receiver down, turned to the young man still waiting, and handed him the camera. “Bryan, I want you to keep track of the news channels. When the Greenville story loses steam, get the photographs on this camera to the media. Anonymously, of course.”

“Of course, sir.”

“What the hell is wrong with you?” said Daniel as they passed a MISSISSIPPI WELCOMES YOU sign. “Are you insane?”

“Stop,” said Tim Trinity.

“Seriously, is your head broken? What is it about the concept of a low profile that eludes you? Please explain how getting up in front of a dozen camcorders qualifies as helping me keep you alive .”

“Will you please just let it go? For the eleventh time: I’m sorry . OK? I just…I saw the tent and I thought God wanted me to confess. I thought…you know, I flushed the rest of my coke down the sink on Saturday. But the tongues didn’t come on Sunday and…I just thought, maybe, if I confessed my past sins to those people…if I denounced a false prophet…I guess I thought they’d come back faster.” He shook his head, smiling ruefully. “I used to cherish the brief respite periods when the voices go quiet…a couple days here, a few days there…blessed relief, for as long as it lasted. And I used to dread their return.” He gazed out the window. “Funny how things change…”

“A dozen camcorders, at least. Probably running on CNN already.” Daniel returned his focus to the road ahead, and they rode in silence for a minute.

Trinity smiled. “You see the way Preacher Bob handled the situation? Gotta hand it to him. Totally blindsided, but didn’t miss a beat when he saw his opening. Did that hypnotic rhythm thing with the hallelujahs, and then got them chanting. Yeah, Preacher Bob’s got game, he’s a real talent. He could be big on television if he smoothed out his act a little.”

“Look,” said Daniel, “ after we get you safe, you can sit down with Julia and come clean to the whole world. But use your head. You just put a giant red dot on the map, halfway between Atlanta and your hometown. You just announced your destination to the entire world.”

“I understand, I fucked up. Can we please shift our focus to what we do going forward?”

He was right. Daniel took a long, slow breath, cleared his mind, and considered their options. “By now, everyone thinks you’re going to New Orleans. So we divert our route a little ways north. Then we hole up for the night.”

“And then what? I still need to get to the French Quarter.”

“ I know ,” said Daniel. It came out sharper than he intended. “Give me some time to think it through. I get a bright idea, I’ll be sure to share it with you.”

Atlanta, Georgia…

Julia entered the office, where Kathy Reynolds stood behind her desk, aiming the remote at the television screen. She closed the door behind her.

“Saw it on the way in,” she said.

Kathy nodded at the television. “Not this part. We just got another angle on it, but on this one, the tape runs longer.” She scanned through to where the crowd started chanting, then let it play at normal speed. The camera jostled as the crowd pressed forward, and then a man jumped onto the stage and grabbed Trinity’s wrist.

Daniel.

Kathy Reynolds paused the action on the screen. “Who is he?”

“I, uh…”

“Don’t tell me you don’t know that fine young man. Your face already established that you do. And given your little freakout yesterday when they started dragging bodies out of the place, I’m guessing you know him quite well.”

Julia dropped into a chair. “I can’t.”

“Julia, this footage goes to air after the next commercial break, and the whole world will be asking the same question. It was his choice to step in front of the cameras. He put himself in the story—his choice—not your fault.”

“If not for him, there wouldn’t be a story, Kathy. He’s the one who brought it to me in the first place, and I made a commitment in exchange. Beyond off the record , he’s my Deep Throat on this whole thing. When I promise to protect a source, I stick to it.” She looked straight at the veteran news producer. “Wouldn’t you?”

“Shit.” Kathy pressed the remote and the screen went black. “Yes, I would. Damn. You know, the answer will be found. It’ll come out.”

“But not from me.”

Julia was keenly aware of the hypocrisy. She’d already breached her professional ethics by wiring money to Daniel, just as Daniel had breached his by contacting her in the first place.

But when the ethics of your profession conflict with your ethics as a human being, well, then there’s just something wrong with your profession.

Las Vegas, Nevada…

William Lamech sat in the cabin of his private jet, drinking Perrier while his pilot waited for clearance from the control tower. He picked up the Gulfstream’s sat-phone and dialed the number of Vito Carlucci, head of all things profitable and illegal in New Orleans.

“Vito, it’s William. The conversation we had earlier? It’s happening…he surfaced, and he’s heading your way…I’m on the tarmac at McCarran, I’ll be touching down in about four hours. Assemble a team of your very best men. I want them at the Hotel Monteleone in six. We’re going to end this, now.”

He hung up, lifted the receiver again, and punched in the cell number of Samson Turner.

Julia sat across from Anderson Cooper and adjusted the lavaliere mic clipped to her dress as Cooper welcomed her to the show.

“My producer tells me you’ve been looking into the possibility that the Trinity Phenomenon can be explained by quantum physics. But I gotta tell ya,” Cooper chuckled, “we had Leonard Mlodinow on last night, and I still don’t fully understand it.”

Julia laughed along with him. “One thing all the top physicists agree on: Anyone who claims to fully understand quantum physics, doesn’t. But that doesn’t make it completely impenetrable.”

“Can you give us an explanation we can understand, I mean without any parallel universes, anti-matter, or cats that are both alive and dead at the same time?”

“I know, a lot of it seems to run counter to common sense,” said Julia. “But common sense tells us that the sun revolves around the earth. We think we see the sun rise and set, while we’re actually watching the earth rotate on its axis.” She shifted in her chair. “And for most of our history, suggesting that the earth revolves around the sun was heresy, punishable by death. The border between the known and the unknown is always perilous for science. Look at it this way: some animals only see black and white. You might be tempted to think our experience of the universe is more ‘real’ than theirs because we can see the color spectrum. But we only see part of the spectrum, while birds also see UV light. And there’s increasing evidence that birds also ‘see’ the earth’s electromagnetic field. Is their view of the world more ‘true’ than ours?” She smiled. “Luckily, evolution gave us the big brains—”