"Tom, is everything alright?"
Tom's voice came back, choked. Olivia heard the click of his throat as he swallowed.
"It’s Betty, she's unconscious, she just…" Tom's voice trembled, and he sniffed.
"I'm coming over right now."
"We're at the Brentwood General," he rasped.
Olivia hung up and raced down the stairs.
She met Tom sitting by himself on a bench in the hospital waiting area. The red linoleum floor was wet and shiny from a recent cleaning. Olivia hated coming to the Brentwood General, but tonight she felt better about the place. Few relatives waited for their people, one or two nurses swished by in their white uniforms.
No blood or gore was in sight; Olivia sat beside Tom and took the man's hand. He looked to have aged five years younger. He was still pale from the shock.
"The doctors say we'll know what her condition is tomorrow. They sedated her," he mumbled at the floor between his feet.
"I'm sorry, Tom."
Tom looked at her. "You still have the dreams?"
Olivia nodded.
"Are they horrible?"
"I can't sleep."
"You need to see a doctor, Olivia."
Tom Garcia said he was going to spend the night in the hospital. There was no use tossing about the bed at home.
"How about you, someone waiting back in your flat?"
Olivia glanced at Tom. "Peter?"
"How about him?"
"Don't know yet."
Olivia was back in her flat an hour after seeing Tom Garcia's wife, Betty, still doped out. As she dragged herself up the stairs, she wished someone was waiting in her flat.
She went straight to her computer and found an email waiting.
2
Two months following the events that culminated in the death of John Williams—her partner and lover—Olivia Newton was inundated by emails from readers of the Miami Daily. Some wanted to tell her how much of an influence she was for working women. Others were mostly trolls who tried to let her know they'd kill her should they lay eyes on her.
The spate of emails continued for weeks. The most intriguing of the letters came from a man named Elias. He threatened to expose Olivia, to stalk her, and then to strangle her for "jinxing up the hood." The Miami police found Elias three weeks after a particularly wild email where he told Olivia how much he wanted to rape her in her apartment. Elias had found Olivia's house.
Elias turned out to be an ordinary man: broke, mentally unstable, and diagnosed with lung cancer from smoking pot ever since he could wield an erection.
Olivia was used to hate-mail or the ones who simply admired the guts of a woman. She opened the email around the time she was holding Betty Garcia's hand in the Intensive Care Unit of Brentwood General. Olivia knew this one was different.
There was no name, no return address, nor was it gendered—she couldn't tell if the sender was male or female. It was precise.
The email said, "You are not wrong. The Templars are real, and they are everywhere. They'll stop at nothing to find the Holy Grail."
She would not sleep that night again.
She received another email in the office. Olivia started before she realized that she would not be sharing her new friend with anyone yet.
This email was even shorter: "The Templars blew the secret lab."
Her barely alert eyes bulged. Her breath screamed in her throat, and Olivia had to go to the restroom. Grabbing the sides of the washbasin with strained knuckles, she vomited. She heaved several more times.
Rubbery-legged and hungry, Olivia walked out of the restroom. She took two glasses of water from the office supply; she eyed the coffee flask too but dropped the idea.
Rob Cohen was out of his office, and Marybeth Norton was the self-appointed deputy. She bustled around the office grounds giving orders. She avoided Olivia mostly. That is good for world peace, Olivia mused.
She went back to her cubicle and read the email three more times.
Then she called Peter Williams.
They met on the corner of Fifth Avenue, behind a parade that was heading south towards Lincoln Road. They carried placards, and a band led the procession, singing the Star-Spangled Banner song with colorful trumpet inflections.
The sun was high. Olivia wore large dark shades, a wide-brimmed hat, brightly-colored shirt, and brown shorts; her feet were clad in leather sandals. A strong breeze blew her hair about her face. She loved the feel of the harsh wind on her feet.
Peter Williams pulled up in a taxi.
They started walking away from the crowd.
"What's up?"
She had made copies of the emails. She gave Peter the folded paper.
Peter read them quietly.
"What is this?"
"Are you serious?" She stopped walking and faced him. "If these emails do anything, they confirm what I have been talking about, Peter."
Peter looked at the emails again. "Okay, the Templars were just a bunch of poor soldiers who guarded the Holy Land in the twelfth century. They couldn't be responsible for this…"
"You don't know that."
"Of course I do." Peter laughed. "Listen Olivia, someone is teasing you. This is a joke; you have to believe me. The Knight Templars don't exist anymore. They are dead and long gone."
Deflated, Olivia grabbed the printed pages from Peter's hand. The wind ruffled them as she placed them back in her bag.
"Whoever sent those emails would like to see you go on a wild goose chase—"
"How about the other proof, Peter? When you add them up, I mean…they do add up to something, don't they?"
Peter placed his hands on Olivia's shoulders and gazed into her eyes.
"Olivia, you need to rest," he entreated her. "You are overthinking this thing. Nobody wants to hear about Hitler's secret lab anymore. Hell, there is not proof anymore, it's all shot to shit."
Olivia started ruffling in her bag again.
"See, here." She pointed. "He mentions the Holy Grail. Look. You know what that is, right?"
Peter exhaled. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his denim. He wore a yellow t-shirt that emphasized his budding protuberance.
The wind carried the trumpets of the marching band from the beach area. Traffic was flowing again, and the light turned red down the road.
"No one knows what the Grail truly is," he said.
"Maybe this person, whoever they are, knows."
"Okay, Olivia, I'll see what I can find out."
"Good, Peter. Can we eat?"
"Sure."
Rob Cohen was livid. He was waiting by Olivia's cubicle when she arrived in beach clothes and sunglasses. Rob's mouth was twisted, and he looked ugly in his blue waistcoat and pencil trousers.
"What is this, Olivia Newton?" he hissed. "This is not Miami Beach."
Heads turned. She caught a triumphant glare in Marybeth Norton's eyes. She was dressed to murder as usual. Olivia thought she saw a bulge between Cohen's legs. Or maybe it was Olivia's eyes playing tricks on her.
"I'm sorry." She raised her palm. "I woke up late."
Rob said into her ear, "In my office, now."
Rob Cohen huffed off to his office. Olivia picked up her bag and followed behind him as the murmur of office life returned. That vindictive glint in Marybeth's eyes was still there.
Cohen sat and said, "Olivia, help me here, what exactly do you want me to do? I gave you a job, and you delegate without my permission?"
Olivia took off her glasses.
"Are you going down again?" Cohen asked when he saw her bloodshot eyes.
"Someone has been sending me emails, disturbing emails."
Cohen cocked his head to the side. His eyes narrowed at her. "What emails?"
She showed Cohen the prints. He read them twice and gave the paper back; he sat back and exhaled. For the first time since most of the month, Olivia saw some empathy in the man's expression. He folded his hands on his chest, sighed, and asked, "What are you goi
ng to do about it?"
"Exactly what a reporter is supposed to do—dig it up."
Cohen took a red-covered book on his table; it was a diary with The Reds embossed on the front in black letters. He flipped the pages, stopped, and read something for a second. Then Cohen tore a page off another jotter. He wrote on it and gave it to Olivia.
"Emily Tozier, she's a specialist of European history at the Florida university," he said. "You might wanna talk to her."
Olivia took the paper and thanked her boss.
She called Tom Garcia on his office phone and caught him as he was leaving for the hospital.
"You're on time. Meet me in ten minutes."
Olivia said she'd be there in five minutes.
She took a taxi that made two detours through downtown before coming behind another rally on Point Break Street. From there, it took six minutes to meet Tom standing in the parking lot, sweating rivers.
They jumped into his car and started talking.
"I have these emails coming in for two days now, some guy telling me things."
"What things?" Tom asked, keeping his eyes on the road for unexpected traffic jams.
"Here."
Olivia read the emails verbatim. She asked him if they struck any vein.
"You are gonna have to put this into perspective."
"What this means is I have proof there's something about the secret lab's explosion in Antarctica—"
"And earthquake, Olivia."
"But we both know the earthquake is a cover for something, right?"
Tom snickered weakly. Olivia regretted coming to the man instantly. Tom's wife was in the hospital dying, and his mind was distracted. She shouldn't be bothering him with her problems.
She put the prints away and exhaled.
"I need to authenticate the email, Tom."
He nodded. "I did some history. These Templars, they don't exist anymore. It's all far-fetched. But I'm gonna check it out. Meanwhile, Olivia, get some sleep. Your eyes give you away."
"That's why I wear this." She waved the sunglasses.
"Just get some rest."
3
Emily Tozier met Olivia at the end of one of her classes. Glutted students with volumes of books under their arms filled the halls. Olivia stood aside to let them through.
"Ms. Olivia Newton?"
"Yes, that's me."
Tozier had red hair that complemented her red sweater well. She had an enormous bosom and a full mouth that smiled all the time; her intelligent eyes followed Olivia as she took her seat. She had an Irish lilt to her homely speech.
"Thank you for seeing me on such short notice."
Tozier smiled and sat on the table where her books were. She looked Olivia over.
"You asked about the Templars. No one has asked about them in centuries. That lot is dead and gone, you know." Tozier launched into a lecture.
"They vanished around the end of the 13th century when the pope of the time vanished them. They were becoming renegades—"
"What'd you mean renegades?"
Emily folded her fingers together like she must do when she lectured her students.
"The Templars were mostly rich folks, enlightened, influential. The small band among them were trained knights that protected Jerusalem, the Holy Land. But as you may have noticed, these groups often developed offshoots—those who think they should do more, be more. They became assassins, mercenaries, for the highest paying client."
Emily Tozier paused. "You get the picture?"
Olivia nodded.
"You're friends with Rob Cohen, how's he these days?"
"He's my boss," Olivia said. "And he's okay, I guess."
Olivia shifted in her seat. She considered showing the woman the prints. Then she asked her, "Do you think the Templars could be back somehow?"
"Why? There's no reason to believe they would."
"Maybe they want something, like the Holy Grail?" Olivia suggested.
Tozier frowned. Her cheeks creased in a smile, and a dimple appeared there.
"There is so much controversy about the Holy Grail," she said. "No one quite knows what it is, although the general conception is that it is a cup"—Tozier made the shape of a cup with her chubby hands—"that Jesus drank from on the night of the Last Supper, but it's all historical crap. That cup is said to be the same one that one of the friends supposedly took Jesus's blood in when he died on the cross. You see my point?"
Olivia said she did. She thought that it was bullshit too.
Emily Tozier's offhand manner was doing something to Olivia. Listening to the woman talk about the Holy Grail made her shoulders feel lighter.
As she drove back to her apartment, she breathed easier. She found a station that played country music on the radio and sang along to “Lonestar's Working in Memphis.” She called Tom Garcia on the phone when she got in. Tom said there was no news yet from his buddy at the FBI.
She soaked herself in the tub and drank distilled water. And then she fell asleep.
"You better get down here fast," Tom said.
Olivia hopped into a taxi and told the driver to step hard on it. The man was Arab from the look of his hook nose, but when he spoke he turned out to be Indian. As he dropped Olivia off at the police station, he said he'd vote democratic. Olivia said she was very pleased.
Tom Garcia was waiting by an unmarked police car, a fading brown Chevy with a shiny grille. Olivia took the other door, and the sheriff started downtown towards General Hospital.
He gave Olivia a piece of computer printout. "That's where your emails are coming from."
"Th…the university?" Olivia stammered.
"Uhuh, and the guy double-checked just to make sure. I asked him to."
The print showed a small map, like a patchwork or a mesh of some sort. Upon closer look, it became familiar. The map of the south side of Florida with the university in the middle of it. There was an icon like a drop of blue water turned upside down. Its pointed side was on the spot of the university.
"Can I hold on to this?"
"Sure."
Betty Garcia was awake when they got there. She looked whiter than average, and most of her hair was gone from the chemotherapy. Dark circles around her eyes gave the impression of old makeup. She was propped up on several pillows.
"Hey, Olivia, I don't get to see you often." Betty took half a hug. "Is it work?"
"I wish it were, Betty."
They touched cheeks and kissed the air; Olivia touched Betty's cheeks. They were dry and clammy.
"I don't know what’s going to kill me first, the chemo or the doctors."
Olivia chuckled. "You just concentrate on getting well."
"I hear you've been concentrating on a fine professor." Betty winked.
Tom feigned an embarrassed look. He said he'd go and check the results of specific tests with the doctors.
Olivia shrugged and said, "We have dinners once a while, nothing serious yet."
Betty's eyes glinted with pleasure as she stared into Olivia's eyes. "It's time to do something again with that heart of yours," she said.
A nurse came to put Betty to sleep with drugs shortly. Tom Garcia said he'd wait a little bit more beside his wife. Olivia called a taxi and left.
When she arrived at the office, there was no Rob Cohen with his feet up on his table, smiling and feeling good. Neither was there Marybeth Norton's shapely figure taking charge of any business.
It is all excellent, she thought.
"Where's Rob?" she asked a youngish, sniffing nerd near his cubicle named Floyd.
"The boss?"
"No, my cat Smokey."
The boy's eyes looked lost behind his thick-lensed glasses. Then they narrowed. "Oh, he just stepped out." He sniffed.
"And Marybeth?"
"Her too."
Of course. Olivia took her seat and looked at the printout from Tom again. Maybe this was just a fool's errand. Maybe there was nothing to the emails, and this person was just a bor
ed reader looking to spice his own life up.
Olivia could not disagree that her life needed some spice. Peter Williams was providing some of that spice, wasn't he? She placed the paper on her desk.
"That's not completely triangulated, you know."
Floyd was bending over Olivia. His breath smelled of onions and fish.
"What'd you mean?"
"Let me see that." He picked up the piece of paper and looked at it. He pushed his glasses up. "You are looking for something?"
"Yeah." Olivia told him about the facts of the emails, but not the content. Floyd took the paper to his seat and immediately went into nerd mode. He brought out his laptop from his backpack that was lying on the floor beside him.
He jerked the laptop to another console and tapped the black square case. "This is a triangulator. You can get one of these from eBay. The FBI's got better machines, but this can do the work too."
Floyd copied the coordinates, inputted them in his laptop, and a page appeared with an array of numbers. The numbers were in packs. As Olivia watched, the numbers reduced until it was just a couple, then the movement paused.
"And…" Floyd raised his hand. "Viola!"
He wrote a new coordinate on Olivia's paper. He then opened a new page on the laptop's browser. He typed the coordinates and waited; the muscles in Olivia's neck tensed. She pulled her chair closer and sat in it.
What appeared on the screen was a map like the one on the printout that Garcia had given her. The difference was that this one zoomed in on the university. The inverted blue drop was on the administrative building on the faculty of Humanities. Olivia's heart was threatening to bust her chest now.
"That's where your email is sent from." Floyd looked at Olivia over his large glasses. "You know if you're having problems with a stalker, you should talk to the cops."
Olivia rose up from her chair, dazed, and in deep thought. She didn't hear Floyd, nor did she see him stare incredulously at her. The nerd went back to tapping on his computer.
Hunt for the Holy Grail Page 22