The Last Inferno

by Michael Cross

  But I also know that’s not for me to judge. We all have to make our personal choices. I can’t force this man to choose this fight any more than anybody can force me to choose it. So I can’t judge him for it. I won’t.

  “Do you know who my father is?” I ask. “I was told he’s part of the Hellfire Club leadership.”

  “I only know him by the name Phil Weathers. But I can tell you that’s not his true identity,” Digger replies. “But from what I understand, he’s one of the Hellfire Club’s top brass. He tried to recruit me, actually.”

  The confirmation of what Arthur Adams told me feels like a kick to the gut. It nearly steals my breath and has me feeling something strange. Something I can’t really identify. A heaviness. A disappointment. A sadness and an anger that reaches every corner of my body.

  “How do you know this Phil Weathers person is my father?” I ask.

  “Because I’m good at what I do. Or I used to be, anyway. I did some due diligence of my own and came across your name in my digging,” he notes. “And I can also tell you that your father’s last name isn’t Kingston. Don’t know what it is though. And also, any links between you and this guy have now been erased. It’s like you don’t exist anymore. I checked.”

  I clench my hands into fists and grit my teeth, feeling the frustration flowing through me. I have what feels like a thousand disparate parts, and I have no idea how they all fit together. I can’t see the bigger picture they’re trying to form in my mind. I don’t share a last name with my father? Does that mean he’s my stepfather? Was I adopted? Is the last name I’ve grown up with my whole life just a cover-up too? What in the hell does it mean?

  “Do you know what group my father is with?” I ask.

  “Agency,” he answers.

  It’s yet another bit of news that kicks me in the balls. So my father is a spook, just like I was. And apparently, for whatever reason, he disavowed his relationship with me. It’s more information than I had but not nearly enough to fill in the gaps that remain in my mind.

  “Do you know why I was erased?” I ask.

  He shakes his head. “No clue. Only so much I can get these days. Like I said, things have changed,” he replies. “All I know is that you can probably answer your own questions by going back to where this all started for you.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Figure it out, son,” he says. “I’ve done what I said I’d do. I told you all I know. The rest is up to you.”

  “I don’t understand. What do you mean, where this all started for me?”

  “Figure it out,” he repeats. “I don’t want anything more to do with this.”

  “But—”

  He shakes his head, his expression darkening. “My part in this play is over,” he tells me. “The rest is up to you.”

  He gets to his feet before I can further object and walks away without a backward glance. I’m left sitting there with a mountain of questions and a yawning chasm of pain in the center of my chest— and no understanding of how to fix either situation.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “No, I’m sure he knows more than he’s telling me,” I say. “I’m sure he knows a lot more.”

  Nisha looks back at me from the computer screen as I pace the hotel room. I was so rattled after my meeting with Digger that I didn’t quite know what to do. So without thinking much about it, I called Nisha. It’s only now that I see her staring back at me, her dark eyes boring into me from the other side of the country, that I stop to wonder why she’d been the first person I thought to reach out to.

  I’ve never been much for sharing my feelings. I admit that I’ve not always been the most open about my innermost thoughts. But it used to be that when things got to be too much, I shared what I could with Mandy. I obviously couldn’t tell her everything, but when I needed to unload and get the weight off my shoulders, she was always there. I always ran to her.

  So what does it mean that I ran straight to Nisha? Maybe nothing. But— maybe something.

  I don’t know. I can’t afford to dwell on that right now. I can’t afford the space in my head Nisha, or at least thoughts of Nisha, take up. If this is the endgame, I need to be at the very top of my game. I need to be laser-focused, and I can’t let anything else in right now.

  “I’m sorry he wasn’t much help,” she offers, sounding genuinely remorseful. “I’d hoped he would be more forthcoming with you.”

  “It’s not your fault. And I appreciate you putting me with him in the first place,” I sigh. “I think he was scared, honestly. I think he believes they can still reach out and snatch him up.”

  She shrugs. “It’s not an unreasonable fear to have,” she notes. “The opposition has quite a long reach. As you know.”

  “Yeah, I know,” I nod “I just wish I knew what he meant about where this all began for me. I’m at a loss.”

  “I wish I could help you, Ezra,” she says gently. “But I have no more idea what he meant than you do. I wish I did. But I’m not privy—”

  “I know. And it’s not your fault,” I interrupt. “I know there are limits to what you know and what you can do.”

  A gentle smile crosses her face, and she looks away. I can see she’s still troubled by how things went down with Temperance. She’s still rattled by it all. Nisha is hurting, and there’s a small part of me that hates myself for doing it to her. But having Temperance in a position of power is a nuclear bomb just waiting to go off. If we let her be, she’s going to blow up in our faces. It’s a matter of when, not if.

  And I know that somewhere deep down inside, she knows and understands this. She doesn’t like it, and it hurts her, but she understands it. She’s too smart and too good at her job, not to.

  I sit down in the seat before the computer and look at her for a long moment. She looks tired. She’s got dark circles under her eyes like she hasn’t slept in a while. Or at least, hasn’t slept well. I’m sure this is all weighing down on her heavily.

  “Are you okay?” I ask her softly.

  Nisha sighs and presses her lips together in a tight line. “Not really,” she says after a long moment.

  “You two were close.”

  I didn’t even need to tell her who I was talking about—she already knew. She nods sadly, unable to meet my eyes.

  “Yeah,” she admits. “We were close. Very close. She was my mentor.”

  “She worked for Interpol?”

  A small smile flickered across her lips. “Seems like another lifetime, but yes,” she says. “She was like a big sister to me. And she’s the one who brought me into the Tower.”

  “Jesus,” I mutter. “I’m sorry it’s all breaking like this.”

  “It’s not your fault,” she replies. “This is all on her.”

  A quiet moment passes between us, the silence filled with words not being spoken. We stare into each other’s eyes, and although we’re on opposite sides of the country, the feeling is electric. It sends a jolt like lightning shooting along my every nerve ending. But then my phone rings, breaking the spell and the moment passes.

  I glance down at my phone and see that it’s Publius that’s calling. I look back up and give her a rueful smile.

  “Listen, when this is all over, we should get together for a drink,” I tell her. “We should probably talk.”

  She nods. “Yeah. Probably should,” she replies. “Now go. Answer your phone.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And Ezra? Be careful,” she says. “I expect that drink.”

  I give her a small smile before I disconnect the video chat and scoop up my phone. I connect the call and press the phone to my ear.

  “Please tell me you have some good news for me,” I say.

  There’s a slight pause before she speaks. And when she does, her tone is slow and careful.

  “I’m not sure it’s good,” Publius offers. “But it’s news anyway.”

  I hit the speaker button and set the phone down, rubbing my eyes, which feel red
and grainy. I feel like I could lay down and sleep for the next five days. Maybe when this is all over, I’ll take a vacation. I’ll just go completely off the grid, fall off the face of the Earth, and get some damn sleep.

  “Talk to me,” I say.

  “How much do you remember about your childhood, Ezra?”

  I shake my head, then immediately feel stupid when I realize she can’t see me. This is a phone call, not a video chat. I rack my brain though, trying to see if I can take one last run at that opaque wall in my head, see if I can crash through it. But of course not. It remains as thick and impenetrable as it has since day one. Not a crack in the surface of it.

  “I don’t remember any of it,” I tell her. “I get snippets here and there, but it’s still all a blur before I entered the service.”

  She lets out a low whistle, and that’s when I realize that whatever she’s holding is serious and it’s heavy. Whatever she found out is going to be surprising, if not downright shocking. I sit back in the seat and draw in a deep breath, then let it out, bracing myself for it.

  “I take it you have a story to tell me,” I say.

  “I do.”

  “Can you tell me who gave you this information?”

  “You know I can’t,” she says.

  “Are they at least reliable?”

  “One hundred percent. They’re rock solid.”

  Unable to keep my seat, I get up and start pacing the room again. I reach into the small refrigerator and pull out a beer. I pop the top and drink half of it down.

  “This is going to be difficult for you to listen to,” she warns. “Are you sure you’re ready for this?”

  Something in her tone tells me this is going to be a hell of a story. That it’s going to kick my ass. I guess my brain was trying to protect me from the truth until I was ready to hear it—just like Nisha had done. I don’t know that I’m necessarily ready to hear it right now. But I need to.

  “No. But lay it on me.”

  “You were born in DC,” she says. “Did you know that?”

  “I didn’t,” I say, thinking back to what I was feeling as I sat in the park waiting for Digger. “But it makes sense, I suppose. I feel really connected to the area.”

  “Born in Georgetown, actually,” she says. “Your mother’s name was Jaclyn Kingston. Your father’s name is Logan Cheever.”

  “Why am I using my mother’s maiden name and not my father’s?”

  “I’m getting to that,” she replies. “You had a brother. Dalton. Dalton died when he was seven, and you were nine.”

  I’m struggling to catch my breath as I listen to her. Small fragments of memory float through my mind. Snippets and flashes. Each scrap of remembrance that flashes through my mind feels like a body shot that drives more of my breath from me.

  “Your father was drunk and got into an accident,” she continues. “Your brother was killed instantly.”

  “I had a brother,” I gasp.

  “Your father was a rising star with the Agency. The Hellfire Club had been recruiting him,” Publius goes on. “And they used their influence to get the charges against him dropped. He never stood trial for killing your brother. Never even got a ticket for driving drunk.”

  I drain the last of my first bottle and immediately retrieve a second. My stomach is roiling, and my heart is thundering inside of me as I listen to Publius spin out her story. My story.

  “After that, your mom and dad’s marriage fell apart,” she says. “There were rumors of domestic abuse— though no official reports were ever filed. Or at least, were quashed before they were filed.”

  “The influence of the Hellfire Club.”

  “Quite possibly,” she notes softly. “And then your mother died, Ezra. Under suspicious circumstances.”

  “Suspicious circumstances?”

  “The official autopsy report lists it as a suicide,” she says. “But my source tells me that’s the second autopsy report. And that it’s a fake.”

  I feel my knees go weak. I have to sit down before I drop. This story is a hell of a lot darker than I thought it would be. I was not expecting anything like this, and it’s hitting me like a locomotive.

  “How did she die?” I ask.

  “I don’t think you want to know—”

  “I do. Tell me,” I beg. “Please.”

  She lets out a breath. “She was beaten to death.”

  It seems so strange to me that these people who are just names in my mind, people I don’t yet feel a solid connection to yet, can have such a powerful and profound impact on me. I don’t remember them. Not fully yet. But hearing this story is twisting my guts up and shredding my heart at the same time. And the bitch of it is, is I know that once that wall in my head is torn down and the memories behind it become more solid, it’s going to hurt so much worse.

  I’ve gone through it once already when the memories of Mandy and Ryan became real and solid for me. And knowing I now have to mourn two more people— my mother and brother— is stacking misery upon misery.

  When the dust settles, I know I’m going to be shattered. I’m going to be left with a pain deeper than anything I’ve ever known before.

  My eyes sting, and my vision blurs. I angrily scrub the tears away with the palms of my hands. I sniff loudly and let out a deep breath, trying to collect myself.

  “Are you okay?” Publius asks gently.

  “Yeah. I’m good,” I say. “What else can you tell me?”

  For the next half hour, Publius continues telling me what she’s learned. Every revelation she lays on me is another brick in this wall I’m building inside of myself, holding back all of my grief. Storing it for later. I can’t afford to let myself dwell upon it all right now. No, right now, I need to focus. I need to be sharp. This is all coming to a head, and I need to be cool and collected if I’m going to put an end to this.

  As I listen to Publius’ story, I’m making connections in my mind. Some memories start to become whole. Real. Pieces of this whole puzzle are falling into place, and I’m starting to see the bigger picture forming. See it slowly beginning to resolve itself.

  After the death of my mother, I took her name, symbolically cutting ties with my father. Which means that back then, I must have known something was wrong with him. I must have begun distancing myself from him at an early age.

  “My father,” I ask. “He’s still with the Agency?”

  “He’s the Deputy Director, Ezra,” she says, a note of caution in her voice.

  “Do you know if he’s the one who put out my burn notice?”

  “That I don’t know,” she says. “My source couldn’t get much more than your full background.”

  I sit back in my seat again and let my mind play it all out. There’s one question I keep coming back to that I don’t have an answer to. If I went to all the trouble of distancing myself from my father, going so far as to change my name to my mother’s maiden name, why would I join the Agency knowing he was a big shot in it? I didn’t realize I’d been musing aloud until Publius answers my question.

  “Your father was the Deputy Director of Homeland Security when you joined the Agency,” she says. “And when he came back to the Agency, you were in different Directorates, so your paths never crossed.”

  I nod to myself, hearing the truth and logic in the words. It makes sense to me. And knowing what I know, my father is the only one who could have burned me. Who else could have had a motive? He must have found out I was going to work for the Tower and decided he couldn’t have that. So he sought to have me killed instead. Which means that he’s the one who murdered my family.

  And as I continue turning the pieces in my head over and over again, Digger’s cryptic statement pops into my head once more. It hits me out of the blue like a lightning bolt energizing me. It makes sense. I suddenly understand what he meant.

  “Thanks, Publius,” I say. “You have made this all make sense to me.”

  “I’m glad I could help,” she says. “And ple
ase, call me Amy.”

  “Well, thank you, Amy. I can’t tell you how much this means to me.”

  “What are you going to do?” she asks.

  “I’m going back to where this all began for me.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Georgetown is a swanky upscale neighborhood in DC. It’s where a lot of the movers, shakers, and power players reside. It’s also where I grew up. As I talked to Amy, the gaps in my mind started to fill in. Memories became more solid. Substantial. Where there were once blank spots, there was suddenly an actual historical record in my mind. I remember just about everything.

  Having the added knowledge of my memory’s lights me up inside. I’m excited to be armed with my personal history once more. But of course, hovering at the edges is the dark, profound sense of grief I know I will have to deal with eventually. It lingers there like a specter just waiting to pounce and drag me into the darkness with it.

  I drive past the old brownstone I once called home. It’s a three-story place. It looks exactly the same as it did when I was a kid. There are a few lights on in the place, but I get the idea that it’s empty. He’s not home. Which gives me a window to operate in.

  I find a place to park on the curb about half a block away. I get out of the car quietly and take a look around. It’s quiet and still. All of the professionals must have already gone to bed for the night. I grab my bag from the trunk and sling it over my shoulders, then set off on foot, keeping my hands in my pockets and my head down.

  As I approach my father’s brownstone, I look around again. Seeing that the street is empty, I dart down the walkway that leads along the side of the house. It seems narrower now that I’m older and bigger than I was as a kid, but I’m still able to move with ease.