Carbon-14: The Shroud of Turin (An Amari Johnston Novel)

by Williams, R. A.

  He awkwardly put his arm around her. She moved into the cradle of his arm and chest. He took the remote and clicked the TV off. “But, Amari, you’re so tough.”

  “People aren’t always what they seem. That’s just what I want people to think. It’s just the way I act. I lose my temper sometimes and people think I’m tough. But it’s not who I am, not really.” Her defenses seemed to crumble in his arms. “It’s not the way I feel right now.”

  “That’s not true. You’re tough as nails. The way you went against Rahal, wow, I could never do that.”

  “Rahal wasn’t trying to kill me, he was just being a jerk. This is different. When you nearly die, everything changes. I thought God had my back, Kevin. I was sure he wanted me to do this. I was sure he would protect me, but I’m not so sure anymore.” An aching sadness built within her. It burned in her eyes and spilled onto her cheeks. “I’m not sure what to think anymore,” she said and sniffed. “I thought I had a purpose. I thought he needed me but now look. People are trying to kill me. Both of us.” She couldn’t control it anymore. She broke into bitter sobs, pushing her face deeper into his chest.

  She felt his gentle, comforting stroke on her hair. “Shh, it’s going to be okay. ‘Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them; for the Lord your God, he is the one who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you.’”

  She caught her breath between sobs. “What did you say?”

  “‘For I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, do not fear; I will help you.’”

  She sat up straight. She pulled a tissue from the night stand and dabbed her eyes. “How do you know those verses?”

  “‘There is no fear in love,’” he said, calmly looking into her eyes. He took her hand and said, “‘But perfect love drives out fear.’”

  “You’re not a Christian. How do you know all that?”

  “In John 17:16, Jesus says ‘they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.’ And if you’re not of this world, then you’re alien to this world. What I said to you was true. The Shroud of Turin was formed by an alien, alien to this world and our imperfections. But he loved this world and spent thirty-three years in this world to teach us, and then to die for us, so that we may have everlasting life.”

  “I don’t believe what I’m hearing,” she said, nodding her head in disbelief. “All this time, you were a Christian and you didn’t tell me?”

  “I was going to tell you today in the car. Got a little distracted.”

  “But why would you wait so long?”

  “I had to be sure I could trust you with my secret. I was waiting for the right time, and God handed it to me just now. It’s time you knew the whole truth about me. I know I can trust you now.”

  She moved over to her bed and rubbed her eyes with tissue. “Wow, this has been a long day. First I almost get killed—again. And now this?”

  He swung his feet over and sat on the edge of his bed, elbows resting on his knees, looking intently into her eyes. “You have to understand, Amari, that in my profession, religious faith is career suicide. Science is God to these people. It’s all they care about. Any hint of faith in something that can’t be proven experimentally is scoffed at. It implies bias. Bias toward things that don’t agree with the culture of science. If I revealed my faith, I would get blackballed. People talk, word spreads. If they had any idea about my true feelings, I would have never been hired to carbon date the Shroud. And then I would have never met you. There’s a purpose in all of this, Amari. You have to believe that.”

  “But Jesus said you have to let your light shine. Put it on a lamp stand. Don’t cover it up and leave the world in darkness.”

  “And I will. When the time is right. Someday, when I’m well established, when I’ve gained respect from my colleagues, when I have more evidence to back my claims, I will let my light shine. But not until it shines bright. When they respect me, they might believe my words. But for now, I’ll only find myself without a career. Please, Amari, you can’t tell anyone, okay? I told you because I trust you. Promise me.”

  She sniffed and stared at his pleading face. So this was his secret. If only her dad could see this. “I knew you were hiding something. My dad did too,” she said and laughed to herself. “I’m just glad you’re not in the mob or something. But it’s not your only secret, is it?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “My dad says you have a juvenile record.”

  “Oh, that.”

  “What did you do?”

  He swung his legs back onto the bed and lay back against the pillows.

  “Kevin, tell me.”

  “When I was a teenager I started reading books like C.S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity and Josh McDowell’s Evidence that Demands a Verdict. I couldn’t deny that Jesus was real. About the same time, I had a crush on this girl named Lisa. She invited me to her church and I was really getting into it until. . .well, you could say things turned a little sour.”

  “Did you love this girl?”

  “Thought I did. Probably more like an infatuation. But I learned my lesson. You’re the first girl I’ve trusted since then.”

  “Since what? Tell me, Kevin, why did you get arrested?”

  He laughed and rubbed at his forehead. “Oh, gosh, it seems kind of funny now that I look back at it.”

  “What, Kevin? Tell me why you got arrested.”

  “Some people at this girl’s church invited me to protest with them at the abortion clinic out in Knoxville. One of them had this crazy idea to cuff me to a light pole just to show how serious we were. When the police came, they scattered and left me there. Lisa just abandoned me. She laughed about it later. So I got arrested for refusing to disband. I told them I didn’t have the key, but they took me in anyway.”

  “How could they do that to you? That’s not the way Christians are supposed to act.”

  “You know, Mahatma Gandhi loved Jesus. It was Christians he had a problem with. At least some of them. Not everybody plays by the rules. Now you can see one of the reasons I haven’t been back to church. I don’t know who I can trust anymore. Until I met you.”

  “They’re not all like that. I can’t believe they did that to you.”

  “I don’t think the older ones realized I didn’t have the key. The younger ones, like Lisa, were just scared of getting arrested.”

  “Don’t make excuses for them. What they did to you was wrong.”

  “It was. And ever since then I’ve been a loner. Just me and God. I realized then that I didn’t need to go to church to believe.”

  “Of course not, but it certainly helps. Look, I understand, it’s hard just walking into a church full of strangers. Especially for someone like you. You had a bad experience and nobody’s invited you to have a better one. You can come to church with me. You’ll see, church is great. It’s not what you think.”

  “You might need that, but I don’t. Besides, like I told you, it would be career suicide.”

  She could see he was traumatized over this, so she decided to drop it. They’d had enough trauma for one day. “I get it, Kevin. You’re not ready. I’m cool with that.”

  “Thank you for understanding.”

  “Thank you for being here for me. You have no idea what you mean to me . . . I mean, how much help you’ve been with the Shroud.”

  “So now you know why I’m helping you. We have the same goal in common. We both want the world to know the truth about the Shroud.”

  “Yeah,” she agreed as the sad realization sank. She’d had a flicker of hope he was helping her because he cared about her, not her mission. She’d hoped his feelings for her was the real reason he’d thrown his profession under the bus during her dad’s interrogation, the reason he bit the hand that fed him. But now she knew the real reason he did it. It was his love for God, not for her.

  “Hey, what’s wrong, Amari? I thought you’d be happy.”

  “I am, Kevin.
I am. I’m just really tired, that’s all.”

  “You don’t look so happy.”

  “Haven’t you ever been so happy you want to cry?” she said, the tears welling in her eyes again.

  He went over to her bed and wrapped his arms around her. “It’s going to be okay, Amari. I promise, everything’s going to be okay.”

  ****

  The gated entrance to Los Alamos National Laboratory was way out in the woods, not anywhere close to the laboratory itself. They patiently waited their turn as the cars ahead worked through security. Amari had slept a full eight hours last night, no nightmares about the man in the library, no flashbacks of a Lincoln Town Car running them off the road. She felt refreshed and energized. Of course, Kevin had been a perfect gentleman. Like Jenny said, he wasn’t wired like other guys.

  She was half-ashamed, half-glad she’d lost control in front of him last night. She was ashamed because he saw the true Amari—just a young girl with anxieties and fears like anybody else, a young girl who tried to act tough and live up to her dad’s reputation and the reputation of a warrior chief whose blood flowed in her veins. But she was glad she could let go in front of him. It made them closer. It gave them a bond. And now she knew Kevin was a Christian. She had no moral qualms about taking the relationship to the next level—if only he shared her feelings.

  He pulled the car forward and stopped in front of the gate. “Hey there,” he said. “Name’s Kevin Brenner. I have an appointment with Jeffery Jenkins.”

  The stone-faced security guard ran his finger down a page stuck on a clipboard. “Here you are, Dr. Kevin Brenner. Says your permission to enter was revoked.”

  “Revoked?” Kevin said. “What do you mean, revoked?”

  “Somebody pulled your clearance.”

  “Look, call Jeffery, he’ll tell you I’m good.”

  “Pull your car over to the side,” the guard said. “You’re blocking traffic. I’ll call and see what I can do.”

  “Thank you, officer,” Kevin said.

  “I’ll let the gate up so you can turn around,” he said. “Park over by the curb and I’ll send someone to talk to you.”

  The gate rail went up and Kevin moved his car forward. “Maybe I ought to make a run for it.”

  “Don’t you dare. We can’t do anything inside federal prison.”

  “Fine,” he said and pulled his car back around and out the exit gate. He moved his car over to a parking space by the curb.

  After a few minutes, a security car pulled up. Two men got out and walked up to the car. One was wearing jeans, but the other was armed security. Kevin noticed them and stepped out of the car to meet them. She stayed put, but she could still hear them through the open window. “Hey, Jeffery, good to see you again,” Kevin said and shook hands. “I thought you said we were good to go.” Jeffery wasn’t much older than Kevin. A mess of brown curly hair fell back past his shirt collar.

  “You were, Kevin, I promise. But someone from upstairs got wind of this and pulled the plug.”

  “But why?” Kevin asked. “We weren’t going to take the tapes. We just wanted to look at them.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you. They were fine with it one minute, then at the last minute, they pulled the clearance. I wonder if someone called or something. Maybe someone thought you were a security risk.”

  “So there’s no way you can get us in?”

  “Sorry, buddy. Sorry you had to drive all the way out here, but I tried. They wouldn’t budge.”

  “I understand. Thanks anyway, Jeffery,” Kevin said and got back into the car. Jeffery and the guard went back to their car.

  “I can’t believe this. All this way, for nothing,” Amari said. “We almost got killed for nothing.”

  “I wonder if someone called them and told them why we wanted to see those tapes.”

  She narrowed her eyes in anger. “Rahal.”

  “He didn’t know we were coming up here. It couldn’t have been him.”

  She winced. “Actually, I might have let it slip back at the biology lab. He told me I’d never get into this place. I bet he called them to make sure I didn’t.”

  Kevin hammered the steering wheel with his fist. “That jerk! That’s got to be it then.”

  “I’m sorry, Kevin, I shouldn’t have told him. It just slipped.”

  “That’s all right. We’ll find another way.”

  “Oh, no,” she said and buried her face in her hands.

  “You’re thinking Rahal knows I’m the one who took you up here. Otherwise, why would they block my clearance?”

  She pulled her hands away and looked at him apologetically. “They never even asked my name. It’s the only thing that makes sense. Kevin, I’m so sorry. Rahal’s going to fire you over this.”

  “So what if he does? I ain’t worried about it.”

  “How can you be so relaxed about this? Your whole career could go down the drain? Because you helped me.”

  “Maybe, but not till after we carbon date the Dead Sea Scrolls. He’d be screwed if he fired me now.”

  “And what about after that?”

  “He’d still have to get Dr. Weiss’s approval to fire me.”

  “You think Dr. Weiss still has your back?”

  “Maybe.”

  “And what if he doesn’t?”

  “One day at a time, Amari. Sometimes you just gotta live by faith.”

  ****

  Kevin pulled his car into his apartment complex and took the spot next to Amari’s Camaro.

  “Interstate 10 was definitely better,” she said.

  “And nobody tried to kill us,” he said. “That’s refreshing.”

  “Well, Kevin, thank you for taking me up there. I’m sorry it didn’t end the way we wanted.”

  “Something will work out. I’ll call Jeffery and see if there’s another way.”

  “And thank you for being honest with me, you know, about your faith.”

  “I should have told you sooner. I just didn’t know how to bring it up.”

  “Is there anything else you want to tell me? This would be a good time.”

  “Now that you mention it, there is a little something. I haven’t been totally honest with you.”

  “Well, spit it out. Nothing surprises me about you anymore.”

  “I’m not really a Republican. I mean, I voted for Bush this time, but I voted for Mondale in ’84. I go either way, really.”

  “I’m serious, Kevin. No jokes. Is that it?”

  “Fine, I’ll ante up. But I’m afraid you’re not going to like it.”

  “Try me. Your last secret was a pleasant surprise.”

  “Okay, but remember, friends stick together through thick and thin. Promise you won’t get mad. I’ve seen you get mad before, and it ain’t pretty.”

  “I promise, I won’t get mad.”

  He held out his right pinky. “Pinky promise?”

  “You really think I’ll be mad?”

  “Not furious mad, but maybe a little disappointed I didn’t show you this earlier.”

  “If it’s anything like your last secret, I promise, I won’t get mad.” She linked her pinky into his. “Pinky promise.”

  They held their pinkies together for several seconds and his eyes drifted to her lips. This was it. He wanted to kiss. All the emotion from the trip finally brought his feelings to the surface. Now or never, Amari told herself and leaned forward.

  “You got something on your lip,” he said. “It’s been driving me nuts. I think it’s a cracker crumb.”

  She let go of his pinky and swiped at her lips. She pulled away the crumb he had used this very intimate moment to bring up. He was right. It was a crumb from the cheese cracker she’d eaten a few minutes before.

  “Hey,” he said. “If you’re still hungry, let’s go grab a bite to eat.”.

  “Oh, no you don’t. You told me you had another secret. Show me now. We eat later.”

  “Okay, but you promised. You won’t get m
ad.”

  Chapter 29

  Kevin’s apartment was a mess. The floor needed to be vacuumed and books and magazines littered the couch and coffee table. It reminded Amari of her own place before Jenny moved in.

  “No wonder Jenny wanted out,” she said.

  “Organization is not my forte,” he said.

  “Mine neither. So what’s the big secret?”

  “It’s in my bedroom. I kept it hidden in there so Jenny wouldn’t see. Uh, hold on a second before you come in.”

  He slipped into his bedroom and shut the door. She heard thumps and rustling and then he reemerged.

  “It’s good now. Come on in.”

  A pile of clothes was on the bathroom floor and the comforter was wrinkled and hastily thrown over the pillows. He pointed to his book shelf. On the top shelf was every book she had read about the Shroud along with several more. The second shelf had history books about the Roman Empire, Medieval Europe, a thick one called Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, and other books by the historian Josephus. There were also three different translations of the Bible. The King James version looked a hundred years old. The next two shelves were lined with science books—physics, chemistry, anatomy and physiology, astronomy, and math.

  “I kept the religious books in my closet so Jenny wouldn’t see them. I put them back on the shelf when she moved out.”

  “She’s a Christian. Why go to all the trouble of hiding this from her?”

  “Because I don’t trust her. She’d go blabbing it to everybody back home.”

  “I promise, I won’t tell.”

  “I know you won’t. That’s why I told you and not her.”

  Her eyes went back to the top shelf. “Well, I see why you think I should be mad. All this time you were just humoring me. You know more about the Shroud than I do. You just let me go on like I was discovering America when you’d been living there the whole time.” She should have been furious, but when someone tries to kill you twice, it’s hard to get excited about something like that.

  “I never said I didn’t know what you were talking about either.”