Madonna Key 03 - Dark Revelations

by Lorna Tedder

  Dark Revelations

  say virile but thought better of it. Still, the pause was enough to make me bite my lip. “After a few days on the grounds, you start to feel invincible.”

  “The ley lines. The rivers of energy.”

  “Not just that. Power. Power to communicate.

  Power to heal. Power to kill. Energy isn’t evil. It’s pure. It’s all in how it’s used, and they’ve learned how to harness it. When it’s tapped into, it’s like opening a door. Some keys open doors and some keys keep them tightly locked.”

  “That’s how they’re able to send storms to block our path.” I gritted my teeth. How could we fight that kind of power?

  “Exactly. They’ve been experimenting with weather manipulation for at least a decade. The first big test was in the States. They were able to hold the jet stream in place for days. Endless rains. Broken dams. Flooded the Mississippi River and St. Louis. It was a big story then.

  In those days, there weren’t that many weather anoma-lies. Now you’ve got tornadoes popping up out of blue skies and hurricanes that defy explanation.”

  “All because of ley lines? I thought they’d been around for years. I know I read about them when I was a kid.” I heard about them once or twice, too. Mostly from Bohemian types who pretended to be psychic. “I’d never really considered them to be a scientific fact.”

  “Not just ley lines. More to it than that. It’s the tiles, and who knows what else? Simon’s become a little too interested in hunting down artifacts that emit unusual energies. Radiological electromagnetic energy fields.”

  Lorna Tedder

  183

  I nodded. “Myrddin told me. They’re some kind of energy waves that affect the brain, right? Makes people hear things or see things.”

  “Some people, yes. Not many. Not until recently.

  Most people who experience it won’t even talk about it.

  They don’t want anyone to think they’re crazy.”

  “What about you?” I asked. “Do you feel it? See it? Hear it?”

  He shook his head. “It doesn’t seem to affect me directly. I do know, though, that there’s more of this energy in the world than ever before. As the world becomes more populated and ‘civilized,’ the elements that give off this type of energy are brought together and the energy is magnified exponentially. For millennia they’ve been left alone, buried under continents or oceans, but now they’re being combined in ways they haven’t been put together before. Like your ancestors did in the tiles.”

  “They’re benign when they’re separate?”

  “Everything emits an energy signature. Even inani-mate objects. But put certain energies together…”

  “And they change? Like in chemistry? Put hydrogen and oxygen—two gases—together and you have water?”

  “Yes. The energies are different now. More people are feeling them. It’s like the vibrations in the air have been ratcheted up a notch or two. The Adrianos have been studying the side effects of these energies for several years now. There’s been a dramatic increase in anxiety attacks, depression, neurological disorders, especially in the States, where commerce and affordabil-184

  Dark Revelations

  ity make it possible for the average citizen to own objects that once sat thousands of miles apart. Chunks of New Age crystals. Jewelry with stones from all over the world. Some energies weren’t meant to be mixed.”

  “The Adrianos mixed these new energies? These radiological electro—”

  “No. The evolution of our race did. The Adrianos simply know how to use them.”

  A wave of rain washed over the automobile and was gone, almost as if it were the outer concentric circle of a hurricane.

  “Eric, like I said before, I think we should find a church.”

  “And like I said before, it won’t do any good. Simon and Caleb will not care that we’re in a church. The Adrianos’ ties to the Church are not holy. The Church is just another tool in their arsenal, and Simon may give his sons Biblical names to prove his devoutness to the pope, but it means nothing beyond politics.”

  “Actually, Monsieur Cabordes, I wasn’t thinking of sacred ground. I was thinking of higher ground. We need the advantage of being able to see them coming.”

  “I have a contact on the coast. With some persuasion, he may be willing to shelter us for a few days until we can get our bearings.”

  “Great. How far?”

  “About fifty kilometers.”

  “That’s not going to work. We’re almost out of petrol.”

  We stared at each other. I flexed my aching fists on the steering wheel. The BMW wasn’t close by, as far Lorna Tedder

  185

  as we knew, and the storm would hold it at bay. Cat was in Paris and too far away to be of any help at the moment. We had the tiles, the book, the boy, one gun and each other, but once again we were running out of options.

  Eric studied the road ahead. “There. Up ahead, where you see that clump of trees. Turn there. There’s a monastery up on the hill. Not a church, but it has the advantage of height.”

  I followed his advice, unable to keep my eyes off the sinking fuel gage. I was amazed we’d made it this far.

  The storm hit us from the side as I pushed down the tree-lined road toward the hill. The monastery had been built into the earth, and while it was centuries old, it wasn’t vacant. Like many old holy buildings in the European countryside, it had been converted into a cross between a hostel and an inn.

  “We’re going to stay here?” I asked. The storm dumped water all around us so that we could see nothing of the monastery except the lamps on the posts outside.

  Eric nodded once. “We’ll be safe for a while. As long as it’s storming, they can’t track us. Even military weapons have trouble tracking targets in bad weather, so we’ll use Simon’s disadvantage to our advantage. As long as the storm rages, it buys us time, and time is what I need to get Benny safely to his father.”

  I turned the key and killed the engine. “And I need to find a way to slip away unnoticed while you’re taking Benny back.” That meant this would be my last night—

  186

  Dark Revelations

  my only night—with Eric. I’d probably never see him again. And I wanted to see him again.

  “You have to get away,” Eric agreed. “We’ll have a day, probably. Maybe two if we play it well.”

  “And if we don’t?” My doubts started to set in. The Adrianos would most likely catch up. Despair washed over me. Not only might this be my last night with Eric but my last night, period. “Simon thinks I know more than I do.”

  “Aubrey, Simon will simply dismember everyone you care about, appendage by appendage, until you tell him about your ancestry or make something up. Then, after you’ve told him everything to his satisfaction, he will very quickly, very quietly, very efficiently put a bullet into the temple of everyone you care for, make you watch and then do the same to you. Simon is no killer. He’s a cold-blooded assassin and he’s just as efficient and courteous about it as he is when he’s glad-handing at a gala fund-raising event.”

  I hadn’t realized I was holding my breath again. I forced myself to exhale. “Simon promised to turn me over to Caleb when he was done with me.”

  “Caleb, on the other hand, is less concerned with efficiency than Simon. He will keep you alive for days.

  He will employ sexual tortures you can only imagine.

  He will deprive you of oxygen until your brain is damaged beyond repair. After that, he will keep you alive a few days more, long after your spirit has left you.

  Or he might drug you and fill your mind with irrever-Lorna Tedder

  187

  sible madness, then turn you loose on the streets of Naples, slobbering and biting your tongue—”

  “Stop! Just stop it!” I yanked my head in Benny’s direction. “Don’t let him hear you.”

  Eric shook his head. “He’s listening to stories of a boy and his dragon.
He can’t hear me. Can you?”

  “I read you loud and clear, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “I won’t let Caleb do that to you, Aubrey. I swear by the Holy Mother, I won’t let it happen.”

  My throat tightened and I looked away. I knew what I had to do. Something I’d rarely done in the past decade.

  “Will you… Eric, will you help me?”

  He smiled, but there was no joy in it, only sadness.

  “Do you trust me?”

  I liked this man. I really did. I liked his sense of integrity and his love of children. I like everything about him, including the way he looked. I wanted to know him better and I thought by the look in his eyes that he might feel the same.

  But did I trust him? My head said no. My heart said no. But my gut instinct screamed yes. I told myself I had no choice, but I knew it was a lie designed to protect my heart.

  “Yes.”

  Chapter 11

  Inside the lobby of the monastery-inn, I carefully peeled back the curtain and peered out the window. It didn’t matter. I couldn’t see anything anyway. Even if it hadn’t been night, the raging storm outside blotted out any light that was left.

  “Signora,” the man behind the desk pleaded. “Come away from the window.You will be struck by lightning.”

  I smiled at him. He was a little younger than Eric but not nearly as handsome. His hair was close-cropped, except at the fringe, which hung low into his dark eyes.

  My presence aggravated the frown lines on his face. He fidgeted with a halogen lantern, setting it on the desk for quick retrieval if he needed it during the storm. He pocketed a small flashlight.

  Lorna Tedder

  189

  I shook my head at him. I was less worried about lightning than I was about a sniper’s bullet. I permitted the heavy curtain to fall back into place. I had no idea if any of the Adriano henchmen were out there or how long we had before they found us, but for the moment, we were safe. We were alive. Thanks to a storm, no one could find us—yet.

  “Signora, please,” pleaded the night manager. “Go to your room. Enjoy your husband. Sleep. Storm so bad.

  You not go anywhere tonight.”

  I pursed my lips. Maybe he was right. Maybe I should go enjoy Eric. I might not get another chance to find out what made him catch his breath besides running for his life.

  “Signora…”

  Night manager probably wasn’t the correct term for the man behind the desk, but neither was he a monk.

  Eric had been right—the inn was actually a monastery, at least five or six centuries old, refurbished in some places and in some places not. It wasn’t uncommon to find them throughout Italy, but I’d never stayed in one before. This one had been converted into something more akin to a youth hostel than an inn, with a definite preference for backpacking university students.

  There had been only a few automobiles near the cluster of stone buildings, and I was certain that most of the automobiles belonged to the family who owned the lodgings. The night manager’s father, a more wrinkled version of the younger man, had met us at the entrance and welcomed us, ushering us inside, where 190

  Dark Revelations

  the air had been warm and smelled of baked bread and homemade sauces.

  I’d carried a snuggling Benny in my arms, with the child wrapped in his Adriano blanket and its ominous family logo of columns and a star. Eric had hauled in the contents of the trunk, the artifacts wrapped in a tapestry, and I’d found myself noticing his ass as he’d walked ahead of me and wishing for more time with him.

  For hours afterward I’d watched the grayness outside, and no one had come. My mind had wandered across Eric more times than I could count. Maybe because there were so many other things I didn’t want to puzzle through and he was a safe place for me to focus. Much safer than memories of a lover long dead or a daughter I’d left behind for what I’d thought was the right reason. The tempest inside me did not still and the storm outside the walls had not stopped. As long as the rain and winds wailed, no one would come. No one could make it through that. Me included.

  After greeting us in flawless Italian and realizing I wasn’t as adept as Eric, the old man had welcomed us in flawless English. His wife had prepared a sumptuous Italian meal for us of homemade pasta with fresh sauce.

  She couldn’t speak a word of English but she’d been all smiles and in some ways she reminded me of Simon’s current wife, even though this woman obviously didn’t have the financial means to keep her face and wardrobe as sleek as any Adriano wife’s.

  She’d prepared an entirely different meal—risotto di scampi this time—for the evening meal for her guests Lorna Tedder

  191

  as well as for her family. My Italian wasn’t very good, but I knew enough to say basta for “enough” and grazie for “thank you.”

  The innkeeper’s wife had made a special dessert of tiramisu for her grandson, who was a few months older than Benny. The two children had taken to each other immediately, and I could see Benny’s Adriano charm showing through, even at his age, as he quickly per-suaded the other boy to share his dessert and pet kittens.

  The two of them had eventually scampered off to play with the cats.

  Later, I put Benny to bed in my room on a pallet of blankets on the floor. Eric took the small room on the other side of our slightly larger one. The two rooms shared a reasonably modern bath situated between them.

  It was ideal for the two of us adults to talk in Eric’s space while Benny slept in my room with a kitten wrapped around his neck. We tucked the artifacts under my bed.

  But Eric…

  I’d watched him throughout both meals. He’d been nervous and careful at first, but he’d relaxed as the day had worn on and no one had come. A few times I’d caught him smiling or even looking as if he enjoyed the banter of family around him and good food. I doubted he ever relinquished the mask of stoicism that was required when he was on duty at the palazzo. His Scorpio-rising personality would have suited his bodyguard career quite well.

  Occasionally across the table I’d caught his gaze and held it for a little longer than necessary. How long since 192

  Dark Revelations

  I’d touched a man? Especially one who had touched my heart, even the smallest bit? I wasn’t looking for any port in a storm, but Eric suddenly seemed like a safe harbor in the tempest around me. God knew, I needed something solid to hang on to right now.

  He mirrored me in some ways. Not only in the hidden depths of emotion just beneath his surface but in his survival acumen. Earlier in the day, not long after our arrival, Eric had gone back outside in the torrents of rain and hidden the automobile in a darkened archway that led to an interior courtyard.

  Me? I’d waited until no one was looking, then I’d stolen a knife from the kitchen. It wasn’t much, but if Simon and Caleb’s men showed up, we’d need all the help we could get.

  The old man who’d greeted us at the door had actually asked if we carried any weapons. Eric had lied about his gun, and the old man had reluctantly accepted Eric’s insistence that we were unarmed and not dangerous. He had explained that the monastery had for centuries been a place of peace and was still sacred ground.

  Blood had never been shed on the premises—this place was a sanctuary. He’d pointed to the walls of the reception area, which were decorated with old weapons supposedly confiscated by the monks over centuries.

  Broadswords. Crossbows. An armload of sabers and foils. A couple of daggers that might have dated back to the Borgia era. With a few exceptions, the typical item on the walls might have sold for one hundred American dollars at any Internet auction house, but none were Lorna Tedder

  193

  worth a second glance on the antiquities market. Still, they made for nice decorations and each had a story behind it, some of which the old man told us in excru-ciating detail.

  Eric had retired to his room with clenched jaws. I knew what he was thinking—that he was
turning over possible stories in his mind to tell Josh and Simon and that he was trying to figure out where to hide both the artifacts and us if the men in the gray BMW found us.

  Old monasteries like this had numerous places to hide things as well as children. As long as it kept storming outside, we still had time. Although the downpour kept us in place, it also kept everyone else out.

  Tomorrow things would be different. Tomorrow I’d have to find a way to leave, to get to safety at Cat’s, to check with my private investigator to make sure Lilah was still safe and clueless on her college campus in the States.

  Ah, Lilah. I can’t even get close enough to see you for myself without putting you in danger.

  “Signora? Signora, please. Go enjoy your husband.

  Relax. Rest.” He smiled feebly. “I go to bed now. I enjoy my wife. Relax. Rest.”

  I got the point, even before he reached for the room lights and held his finger at the switch as he waited for me to exit the room.

  Alone, I walked the length of a dark corridor lit by dim bulbs where once torches probably showed the way.

  Outside, the winds howled, but inside the corridor, the stormy sounds were muffled. The only noise was the soft footfalls of my boots on stone floors.

  194

  Dark Revelations

  I could tell by the ringing in my ears that I was getting closer to my room. I stopped outside the wooden door and adjusted the room key in my hand as I glanced up and down the corridor. No one was there. Just me and whatever ghosts of the past had died there without bloodshed.

  Carefully I opened the door. I’d left the light on.

  Benny had insisted. Funny, our fearless little Adriano wouldn’t sleep in the dark.

  The ringing amplified as I stepped inside. Benny had crawled off his pallet on the floor and into my bed. The kitten still slept under his chin.

  I locked the door behind me and shook my head as I did. The lock was flimsy, old, cheap. Meant for preventing peaceful people from accidentally wander-ing in unannounced on other peaceful naked people. Not meant for keeping assassins out. These locks wouldn’t hold up to Adriano boots. Maybe there was some way we could sneak out, even in this storm, to someplace even safer. We could take one of the innkeeper’s automobiles, one full of petrol.