by Chloe Palov
‘Think again, cunt,’ he snarled, lifting her bodily off the ground. Pivoting, he tossed her onto the bed, the iron frame clanging against the wall. Edie immediately rolled to her right but, anticipating the move, he grabbed her by the ankle, pulling her back to the middle of the bed.
‘Don’t move,’ he ordered, pointing the gun at her heart. ‘Or there won’t be anything left of your left titty.’
Not so much as twitching, Edie braced herself, certain a bullet would slam into her chest at any moment.
When it didn’t happen, she released a pent-up breath, wordlessly watching as her would-be rapist clicked the safety catch on his weapon. That done, he placed it on the mantel. Completely out of reach.
Cracking his knuckles, he walked towards the bed. ‘In case you’re wondering, I can kill you with my bare hands as easily as I can shoot you.’
Edie didn’t doubt for one second that he spoke the truth.
Intently staring at her, he placed a knee on the foot of the bed. The next instant, he had her pinned beneath him. His harsh breath hit her full in the face. Edie figured he had a good hundred pounds on her.
Unable to move, barely able to breathe, she stared mutely at her assailant.
She had only two choices: submit or fight. Either way, when all was said and done, she figured she’d end up dead. At that thought, Edie heard a buzzing in her ears and the rapist-cum-murderer’s unshaven face blurred at the edges.
Submit, Edie.
Submit and you might live.
If you live, you might be able to get to his gun.
If you get the gun, you can blow him away.
Mind made up, Edie clenched her jaw and stared at the ceiling.
Pushing his hand between their hips, the monster unbuttoned his trousers. In the same instant his mobile vibrated, Edie able to feel the pulse against her bare hip.
‘Fucking shit.’
Removing his hand from between their two bodies, he reached for the phone clipped to his waistband. ‘Not a word,’ he warned, supporting himself on his elbows.
Relieved to have some of his weight removed, Edie nodded obediently.
‘Braxton. Yes, sir, I got her.’ He frowned, his brows drawing together in the middle. ‘No, sir, she’s all right… Yes, sir… I’ll have her there in fifteen minutes.’
Disconnecting the call, he snapped his mobile shut and clipped it back on his waistband. Muttering some of the most foul-mouthed profanities she’d ever heard, he pushed himself to his knees, clamping a hand around her upper arm as he did so. With no explanation as to what he was doing, or why he was doing it, he pulled her off the bed.
Edie had no idea who had been on the other end of the line. And she didn’t much care. She only knew that she’d been given a reprieve.
Hand still wrapped round her upper arm, he dragged her over to the mantel, retrieving his gun, then shoved her through the open bathroom door.
‘Get dressed,’ he ordered, gesturing to the pile of clothes on the toilet seat.
Bending at the waist, Edie picked up her discarded bra. ‘Can I at least dry off? I’m still wet.’
‘Bitch, do I look like I care?’
58
Cædmon, without a doubt, you’ve been a pompous ass.
Ashamed of himself, Cædmon hoped that a heart-felt apology would smooth things over. If it didn’t, he would woo Edie with lamb jalfrezi and cardamom pudding. He glanced at the brown takeaway bag clutched in his hand, hoping the peace offering would lead to improved relations. And that improved relations would lead to something decidedly more intimate. More romantic.
As he climbed the well-worn treads that led to their garret room, he wondered if the day would ever come when he could make a full confession. When he could freely and openly tell Edie about the pain of love lost, of vengeance sought and claimed, of his eventual emergence from an alcohol-induced fog. He thought that because of her own travails she would understand. Maybe even accept.
‘And a warm fuzzy hug would be nice too,’ he said aloud, chortling.
Still laughing as he reached the top of the stairs, the chuckle caught in his throat.
The door to their room was ajar.
Afraid of what he would find on the other side, he slowly pushed the door all the way open and entered the room. At a glance, he could see that some sort of commotion had taken place. Almost immediately his gaze landed on the large dark patch that stained the tousled coverlet. Setting the brown bag on the dresser, he walked over to the bed. His heart painfully thudding against his chest, he placed his hand upon the wet spot. He breathed a sigh of relief. It wasn’t blood.
Edie was still alive.
Maybe not as well as she might be, but definitely alive.
Thank God.
Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the Virgin bag on the floor next to the bed, upended, emptied of its contents. He next scanned the room, searching for a ransom note. There wasn’t one, although he didn’t need a scrawled scrap of paper to know Edie had been kidnapped because they wanted him.
Stunned by the abduction, he went into the bathroom, heading straight for the sink. Turning on the cold-water tap, he rinsed his face.
He knew the drill: wait for further instructions. Eventually he would be contacted. If their plan had been to kill Edie, they would have left her corpse behind as a warning to him. But there was no sprawled, blood-splattered body. Her abduction was simply a means to an end.
He reached for the neatly folded bath towel and dried his face.
Taking deep, measured breaths, he walked back into the bedroom. Again, he checked the room, searching for anything that could be used as a weapon. When the time came to confront his enemies, he didn’t want to stand before them defenceless. His gaze alighted on the upholstered chair. The chair where Edie had sat earlier, filing a broken nail.
Having no recollection of her returning the file to the shoulder bag, he walked over to the chair. The file not being in view, he slid his hand around the chair cushion. Coming up empty-handed, he removed the cushion from the chair.
There, between two squashed crisps and a boiled sweet, dully gleaming in the lamplight, was the nail file. While hardly a honed broadsword, it would have to do.
He replaced the cushion.
Bloody hell, but he wanted a drink. Needed a drink to –
Not on your life. You need your wits about you. She’s yours and she needs you.
Lowering himself into the lumpy chair, he inhaled the exotic scents of cardamom and cumin mingled with the more prosaic smell of lemon-scented bathwater.
Wait.
59
‘I mean you no harm,’ Stanford MacFarlane said as he ushered her into the room.
Edie snorted, the memory of her near rape all too vivid. ‘Yeah, and British beef is safe to eat. Guess you’re unaware of the fact that your henchman sexually assaulted me.’
MacFarlane stared at her. She guessed him to be in his mid- to late-fifties, the sharply defined widow’s peak in the greying buzz cut being the giveaway. At one time he had probably been handsome, but years spent in the sun had turned age lines into deeply incised creases, giving him a stern gnome-like visage. A man of medium height, he had an erect military posture and an air of command that bordered on the egomaniacal.
‘You lie,’ he said dismissively.
‘I should have known you’d stand by your man.’
‘I will always stand by a man of God.’
So much for sowing the seeds of dissent.
Shot down, Edie glanced around her, taking in what appeared to be an old mill, the metal cogs and wheels of the original machinery still in place on the other side of the room. Able to hear water running beneath the floorboards, she figured the mill was located on a stream or river.
She turned her gaze back to the man standing across from her. ‘Just answer me this: what are you going to do if you actually get your hands on the Ark?’
‘That’s between me and the Almighty,’ Mac-Farlane replied.
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‘What if the Ark of the Covenant turns out to be nothing more than a gold-plated box?’
MacFarlane smiled. ‘And God said to Moses, “Let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them.”’
Clearly he considered the Ark some kind of God box, so Edie decided to try a different approach. ‘There’s no question in my mind that you’re a God-fearing man. Which means that we have a lot in common. You may not know this, but I go to church every Sunday and… well, I don’t have to tell you what the Bible says about mercy and compassion. “Blessed are those who are pure in heart: for they shall see God,”’ she recited, tossing out a Bible verse of her own, figuring the only way to fight fire was with more of the same.
MacFarlane’s gaze narrowed. ‘Like many of your ilk, you’ve hijacked the Bible in order to advance your left-wing, feel-good agenda. According to people like you, the carjacker will not steal your vehicle if you show some compassion, nor will the killer pull the trigger as he is an intrinsically good man.’
Turning away from her, MacFarlane walked over to the kitchen counter, the stone-walled room a big open space with matching sofas on one side, a dining table in the middle and a kitchen area at the far end. She watched as he took down two mugs from a shelf. He opened two packets of instant cocoa. That done, he added hot water from an electric kettle.
Even as he handed her one of the mugs, he glared at her. A dark, impassioned glare that sent a chill down her spine. She didn’t dare refuse the cocoa.
‘I know you and your kind, Miss Miller. You think that by putting your carcass in a pew every Sunday, God will look kindly upon you, perfect church attendance equalling a free pass to salvation.’
‘You’ve got me mixed up with some other person. Personally, I think it’s important for –’ she searched for the right word ‘– the betterment of one’s soul to engage in good works. Christian charity being the touchstone of –’
‘Spare me the secular sermon. As if volunteering at some inner-city soup kitchen will gain you entry into heaven. Faith, not deeds, will secure you a place among the righteous.’
‘Don’t you mean the self-righteous?’ she retorted.
‘You and your kind are anathema unto the Lord.’
‘Then we clearly worship two different gods.’
‘At last, something we can agree upon.’
And as Edie knew full well, it was an agreement based on a bitter divide.
Truth be told, she was taken aback at how much Stanford MacFarlane reminded her of Pops, her maternal grandfather having held to a very conservative interpretation of the Bible. At the time she’d thought it a stifling interpretation. But when espoused by a man like MacFarlane, it went from stifling to scary. Put a black robe on him and Stanford MacFarlane would have made the perfect Spanish inquisitor.
‘Speaking of entry into heaven, if you think finding the Ark is your stamped ticket, think again,’ she said, refusing to go quietly to the stake.
About to raise his mug to his lips, MacFarlane lowered it. For several seconds – seconds that conjured up images of burning bodies – he stared at her.
‘Unlike you, I will die and rise with the Old Testament saints.’ Then, as though he’d simply made a passing comment about the weather, he calmly took a sip of his cocoa.
Edie was silent.
There’s no way you can argue with a zealot. The years spent with Pops had taught her that, the memory still weighing heavy. Like a giant millstone on her heart.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a gossamer strand of cobweb dangling from the wood-beamed ceiling. Staring at it, she suddenly felt very much like the fly ensnared in the deceptively beautiful trap.
But unlike the ensnared fly, she had an out. Cædmon.
She knew he would come. If not to rescue her, then to find the Ark.
60
Hearing a knock, Cædmon turned in his chair. The guest-house proprietor, a florid-faced Welshman, stood in the doorway, no doubt wondering why the door had been left open. Simply put, he had not seen the need to close it.
‘You’ve got a call,’ the man announced, clearly annoyed at having had to climb four sets of stairs to convey the message. ‘You can take it downstairs.’ Announcement made, he departed.
Cædmon rose to his feet. As he walked towards the door, he glimpsed the sketch of the Canterbury window and the handwritten translation of the quatrains on the wooden bench. Stark and painful reminders that Edie’s abduction had everything to do with the Ark of the Covenant. Knowing he would have need of both, he retrieved the two sheets of paper, slipping them into his anorak pocket, these being the only things of value in the room. He followed the proprietor, closing the door behind him.
A few moments later, standing at the rough-hewn counter that masqueraded as a reception desk, Cædmon lifted the heavy handset of an old-fashioned telephone. ‘Go ahead. I’m listening,’ he said, refusing to engage in the hypocrisy of a civil greeting.
‘I do hope you’re having a pleasant evening,’ an American male on the other end said smoothly and sarcastically.
‘Sod off! Is she still alive?’
‘You know that she is.’
‘I know no such thing. If we are to continue this conversation, I require some proof.’
‘You’re hardly in a position to make demands.’
‘I am not demanding,’ Cædmon countered in a calmer tone, reining in his emotions. ‘I am requesting, as a show of good faith, that you give me proof that Miss Miller is your captive.’
Cædmon was able to detect a muffled command being issued, then, a few seconds later, ‘It’s me, Cædmon. I’m… I’m all right.’
She was alive.
‘Have they harmed you in any way?’
‘No, they –’
‘Satisfied?’ her captor snarled into the phone.
‘Yes, I’m satisfied. What do I have to do to ensure her safe return?’
The other man chuckled, obviously amused by the question. ‘Find me the Ark of the Covenant, of course.’
Cædmon fell silent.
Hearing the deal so clearly and bluntly spelled out made him acutely aware that MacFarlane might well be asking the impossible. For nearly three thousand years the Ark had remained hidden. Nothing more than a legend. Many before him had failed to find it. Somehow, against impossible odds, he had to succeed.
His stomach muscles cramped painfully. Knowing the negotiations could come to a rapid end if he sounded anything less than totally confident, he strove for a calmness he didn’t feel. ‘Do I have your word that when I find the Ark Edie Miller’s life will be spared?’
‘You do. And my word is my bond,’ the other man promptly replied. ‘As soon as we hang up, I want you to leave that rat hole of a hotel and head three blocks south. Turn left at the telephone booth on the corner. There’s an alley halfway down the street. My men will be there waiting for you. Don’t try anything foolish. If you do, the woman dies. And, trust me, it won’t be a pleasant death.’
Instructions issued, the call was unceremoniously ended.
For several long seconds Cædmon stared at the telephone, events moving at a faster pace than he would have liked.
He brought his palm down hard on the silver bell on the counter. When the Welshman appeared, Cædmon slid his hand inside his coat pocket, removing his wallet. ‘I would like to check out.’
The proprietor stared suspiciously at him. ‘Where’s the missus?’
‘She has gone ahead without me.’
Bill paid in full, he left the guest house and headed south as directed.
He passed a pub on his right, yellow light spilling onto the pavement. Earlier in the evening he’d sat glumly in that same pub, staring at a pint of lager. Knowing alcohol would do nothing to resolve the unsettled business with Edie, he’d handed the untasted glass to an inebriated local before wordlessly slinking out. Had he not succumbed to a moment’s weakness, he might have been able to thwart the abduction.
Cædmon
shoved the thought aside. He couldn’t change the past; he could only affect the here and now. If used correctly, the metal nail file hidden beneath the leather insole of his right shoe could be a deadly weapon. He’d killed before; he could do so again. He rehearsed the plan in his mind’s eye. A jab to the eye. A deep puncture to the neck.
Approaching a red telephone box, he turned left as he had been instructed. When he came to the alleyway, he made another left. At the end of the deserted lane, he sighted two men leaning against a parked Range Rover.
MacFarlane’s bully boys.
While he could not be sure, Cædmon assumed that MacFarlane recruited his mercenaries straight out of the US military. Special forces more than likely.
‘Good evening, gentlemen,’ he said, touching his fingers to an imaginary hat brim.
Neither man acknowledged the greeting, although one of them pushed himself away from the vehicle and stepped towards him. Without being asked, Cædmon raised his arms, grasping the back of his head with his clasped hands. The man impersonally patted him down, searching every crevice where a weapon might be concealed.
Search concluded, Cædmon slowly lowered his arms.
‘Take off your clothes.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘You heard me, take off your clothes.’ To ensure that the order was obeyed, the man opened his jacket, revealing a holstered gun.
Bang goes the smarty-pants plan with the nail file. He had not planned for a strip search.
There being nothing he could do but comply, Cædmon removed his anorak, dropping it onto the ground. Then, giving every indication that he was a man with nothing to hide, he levered off his right shoe, purposely kicking it in his escort’s direction. The subterfuge worked, his shoe warranting little more than a uninterested glance.
As quickly as possible, he divested himself of the rest of his clothes.
Naked, he stood before his captors. He couldn’t think of a time when he’d felt more vulnerable. ‘I know. I should probably be more diligent about my exercise regime.’