The Cotten Stone Omnibus: It started with The Grail Conspiracy... (The Cotten Stone Mysteries)

by Lynn Sholes

  “But why?” Cotten said.

  “It doesn’t matter,” John said. “The CDC isn’t going to do anything.”

  “So where does that leave us?” Cotten said.

  “I have an idea,” John said. “It’s a long shot, but I’m going to call in some favors. Plan on me flying out of Rome late tonight or first thing in the morning. I’ll call you with my flight info as soon as I know.”

  “To New York?” Cotten asked.

  “No, Washington.”

  camp david

  When Cotten first caught sight of John coming through customs at Dulles, the compelling desire to run to him whirred within her, starting deep inside, then prickling its way across every nerve and out to her fingertips.

  Instead, she smiled and waved.

  Cotten realized she had stopped walking and was glued in place, watching him approach. Finally, within touching distance, John stood his rolling Travelpro on end and hugged her. “Hello, Cotten Stone.”

  She felt his breath on her cheek. “Hello, John Tyler,” she whispered into his shoulder.

  Then his arms released her, and the bite of cold air replaced the warmth of his embrace. “How was your flight?” she asked, tossing back her hair and tying to regroup her emotions.

  John grasped the handle and towed his bag behind as they walked. “Not bad. It actually gave me some undisturbed time to think and prepare for what I’m going to say.”

  “Do you think you can persuade President Brennan to get involved?”

  “I think so. We know his background. He ran his campaign on moral and religious platforms. An evangelical Catholic is in the White House.”

  “But you can’t just blurt out that the legions of evil are behind a couple of mysterious deaths—” She corrected herself. “No, considering the number of bodies on the Pitcairn, it would be a whole host of deaths and their unobtainable or disappearing bodies. No matter, he would still think you’re nuts.”

  “Yes, he would,” John said. “But I believe I’ve come up with a convincing argument. Scary, but convincing.”

  “You’re not going to tell him about me, are you?”

  John turned to look at her. “No. He’d definitely have us both sent to the funny farm if I did that.”

  “Sometimes it doesn’t seem real. Even to me it sounds ridiculous. There are moments I wonder if this is all a weird dream and any minute I’ll wake up and my life will be normal. No more Nephilim or Fallen Angels. The next moment I realize it’s no dream, and my stomach churns. Thank God for you and Ted. You two keep me sane.”

  “Somebody has to,” John said.

  Cotten elbowed him. They exited the terminal and boarded the car rental shuttle. A half hour later, they were on I-270, heading northwest toward Maryland.

  The hour-long ride took them through Frederick, north to the Catoctin Mountain Park which surrounds the Presidential retreat at Camp David. The drive gave them plenty of time to plan their strategy. The rustic 125-acre mountain retreat was colder than it had been at Dulles, and the rental’s heater didn’t seem to be able to keep the car warm.

  Cotten kept one hand on the steering wheel and banged the dash with her free hand, hoping to jar the heater into cranking out more warm air. “My feet are freezing,” she said. “And my nose feels like if I flicked it, it would shatter.”

  John leaned forward and fiddled with the temperature controls. He held a hand in front of the center vent testing for any change. “At least we’re almost there. Enjoy the scenery and try to take your mind off the cold. If you want to stop for a minute, I’ll get you a heavier jacket out of my bag in the trunk.”

  “It’s okay. I want to hurry up and be there. Besides I don’t want you to open the door and let in more cold air.” Cotten watched the snow-powdered hardwood forest flow by. “You’re right. The scenery is lovely. Even in the winter, the mountains are beautiful. So you’ve been here before?”

  “Twice, once with Brennan, the time before that with his predecessor. The last time was to brief the President on secret talks between the Holy Father, the Israelis, and the Palestinians.”

  “I wasn’t aware that the Vatican was involved with Middle East peace negotiations.”

  “That’s why they’re called secret talks.”

  She glared at him then smiled. “Touché.”

  Up ahead, she spotted the sign marking the turnoff to the main entrance of Camp David. It read, Camp #3. Cotten made the turn, and a short way down the road passed the first of three black SUVs. Next, they drove by two fully armed Humvees parked on each side of the forest road, their .50 cal machine guns aimed at the approaching car. Finally, a high metal gate and fence resembling the entrance to a maximum security prison emerged out of the forest. A U.S. Marine dressed in full combat gear held his hand up as Cotten slowed the car to a halt. Additional Marines, all carrying assault rifles approached from both sides.

  Cotten lowered the driver’s side window and the officers leaned down. “Identification, please.”

  She removed her license and SNN press ID from her purse and handed it to the Marine. At the same time, John handed his Vatican City passport to Cotten who gave it to the officer.

  The Marine scrutinized the documents while he spoke into a tiny microphone that protruded from an earpiece. A moment later, he gave the IDs back to Cotten. “Please proceed through the gate and follow that vehicle.” He pointed to a Humvee that had just positioned itself onto the entrance road up ahead. “Welcome to Camp David.”

  ___

  President Brennan sat in front of the fireplace in Aspen Lodge. His old friend, John Tyler, had been intentionally vague when he called and said it was urgent that they meet. Brennan and his advisors had discussed the upcoming visit from the cardinal, and the President prayed it had nothing to do with the dropping of the CDC’s investigation of the death in West Virginia. But, he was well aware of John’s association with Cotten Stone, so he anticipated the worst. Shutting down Charlotte Swan had been difficult enough. This would be even harder.

  An aide opened the door. “Mr. President, Cardinal Tyler and Ms. Stone are here.”

  Brennan closed the file folder marked Top Secret, stood and went to a decorative secretary desk. He slipped the folder into a drawer, then laced his fingers, cracked his knuckles, and rocked his head from side to side to loosen his neck. Finally, he glanced at the aide. “Show them in.”

  The man left, reappearing in a moment with Cotten and John.

  “John,” Brennan said, striding toward him and extending his hand. “So good to see you again.” They shook hands. “Sorry, I have a hard time calling you anything but John, though I know it should be Your Eminence.”

  “I’m honored that you still call me John, Mr. President. And that you’ve agreed to see us.”

  Smiling, Brennan turned his attention to Cotten. “Ms. Stone, your reputation precedes you. I’m glad to finally have the pleasure.”

  “Thank you, Mr. President,” Cotten said, shaking his hand.

  “Please have a seat and enjoy the fire. I find when I’m out here at the retreat, it’s one of the most soothing things I can do. Staring into the fire is mesmerizing, almost primeval.”

  Cotten and John chose two armchairs that formed a semi-circle grouping in front of the fire.

  Brennan took a seat in a third. He felt a spear of anxiety poke at his throat and rolled his head again, hearing it crack and a sound like sand being grated between his cervical vertebrae. “Tension affects the whole body.”

  “And you certainly have a stressful job,” John said. “Exercise helps. But you’re in good shape.”

  “Actually my health is good. The First Lady keeps me in line. I eat right. Jog or fast walk every day. But I haven’t done any real running since track in Boston.” He paused a moment, then locked his eyes on John’s. “Might as well get on with the rat killing, John, don�
��t you agree? I’m sure you didn’t come all this way for small talk. So shoot.”

  “Mr. President, I think the United States and its allies are in grave danger.”

  Immediately Brennan knew that his fears were justified. They had come about the investigation.

  John went on to explain what they knew and how they had gone to Director Swan at the CDC. Cotten chimed in now and again, adding details.

  When they finished briefing him, Brennan sank deeper into the chair and bit his bottom lip in a grimace. The integrity of the United States was at risk if this investigation went forward. He was the President, and it was his duty to protect the nation. He had to come up with some legitimate-sounding response. He had to stop this from going any further or the country would be forced to reveal a dark secret long buried. It could irreparably damage the United State’s position with respect to human rights in the eyes of the world.

  Brennan gathered his thoughts. “This is alarming. Especially your suspicion of a Korean connection. Know what’s really scary about that? The DPRK is a closed society. Try as we might, we have little success penetrating their world. Might as well be on another planet. Frankly, I wouldn’t put this or anything past that nut-job tyrant.”

  “Mr. President,” Cotten said, “we don’t know why, but we suspect that somebody shut down Director Swan’s investigation on purpose. But at this point it probably doesn’t matter. We’re asking that you consider bypassing the forensic investigation and move to take action to stop North Korea and the Black Needles threat before it’s too late.”

  “Dr. Swan is excellent at what she does,” Brennan said. “If she dropped the investigation, I’m sure it was for good reason.” He ran a finger under his collar, loosening it from his neck.

  “But you can do something, Mr. President,” Cotten said. “Forget about Dr. Swan, it’s bigger than that. If North Korea is planning a biological attack on this country, it’s your sworn duty to try to stop it. Don’t you see they’ve been field testing their weapon? Black Needles has already claimed innocent lives.”

  Brennan gave a patronizing smile. “If you’re correct, the thought is frightening. But where is the evidence? I can’t act on supposition. I can’t go to the Joint Chiefs and Congress and say, hey, I’ve got this funny feeling that North Korea is up to no good.” He laughed. “It would be dead on arrival.”

  John swiped his hand over his face and stood. “Mr. President, we go back a long way, and I know how strong your faith was then. I’m depending on it being even stronger now. I’m going to reveal something to you that I think will change your mind. I need you to not only listen to what I’m about to say, but also hear. The future of the world may be dangling from a thread hanging from your soul.”

  grand tour

  It had been a fairly quiet morning at Golden Ridge Elementary School in Chino Hills. Even the traffic in the front office was slow.

  The secretary was listening to a parent on the phone who wanted to cancel a teacher conference when a cough at the front counter got her attention. She looked up to see a man standing there. The secretary nodded to let him know she would be right with him. “I’ll get the message to your son’s teacher,” she said into the receiver, then hung up.

  “Can I help you?” She got up from her desk and walked over to him.

  “Yes. I purchase home next to Hidden Hills Park. My children attend this school? Correct school, yes? And I have questions.” He coughed again, covering his mouth with his hand. “Sorry. Bad cold.”

  The man spoke with an accent. Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese, one of them, she thought. She hated to be prejudicial, but Oriental accents all sounded alike to her, just like Spanish accents—Mexican, Columbian, Cuban, Venezuelan—she couldn’t tell the difference. “That’s definitely in our boundaries.” Poor guy seemed to be miserable. “Everybody’s had a bug lately,” she said. “Stuffy head and cough. We had three teachers and a ton of kids out last week.”

  “I thought I am only victim,” he said grinning.

  It was an odd smile, the secretary thought, as if he had put something over on her—slipped something by like a private joke. “When you come to register the children you’ll need proof of age, such as their birth certificates, passports, baptismal certificates along with proof of residence address, and immunization records. Are they up-do-date on their immunizations?”

  The man didn’t answer and seemed distracted, surveying the office.

  She asked again. “Are the children’s immunizations up-to-date?”

  The man glanced over his shoulder out the glass doors. “Yes,” he said, turning back.

  Oddball, the secretary thought. She hoped the kids weren’t as bizarre as their daddy. She took a couple of brochures from the stand on the counter. “Here’s information on bus routes, and this one is about after-school care. Some other basics you’ll want to look over.” She held them out.

  He took the pamphlets. “Thank y—” He couldn’t finish, instead sneezing several times in succession.

  The secretary reared back to avoid the spray of droplets she saw in the air. Even so, she felt a fine mist on her face.

  “So sorry,” he said when the coughing subsided. “I came here yesterday but school already closed. I like to take tour. Now, please. Tight schedule. I like see classrooms, maybe cafeteria? Must do today.”

  “Sure.” The secretary glanced up at the wall clock. “Lunches started about twenty minutes ago. Let’s get you signed in, Mr. …”

  “Choi.”

  “Okay, Mr. Choi, I’ll need your driver’s license, and here, sign in on this log.” She pushed a clipboard with an attached ballpoint toward him as he took his wallet out of his pocket. Mr. Choi is really Mr. Weird, she thought.

  A few minutes later Choi had a visitor’s pass sticker to put on the front of his shirt.

  “Have a seat and I’ll get someone to take you around. It shouldn’t be but a few minutes. We’ll give you the grand tour.”

  ___

  “I can’t believe I’m really standing here looking at it,” the elderly, gray-haired tourist said to his wife. He had recently retired, and they were visiting London on the first leg of an around-the-world vacation. They stood a few feet away from the Rosetta Stone on display in the British Museum. “You know how when you buy an appliance or tech device, you get an instruction manual in multiple languages?”

  “Sure,” she said, holding on to his arm.

  “Well, let’s say a thousand years from now, archaeologists lost the ability to read and write English but they know how to speak and read Japanese. So, let’s say they come across the owner’s manual for your blender. If they compare the Japanese version of the instructions to the English version, they would probably have enough information to learn English.”

  “That’s how the Rosetta Stone works?”

  “Right. After Egyptian hieroglyphs went out of use, the knowledge of how to read and write them soon disappeared. Now, jump forward to Napoleon’s time. His army discovered the Rosetta Stone while digging the foundation of a fort in Egypt. What’s inscribed on the surface is actually nothing earth shattering. It’s something about some royal event commemorating the coronation of a pharaoh. The big deal is that the decree is inscribed three times just like your blender’s owner’s manual. It’s in hieroglyphic, some other Egyptian script, and Greek.”

  “So, the Greek version was the key.”

  “You got it. Scholars realized they had a means of decoding Egyptian hieroglyphics by comparing the Greek version to the glyphs on the stone. That started the whole—”

  They both turned toward a commotion coming from the tour group exiting Room Four that housed the large collection of Egyptian sculpture. The tour group opened up around an Asian man who was bent at the waist as he threw up on the marble museum floor.

  Even from a dozen yards away, the retiree could see that the vomit wa
s bloody.

  aspen

  John paced in front of the huge Aspen Lodge fireplace while President Brennan’s eyes tracked him.

  What on earth was John getting at? Brennan wondered. Why such high drama?

  John gazed into the flames, his back to Brennan. “Steel yourself for what you’re about to hear, Mr. President. Listen with an open mind.” He turned around. “Can you do that?”

  “Of course.”

  “We did some Bible study together, so I know you’re familiar with the scriptures. Go back to the original battle for Heaven. God cast the rebellious angels out of Paradise, never to return. And what does Genesis tell us about those Fallen ones?” He removed a small Bible from his jacket pocket and opened to an earmarked page. “In Genesis, chapter six, verse four: The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.”

  “I’m familiar with that verse,” the President said.

  “The Nephilim were the offspring of the Fallen and mortal women. They were half human, half angel, described as giants. Goliath of Gath was believed to be one. The Nephilim aren’t just an Old Testament legend, Mr. President, they’re referred to in myths of almost all cultures including the Egyptians, Hindus, South Sea Islanders, American Indians—across the globe, giving credence to their existence.”

  “Yes, John, I know that. Where are you going with your Bible lesson?”

  “Think about this, Mr. President. What motive did the Fallen have to populate the Earth with their hybrid children? Was a plan orchestrated by Satan to interrupt Abraham’s bloodline because the Seed of the Woman, Jesus Christ, was to come through Abraham? God responded with the Great Flood to cleanse the earth of this corrupt genetic race. Only Noah and his family were spared because they had not been defiled. No Nephilim in their family, and so they were saved.”