“My wife needs you,” Jack told Tom. “You know the location of my journal. You have to walk back into the war, Pastor, and please never leave my wife.” With those words, Jack placed his right hand over Tom’s eyes. Before Tom could object, he felt a heavy darkness consume him. A terrible pain struck his head followed by Jessica’s sobs.
“Don’t die,” Jessica begged.
Tom’s eyes fluttered open to a very blurry Jessica looking down at him. He winced in pain. “I’m...alive,” he promised through a shaky whisper. “I...Jack...your...husband...he spoke with me...I know...”
Tom’s words caused Jessica to burst out into a torrent of fresh tears. “Pastor, you’re alive,” she cried and kissed Tom’s forehead. Tom was very much alive. Jacob, Alvin and Mandy looked at each other anxiously, as Jessica repeated, “You’re alive.”
“I’m alive, Jessica.” Tom whispered, as he raised a shaky hand and patted Jessica’s tender cheek. “My...daughter...I’m alive.”
Outside, in the dark snow, Wendy Cratterson ran from Lionel. She wondered if she was going to fair as well as Tom. Certain that Lionel was determined to kill her, she ran off into the dark, snowy woods behind the church and vanished. She barely escaped her grave.
“You’re dead,” she muttered, thinking of Jessica while running past one frozen tree after another. “I’ll be back. You’re dead. You’re all going to die! All of you!”
The snow continued to fall as darkness reigned over America.
Chapter 3
Virus
Lionel returned to the church with anger flashing in his eyes, and his cheeks red from the cold. Wendy had managed to escape, vanishing into the dark, snowy night. Lionel knew he could follow the woman’s tracks through the snow, but he was more anxious to get back to Tom and check on the pastor’s condition.
Wendy was now running scared, but she really had nowhere to run. With America now crippled in a completely new world of darkness and chaos, Wendy would not be able to make it into Canada and fly back to the Ukraine for a meeting with Boris for quite a while.
Lionel was still in the clear. For now. Lionel didn’t know that Wendy had no intention of leaving Hope Springs without killing Jessica Mayes. Lionel would end up taking the woman’s bullet for her.
Jacob heard footsteps and spotted Lionel walking down the candlelit hallway toward Tom’s office. A clear expression of worry, disappointment and anger rested on his deadly face.
“Report?” he demanded.
“Wendy Cratterson escaped,” Lionel informed Jacob, stopping in front of a closed door. “How is the pastor?”
“Alive,” Jacob answered, studying Lionel’s face. “You were willing to die for Pastor Braston. Why?”
Lionel glanced at Alvin who stood in front of the office door like a protective mother bear prepared to launch an attack at any second.
“Jesus,” he answered in a strained voice. “When I prayed, Jesus came to me and answered my prayer. I can’t explain.” Lionel looked down at the gun he was holding. “All my life, I’ve been living as a dead man, searching for life through power, intimidation, force, money and control. I dedicated my life to a political position that required me to become a skilled killer. Why? Because I had no life inside of me. Ideas, philosophies and theories were my religion. All were connected to create a false purpose. It wasn’t until I prayed tonight that I realized this.” Lionel raised his head and locked eyes with Jacob. “I realized that man’s goals will always fail. God raises up kings and destroys kings. It’s His will that will be done, not man’s.”
“All this through one prayer? Is that it?” Jacob interrogated Lionel.
“I suppose God doesn’t need a million prayers to get His attention. One prayer from a sincere heart works,” Lionel answered, studying the gun he had taken from Alvin, and shaking his head. “I’ll keep this gun, because Wendy Cratterson is still on the loose.” Lionel tucked the gun away and nodded at the closed office door. “I would like to see the pastor.”
“In time,” Jacob explained. “Right now, Fiona is giving the man medical attention. Jessica and Mandy are in the office with him. We don’t need to overcrowd the room.”
“Fair enough.” Lionel eased back and perched himself against the hallway wall. He closed his eyes and waited while whispering in prayer, “Dear Jesus, forgive me. I am a sinner. Help me finish my life with your cross on my back. Forgive me, Lord, for my sins. Forgive me for never knowing you as my Lord and Savior. Forgive me for killing your people and being your enemy. I once heard you would leave an entire flock to search out a lost sheep. I am your lost sheep, Jesus. Hold me tightly.”
Jacob and Alvin listened to Lionel pray. “The man seems sincere,” Alvin stated.
“That’s the problem,” Jacob whispered. “Don’t let him fool you, Alvin.”
Alvin shook his head. “My friend, if that man wanted us dead, we would be dead. Don’t minimize God’s redemptive power through Jesus.” Alvin reached out and touched Jacob’s shoulder. “Maybe you need to pray, huh?”
“I have to focus on the situation.”
“Man, the situation is hopeless without God,” Alvin lectured Jacob. “What do you think flesh and blood can do, huh? Look what flesh and blood has done to this world. Over sixty million abortions; the blood of innocent babies. Do you not think God is going to require an answer? Do you not think God is going to judge? Man, flesh and blood has destroyed the world! And here you stand thinking you can still do something? You’re nothing but a chump!”
Jacob felt his cheeks turn red. “President Green must have a plan and—”
“President Green is flesh and blood, boy!” Alvin squeezed Jacob’s shoulder. “If that guy has sense enough to know the truth, then you’d better have sense, too, before it’s too late.” Alvin tossed a thumb at the closed office door. “I done made up my mind to ask Mandy to marry me. I’m tired of beating myself down for a past I can’t change. Shoot, I was living in an old morgue, just waiting to die. But it took all this mess to bring me back to life. Jesus brought me back to life. I ain’t sure how much time we got left to live, but I intend to do some living with what time I have left. You’d best do the same.”
“Alvin, we...I...have a mission.”
“So did he,” Alvin pointed at Lionel.
Before Jacob could answer, the office door opened. Jessica appeared in the glow of cold candlelight, with eyes that were filled with relief and a brief moment of peace. “Pastor Braston is alive. The cayenne pepper helped stop the bleeding. Alvin, your idea saved the man from bleeding to death.”
“Old remedy,” Alvin beamed, relief washing over him. “Can I see him?”
“Sure,” Jessica told Alvin, and patted the man’s hand with a loving touch. “You’re my family now, Alvin. You’re part of my heart, and as long as you’re at my side, I feel safe. I love you and thank you.”
Alvin didn’t know how to respond to Jessica’s sudden show of emotion. No one had ever told the man that he was loved before; not even his own parents. “Well, the feeling is mutual,” he told Jessica in a shaky voice, feeling a tear slip from his eye.
“Oh, Alvin,” Jessica started crying and wrapped her arms around the man to hug him. “You mean more to us than you will ever be able to understand.”
“But I ain’t did nothing,” Alvin said, as more tears left his eyes.
“You did everything,” Jessica cried, and took Alvin by his face with two loving hands. “You never left us. You easily could have.”
Alvin stared into Jessica’s eyes and saw a woman who sincerely loved him. That’s when he felt the presence of Jesus fill the hallway. The love Jessica was showing him wasn’t a romantic love, by any means. No, the love the woman was giving the broken man was a holy, pure love that resonated from the very heart of Jesus. For a mere second, Alvin understood what love Heaven was filled with must feel like.
“I’ll never leave,” he promised. He pressed his head against Jessica’s fo
rehead, and then walked into Tom’s office to find Mandy sitting behind the desk. Fiona was carefully helping Tom take cautious steps back and forth across the office floor.
“You and me...I want to marry you!” he called out to Mandy, before his heart could fail. “I done went and fell in love with you, woman!”
Mandy sat very still, basking in the cold candlelight, and then simply answered in a sweet voice, “Well, we do have a pastor standing right here in this office. There’s no time like the present to become the wife of a good man.”
Jacob could barely believe his ears. He looked at Jessica with shock in his eyes. Jessica simply wiped at her tears and smiled. “I knew,” she whispered to Jacob. “I see how Mandy and Alvin look at each other. It’s the same way Jack and I used to look at each other and will again...someday.”
Alvin felt his heart nearly leap out of his chest. He ran over to Tom’s desk and looked down into Mandy’s lovely face. Mandy held her arms up, like a doll waiting to be picked up by a loving owner.
“Kiss me.” Alvin felt fear and panic grip his chest. He had never been so scared in all of his life. “It’s okay,” Mandy whispered. Alvin slowly nodded his head, and with hands as tender as a doe, he picked Mandy up and gently kissed her.
“Get over here,” Tom begged Alvin and Mandy, struggling to regain his strength. “Hurry.”
Alvin helped Mandy walk over to Tom. “Here we are.”
“Mrs. Mayes, Jacob, come in here,” Tom called out. Jessica hurried into the office and took her position beside Mandy. Jacob, on unsteady legs, stepped up beside Alvin, as Fiona maintained her position beside Tom. Lionel carefully eased his head into the office. Tom pointed at the man. “Step up beside Jacob.”
Lionel nodded his head and did as he was told after closing the office door. Tom drew in a shaky breath. “We are gathered here, on this night, to unite this man and woman as man and wife, before the eyes of our Creator, the Living God,” he began, and didn’t stop until he pronounced Alvin and Mandy husband and wife. “The law of man requires legal papers. Adam and Eve didn’t need papers. God Himself made them husband and wife. You may now kiss your wife, Alvin.”
A big, amazing smile spread across Alvin’s normally tormented face. He bent down so they could kiss.
“My wife,” he whispered.
“My husband,” Mandy whispered back. “Forever, you and me. That’s the way it’ll be now.”
“Forever, you and me,” Alvin promised.
“Oh, Mandy, I’m so happy for you!” Jessica cried, hugging her sister and then Alvin. “I knew you two were meant to be together.”
“Congratulations,” Lionel told Alvin and offered his hand.
Alvin studied Lionel’s hand, studied the man’s eyes for a second, and then shook his hand. Deep down, a voice told Alvin that Lionel had very little time left on the earth.
“Thank you,” he told Lionel, and then lowered his voice to a whisper. “You won’t be alone when it happens.” Lionel simply nodded his head in response.
“Congratulations, Alvin,” Jacob said. He shook his friend’s hand, and then congratulated Mandy and offered a quick hug. “At least there is some joy in this night.”
“Fiona, take everyone down to the kitchen. I believe there will be coffee there,” Tom ordered Fiona in a tender but stern tone. “I need to speak to Mrs. Mayes...alone.”
Fiona began to object, but the expression in Tom’s stern eyes quickly silenced her.
“I’ll stand guard outside,” Jacob said.
“I’ll join you,” Lionel offered.
“No,” Tom objected. “You two will have to trust God. I need absolute privacy. Now, please,” Tom pleaded.
“No,” Jacob shook his head. “Pastor, I will be—”
“You will do as I say!” Tom yelled at Jacob, surprising everyone, including himself. “I depend on God’s protection, not yours, son. I know you mean well, but you cannot win this battle with the weapons you are using! Now, leave my office, and do as I say!”
“Better mind the man,” Alvin told Jacob, taking Mandy’s hand and helping his wife walk out of the office.
“Come with me,” Fiona told Lionel. She took the man’s hand and led him away.
“Go,” Jessica begged Jacob. “Do as Pastor Braston ordered.”
Jacob stared at Tom. He didn’t like being yelled at or ordered to leave Jessica. But as he stared into Tom’s eyes, a strange feeling washed over him. Suddenly, he was back in the driveway of an old house, working on a car that was nearly beyond hope; a car Jacob had managed to repair and save. Tom was doing the same for him. Jacob was an old clunker that needed saved.
“I’ll go get a cup of coffee.” he said in an uneasy voice. He left the office, secured the office door, studied the hallway, and then followed after Fiona and Lionel, leaving Jessica and Tom alone.
Tom reached out and took Jessica’s hands. “Your husband...I had a dream...or a vision...he told me where his journal is hidden.”
Jessica stood very still as the snow outside continued to cover the dark night. The office was cold, lit only by dying candles. It illuminated her very scared, exhausted and tormented face. She still held a delicate beauty, yet a beauty stained with misery.
“I assumed...” she managed to whisper as a single tear dropped from her eye. Tom quickly wiped the tear away. “Where is my husband’s journal, Pastor Braston?”
“Follow me.” Tom took Jessica’s hand and, although he was very weak and his head felt as if it were going to split open, he led Jessica to his desk and pointed up at the ceiling tiles. “Somewhere up there. Hurry.”
Jessica looked into Tom’s eyes, saw a brave and caring man that loved her as if she were his own daughter, and then quickly climbed up onto the desk, reached up, and began checking one ceiling tile after another. Her heart raced as her mind urged her to hurry.
“Where is it?” she whispered, fearful that her husband’s diary wasn’t hidden in the ceiling. But then, just as hope seemed lost, she lifted one last ceiling tile. Only this ceiling tile had more weight bearing down on it than the others. “Pastor, I found it,” she whispered in an urgent voice, as her hands removed the ceiling tile and found a green journal duct taped to the top side of it. “This is my husband’s journal.”
Tom watched as Jessica removed the journal from the ceiling tile. “Put the tile back in place.” Jessica handed Tom her husband’s journal, replaced the ceiling tile, and then climbed down from the desk. Tom carefully sat down in his desk chair and looked up into Jessica’s frightened but relieved face.
“Mrs. Mayes,” he said, and handed over her husband’s journal. “Please do the honors.”
With a shaky hand, Jessica took the small book and cautiously opened it. Secured to the front page with a green piece of duct tape was a folded brown envelope. Jessica looked at Tom with frightened eyes, and then carefully opened the envelope to find a single computer disc and a letter of instruction written in Jack’s handwriting.
“Oh, Jack,” Jessica burst out crying, “we found your journal. Oh, honey, we found it.”
Tom watched Jessica bow her head and allowed the woman a minute to mourn.
“Mrs. Mayes,” he spoke, “now what do we do?”
Jessica lifted her head, wiped away her tears, and studied the computer disc she was holding. “We pray,” she answered Tom. “Pastor, we have to pray and ask for help.” Jessica lifted her eyes and handed Tom the computer disc. “Hide this disc, please.
Tom managed to stand up and walked over to the wooden bookshelf where he took out an old Family Bible. “Here,” he said, placing the disc into the Bible, and then walked back to Jessica. “Now, let us pray.”
((((((((((*))))))))))
Jacob couldn’t believe his ears. “You have the virus? Where?” he asked, in an urgent voice that told Jessica the man was anxious for battle. “Jessica, I know President Green is secure in an underground bunker that has full operational abilities. Th
ere are operational bunkers located all around the country. The disc—”
“Jacob,” Jessica spoke in a calm tone, as she lifted her husband’s journal up over a dying candle that would be replaced soon, “my husband gave specific instructions.”
“Very specific instructions,” Tom warned, sitting behind his desk. “The AI virus he created can easily become hostile if not controlled.”
Jessica studied her husband’s journal with a broken heart. “Where is President Green?”
“In a secure bunker,” Jacob explained, “It’s called the Green Bunker, located under Andrews Air Force Base. That would be the most likely place.” Jacob felt hope surge into his heart. “Roger Alden is most likely hidden under the CIA building. He’s not going anywhere right now. In time, he will crawl out of his hole. Jessica, we have to act.” Jacob looked into the far corner of Tom’s office, and carefully studied Lionel. “Are you on our team?”
“Yes,” Lionel answered in an even voice, keeping his arms folded. Jessica Mayes had the AI virus; a virus that represented absolute world power. And there he was, standing in the shadows of a cold office while agreeing to assist people who were once considered an enemy of the cause. Jesus certainly changed hearts. “We need to move.”
“Mandy,” Jessica spoke in a loving voice, “you and Alvin will stay here at the church with Pastor Braston and—”
“Out of the question,” Mandy objected, standing close to the office door and holding Alvin’s hand.
Jessica walked over to her upset sister, touched the woman’s tender face, and smiled. “Honey, I love you so much, but you will slow us down. We have to hurry. Time isn’t on your side.” Jessica lifted her husband’s journal. “Jack recorded the agreement Russia made with China, Iran and North Korea. But, Mandy, China is going to betray Russia. Jack used his virus to steal extremely sensitive military data from the Chinese. Before he was killed, Jack had decided to contact someone inside the Russian military and send them the information.”
“All of that is in that journal?” Mandy dared to ask.
Green File Crime Thrillers Box Set Page 42