The Constantine Conspiracy (2 page)

On the ground outside, a chunky man in faded blue jeans, gray flannel shirt, and black baseball cap covering a shaved head stepped to the home’s security console located beside the garage and did exactly as he’d done minutes earlier at the security gate a mile away—he punched in three separate codes with gloved fingers and disabled the alarm system. The cameras that monitored every inch of the house’s perimeter went blank and the movement-triggered laser sensors shut down.

The thick man eased away from the keypad and attached his left boot, studded at the toe and heel, to the lowest log in the wall. His left hand followed, then his right boot and right hand. He moved with surprising agility for a man of his bulk and made quick progress up the side of the house. The man almost grinned under his Nike cap. Assignments like this challenged him and he liked it. Far too many of his jobs bored him these days—a bribe here, a theft there, a murder somewhere else. Nothing to brag about in any of those, but this task signaled the start of something more thrilling than wrestling an alligator, a job he’d actually held for a summer as a teenager growing up in southern Louisiana.

Within a couple of minutes, the man reached the bottom of the balcony that wrapped the house and heaved himself over the edge and onto the flat patio area. His breath slow in spite of his efforts, he pulled a tiny antilock device from the backpack he carried between his shoulders and eased to the glass doors that separated him from his target inside. The lock provided no resistance, and within seconds it quietly clicked open. The thick man waited a few seconds, but nothing moved inside, so he put away the device, pushed aside the door’s curtains, and slipped inside the night-draped room.

Five miles away from Solitude, national park ranger Shannon Bridge finished her breakfast—a bowl of apple-flavored oatmeal, a cup of straight black coffee, and a piece of dry toast—then cleaned up the dishes and tromped in bare feet to her bedroom. There she slipped her five-foot-eight frame into the freshly pressed uniform that hung in her tiny closet—the forest green blouse, then the matching slacks. The outfit hung a bit too loosely on her slender frame and its color clashed with her sky blue eyes, but she didn’t care. The uniform, and the job that went with it, provided a means to a crucial end, so she wore the clothes gladly in spite of their less than flattering color, fit, and style. A pair of hiking boots and a two-inch-wide leather belt complete with a government-issued Sig Sauer 9 mm pistol slung in a brown holster completed the ensemble, and she finished dressing within minutes. After checking herself in the mirror, Shannon stepped back, pulled a Velcro wrap from the drawer by her bed, and slid it around her right ankle. A second later she pulled a nine-inch Bowie knife with a rosewood handle and a gleaming blade from the same drawer, dropped to one knee, and slipped the knife into the Velcro wrap. Standing, she shook her ankle to make sure the knife stayed in place, then faced the mirror again. A stranger seemed to stare back at her: a park ranger stationed in Montana wearing a hidden knife—a peculiar job in a remote place for a troubled woman facing the most dangerous challenge of her life.

Taking a deep breath, Shannon glanced back at the closet but, as she did every morning, refused to put on the ranger hat that completed the uniform. Nothing, not even the mission she’d accepted just over a year ago, provided enough incentive to make her wear the fashion-challenged headgear.

Ready, she moved to a small desk in the front room of her cabin—a six-room park-provided dwelling in the Gates of the Mountain National Park—turned up the police scanner, and flipped on her walkie-talkie. Then she sat down, picked her cell phone up off the desk, and leaned back to wait as she powered it on. Although her shift as a ranger didn’t officially begin for another two hours, that didn’t matter. Shannon had another job to complete, one far more important than the work she’d taken as a cover, and nobody, not even she, knew exactly when or if it would start or stop. For now, then, she simply had to put on her ugly uniform every day, do her job as an employee, and wait.

Wait, watch, and listen. Listen for the second when the walkie-talkie squawked or her cell phone beeped or the scanner blared out. Any one of them might signal her that it had begun. In that moment, and not before, she would jump to attention, check both her weapons, and speed away in her park service jeep to meet the foe that she both feared and longed for.

Feeling refreshed, Rick Carson emerged from the shower and slipped into khakis, a pullover Georgia Bulldogs shirt, and a pair of hiking boots. Then he picked up his Blackberry and shuffled downstairs to the breakfast table, lights flicking on as his movement triggered them.

“Morning, Luisa,” he said as the cook approached and handed him his water. “You eat breakfast yet?” he asked, taking a chair.

“Not yet, Mister Rick,” Luisa said, her native accent still evident in spite of her fifty-plus years in the U.S.

“Fix yourself an egg, have a seat with me. And like I’ve asked you a thousand times, please drop the ‘mister’ thing. You practically raised me, for heaven’s sake.”

Luisa smiled but shook her head. “No egg for me,” she said. “I have much work to do.”

“You never eat with me,” Rick teased. “Aren’t you one of my fans?”

“You know I love you very much, Mister Rick,” Luisa said. “And everybody is your fan. But I am already too fat, no more food for me.”

Rick smiled, then glanced at his watch, noted the 4:30 hour, about normal for him and his dad during their days on the ranch. “Dad up?” he asked.

“No, Mister Rick, your father is still sleeping. You prefer I should call him now?”

Rick hesitated, then said no. “Let him rest a few more minutes. He’s not as spry as he used to be. His heart okay?”

“He takes his medication. I’ve heard no complaining of pain.”

“Good, how long ago was his by-pass?”

“Just over a year. You ready for your eggs?”

“Sounds great.”

Luisa stepped away, and Rick flipped open the Blackberry and keyed it up. Seconds later, his email page appeared, and he scanned his messages, his mind instantly absorbed with news and notes from all the exotic people he knew, people he’d see again as soon as his retreat ended.

The man in the Nike cap moved like a cat on carpet to the bedroom door and clicked the keypad on the wall beside it. Steel lock bolts slid silently into place at the bottom, middle, and top of the door. Then the man shifted to the bed where Rick’s dad lay sleeping. For a moment he wished Carson would wake up and fight. Not that he’d have any trouble with his victim if he did. The assassin lifted weights at least four times a week, topping out at 400 pounds in a bench press, over 600 in a dead squat. His heart played a steady 48 beats per minute, and he ran a mile in six minutes, far faster than anyone expected from a guy of his girth. Middle-aged guys with marshmallow bellies like Steve Carson had no chance against him. Still . . . a little struggle before the coup de grâce would at least get his blood stirring.

To the big man’s chagrin, Carson failed to rouse, so he tamped down his disappointment and shifted into high gear. He withdrew a penlight from his backpack and held it between his teeth as he took a drug-filled needle from the pack on his waistband, uncapped it, and stuck it directly into Carson’s carotid artery. Carson’s body stiffened and his eyes jerked open, but the big man held him in place. Within a few seconds, the drug took effect, and Carson settled back down, his eyes closed once more.

The intruder put the needle away, counted to thirty, then lifted Carson’s one hundred and eighty pounds and hauled him to a desk chair about twenty feet away. Carson stirred but not enough to warrant another injection, so the intruder propped him in the chair, straightened his pajamas, and keyed up the desktop computer before him. The screen saver disappeared and the blue background of the word processing program flashed up. The assassin typed three words on the computer keyboard, then hit the print command. As the printer started, he backspaced over the three words he’d just printed, then stepped back and stood over Carson—so defenseless yet still alive.

The hit man’s spirits sagged; finishing Carson off felt like shooting a turtle in a bathtub. When the victim had no chance, the sport disappeared. Yet, like his sweet momma used to tell him, “a man starts a job, a man ought to finish it,” and right now he, better than anyone in the world, finished the jobs he accepted. He finished them clean, clear, and without complaint.

2

R
ick finished his breakfast quickly and Luisa reappeared.

“More egg?” she asked.

“No, I’m good.” Rick clicked off the Blackberry, stood, and picked up his dishes.

“I’ll take those,” Luisa said.

“I got ’em,” Rick said, headed to the sink. “Mother taught me right before she . . .” He quickly rinsed the plate and glasses and placed them in the dishwasher.

“You a fine man,” Luisa said, falling into the truncated speech she sometimes used in spite of her English fluency. “One of your fancy women will take you home to meet her papa real soon.”

Rick chuckled. “You just want me married and out of your way.”

Luisa smiled, then went back to work, and Rick headed slowly toward the stairs.

“Dad!” he called.

Rick’s voice crackled through a speaker over his father’s bed upstairs.

“Move your keister!” Rick shouted. “We’re hiking Bear Ridge this morning, remember?”

In his dad’s room the stocky man shoved the point of a new needle into a vein in Steve Carson’s left forearm, injected its contents, then dropped the needle to the floor by Carson’s feet. Then he slid a long-bladed knife from his backpack and held it up in the moonlight slithering into the room from the balcony. A beautiful instrument, well-crafted, designed to carry a subtle but deadly message, one that only a few people on earth would know enough to understand.

After leaning Carson forward, forehead on the desk, he grabbed his left hand and turned it palm up. He knew the knife contradicted the notion of suicide, but he didn’t mind because his goal was confusion. Keep ’em guessing for awhile; that’s all he wanted.