The Goddess Legacy (23 page)

“Oh, that is the swami’s residence. It’s his home, as well as the living quarters of his most senior staff.”

“It’s beautiful,” Allie commented, taking in the carved reliefs over the arches, hundreds of depictions drawn from Hindu mythology carved into the three-story façade.

“Yes, we are very fortunate to be in its presence on a daily basis. So close to the great one, and reminded of such by his artisans’ handiwork.”

“He lives there full time?”

“He travels occasionally, but nowadays, not often. The faithful come to him when they feel the draw, and he finds it more important to be here for them than to spread his word. He has many who do so for him, so it isn’t necessary.”

“Have you ever seen the interior? It must be incredible.”

“Once, when I was on special cleaning detail. And yes, it is breathtaking.” Dev paused. “At the assembly tonight, you will be presented to the swami along with the rest of the new devotees. It is a great honor, but he is generous with his blessings. You are truly in luck.”

“That’s wonderful!” Allie gushed. “I can hardly wait.”

“Have you been at the ashram a long time, Dev?” Drake asked as they ambled along a path toward the assembly hall.

“Four years. It feels like yesterday. You will find that time ceases to matter once you’ve embraced the swami’s energy. It is eternal, and to bask in it is like bathing in the cool waters of a blessed lake.”

Half an hour later, Dev had finished the tour and told them to listen for the gong that announced the assembly was going to begin. He encouraged them to rest, which was easier said than done, they found, their rooms equipped only with reluctant ceiling fans and no mosquito netting on the windows. When the gong rang, it was with considerable relief that they made it to the open-air assembly space, where one of the staff showed them to the area reserved for new attendees. They joined the twenty or so of the day’s arrivals, all seated cross-legged on the stone floor, and waited as the group chanted the swami’s mantra. The effect of thousands of voices repeating the same syllable over and over was mesmerizing, even to nonbelievers like Drake and Allie.

Drumming interrupted the collective trance state, and a procession arrived from the swami’s residence. The holy man floated among his faithful, smiling at the group and waving his hand in blessing as he approached the raised dais.

Drake leaned into Allie and whispered over the drums and chanting voices, “Oh, brother.”

She shushed him as the swami took a seat on an elaborate golden throne. After several minutes of descriptions of the swami’s benevolent deeds, one of his minions gave the equivalent of a sermon, with plentiful reminders of cosmic energy, atemporal unified fields, and the duty of the enlightened to serve the less fortunate – and of course, to spread the gospel according to Swami Baba Raja. When the oratory was over, the new devotees were led to the swami, who materialized holy ash and sent a shower of it over their heads.

When Drake and Allie were presented to him, his eyes fixed upon Allie, and Drake saw something all too familiar in his countenance. Drake had to fight back the instinct that rose in him at the man’s attention to her, but the swami barely noticed him.

“Welcome, young ones. It warms my heart to meet you,” the swami said, in good English.

“As it does ours,” Allie and Drake said together, repeating the line they had been told to use when the swami spoke his ritual line of greeting.

“I’m glad you finally made it,” the swami said, taking Allie’s hand in his while deviating from the script, which they’d been told would consist of his greeting, their response, and then their dismissal so the swami could bless the next in line. “I have been waiting for you to arrive.”

Neither of them was sure how to respond, but the swami seemed unfazed. “What is your name, child?” he asked her.

“Allie.”

“Like music. Allie. Truly blessed,” he said, and winked. Allie smiled in return, and then the swami seemed to remember himself. He waved them away and tore his eyes from Allie only after she’d returned to her spot on the floor.

“Tell me that wasn’t weird,” Drake whispered to her. “Guy’s an old lech.”

“I’ll say,” she muttered under her breath, while keeping her smile. “We are indeed blessed,” she said more audibly. “He is magnificent – like staring directly into the sun. We are unworthy to be in his presence.”

Drake took the hint and remained silent, his stomach twisting. The swami looked like he had been ready to tear Allie’s clothes off; there was no mistaking the path of enlightenment he wanted to show her. Drake forced the resentment away – of course Allie would catch the eye of the old pervert. She had a quality, a bearing, that was indeed special, and it was foolish to expect nobody besides himself to notice.

An hour later the chanting subsided, and the swami’s entourage accompanied him back to his residence. The musicians began packing up and the group stood. The Germans were chatting in broken English with three young women from Portugal when a thin man with oil slicked hair approached and spoke quietly to one of them. Her face lit up with excitement and she nodded, and then the man smiled and came over to where Drake and Allie were looking around, trying to figure out what to do next.

“The swami has chosen you to participate in a special blessing this evening, young one,” he said to Allie. Drake caught the look in her eyes and excused himself with a nod.

“Really?” she exclaimed once Drake had left.

“Yes, it is a special honor few are selected to attend. It will begin following the evening meal. Will you be coming?”

“Of course!”

“Good. Present yourself at the residence promptly at nine tonight.”

The little man hurried away toward another of the comely new arrivals, and Allie joined Drake at the edge of the assembly hall. She told him about the invitation in a hushed voice, and he listened with a stony expression. When she was done, he looked off toward the residence.

“I don’t like it.”

“It’s a chance to get a look inside.”

“The swami wants you to get a look at more than that, judging from his performance tonight.”

“Don’t worry. I can handle myself.” She paused. “He’s tall for an Indian, isn’t he?”

“Looks like he uses the same dye Spencer does.”

“He’s not a youngster, that’s for sure.”

“He’s a lecher. Probably rapey, too.”

Allie shrugged. “I don’t know. He’s got a certain charisma in person, you have to admit. Like a rock star or something. My guess is he can have whatever he wants from his groupies.”

“The guy’s a charlatan.”

She looked around in alarm. “Keep your voice down, Drake. Remember why we’re here. If the idol’s made out of gold, it shouldn’t be hard to spot. If Divya’s correct and the dagger is a sword, I’d expect the idol to be almost three feet tall. This is the perfect opportunity to get into his residence and snoop around. Unless you’ve got a better idea, this is the break we need, and we’d be crazy not to take it.”

Drake nodded reluctantly. Allie, as usual, made perfect sense.

“I don’t have to like it.”

Allie glanced at him and her expression softened. “Why, Drake Ramsey, you’re jealous!”

“Not jealous. Concerned. I don’t want you to get into a situation you’ll regret.”

“You are too, aren’t you?”

“I’m going to go do some yoga or something.”

“Drake?” Allie asked as he spun and stepped away.

“What?” he snapped.

“You’re still number one in my book.”

He stopped, his expression unreadable, and then looked back at her with a half smile.

“Hold that thought, Allie.”

She returned the smile. “I mean it.”

“So do I.”

India-governed Jammu and Kashmir

Nayan Mehta stood in front of the French doors that led out to the expansive gardens of his four-acre estate, one of the larger residential properties in New Delhi, with a value in the tens of millions of dollars. He was on the phone with Pradesh Suri, his second-in-command at the Kashmir mining camp he operated, who was waiting patiently on the line for instructions.

Mehta’s voice was agitated – always a dangerous situation, his temper as infamous as his vast fortune. Mehta was the third generation of industrialists who’d accumulated a substantial slice of the region’s riches, and had never known a day without entitlement.

“What is the delay?” Mehta demanded again. “I do not understand.”

“There was a problem transporting the material from the facility. Some sort of unannounced spot check.”

“I thought we bought everyone off. Was that not so?”

“This is a different branch of the regulatory agency. Nobody could have foreseen they would stage an inspection. As it was, no harm came of it, but it set our schedule back a day.”

“The customers are on their way with money. They are expected the day after tomorrow. They will panic if the material is not here for their inspection, and I wouldn’t blame them.”

“We could always just kill them,” Suri suggested. “What would their people really be able to do if we did?”

“That is not an option. I would be a marked man. These people are as dangerous as cobras, even if they are crazy. Don’t even suggest such a thing.”

“I was merely thinking out loud.”

“Then refrain from doing so.”

Suri quieted, chastened by Mehta’s warning. The powerful magnate was scheduled to travel from his headquarters in Delhi to meet the customers in person, and he was obviously in no mood for Suri’s suggestion. Mehta was on edge, and that put everyone around him in jeopardy, Suri knew from harsh experience.

“When is the shipment expected now?”

“Forty-eight hours, in the early evening.”

“That’s too late.”

“It is the best our people can do.”

“Why don’t they deliver it via helicopter?” Mehta asked.

“It would be picked up by the air defense force that monitors Kashmir. That, and it’s already in transit, somewhere on the road – we don’t know exactly where.”

“Then we will need a diversion to keep the customers occupied while we wait.”

“We can give them a tour of the camp.”

“One has already been there, at the start of our transaction, do you not recall? We can try, but they might not be interested in anything but the exchange.”

“Women?”

“They’re zealots. Their religion prevents them from partaking in the pleasures of the flesh.”

“We can drug them.”

Mehta was silent for several moments. “No. I have the perfect solution. We will simply count the currency by hand. That will take many hours if we don’t use the machines,” Mehta said. “Five million euros. We will count slowly.”

Suri exhaled with relief. “Perfect. I shall make the necessary arrangements.” He paused. “Do you think they will buy it?”

“It doesn’t matter what they think while we’re counting. Only that we don’t finish until the material arrives.”

Mehta ambled outside onto the veranda and sniffed the air, the blooms of his perfectly manicured grounds scenting the surroundings with floral perfection. He could hear a generator thrumming in the background on Suri’s end of the line, reminding him of the rural conditions at the camp.

The mine was now over fifty years old, invisible from the air, located in a hidden valley far from any roads, and his security was foolproof – the penalty for attempting to escape was death. It had been so for as long as he’d been alive, put in place by his grandfather after the war and continued by his father, until the mantle had been handed over to Mehta. The government left him alone, turning a blind eye to his methods as it had for eons, the appropriate parties were well paid to ignore the goings-on that directly benefited them, the camp’s production gladly taken by them since the mine had begun operating.

This transaction had been one he’d been reluctant to do, though, and he had only agreed to entertain it at the behest of his newest benefactors – the Americans, who had arranged through a cutout for an introduction to the customers’ group after swearing him to secrecy. The proposal from the Americans hadn’t surprised him in the least, even though the customer was supposedly their sworn enemy, and Mehta had been told to keep their involvement silent. It was well understood in certain circles that the Americans’ clandestine agendas were as Machiavellian and unknowable as those of a court mistress, and if their wishes made him richer, so much the better. Because there was no such thing as wealthy enough, he knew.

And in only two more days, it would all come to fruition.

He turned from the window and resumed his call. “I will arrive there in the late morning the day after tomorrow and will require entertainment that evening. Select suitable candidates for my approval after dinner.”

“The usual age?” Suri asked.

“Of course. And nobody sick.”

“Absolutely not. I shall put out the word.”

“Very well. Call me if there are any changes. If not, I will be at the camp by dusk.”

Suri hung up and looked around at the barren terrain. He checked the charge on his satellite phone and then marched toward the rent in the mountain that was the entry to the camp, the actual mine many stories below it. As he made his way to the caverns, he smiled to himself – he’d already chosen four young blossoms for Mehta’s pleasure, barely into their budding womanhood. His master would be pleased by his selections, he was sure.

He signaled to one of the guards standing just inside the cave, and the man whistled. A boy came running carrying an LED lantern, his bare chest pale as a ghost, his feet clad in sandals made from discarded tires pilfered from a distant dump. The boy and his kind had never seen the sun for more than a few hours at a time; the lion’s share of the population were confined below ground, with only a fortunate few allowed above to tend to the gardens that fed the rest.

Suri didn’t question the arrangement, nor his part in it. He was simply following his master’s orders and was well rewarded for his obedience.

As his father had done before him.

And as would his oldest son, eventually, he was sure, when Suri became too old for his responsibilities.