The Thieves of Faith (8 page)

He wouldn’t fail his superiors, he wouldn’t fail his country, but most of all he wouldn’t fail his son. There was still hope.

Chapter 7

A
lec Michael St. Pierre stood in his shop. It
was really a garage but he had converted it to a fully outfitted workshop for wood, metal, and plastics. While so many fathers spent their time under the hoods of muscle cars or swinging a three wood time and time again in pursuit of the perfect game, Michael’s father found comfort in creation. Shaping and forming, carving and honing; he turned wood into furniture, metal into art, and plastic into whatever his heart moved him to. Michael would watch his father concentrating, lost in his creations, seeming to leave the room—while not in body, surely in mind—for nothing seemed to break his dad’s concentration when he was lost in his projects. He was amazed at his father’s dexterity with such stubby fingers.

By the time Michael was fourteen, they couldn’t have been more different. Michael was thin and muscular, his dad short and heavyset. Michael had the long curly hair of a teenager, while he had yet to meet anyone old enough to remember his dad when he had hair. His father was cerebral; Michael, while smart, leaned to the physical. But as so often occurs, opposites attracted. Michael would sit patiently with his dad every Saturday morning before heading off to play whatever sport was in season. They would sit and talk about everything and nothing. His father would subtly try to interest Michael in working with his tools, building and creating. He insisted that Michael had such a creative mind, if he was only to hone it a bit he could create anything he desired. But like so many teenage boys, he just wasn’t attracted yet to the things his father was. Michael didn’t think it was rebelling, he just had sports on the brain. And while Michael would listen and play along, he really didn’t find much enjoyment in building, though he never said a word, knowing it was his dad’s passion.

While his father never played organized sports, you would never know it from his vocabulary. Alec read up on every sport that Michael was interested in to the point it seemed he was a grizzled veteran.

“Hold this,” Alec said, holding out a metal gear.

Michael took it, leaned over his father, and looked into the complex inner workings of the six-foot grandfather clock that was nearly complete. Each piece was built from scratch: the wooden case, the chimes, clock wheel, gears, even the face.

“Ready for the game today?” his dad asked without lifting his head from his work.

“Think so, we’ve got a few new plays. Stepinac is a pretty good team, though.”

Alec didn’t respond, seemingly lost in the moment. But then, after a good minute, he spoke as if it had only been seconds. “Yeah, but they don’t have a quarterback that can read a nickel defense like you.” Alec looked up, their eyes connecting. “You know how lucky you are that you don’t have your mother’s and my genes?” Alec patted his stomach.

“Did you play when you were a kid?”

Alec smiled. “I was the kid who felt lucky even to be picked last,” he said with an outstretched hand. “Let me have that gear back.”

Michael passed it.

“Actually, why don’t you place it right there?” Alec pointed at a small metal stem. Michael looked in the clock box and slid the gear over the spindle. His dad placed an impossibly small cap on the pin-sized rod and closed up the back of the box. He wrapped his short arms around the six-foot case and motioned to Michael to do the same. Michael took up position at the base of the clock.

“On three, now.” Michael’s father looked at him. “And…three.”

They hoisted the clock off the workbench and into the air, placing it upright on the floor. Alec opened up the glass cover over the face of the clock. “Time?” he asked, his index finger on the minute hand.

Michael glanced at the clock on the wall. “Eight fifty-nine.”

“Perfect timing, if I do say so myself.” He set the clock and opened the glass door over the pendulum. “If you would be so kind.”

Michael reached in, and with a gentle grip, lifted the pendulum back and let it swing.

Tick…tick…tick…
The elaborate timepiece spoke in the common language of clocks. Michael watched as the numerous gears clicked and spun, the second hand sweeping around. And with a sudden
thunk
the main gear activated and the chimes rang out nine times.

Michael caught himself, mesmerized by the steady beat of the clock, its timing still as perfect as the day it was made twenty-some-odd years ago. He stared at the enormous timepiece, wishing he could wind it backward. Michael missed those mornings talking with his dad, who always had a way of seeing things so clearly. Michael had never fully appreciated the value of wisdom, of experience. Like so many, he took his father’s unconditional love for granted, never grasping how much he needed him. Michael’s father had passed away a few years back. It was sudden, brought about by complications from diabetes; his mother followed shortly thereafter of a broken heart. Michael wished that he could have had one more week with his dad, even one more day to ask all those questions he never got around to asking; always thinking that there would be time for them, always thinking there would be a tomorrow, always concerned with the future, forgetting to live in the moment.

Michael would have liked his company now, but like a year ago, when Mary died, he would have to forgo the sage advice of his father.

Mary’s plea dominated Michael’s heart, only to be reinforced by the business card reflecting the same address. The address of Stephen Kelley, an attorney Mary thought could help Michael in his quest.

Michael’s father had always urged him to find his birth parents, explaining that it was important to know where we come from, what we are made of. Alec had explained very early on that Michael had two sets of parents: the ones whose love brought him into the world and the ones whose love brought him up in it. But Michael banished the thought of seeking them out while the St. Pierres were alive. He had felt it to be a betrayal of his parents, as if he was turning his back on them, to abandon those who chose him for those who chose to give him up.

Michael stood in his great room, his two big dogs asleep at his feet, staring at Mary’s letter and the business card that sat side by side on the coffee table before him. The address was in Boston, a foreign land to Michael: 22 Franklin Street held no meaning. To a Yankee fan, it was the land of the enemy. He had only been up to the New England city a handful of times, preferring Cape Cod, a place that had held special meaning for him and Mary, a place to run to for their weekend escapes.

Michael’s mind was a swirl of confusion as he thought on the single business card. It was no coincidence that it matched the address that Mary had given him, the ticking of the grandfather clock at four a.m. driving home the point.

Michael picked up his glass, downed his Jack Daniel’s, and immediately snatched up the bottle for a refill. His mind was a jumble as he ran the past four hours over again, so sure that he was missing something, so sure that a simple clue eluded him. Then it hit him.

His mind was so consumed with the card, he had forgotten about the water-soaked purse. He picked it up and laid it on the coffee table. It was simple, tan leather with a brass clasp and woven strap. He triple-checked every empty pocket and seam and realized it was the deviation from the typical that underscored the significance of the single item found within. There were no personal effects, none of the usual female accoutrements, grooming or otherwise, that clutter a female bag. It was empty but for the business card the water had not managed to wash away.

And then a chill raced up Michael’s spine and grabbed hold of his mind. He stepped back and looked at the purse again. He was not captivated by the design of the purse, nor the card that was found inside; a truth of recognition percolated to the surface.

There was no question in Michael’s mind—he had seen this purse before.

Chapter 8

I
lya Raechen was at the Delaware Bridge when
he finally exhaled. He had driven the Chevy Suburban with tinted windows the last four hours without so much as a whisper or touch of the radio dial. He flew down the Jersey Turnpike, happy for the EZ-Pass convenience of avoiding a toll clerk; the less people who saw him the better. It was so cliché to be riding with a victim bound and gagged in the rear cargo space, but he had had no choice. Vans and panel trucks drew attention in this post-9/11 age and he couldn’t hide behind his Russian diplomatic credentials if he was pulled over. Not too many excuses for riding around with a trussed-up woman in the back of your vehicle.

For all his life, Raechen had told his son, “Don’t worry, Daddy will protect you, he will never let anything happen to you.” It was a promise that every parent made to their child, it was a promise that every child believed. And it was a promise that Raechen wasn’t living up to as he watched his son slipping away, wasted by disease. But things were changing, hope would be reborn for not only his son but for himself. No more broken promises—he would save his son no matter the cost.

He had waited until five-thirty in the morning before leaving the motel. The lights were dimmed and the parking lot was empty; never much traffic at dawn. He loaded both pistols, sliding them in his waistband at the small of his back. He hadn’t fired his Glocks in seven years, since he retired from the field to start a family. Raechen prayed before entering the Suburban that the day ahead wouldn’t break that streak.

As he crossed the border into Delaware, he picked up his cell phone and called for the plane. It would be fueled and ready at a small airstrip in rural Maryland, diplomatic clearance processed for a smooth exit from the country. Raechen would accompany Genevieve and personally deliver her not out of loyalty or pride; he would do it to ensure payment, to obtain the treatment that his son so desperately needed. He was counting on them, but more importantly, his son was counting on him.

Chapter 9

T
he loft was a big boys’ playground, a private
room upstairs in Valhalla. Busch designed it to his exact specifications, replicating an image that had resided in his mind since he was sixteen. The room was long and narrow, the angled ceiling rose up twenty feet, mirroring the roofline, its thick, exposed beams dark and polished. The pool table, card table, and pinball machine were set off in the back section, while a thick couch and two Barcaloungers filled up the front, circling an enormous plasma TV screen. A small bar in the corner was stocked by the liquor and beer distributors as a courtesy for Busch’s continued business from his downstairs establishment. This was his sanctuary, frequented only by friends. Jeannie had allowed him his indulgence on the proviso that the bar and restaurant’s operations were not affected.