‘Definitely don’t screw with my husband,’ said Nina.
Simeon and Anna both shot her angry looks, but Cross remained focused on the view from the remaining camera. Trant had reacted to his warning by dropping behind a hedge. He peered warily over it to see Eddie crouched by Whelan’s corpse, collecting his MP7 before picking up the statue.
‘Careful,’ snapped Cross into his headset as Trant’s own gun rose into the camera’s field of view and lined up on the Englishman’s back. ‘You might hit the angel. Move in closer.’
The team leader sidestepped along the hedge to a gap, then began a cautious, measured advance. ‘No, wait,’ said Nina in alarm. Eddie still had his back to Trant, the angel under one arm as he cleaned mud off the weapon. ‘Don’t kill him!’
‘Too late for that now,’ snarled Simeon.
She rushed to the cult leader’s side. ‘If you kill him, I’ll never help you find the last angel!’
‘You will,’ Cross replied, his cold certainty far more menacing than any of Simeon’s threats.
Nina looked back in desperation at the monitors. Trant was now directly behind Eddie, closing with each step. The MP7 was fixed on the Englishman’s back.
‘Aim for the head,’ said Cross. The gun’s muzzle rose slightly. ‘Ready—’
Nina snatched the headset off him – and jammed its microphone against the earpiece. Trant flinched at a squall of nerve-scraping feedback—
Eddie heard the shriek from the other man’s headphones and spun, firing a burst from his MP7 squarely into the cultist’s chest.
The camera’s view blurred as Trant was flung backwards, ending up pointing skywards. The image rippled as rain landed on it.
Dalton gawped at the screens. ‘What just happened?’
‘Eddie just happened,’ said Nina with triumph, even as Simeon hauled her away from Cross.
The cult leader jumped up, facing her with an expression of rage, but before he could speak, a voice boomed from the speakers. ‘Ay up. You at the other end of this camera – can you hear me?’
Eddie reappeared, pulling the headset from the dead man and peering into the lens. ‘Anyone there?’ he asked, tapping the microphone with a loud whump. ‘Come on, speak up.’
‘Eddie, I’m here!’ Nina shouted into the headset, before Simeon snatched it from her.
The Englishman’s face broke into a strained smile. ‘Nina! Thank God.’
‘Mr Chase!’ said Cross as he put the headset back on. ‘Can you hear me?’
Eddie frowned. ‘Who’s that? You this Prophet bloke?’
‘Yes, I am. Do you have the angel, Mr Chase?’
Eddie drew the camera back and lifted the statue into view. ‘Here. Say hello to everyone at home, angel. Hello, everyone!’ he added in a squeaky voice. Nina couldn’t help but smile.
‘You know how dangerous it is,’ said Cross. ‘If you want to see your wife again, you’ll—’
‘No, no, no,’ Eddie cut in, shaking his head sarcastically. ‘Here’s the deal. You tell me where you are, I turn up, you let Nina go unharmed and then I give you this little fella here. Otherwise, I’ll put it somewhere nobody will ever, ever get their hands on it again. There’s a lot of construction sites in Berlin – a lot of concrete being poured, if you know what I mean. Your man Irton told me you’re pretty desperate to have the full set of these things. So without this, I guess your plan’s fucked, right?’
Cross’s jaw muscles drew tight with anger. Simeon gripped Nina harder, making her gasp in pain. ‘Nobody dictates terms to us!’ he told his leader. ‘If we hurt her, he’ll back down—’
Eddie interrupted him. ‘Cops are almost here.’ The sirens were now much closer. ‘You want me to leave it for them?’
‘Antigua,’ said Cross, the word forcing its way free of his mouth. ‘We’re in Antigua. Bring the angel to the island, and we’ll make the exchange.’
‘Antigua, eh? Me and Nina’d been thinking about having a holiday there. Let me talk to her.’
Cross reluctantly returned the headset to Nina. ‘Eddie!’ she said. ‘You’re okay?’
‘Bit wet. What about you? Have they hurt you?’
‘Not yet.’ She gave Simeon a sidelong look. ‘There have been some threats, though.’
Eddie’s glare through the screen seemed to be aimed directly at Cross. ‘And the baby?’
‘Safe, as far as I know. And Eddie . . . I’ve decided on a name.’
‘Oh you have, have you? Don’t I get a say?’
‘Nope. That’s what happens when you don’t want to know the sex in advance.’
‘Nowt wrong with Arbuthnot, for a boy or a girl,’ he muttered, before glancing back at the alley. ‘Okay, gotta go. I’ll see you soon, love – trust me.’
‘You know I do,’ she replied. He grinned, then dropped the headset on to the grass and ran.
Dalton whirled to face Cross. ‘You’re giving in to him?’ he asked incredulously. ‘You’re letting him come here?’ A faint edge of hysteria entered his voice, before he glanced almost in embarrassment at Nina and hurriedly regained his composure.
‘No, I’m not, Mr President,’ Cross replied, holding in his anger. ‘There’s only one international airport in Antigua, so he has to come through it. We know him; he doesn’t know us. We’ll take the angel from him when he arrives – by force if necessary.’
‘It’ll be necessary,’ rumbled Simeon. Anna nodded in agreement.
‘He’ll be ready for you,’ said Nina.
‘And we’ll be ready for him,’ Cross replied. ‘Norvin, take her back to the house. Dr Wilde,’ he added, as the bodyguard led her away, ‘you’re still going to find the last angel for me, no matter what happens with your husband. You can trust me on that.’
Again the threat was perfectly clear. But Nina also felt a new sense of hope. Not only had Eddie survived; right now he had the upper hand – and the angel.
And now that she knew where she was, she had options too. Without the threat of Eddie’s suffering to force her cooperation, she could risk an escape attempt. She knew from her vacation research that the Caribbean island was not large, and was certain she would not have to go far to find help.
There was the problem that she was under constant surveillance, of course, both electronically as well as by guards like Norvin. She had already started preparations to deal with the latter, though. Even if she was successful, it wouldn’t buy her much time – but it might be enough to let her make a run for the jungle beyond the Mission’s boundary.
With the baby’s well-being to consider as well as her own, though, she couldn’t afford to take the chances she would have done in the past. The moment had to be right.
But she was sure it would come.
Eddie took a circuitous route back to the bridge, tossing the gun into the river along the way. He saw police cars at the intersection, and Maureen Rothschild amongst a small crowd of onlookers.
He moved up behind her. ‘Ay up, Prof.’
‘Oh my God, Eddie!’ gasped Rothschild. ‘You’re alive!’
He huffed with dark humour as he ushered her away from the gawpers. ‘Don’t sound so horrified.’
‘That – that’s not what I meant. I thought they’d killed you! I heard gunshots—’
‘That was me.’
‘But you didn’t have a gun.’
‘Took one of theirs.’
She sucked in her thin lips. ‘I . . . don’t want to know how, do I?’
‘Probably not. But,’ he went on, opening his sodden leather jacket to show her what he was holding inside, ‘I got the angel.’
She regarded the statue with amazement – and concern. ‘Is it intact?’
‘If it wasn’t, I get the feeling I’d be dead already, and so would a lot of other people.’ He closed his jacket again, suppressing a shiver.
‘My God,’ she said, this time with sympathy. ‘You’re freezing! You’ve got to get indoors and dry off.’
‘I can do that back at
the museum.’ He took out his phone. ‘Nina thought I was mad for paying so much, but I’m really glad now I shelled out for a waterproof case.’
‘Who are you calling?’
‘Seretse, for one; we’ll need him to fix things up with the Germans.’ He looked down the street at the police cordon. ‘Last thing I need is to get arrested on a murder charge. It was self-defence, but stuff like that can take days to sort out, and Nina doesn’t have that long. I’ve got to get to her, fast.’
‘You know where she is?’
Eddie nodded. ‘Antigua.’
‘In the Caribbean?’
‘No, in Siberia.’ He gave a half-hearted smile. ‘Yeah, the Caribbean. I’ve got a mate who moved there, so that’s another call I need to make. But I managed to talk to Nina, and the arsehole who kidnapped her. We’re making an exchange, the angel for her.’
‘Do you think you can trust this person?’
‘Nope. Which is why I want to go back to the museum.’
‘Oh, I hope poor Markus is all right,’ Rothschild said.
‘So do I. I need his help with something.’ He looked across the river at the city beyond, then asked a question that left his companion puzzled. ‘You know what time the shops open in Berlin?’
17
Antigua
Maps and notes covered the desk, the laptop open and displaying a chapter from the Bible, but Nina was not reading it. Instead she was in the kitchen making herself breakfast, having forced herself away from her work.
She hadn’t planned to continue Cross’s task, but she found herself being drawn back in, first by boredom and then by her own insatiable curiosity. She kept telling herself that she wasn’t helping her captor by doing so – certainly there had been no blinding flashes of inspiration revealing the last angel’s location – and that with Eddie now free and on the way to her, even if she did discover a secret hidden within Revelation, Cross would never hear it. But a small voice kept warning her that she was falling into a familiar trap . . .
‘I know, damn it!’ she whispered to herself, annoyed by the chidings of her own personal Jiminy Cricket. A glance at the nearest camera, then at the small glass jar beside the sink, containing a cloudy liquid in which a few of the chopped and mashed ingredients were faintly visible. While Norvin had taken over the task of escorting her, Miriam had still been acting as housekeeper; to Nina’s relief, she had left her recipe untouched.
She quickly looked away, suddenly concerned that the attention would somehow alert the watchers to her plan, and took her breakfast to the desk. The Bible text was still waiting on the screen. She munched her toast, trying to ignore it, but her inquisitive side was already drawing her gaze back to the words. They were not from Revelation, but a part of the Old Testament, Exodus, which she had come to suspect was an important piece of the puzzle laid out by John of Patmos almost two millennia earlier. Exactly how, she didn’t know, but the references in Revelation to specific numbers and people and places now seemed unlikely to be coincidences— ‘Mommy’s doing it again,’ she told her bump as she caught herself. As irresistible as she had always found an unsolved puzzle, this time she had to fight the urge to discover the solution.
She finished her meal, battling tedium as she pretended to be working. Even then, part of her mind was still trying to fit the pieces together for real. Finally, she caved in and checked one of the reference books. A map showed the ancient Near East, Egypt to one side and the lands that were now Israel, Jordan and Syria on the other, with the possible routes of the Exodus winding across the arid desert. Landmarks mentioned in the Bible stood out: towns, mountains, oases . . .
Nina looked back through her notes, frowning as an idea gently brushed her thoughts like a passing moth. There was something important, if not on this map then in another she had seen in her research, but she couldn’t quite make the connection—
The answer came to her.
It almost did feel like a blinding flash, so clear that she couldn’t believe she had missed it before. Excited, she peered more closely at the map, about to trace one of the lines with a fingertip before remembering that she was being watched. Instead, she forced herself to follow the path with her eyes alone until it reached a particular named spot.
Could that be it? The clues were in keeping with those that had led to the angels hidden in the catacombs of Rome and the Altar of Zeus. And however insane Cross might be, the fact remained that he had broken the code in Revelation, lacking only the archaeological knowledge to pin down the actual locations. If he were also correct about the third clue, then she might just have identified the Place in the Wilderness . . .
The sound of the door lock snapped her back to the present. ‘Dr Wilde!’ said Norvin, entering before she could answer. ‘The Prophet wants to see you.’
She tried to conceal her sudden nervousness. This was her chance – the only one she would get. ‘Okay, let me wash these,’ she said, quickly tying her hair into a ponytail before standing and collecting her plate and cup.
He folded his arms. ‘Now.’
‘It’ll only take a second.’ Nina went to the sink and ran the crockery under the faucet. ‘Can you pass me that dishcloth?’ She nodded over her shoulder.
Norvin grudgingly picked up the cloth. ‘Here,’ he said, stepping up behind her—
Nina whirled and threw the jar’s contents into his face.
The big man staggered back, trying to cry out, but could only manage a strangled gasp. The recipe was something Eddie had once taught her: a makeshift chemical agent of dried chillis and garlic and vinegar, weak compared to commercial pepper sprays . . . but still more than potent enough to blind and choke an assailant.
Nina took full advantage and smashed the plate against his head. Norvin collapsed, clawing at his burning eyes. She ran for the door, hoping her observers had been frozen by the shock of the attack—
She pulled it open just as a clack came from the lock. The watchers had recovered and tried to seal her in, but too late. She rushed out into the sunlight, alone in the grounds of the Mission.
Waving trees beckoned beyond the fence. She ran to it, grabbing the barbed topmost wire and pulling it upwards before forcing herself through the gap. Her clothing snagged; she tore free, pregnant belly sliding over the steel line below before she almost fell out on the other side.
Her back and one thigh were bleeding from stinging cuts, but tetanus was currently the least of her worries. She looked over the fence. The nearest CCTV camera turned to track her. Cross’s voice barked from the loudspeakers: ‘Dr Wilde! Come back, right now!’
She ran into the trees. The cult leader’s tone became more strident as he issued orders to his followers. ‘Dr Wilde has escaped! Everyone – hunt her down!’
His wording sent a chill through Nina. Another glance over her shoulder, and she saw white-clad figures pouring from the houses. They ran towards the fence after her.
‘Shit!’ she gasped, fear driving her on. One hand outstretched to protect the baby from low branches, she used the other to swat foliage aside as she hurried deeper into the jungle.
It took only seconds before the Mission was lost to sight amongst the greenery, but she could see nothing except plants in every direction. Which way? Following the coastline either north or south would probably bring her to somebody else’s seafront property, but she might end up trapped on a promontory.
Inland. She adjusted her course, hoping she was heading due west. The country’s eastern, Atlantic side was less developed than the calmer Caribbean west, but on such a small island, she couldn’t imagine being more than a mile at most from any settlement.
Running a mile while pregnant presented new problems, though. At this stage, it was not a danger in itself to the baby, but nor was it actively encouraged. And she had let herself slack off in recent months, the combination of reduced exercise and occasional binge-eating now combining with the heat to sap her energy.
No choice. This was her only chance to escap
e.
The ground began to slope more steeply as she weaved between the trees. She angled upwards, breath starting to burn her throat. There might be a viewpoint at the top of the hill, letting her see which way to go instead of trusting to blind chance.
If she could reach it. Shouts came from behind. The cultists were spreading out through the trees after her. The dense layers of wet fallen leaves masked her footprints to an extent, but she had already been through patches of mud, leaving clear tracks. Could she risk trying to decoy them in the wrong direction?
Another shout, this time clear enough for her to make out. ‘Over here!’ She hadn’t been seen directly, but her path had been spotted. They were on her, closing fast.
No time to decoy them – and she couldn’t outrun them for much longer either, already tiring. Once they were close enough to see her, her flight was over. That would happen in a minute, less. Nowhere to run—
Hide. But where? All she could see were trees and shrubs . . .
A large rock jutted from the ground higher up the slope. She ran to it. Could she hide behind it, under it, inside it?
No – but it had a smaller neighbour, and there was a gap between them. Would she fit?
She would have to. The hunters were closing, calling to each other as they swept the hillside.
Nina crouched and backed into the hole feet-first. Stone barked against her heels even before her waist was under cover; the opening was only shallow.
She twisted to fold herself almost into a foetal position as she squirmed backwards, then on some desperate instinct grabbed the broken fronds of a palm from the ground and spread them like a fan, holding them up in front of her. It was a pathetic ruse, she knew. Anyone giving it more than the most casual glance would see through it.
The flat thump of footsteps warned her that her time was up. She froze, hardly daring to breathe.
A middle-aged man with a greying beard came into view past the rock, moving at a rapid jog. He cast a brief sidelong look at the stones to make sure nobody was skulking behind them . . . then continued on.
Nina felt a moment of relief – which was instantly consumed by fear as a second white-clad man rounded the other side of her hiding place. ‘Anything?’ he called.