The Last Templar - Страница 15

"Any chance you can send me copies of them?"

"Not a problem. We'll have to charge you, though."

Tess gave him her office address and made sure he billed her in her own name. Right now was not a 41

good time to upset the budget watchers at the Institute. She hung up and felt strangely elated. It brought back memories of the field and of the excitement, particularly at the beginning of a dig, when everything was possible.

But this wasn't a dig.

What are you doing? You're an archaeologist. This isn't detective amateur hour. Call the FBI, tell them what you're thinking, and let them follow it up. Tess wondered if not telling them what she was working on was in any way hindering their progress. Then she dismissed the thought. They'd probably laugh her out of the building. Still. Detectives and archaeologists. They weren't that different, were they? They both uncovered what happened in the past. Okay, so two days ago wasn't really a time frame archaeologists usually focused on.

It didn't matter.

She couldn't help herself. She was way too intrigued by it all. She was there, after all. She was there and she'd made the connection. And most of all, she really, really missed a bit of excitement in her life. She went back online and dove back into her research into the Knights Templar. She glanced up and noticed Lizzie, the secretary, looking at her curiously. Tess smiled at her. She liked Lizzie and occasionally confided in her over personal matters. But, having already talked with Edmondson, she wasn't about to confide in anyone else. Not about this. Not to anyone.

Chapter 18

N either Reilly nor Aparo had been hurt, just a few seat belt bruises and a couple of minor lesions from windshield debris. They had trailed the speeding ambulance carrying Gus Waldron up the FDR Drive to the New York-Presbyterian Hospital. Once Waldron was in the operating room, a black nurse with a short temper persuaded them to let her check them over. When they finally relented, she cleaned and bandaged their cuts, more brusquely than they would have liked, and they were free to go.

According to the doctors in the ER, their man was unlikely to be in any condition to talk to them for at least a couple of days, maybe more. His wounds were extensive. All they could do was wait for him to be fit for questioning, while hoping the agents and detectives now looking into the wounded raider's life got a handle on where he'd been holed up since the robbery.

Aparo told Reilly he'd call it a day and head home to his wife who had, in her midforties, managed to become pregnant with their third child. Reilly decided to stick around and wait until the raider came out of surgery before heading home. Although he was physically and mentally exhausted by the events of the day, he was never in that much of a rush to go back to the solitude of his apartment. Living alone in a city teeming with life did that to you.

Wandering in search of a hot cup of coffee, Reilly stepped into an elevator to find a familiar face staring back at him. There was no mistaking those green eyes. She gave him a brief, cordial nod before turning away. He could see she was preoccupied with something and looked elsewhere, his gaze setting on the doors of the elevator as they slid shut.

Reilly was surprised to find that the confines of the small elevator cabin made her proximity unnerving. As the elevator hummed its way down, he glanced over and saw her acknowledge him again. He hazarded something that was trying to be a smile, a quasi-smile, and was surprised to see a look of recognition crossing her face.

"You were there, weren't you? At the museum, the night of. . ." she ventured.

"Yes, sort of. I came in later." He paused, thinking he was being too coy. "I'm with the FBI." He hated the way tiiat must have sounded, although there was no simpler way of putting it.

"Oh."

There was an uncomfortable pause before they spoke at the same time, her "How is the—" colliding with his "So are you—." They both stopped and smiled mid-sentence.

"I'm sorry," Reilly offered. "You were saying?"

"I was just going to ask how the investigation was going, but then I don't suppose it's something you can discuss freely."

"Not really." That sounded way too self-aggrandizing, Reilly thought, quickly catching it up with,

"But it's not like there's that much to tell anyway. Why are you here?"

"I was just visiting a friend. He was hurt that night."

"Is he okay?"

"Yeah, he'll be fine."

The elevator pinged, having reached the ground level. As he watched her walk out, she turned, seeming to make her mind up about bringing something up.

"I've been meaning to contact your office again. Agent Gaines gave me her card that night."

"Amelia. We work together. I'm Reilly. Sean Reilly." He extended his hand.

Tess took it and told him her name.

"Is it anything I can help you with?" he asked.

"Well, it's just. . . she said to call if I thought of anything, and, well, there's this one thing I've been thinking about. It's actually something my friend who's here has been helping me with. But then I'm sure you guys have already looked into it."

"Not necessarily. And believe me, we're always open to new leads. What is it?"

"It's that whole Templar thing."

Reilly clearly didn't know what she was talking about. "What Templar thing?"

"You know, the outfits they were wearing, the decoder they took. And the Latin saying one of die horsemen said when he grabbed it."

Reilly looked at her, perplexed. "Do you have time for a cup of coffee?"

Chapter 19

The cafe on the ground level of the hospital was almost empty. After they had brought their coffees to a table, Tess was surprised when the first thing Reilly did was ask if it was her daughter who'd been with her at the museum.

"Yes, she was," she said, smiling. "Her name's Kim."

"She looks like you."

She was immediately disappointed. Even though she'd only glimpsed him fleetingly at the Met, and only actually met him minutes earlier, something about him felt comfortable. God, I've really got to get my male sensors recalibrated. She cringed as she waited for the inevitable guy-on-the-make's traditional compliment. You don't look old enough; I thought you were sisters; whatever. But he surprised her again when he asked, "Where was she when it all happened?"

"Kim? My mom had taken her to the ladies' room. While they were in there, she heard the uproar and decided to stay put."

"So they missed the bad part."

Tess nodded, curious as to his interest. "Neither of them saw anything."

"What about afterward?"

"I went to find them and made sure we stayed away until the ambulances were gone," she told him, still unsure about where he was going with this.

"So she didn't see any of the wounded or . . ."

"No, just the damage in the Great Hall."

He nodded. "Good. But she obviously knows what happened."

"She's nine, Agent Reilly. She's everyone's new best friend at school right now; they all want to know what it was like to be there."

"I can imagine. Still, you should really keep an eye on her. Even without actually witnessing it, something like this can have aftereffects, especially on someone that young. Could be just nightmares, could be more. Just keep an eye out, that's all. You never know."

Tess was totally thrown by his interest in Kim. She dazedly nodded, "Sure."

Reilly sat back. "How about you? You were right in the thick of it."

Tess was intrigued. "How'd you know that?"

"Security cameras. I saw you on the tape." He wasn't sure about whether or not that sounded mildly perverted. He hoped it didn't, but he couldn't tell from her look. "You okay?"

"Yeah." Tess flashed back to the horsemen trashing the museum and firing their guns and to the fourth horseman grabbing the encoder inches away from her, his horse literally breathing down her neck. It wasn't a sight she'd ever forget, nor would the fear she felt soon dissipate. She tried not to show it. "It was pretty intense, but . . . somehow it was so surreal that, I don't know, maybe I've tucked it away under the fiction section of my memory bank."

"Just as well." He hesitated. "I'm sorry to be nosy, it's just that I've been around circumstances like this and it's not always easy to deal with."

She looked at him, brightening. "I understand. And I do appreciate your concern," she said, mildly curious to note that while she was usually defensive when anyone talked to her about Kim, she did not take exception to this man. His concern appeared to be genuine.

"So," he said. "What's all this stuff about Templars?"

She edged closer, surprised. "You guys aren't looking into any kind of Templar angle?"

"Not that I'm aware of."

Tess felt deflated. "See, I knew it was nothing."

"Just tell me what you're thinking."

"What do you know about them?"

"Not much," he confessed.

"Well, the good news is you're not a lunatic." She smiled before quickly regretting her comment, which he didn't get, and moving on. "Okay. Let's see ... 1118. The First Crusade is over, and the Holy Land is back in Christian hands. Baldwin II is the King of Jerusalem, people across Europe are jubilant, and pilgrims are flocking to see what all the fuss was about. What the pilgrims often didn't know was that they were venturing into dangerous territory. Once they'd 'liberated' the Holy Land, the crusading knights considered their vows fulfilled and went back to their homes in Europe, taking their plundered riches with them and leaving the area precariously surrounded by hostile Islamic states. The Turks and the Muslims who had lost much of their lands to the Christian armies weren't about to forgive and forget, and a lot of the pilgrims heading there never made it to Jerusalem. They were attacked and robbed and often killed. Arab bandits were a constant threat to travelers, which kind of defeated the purpose of the Crusade in the first place."