Moses & Mac, page 4
part #1 of Vatican Archaeological Service Series
I folded the envelope and inserted it in my bag with a meek thank you.
“You will be getting a fake passport.”
That grabbed my attention.
“You’re a wanted woman.”
That made me nervous.
“It will ensure anonymity. I got a hold of our former contact at the RCMP and he assured me that one of their agents would be meeting you in Newfoundland and giving it to you. You’ll be provided with an identity and the details. You’ll have to remember them wherever you go.”
“Any idea who I’m going to be?” Famous author? Struggling actor? Novice nun?
He shook his head.
For an organized neat freak, who needed everything planned to the minute detail, I had to stifle the panic attack welling up in me and just try and roll with it. “So, we’re all running by the seat of our pants?”
“We’re all scrambling to get the operation going again. We’re…improvising. I’m very thankful that our old contact at the RCMP is now the Commissioner and can get everything going in a blink of an eye. If he wasn’t, I don’t know how long it would have taken to get a fake passport for you.”
My new phone rang. It was Rabbi Sever and I put her on speaker.
“I got a hold of our agent at the Jerusalem office,” she said. “He was just as surprised and excited as we were to hear we were starting up operations again and were on a mission to find Moses’ rod. You can fill him in when you meet him in Jerusalem. His name is Gideon Kleiman. He’s sending a private jet to pick you up at Churchill, a small airport in Newfoundland, which will be equipped with your very own Mossad agent, Jonathon Zingel.”
“Mossad?”
“Mossad is the CIA of Israel—intelligence and special operations. You will be boarding the jet bound for Tel Aviv. Agent Zingel will be your bodyguard, driver, shepherd or whatever you need him to be, and he won’t leave your side until you are safely deposited in Gideon’s office in Jerusalem. In the meantime, Gideon will be looking for a VAS agent to help you. Until then, Jonathon Zingel is your man.”
I had a private jet coming just for me with my own Mossad James Bond at my beck and call. Other than a happy birthday from anyone in my vast family, what more could a Victorian scholar ask for?
I should have dressed better.
“You don’t have to worry about anything here. I’ve arranged for someone to take over your classes if need be. I’m still trying to get a hold of Cardinal Z at the Vatican. Call me using Sister Emma’s cell.”
Sister Dictator from high school? “She knows?”
“Former VAS agent.”
“Right and Father Somerville, too.”
“How did you know?”
I glared incredulously at Father Logan.
“You think those moves with the desk and the cane came out of nowhere? His spy instincts checked in.”
“And dementia is his cover?”
“That’s classified information.”
Okey dokey.
“Logan will have Father Somerville’s cell,” Rabbi Sever said. “Don’t call anyone with your new phone or any phone for that matter. No family or friends. Their phone could be compromised, and we don’t want anyone knowing where you are.”
“My parents will be worried if they don’t hear from me every couple of days.”
“I’ll think of something to tell them,” Father Logan said.
“Bring me back a souvenir from Jerusalem, Auntie Mac!”
I flinched. “Is that Kaitlyn?” Hadn’t she gone to school?
Rabbi Sever moved her phone and I saw Kaitlyn working on an old computer. She waved and continued working.
“You’re doing the right thing, Mackenzie,” Rabbi Sever said. “Father Somerville would like you to light a candle for him at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. I’d appreciate it if you would say a prayer for me at the Wailing Wall. Mazel tov.”
Great. Souvenir for Kaitlyn. Candle for Father Somerville. Prayer for Rabbi Sever. Moses’ rod for the world. All I wanted was a simple happy birthday.
Over an hour later, we reached the airport. Father Logan parked, took my suitcase and wheeled it toward a number of small planes parked in front of a hangar. He was weaving around the planes, looking for one in particular and then stopped and laughed. “That’s the one.” Under the number was the plane’s name. Jezebel. How fitting. A princess in the Old Testament, who had convinced her husband to abandon God and follow random deities. The plane glistened pearly white but had lettering the color of blood. Father Logan’s Firebird looked bigger, stronger, and meaner than Jezebel.
I could feel myself getting dizzy already. I didn’t do well on things that left the ground—rollercoasters, elevators, swirling staircases—and planes were at the top of the list. I had brought some remedy, but I hadn’t taken it yet, mainly because I’d have to drink the whole bottle or the bubbles would go flat.
I checked my phone for messages. My family still had a lot of time to call but nothing.
As I started to give way to self-pity, my gaze zeroed in on a super tall man with muscle power pushing out of tight jeans, a checkered shirt and a well-worn leather jacket. He had ginger hair on the disheveled side with matching fuzz around the jaw and the fair skin of an Irishman. He wasn’t under thirty because I didn’t want to believe I was attracted to a younger man and he wasn’t over forty because I also didn’t want to believe I was attracted to an older man. I had always refused to get involved with any man who was Irish—as well as any man who was Italian—but he was the most gorgeous Irishman my forlorn eyes had ever seen.
If this was Father Logan’s nephew, I was in trouble.
Father Logan waved, and the man waved back.
I was in trouble. I was totally inept with men below Ph.D. status and if this man made a living flying planes, wearing cowboy-tight jeans and biker-style leather jackets, then I was sure he hadn’t spent the better part of his life in libraries, dissertation hearings, and lecture halls.
“Eoin, how are you?” Father Logan gave him a big hug.
“Business has been good, and mom isn’t on my back, so all is well.” His gaze landed on me. Leprechaun green eyes, a smattering of freckles, and through the fuzz on his jaw, I spied a cleft in his chin. Could it get any better...or should I say any worse?
I really should have dressed better.
“Mackenzie Braden, my nephew Eoin Reilly, my oldest sister’s son.”
Eoin held out a big hand and we did the handshaking business. It was firm and covered my entire hand. I felt myself breaking out in a sweat. I was so out of my male realm.
“I’m flying you out to Churchill, Newfoundland and then you’re boarding a private plane for Tel Aviv,” he said like a summary. “RCMP, CSIS, FBI, CIA, NSA?”
“Ph.D.”
“Some sort of research dig?”
I thought about it. “Possibly.”
Father Logan cleared his throat. “Eoin, remember those tales I used to tell you about me being a spy?” Eoin’s eyebrows arched. “Well, they weren’t tales.”
His eyes narrowed. “RCMP, CSIS, FBI, NSA, or CIA?”
“VAS,” Father Logan replied. “Vatican Archaeological Services.”
Eoin waited for more information.
“Remember when you were still that innocent boy and your father went on long trips and came back to say he had gone to Ottawa?”
“I’m afraid to say it but, yes.”
“He was flying me or Mackenzie’s Aunt Sara or anyone of our other agents to Saint John’s, Newfoundland, where we would board a cargo plane and fly out to Tel Aviv, Damascus, Cairo or some other Middle Eastern city for a biblical archaeological mission. He worked for VAS as our pilot.”
Eoin folded his arms against his broad chest and looked at him. Then at me. I simply shrugged, trying to keep my eyes off his chest…and arms…and legs. “Does mom know?”
“No one other than you knows, and we’re keeping it that way. I’ll fill you in on all the details when you get back from Newfoundland. For now, I need you to keep this under your hat and get Mackenzie there safely. She’ll be met by a representative from the RCMP there. A private jet will be waiting also, and a Mossad agent will be escorting her to Tel Aviv.” He ran his hand over the plane. “You got a new plane?”
“I sold Dad’s about a year ago. It’s more lucrative to carry cargo than people.”
“So, you’re doing well?”
“Business goes up and down, but I’m surviving.” He turned to me. “We should start heading out if we want to make Churchill by nightfall. It’s a good five-and-a-half-hour flight with a stopover for fuel in Montreal.”
Father Logan handed Eoin my suitcase. “Good luck, Mackenzie.” He held out his hand for my cell. I checked it one last time for messages—nothing—and gave it to him.
Kaitlyn, Rabbi Sever, and Father Somerville had put in their orders except for him. “Do you want anything from Jerusalem? Souvenir, prayers, lit candles?”
He thought about it. “A miracle.”
“Moses’ rod?”
His smile was wry. “Yes…but Sara dead or alive would be better.”
Chapter Five
He couldn’t have asked for holy water from the Jordan River?
“I’ll work on it.” He hugged me, gave Eoin a fist punch, raised his hand over Jezebel, said a blessing and then with a wink left for his car. None of that “go-get-them-in-the-name-of-God” made me feel better.
Eoin swept his hand over the steps. “Climb on board, Doc.”
I flinched. No one ever referred to me as Doctor Braden. At school it was Professor Braden. At home I was Mac or Mackie except for my mother who always called me Mackenzie. “It’s Mackenzie. When you take one of my classes, it’s Professor Braden.”
“It’s E O I N.”
I was confused.
“My name. It’s spelled E O I N not I A N as most people assume.”
“E O I N,” I repeated. Interesting. Exotic. Sexy, actually. Perfect for an Irish cowboy-biker right out of my league. I indicated the name under the number of his plane. “What’s with Jezebel?”
“I like challenging women.”
“Jezebel was underhanded.”
“Even better.”
Well, that pretty much excluded me.
I got into the plane and sat in the passenger’s seat, putting my saddle bag under it. I could feel a sweat coming on. There was lots of leg room in the cockpit, but the windows would be the only thing separating me from the great outdoors when we were way up in never-never land. Eoin dropped my one little suitcase in the empty space behind my seat. I hoped the hatch at the back didn’t open and suck me out while we were in the clouds. I did want to return home and make sure my family suffered sharp pangs of guilt for not remembering my birthday (before they turned the tables and made me feel guilty for being angry with them).
Eoin secured the door and sat in the pilot’s seat. I put on the seat belt, tugged at it several times to make sure it was locked, checked for an airbag, which was missing, and a lifejacket, which I also couldn’t find.
“Looking for the inflight magazines?” Eoin’s smile was lopsided, making him look cute.
“The last time I was in a plane this small it was at the kids’ rides at Wonderland.” I didn’t want to tell him I had thrown up all over big sis Gabriella that first and last time. It was a rather delicate memory and one she and sisters’ number two and three had never let me forget.
“It’ll hold you.”
“Good. I was too heavy for those rides.”
He took all of me in in a flash, which made me feel sexy hot. I couldn’t remember the last time a man looked at me liked that and not for an answer about Jane Austen.
“If you’re going to play the ‘I’m fat’ tune, then I’m not dancing.”
I looked down at my size 36C bust line, hidden underneath my decorative scarf, complements of my mother and stolen from my three evil sisters. I always jogged—even when I had the extra weight on—but I hadn’t done a sit up or push up since grade ten gym class. E.O.I.N. was surprisingly sharp. “How many sisters do you have?”
“Two. One older and one younger. I’ve heard all the tunes, especially the fat one.”
That was fine with me. I could never carry a tune. “So, you were the ham between them?”
His grin was cute again. “The ham and all the other fixings.”
He gave me a headset, a stick of gum, and a sickness bag. “Headset stays on. Gum is optional but recommended. Sickness bag is a precaution. Look forward and you should be okay.”
“No demo video?”
He put on his headset. “That’s the extent of the pre-flight security info.”
I adjusted the headset over my ears, popped the gum in my mouth, put the bag on my lap, closed my eyes, and dug my nails into the armrests. “Tell me when we get to Churchill,” and I began to chomp away at the gum.
The plane moved out its parking space and toward the runway. Once Eoin received clearance from the air traffic controller, he began to move the plane forward. I took a quick peek out of the side window. Things were flying by more quickly than a car on a highway and I closed my eyes again. I fell back against the seat and began to feel weightless. We were moving into the air, climbing higher and higher. Eoin said some pilot-techie stuff on the radio, which responded in static but meant something to him. After a while the plane levelled off and I was sitting rigid in my chair, facing forward.
I felt a knock on my headset and jumped. “You can open your eyes now, Doc.”
I cracked an eye open and feasted my gaze on him. I didn’t want to look down or sideways. I didn’t know what my stomach would say. “Are we in Churchill already?”
“We won’t get there until almost nine, Newfoundland time. When you’re ready, take a look around and get comfortable.”
I cracked open my other eye. We were just below some clouds and I could see lots of fields and highway below. “That’s a whole lot of traffic down there.”
“Rush hour is starting. No rush hour up here.”
He was right. I settled into my chair and tried to pick out places I recognized. The old Bowmanville Zoo. Queen’s University—their football team was practicing. The Thousand Islands, which were spectacular from the sky as they were from down below. I continued chewing away at my gum. It was bubble gum and I almost blew a bubble until I remembered I wasn’t in high school with my bestie Carla.
“So, you’re a spy?” he asked.
“Since about 11:30 this morning and not by choice.”
“How’d that happen?”
“I got a package and a letter from my Aunt Sara.”
“It was unexpected?”
“She’s been dead for thirty years.”
Eoin turned his attention on me until I indicated that he should keep his eyes on the road.
“It didn’t stop there. Soon after, I got shot at by five Syrians, one of whom was a doctoral candidate I was advising, got rescued by a female rabbi, heroically fought for by a homeless man, found sanctuary in a church, went through a wardrobe in the sacristy to the secret hideout of some hitherto unknown spy agency called VAS, saw a spider turn into salt, and after kicking myself for being a wimp, I became a spy.”
“If my uncle hadn’t told me about all that spy business, I would think you were nuts. What did the Syrians want?”
Out of my messenger bag I pulled the figurine of Moses and the rod. “According to your uncle and the female rabbi who also happens to be a VAS agent, my aunt has discovered Moses’ rod. If it gets into the wrong hands, then it’s world domination for the bad guys.”
“So, you’re supposed to get it before the wrong hands do?”
“That’s the bottom line.” I was expecting him to sneer or do something that would make me feel foolish, but he didn’t say or do anything.
“Does this mean that your Aunt Sara is alive?”
“Three years ago, she was but now, I don’t know. The letter didn’t have a date. I don’t know when it was mailed, if she mailed it, where it was sent from, or why now of all times.”
“Why are you the lucky winner?”
“She thinks we’re kindred spirits.”
“Are you?”
I almost blew a bubble. “We’re about to find out.” We were flying outside Ottawa now. I could see the Rideau Canal and the Parliament Buildings. It wasn’t as bad as I first imagined. It was kind of sedative—as long as Jezebel didn’t screw around and stayed up. “Where did you learn to fly?”
“The military. I joined right after high school and trained to fly fighter planes. Did three tours in Afghanistan. When my father died two years ago, I left, got my commercial pilot’s license and took over his business. He flew people. There’s more money in flying cargo. Been doing that for the last few months now.”
“Is this plane easier to fly than a fighter plane?”
“A fighter can go one and half times faster than the speed of sound, is far more computerized, and a lot more destructive. Flying this little baby is like driving a car in the air. The control column is your steering wheel and controls whether you go up or down. It also tips the wings. The throttle is the stick shift and can make you go faster or slower. The rudders help to turn the plane left or right. Then you’ve got your panel, which is like the dashboard of a car. It indicates airspeed, altitude, and where you’re heading. The GPS map display shows where you are. This gauge tells you how much fuel you’ve got and these little buttons control the lights.”
There were a lot more buttons, but I supposed the ones he had mentioned were the most important. From one well-organized brain to another, it was impressive and understandable. “How do you know where you’re going when you’re in the air? I don’t see any road signs.”
“GPS and radar.” He indicated the screen that had an outline to the airport to Montreal and then to Churchill in Newfoundland. “Our flight plan is….” He started to blink. “Our flight plan is programmed….” He took a drink of water. “Sorry, our des…tin…a…tion….” He slumped over his control column and went still. The plane tilted, jolting me toward him.
