Eye of the God Read online

  “It's been too long.” DeDe's salt-and-pepper curls, thin frame, and bohemian aura revealed her sense of personal style. It had found its way into the home and made it a comfortable if somewhat messy retreat. Black-and-white photographs, artwork, wall hangings, and stacks of old newspapers were scattered at random.

  “Dow!” Abby beamed as her friend wandered in from the kitchen holding a glass of murky green liquid. Older than DeDe, Dow's wild-looking gray hair was held loosely in a ponytail. He chugged the contents of his glass with a grimace.

  “Good Lord, what on earth are you drinking?” Abby asked, eyeing the glass suspiciously.

  “Barley green,” he said, wiping the green moustache on his shirtsleeve. “Wretched stuff. Tastes like grass clippings.”

  “Then why are you drinking it?”

  “Because I'm old, I'm ugly, and I smoke too much. I figure I ought to do something that's good for my body.”

  Abby laughed with affection and gave him a big hug. “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but barley green won't change any of that.”

  “You're probably right. But it keeps my wife happy.”

  Abby surveyed the apartment, resting her eyes on a recent stack of newspapers. “Looks like you've been busy.”

  “Busy yes … productive no. The Collectors have pulled off three major heists this year.” He dug frantically through a stack of newspapers in the corner. After searching for a moment, he found what he was looking for and shoved it in Abby's face. “The heist in Rio … the Dali … and the others.”

  “Ugh,” she said, waving the paper away. “You don't have to remind me. I was there.”

  “Yes. Yes. Remarkably lucky you were able to witness them firsthand.”

  “Not exactly the word I would use to describe it.”

  DeDe shook her head. “Most men take up golf, or fishing, or welding. My husband spends his spare time documenting art thefts.”

  “So you're sure it was the Collectors in Rio?”

  “Without a doubt.” He dove into another stack of newspaper clippings and continued. “Fascinating, absolutely fascinating, how they work. It's a competition among them you see. They're in a race to acquire priceless works of art. We have yet to see a piece resurface. From what I can gather, it doesn't seem to be a business, but rather a pastime.”

  “I'm sure Interpol would be interested to hear that.”

  Dow snorted and waved an accusatory finger in her face. “Interpol isn't doing half of what they should to catch these guys.”

  She shook her head and suppressed a laugh. “So it's up to you then? You're going to catch them on your own?”

  “If I have to,” he said with a curt nod.

  Abby lifted the top paper from the stack in Dow's arms and read the headline:

  EDVARD MUNCH'S THE SCREAM STOLEN AGAIN

  “What is that, like the twentieth time?”

  “Mark my words,” said Dow. “It will be the last. You'll never see that painting again. The Collectors took it. It's gone.”

  “But it always surfaces. Surely, it's just a matter of time.”

  “I'm telling you, these men don't sell what they steal.”

  DeDe bustled in from the kitchen, carrying a tray of food. “Enough of that. Let's eat.”

  Abby eyed the tray. “Sorry, DeDe, but I've already had dinner.”

  “With whom?” her friend asked.

  “A reporter from National Geographic.”

  “A date?” Dow and DeDe questioned in unison.

  “Hardly,” Abby said. “It was an interview.”

  Eagerly, Dow took her elbow and led her to the table. He could not hide the excitement brimming in his eyes. “Now tell me everything what happened in Rio. And I mean everything.”

  Isaac pushed through the revolving door of Driscoll's, an upscale watering hole in D.C.'s financial district, and headed toward a private room at the back where Alex and the man they knew only as the Broker were waiting.

  “Have a seat,” the Broker said, motioning toward a plush leather chair. He was an attractive, brown-eyed gentleman, somewhere in his late fifties, with flecks of gray at his temples. He rarely smiled, and he never laughed. He would have been a great deal more handsome if he did.

  “Let's get down to business,” Isaac said, wasting no time.

  The Broker took a small sip of his dry martini and brushed an invisible piece of lint from his pant leg. “Have you made contact with the woman?”

  “I have,” replied Alex.

  “And you can use her to get the diamond?”

  “Yes, I believe so.”

  “Good. Then we just need to make payment arrangements.”

  “Not so fast,” Isaac interrupted. “We still need to negotiate a price.”

  “Negotiate? I think not. Our standing fee should be more than sufficient.”

  Isaac laughed. “Twenty million dollars may be adequate to secure a few paintings, but it hardly scratches the surface on this job.”

  The Broker leaned forward in his chair, lips drawn into a tight line. “Twenty million dollars is—”

  “Not enough to draw me out of retirement,” Alex interrupted.

  “Retirement?”

  Alex cast a sideways glance at Isaac, but spoke to the Broker. “You were well aware that I stepped down from your employment after our last contract.”

  “Your brother assured me—”

  “My brother doesn't speak for me,” Alex said. “So if you want your diamond, and you want me to participate, then I'd suggest you up the ante.”

  The Broker narrowed his eyes. “I doubt that your commission warrants such a drastic change in terms.”

  “I beg to differ,” Isaac said. “After many months of reconnaissance, we've concluded that we cannot do the job for what you've offered. Our price is fifty million dollars.”

  “That's ridiculous!” The Broker pounded his fist on the table. The door to their private lounge opened, preventing him from bursting into a full tirade.

  The blonde waitress who entered the room was adept at distracting men from their business. She wore a form-fitting black dress, three-inch heels, and a smile that instantly diffused the tension in the room.

  “Crown and Coke for you,” she said, handing the first glass on her tray to Alex and the second to Isaac. “And Scotch and soda for you. Your friend ordered.” She met Alex's appreciative gaze, curled her lips into a seductive smile, and left the room.

  It took Alex a few seconds to regain his train of thought. He lifted the tumbler from the mahogany table and took a long swig of his drink. “You remembered. How thoughtful.”

  “You must be out of your mind,” the Broker said.

  Isaac shrugged. “You know how this works. The price is never fully settled until we've completed the background work and determined the difficulty of the job. This heist is a logistical nightmare. The price is fifty million dollars.”

  “Absolutely not.”

  Isaac wiped the sweat from his glass and met the Broker's steely gaze without flinching. “The Smithsonian is a fortress, unlike any facility we have ever penetrated, and the odds of us succeeding are almost nonexistent. If we're going to risk our lives and almost certain prison time, we will be well compensated.”

  “I have never paid such a ridiculous amount, and I won't do it now.”

  The brothers exchanged a glance and rose from the table. They left the room without another word. Alex could not help but scan the bar for their waitress on the way out. It was not until they had exited the building that they dared look at one another.

  “He'll come,” Alex said, sticking his hands deep in his pockets.

  “Of course he will,” Isaac agreed.

  “He wants it bad enough. I give him thirty seconds.”

  They began to walk toward the parking garage.

  The Broker stumbled out the revolving door, the fury evident on his face. He struggled to hide it. “Wait!” he shouted. “I need more time to consider the price.”

&n
bsp; Alex pulled a slip of paper from his pocket and handed it to him. “Twenty-five million dollars will be wired to this account by midnight tonight as a down payment if you are serious about enlisting our services. If not, we don't ever want to hear from you again.”

  The Broker took the paper with a trembling hand and slid into the back seat of a silver BMW that waited at the curb.

  Alex's eyes narrowed as he watched the car pull away. “Call me when he makes the transfer.”

  “Where are you going?”

  A mischievous grin crept across his face. “I think I'd like to make the acquaintance of a certain waitress.”

  Three hours later, Alex lay in bed wide awake, watching the clock. Beside him slept a naked woman, wrapped in sheets. Her blonde hair spilled across the pillow.

  As soon as the numbers on his digital alarm clock changed to 12:01, the phone rang. He grabbed it from the cradle before it could ring a second time.

  The pleasure in Isaac's voice was evident. “He was serious.”

  “I thought he might be.”

  6

  ABBY PULLED THE COVERS OVER HER HEAD AND TRIED TO GO BACK TO sleep. Sounds of Sunday morning traffic echoed through the walls of her apartment, and despite her best efforts, she could not ignore them. So she lay motionless under the rumpled covers, letting the sleep drain from her body.

  Finally, she pulled the blankets down just enough to see a promise of sunrise hug her bedroom window. The clock on her nightstand read 7:30. She had hoped to sleep until at least nine. Abby sat up and tossed her legs over the side of the bed, digging her toes into the thick carpet.

  “Coffee,” she mumbled, making her way to the kitchen. “I really need coffee.”

  She flicked the switch on the coffee pot and poured a great deal of creamer into her empty cup. She was not a coffee purist and had never been able to drink it black. The water began to hiss and bubble as it streamed through the machine. The hot, pungent smell floated through the kitchen.

  A few moments later, cup in hand, she pulled an old red blanket around her shoulders and waited for the sun to rise above a small chapel across the street. It was a beckoning of sorts, one that went unheeded, but one she looked for each morning nonetheless.

  Something about the small church comforted her. The warm wooden doors, the stones worn smooth, and the softly chiming bell reminded her of a church on a street corner in Massachusetts that she had entered as a child. Mother had taken her there to kneel before the altar the day her father left them. Her memories of that day were filled with tears and sadness, an ache that drew them into the small chapel. She remembered her bare knees pressing against the smooth wood floor and the feeling of quiet, not just in the church but in her heart as well. She did not know Jesus then, but for the first time she wanted to. Many years had passed since then.

  Abby brought the cup of coffee to her lips, parting just enough for a sip of warmth, and waited for her favorite part of every sunrise. The little chapel was plain and unadorned except for two brilliant stained-glass windows, one behind the pulpit and one at the front above the arched wooden doors. Both were circular, and no more than six feet in diameter. The one above the entry was a simple blue sky with a white dove carrying an olive branch in its mouth. The window above the pulpit was a deep crimson, broken only by a cross.

  Abby leaned forward, expectantly. Slowly, the burning disk of orange sunlight rose, bathing the chapel in light, and bright beams drifted through the empty church, first illuminating the window of red stained glass, and then drifting to the blue. For a few glorious moments the colors combined, bathing her line of sight in majestic purple.

  She watched until it passed, and as the color faded, she felt a pang of loss. The beauty lasted for such a short time, and then once again she sat staring at the cold stones of a church she'd never entered.

  Abby sighed and shuffled into the kitchen to refill her coffee cup. On her way back to the sofa she noticed the glaring empty space on the desk where her laptop usually sat. She froze, and her heart began to pound. Her briefcase was missing as well. It always sat next to her chair under the desk.

  Oh no! This is bad. This is very bad.

  Abby bolted through her apartment, checking all her doors and windows. They were locked from the inside.

  Think, think. She pressed the heel of her hand on her forehead. Where did you have them last? Then she closed her eyes and grimaced.

  She had forgotten to bring them home from work. She was in such a hurry to leave that she hadn't returned to her office after yesterday's presentation. The sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach doubled when she realized that she had not locked her office door either.

  Abby quickly changed into a pair of jeans, old tennis shoes, and a sweatshirt. She twisted her hair into a loose ponytail, grabbed her reading glasses, and bolted from the apartment without applying makeup.

  “How could I have been so stupid?” she moaned. Abby threw her billfold into the car, pulled into traffic, and hit the accelerator.

  To the casual observer it looked like an average, if not obscenely expensive, digital camera. However, what Isaac saw when he looked through the lens was not just the main gallery of the National Gem and Mineral Collection inside the Smithsonian, but also a series of intersecting infrared beams. Yet the display before him showed not where the beams were, but where they had been in the last twenty-four hours. He saved the image to disk and changed his angle, methodically recording the entire grid of light.

  Every exit, camera, security guard, and museum staffer was photographed as he wandered through the gallery, like any other tourist.

  He spent the majority of his time in the room housing the Hope Diamond. The ebb and flow of tourists was constant, and he went unnoticed. Tour guides paraded through, telling the story over and over to snap-happy tourists. The diamond was a favorite attraction, so it was easy for Isaac to mill with the crowds, listening intently and taking detailed pictures of every inch of the room.

  The glass cylinder encasing the diamond was three inches thick and bulletproof. Inside the case itself, the diamond sat on a rotating column, taking one minute to come full circle. With each rotation, the light bounced off every facet, giving the appearance that it glowed from within. The lighting system itself was a fiber-optic marvel, created by Absolute Action Ltd. of London, the world's most renowned lighting firm. It had taken a team of lighting engineers five months to complete the display in 1997 at a cost of thirteen million dollars to the Smithsonian. Included in the renovations were the new display case and a security vault directly below the jewel that was so heavy the museum floor had to be structurally reinforced.

  Isaac circled his prey like a hungry animal. The diamond taunted him from within, forbidden, impossible. The challenge was intoxicating.

  Harsh beams of sunlight fell across Alex's face, burning red behind his eyelids. He squinted into the glare and rolled over in search of his previous night's companion. Empty sheets met his eager grasp, and he sat up to discover he was alone. Alex didn't bother searching the small penthouse. Her purse and the trail of clothes she'd left on his bedroom floor were gone. An uneasy sigh escaped his lips. He had planned on making her breakfast … and asking her name.

  Abby's office sat tucked away on the second floor of the Smithsonian Institution Building, a short distance away from the Museum of Natural History. The red sandstone edifice, constructed in an early Gothic motif, complete with turrets, spires, and arched windows, was appropriately dubbed The Castle. Although it held the main visitor center for the Institution and had a number of maps and displays, The Castle's main function was to house administrative offices and security operations.

  Abby made it to the office in record time. At eight o'clock she charged through the employee entrance and jogged to the elevator. As soon as the doors slid open on the next floor she rushed to her office. The door was slightly cracked, and she pushed it gently, allowing it to swing open. The lights were off, and the room appeared empty. Abby hit the
switch, locked the door, and went straight for her computer. It was sitting on the desk, exactly where she'd left it, scrolling through pictures on her screensaver.

  The cursor blinked rhythmically in an open Word document, the last paragraph of which read:

  Jean-Baptiste Tavernier built a lucrative career on the sale of precious stones he acquired in Asia. An accomplished and shrewd businessman, it was in his best interest to resell his acquisitions as soon as he returned to Europe. Records indicate that is exactly what he did, with one exception: the 112-carat blue diamond purchased from Mir Jumla.

  For reasons he did not record, Jean-Baptiste Tavernier kept the great blue diamond in his possession for fifteen years. It was the largest and rarest diamond he had ever owned, and ultimately, the one that profited him the most. In 1668, it was purchased by King Louis XIV for the astounding sum of 400,000 livres, or the equivalent of 3.6 million dollars in today's currency…

  Abby saved the document and went to her control panel. She hastily typed in her password and pulled up a list of recently used programs. Nothing out of the ordinary. She was not fully satisfied, however, and ran KeyLogger, a program that showed every keystroke made within the last seventy-two hours.

  She had only intended to stay at the office long enough to make sure that her computer and briefcase had gone untouched. But as soon as her mind was put at ease, the piles of paper on her desk drew her attention. Almost three hours later, she was still engrossed in a stack of release forms. The abrasive buzzing of the telephone startled her. Abby glanced at it, but didn't answer.

  Her answering machine picked up on the fourth ring, “Hi, you've reached the office of Dr. Abigail Mitchell. I'm out of the office at the moment, but if you leave your name and number I'll get back with you.”

  “Hi Dr. Mitchell … I mean Abby. This is Alex Weld from National Geographic—”

  She turned and stared at the recording light on her machine and debated whether to pick up.

  “I was calling to see if I could set up a time to finish that interview we started. Just let me know when is best for you. My number is—”