Rising Phoenix Read online

  Erica nodded and silently turned back to her pasta.

  Blake sighed and headed for his bedroom to change.

  Erica had been the perfect wife when he had still been at his little chapel in western Maryland—reserved, God-fearing, and supportive. The further his star had risen, though, the further she had retreated into her furniture collecting, painting, and childrearing. While her increasingly introverted nature was not really a hindrance to him, he had hoped that she would develop into a formidable ally. He still saw himself as a preacher, but he needed a politician’s wife.

  Ten minutes later Blake reappeared in loose-fitting khakis and a Polo shirt. His children, Joshua and Mary, were already seated, and Erica was spooning sauce onto plates heaped with pasta.

  “Hi, Daddy,” Mary said, waving her little hand. Josh remained unusually quiet and did not meet his father’s gaze.

  “Hello, Princess. Did you have a fun day today?” She smiled and nodded her head.

  Blake turned to his son, who had begun junior high the month before. “How was school today, son?”

  A strange look flashed over Joshua’s face. Fear? Then it was gone.

  “Fine, Dad.” He studied his food.

  “Something wrong?”

  “Huh-uh.”

  They finished the meal in silence. Blake resisted the urge to have a second helping. His pants were starting to feel a little tight.

  “You all finished, honey?” Erica asked her daughter. She smiled and nodded again.

  “Why don’t you wipe all that sauce off and go watch some TV?”

  “Can I?” she dragged a napkin across her face and took off before her mother could change her mind.

  Dinner had left Blake a bit confused. Their usual lively conversation had been replaced by the quiet clinking of forks against porcelain. And now Erica had suggested that Mary go watch TV, a device that she could effectively argue was the root of all evil—though she would never dare to do so in front of him.

  “Josh has something he wants to talk to you about,” Erica said as the sound of their daughter’s footsteps faded into the distance. She was talking to her husband but looking directly at Josh, who squirmed uncomfortably.

  She prodded again. “Josh?”

  “It’s about Jimmy,” he said, still working to find a comfortable position in his seat.

  James Miller was Josh’s best friend. They had met in the fourth grade and had been virtually inseparable ever since. Two peas in a pod.

  “What about Jimmy?”

  Josh looked to his mother for support. She wasn’t offering any.

  “He, uh, got expelled today.”

  At first Blake thought that he hadn’t heard correctly. “Expelled?”

  Josh nodded.

  “What? Why? Was he cheating?” Blake couldn’t imagine Jimmy doing anything warranting expulsion. There must be some mistake.

  “Uh, no.”

  Josh didn’t seem able to continue. He stared at his plate. Blake looked at his wife. “What?”

  She was silent for a moment, but finally decided to jump in and help her son. “They found some marijuana in his locker, Simon.”

  He fell silent, staring dumbly at his wife. Finally he turned back to his son. “Did you know that Jimmy was using drugs?”

  “Not really, I …”

  Blake exploded, slamming his hand down hard on the table. The drinking glasses swayed dangerously as Josh scooted back in his chair, putting some distance between him and his father.

  “Don’t give me that ’not really’ crap! Either you knew or you didn’t!” The flames of hell began to glow alarmingly bright around his son’s head.

  Tears welled up in the boy’s eyes. His mouth moved, but at first no sound came out. “He just told me a few days ago.”

  “Bullshit!” Blake yelled, reaching across the corner of the table and grabbing Josh’s arm. “Have you been using drugs? Answer me! Have you been using drugs?”

  Josh looked to his mother again, and in that brief moment Blake saw the truth in his son’s eyes. He let go of the boy’s arm and slumped back into his chair. A wave of nausea hit him violently and then subsided.

  “It was nothing Dad. Really, I …”

  “Get out of my sight,” Blake said quietly.

  Josh stood and Walked slowly from the room wiping at his eyes with his sleeve.

  Erica reached across the table to take her husband’s hand, but he pulled away.

  “We’ll talk about this later,” Blake said in a slightly threatening tone. He pushed his chair back and began walking slowly to his den.

  There wasn’t anything Oriental in his den. The cluttered room was dominated by a large desk in the far corner. Books on various aspects of Christianity littered poorly organized book shelves. But it was the overstuffed chair by the fireplace that he was interested in at the moment. He did his best thinking in its embrace.

  Blake grabbed some kindling out of a bronze bucket and carefully organized it in the fireplace. When the fire was roaring to his satisfaction, he sat, regretting for one of the few times in his life that he didn’t drink.

  It was too quiet. He grabbed the TV remote and flipped quickly through the channels, finally deciding on a local newscast. He didn’t have much interest in what the well-groomed anchorman was saying, but the background noise was somehow comforting.

  “… young Katerina Washington was found dead in her home in Washington, D.C., this evening.” Blake turned his attention from the dancing flames to the television as the scene cut to a shot of a dark D.C. neighborhood. Four police cars were parked haphazardly in front of a small gray house, their blue lights giving a sick swirling effect to the scene. A small lump under a white sheet was being rolled down the sidewalk as a growing crowd looked on. The cameras turned and focused on a young woman sitting in the back of one of the squad cars. The powerful lights glared off of the glass, partially obscuring her tear-streaked face. A man with a microphone stepped into the picture, successfully stopping a policeman who seemed to be walking toward the house.

  “Lieutenant, can you tell us what happened here?”

  The cop looked bored. His eyes met the camera as the reporter pushed the microphone into his face. “The victim was found by her mother about an hour ago. It looks like a bullet came through an open window and struck her in the head. She was killed instantly.”

  “Do you have any suspects?”

  The cop shook his head. “Nobody seems to have seen anything. There’s a lot of drug trafficking in this neighborhood. Seems pretty likely that it was a stray bullet from a gunfight that took place earlier today.”

  “Shit!” Blake yelled, throwing the remote at the TV. When it hit, the channel changed to an old episode of Father Knows Best. He turned his attention back to the fire. The television played on, recalling another time. A time when America was on the right track. A time before drugs, before hippies, before Vietnam.

  After about ten minutes he rose from his chair, turned off the television, and walked to his desk. Glancing back to make sure that the door to the den was firmly shut, he picked up the phone.

  John Hobart was sitting in the small office that he kept above his garage. The room was lit only by the screen of his personal computer and a small halogen desk lamp. For the past two hours he had been reviewing the status of Blake’s offshore accounts, a job that was becoming easier and easier with recent advances in technology. And that concerned him. The thought of an overzealous reporter finding an MIT whiz kid to dig up embarrassing information about the church had been bouncing around in his mind for some time. But he had done, and was doing, everything possible to prevent that kind of thing from happening. There was no point in spending time worrying about things that were beyond all control.

  His concentration was disrupted by the phone sitting on the credenza behind him. He picked it up on the first ring. Not surprisingly, it was Blake. He gave very few people his home number.

  “What can I do for you, Reverend?”
/>   Blake’s voice was low and quiet. There was something in his tone that could only be described as despair.

  “Remember what we were talking about today? Your simple solution to America’s problems?”

  “Yes.” Hobart was cradling the phone in the crook of his shoulder, half listening, as he punched instructions into his computer.

  “I recall you saying that one of the best things about this, uh, operation, was that maintaining it wouldn’t take much manpower.”

  “I don’t know if I used those exact words. What are you driving at, Reverend?”

  There was a moment of silence on the line. “Could a small organization with substantial financial resources carry out a course of action like we discussed without the involvement of the government?”

  Hobart stopped tapping at the keyboard and focused for the first time on the conversation. “That’s an interesting question, Reverend.” He thought about it for a few moments. “Sure, I don’t see why not.”

  “Would you be interested in being involved in an organization like that?”

  Hobart couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and for a moment thought he had misunderstood Blake’s meaning. Replaying the conversation in his head, he decided that he wasn’t mistaken.

  “I’m probably the only man for the job,” Hobart replied honestly. Other men would crack in the face of mounting casualties, he knew, or would make mistakes that would lead the FBI to their door. Hobart’s amoral nature and intimate knowledge of investigative procedure combined to make him perhaps uniquely qualified.

  “Let’s discuss it tomorrow. Eleven A.M.” The phone went dead.

  Hobart sat quietly in the semidarkness of his office, still stunned by the conversation. He had seen the Reverend act ashly before, but he usually came to his senses within a few days. Hobart suspected that his boss would regret this conversation in the morning, and by eleven o’clock would have forgotten all about it. He’d seen it before.

  He flicked off the computer and the lamp and sat in the dark silence of the office. His mind raced, running endless scenarios for the operation and for his meeting with Blake the next morning. He would have to downplay casualties and cost, but most important, he would have to devise a plan that would insulate Blake from any personal risk.

  Hobart pulled his knees to his chest, balancing his heels on the edge of the chair. Until now, he hadn’t realized how much of the frustration and resentment he’d suffered at the DEA was still with him. He had spent years trying to compete against the world narcotics machine using conventional legal tactics, and had suffered defeat after defeat at the hands of men of vastly inferior intellect and capability. Now he had a chance to level the playing field, to use methods that would make the most ruthless cartel enforcer cringe. A chance to beat them at their own game.

  3

  Baltimore, Maryland,

  October 16

  The Reverend Simon Blake stared silently at the blank piece of paper lying on his desk. He reached for the mug of coffee next to him, but feeling that the cup had gone cold, withdrew his hand and leaned back in his chair.

  It was a little after ten o’clock on Monday morning. Sermon-writing morning.

  Usually Monday was his favorite day of the week—the day that he created the message that would keep millions of viewers glued to their televisions and on the virtuous path. But today the words wouldn’t come.

  As soon as he had settled in behind his desk, his thoughts had turned to his son. Pictures of Josh’s “innocent” experimentation with marijuana flashed through his mind, gaining mass and speed. Soon the image of his son taking his first hesitant puff on a joint was replaced by that of an older Josh sitting alone in front of a mirror piled high with cocaine. Finally he saw his son, old and emaciated, lying in a garbage-strewn alley with a needle in his arm.

  Blake knew that he couldn’t let that happen.

  A knock at his office door jolted Blake back to reality. He straightened up in his chair and ran a hand through his short hair.

  “Come in.”

  John Hobart strode through the door, closing it firmly behind him. “Good morning, Reverend. You ready to talk?”

  Blake stood and walked silently to the conference table near the door. Hobart sat down next to him.

  “Have you made a decision, Reverend?”

  Blake shook his head slowly. “I’d like to hear some specifics.”

  Hobart’s tone was casual. “What do you want to know?”

  “You talk, and I’ll tell you if I’m getting bored.”

  Hobart cleared his throat. He’d hoped to avoid getting into details. They’d just give the Reverend ammunition. He was too close to blow it now.

  “Well, at first, we would concentrate on coke and heroin—those drugs, and drugs based on them, seem to be the major problems right now. I would expect that after the first few … casualties, the media would saturate the country with the story. Every addict would be on the alert. I think we could expect a substantial drop in use almost immediately.”

  Blake broke in. “What about the truly addicted? Do you think that they would be capable of just stopping?”

  “I think so. There are programs out there to help people like that, they just haven’t had much of an incentive to go.”

  Blake looked satisfied with that answer and signaled for Hobart to continue.

  “The fact of the matter is that casual users—not addicts—account for the vast majority of drug consumption in the U.S. I think we can count on them to stop purchasing right away. And that’s going to throw a real monkey wrench into the drug dealing and manufacturing machinery. They work just like any other business—credit, cash flow, profitability, inventory—all words you’d hear at a cartel meeting, I guarantee you. Suddenly they can’t sell the product they paid so much to produce and ship. The-same thing that’d happen to Ford if it suddenly couldn’t sell cars, is going to happen to them. In essence, they’ll go bankrupt. And without their phenomenal cash flow, they won’t be able to pay for the political influence, police protection, and muscle that has kept them in business for so long. I think their infrastructure would collapse faster than anyone expects.”

  “You mentioned casualties. How many?”

  It was a subject Hobart had hoped to stay away from. He lied. “Not many. Drugs are a recreational item; nothing more. I think people would be quick to give them up with that kind of a threat hanging over their heads, don’t you?”

  He knew Blake’s answer to that question. The preacher couldn’t understand why people used drugs in the first place.

  “Cost?”

  “About a million five, total. It should be a self-sustaining operation after the initial start-up.” Blake didn’t even flinch at the number.

  “And my involvement?”

  Hobart smiled. “None whatsoever. You give me the okay to drain the money from your accounts, then you fire me. There would be absolutely no way to trace anything back to you. In the unlikely event that anyone ever comes sniffing around, I’ll make it look like I embezzled the money.”

  Blake stood and walked once again to the wall of glass behind his desk. He stood there motionless with his hands clasped behind his back.

  “This is it, Reverend. Your chance to smash the cartels and bring America back on course.” Hobart felt an excitement he hadn’t felt for years. The government, with all its whining bureaucrats and human rights fanatics, had lost its battle with drugs. He wouldn’t.

  Of course, there were drawbacks that Hobart hadn’t elaborated on. Casualties would undoubtedly be significant—but that was all to the better. America needed to have its population thinned. It was like laser surgery. Cut out the cancer and leave the healthy tissue.

  And then there was the FBI. They could be counted on to do everything in their considerable power to spoil the party. It would be one hell of a tough investigation, though. No traceable motive, victims who would be reluctant to talk, and an opponent who knew their investigative techniques backwards
and forwards.

  They might eventually get close enough to make him run, but by then it would be too late. The users would be gone—one way or another The memory of the initial casualties would be fading in the minds of the population, but new drug-free neighborhoods would be right out their front door. The pressure would be on for the government to maintain the new status quo.

  Hobart suppressed a smile. Someday he might be recognized as one of the most important figures in American history.

  “It looks like I’ve got some thinking to do, John,” Blake said from his position by the window. “Let’s talk tomorrow.”

  Simon Blake didn’t move from the window as he listened to his security chief walk quietly out of the office.

  The moment was at hand. His moment. God had chosen him for a great mission. He was destined to drive Satan from the hearts and minds of America. Until today he had thought that he was to accomplish this through his expanding television ministry and political influence. Now he knew the truth. God didn’t want a messenger—it was too late for that. He wanted a soldier.

  John Hobart was already waiting when Blake walked into his office the next morning. He was sitting cross-legged with his back to the door, bouncing a pencil impatiently on his knee.

  “Early start today, John?”

  “You know me, Reverend.” He put the pencil down next to his leather-bound legal pad.

  “I guess you want my answer on your proposal.” His tone was aloof.

  Hobart smiled. The Reverend’s tone and choice of words spoke volumes. He was already distancing himself from the project. There was no need to distance yourself from something that wasn’t going to happen.

  Blake sat down behind his desk. “My answer is a conditional yes. But I think that we have some moral obligations here.”

  Hobart’s smile faded. Moral obligations had a way of turning a workable concept into a disastrous operation.

  “I feel that you have to warn the public of your intentions. Also, I don’t want marijuana tampered with. There are just too many basically good kids involved.”