Chapter Twenty-Four
Will Asher crossed himself and rose from where he knelt next to the tomb of Ian Cooper. The knight in medieval garb carved into the stone sarcophagus was new, but the style—a knight lying on his back with his sword upon his chest—harkened back to a time when the Knights Templar had fought for the church, believing their mission righteous. How quickly that had changed when those for whom they’d fought turned on them, declaring them heretics.
As Will stood near the newest of the tombs, he surveyed the others in the room. They’d used this particular church in Chicago for all their burials in that region for as long as he could remember. Some of the sarcophagi held the bodies of fallen Templars dating back over a century. He looked out over them, mentally calculating how many had been laid to rest under his watch. Only a handful. But each one weighed heavily on his shoulders. And he wondered if it ever got easier.
He hoped not. It shouldn’t be easy to lose a brother, a friend. If he ever reached the point when it did, he’d know it was time to step aside and let another take his place.
He already worried at how easily he’d walked away from Claire again. How simple a thing it had been to create a new life for her, send her away to start over—regardless of how she felt about it. He hoped she’d know happiness, but he had a feeling that the woman would continue to be a thorn in his side.
Eva Antonovich was an entirely different matter. Her status in the country made things a little more complicated, but they’d soon find a suitable situation for her. In the meantime, she was staying at the compound. Considering their recent ops, having a nurse on staff might not be a bad thing . . .
Will would’ve liked to speak to those who’d come before him—Hugues de Payens, Jacques de Molay—to ask them if they would’ve continued their mission, persevered in their desire to protect the innocent, had they known that the Order would one day be reviled by those who had once championed it. Would they have stayed their course, knowing that those they’d called brother would one day betray them?
The Alliance had long ago severed all ties with the church and had redefined its mission to protect all people of the world—not just a select few. They had realized after the Order was disbanded and their Grand Master burned at the stake that no one group should hold all the power, no one entity should rule over all.
The Illuminati had attempted to challenge that position, had sought to create the New World Order through tyranny, but the Alliance had been there to stop them, to maintain a balance. Or so he’d thought.
Will looked down at his hand, in which lay the flash drive they’d retrieved from Sergei Antonovich’s safety deposit box in Washington, D.C. He inhaled a deep, bracing breath and blew it out slowly, wishing he could disregard the information he’d discovered there. It was ironic how one tiny little piece of plastic could have such enormous ramifications.
He closed his hand around the flash drive, then placed his other hand on the carved knight, whose face bore a striking resemblance to the man Will’s team had lost just a few short weeks before. “I will make your death count for something, Ian,” he vowed, his voice echoing in the burial chamber. “I swear it.”
Will sighed and made his way through the tombs, reading the names as he passed, committing them to memory so that they’d not be forgotten. Finally, he came to the one he’d visited more times than he could count. Sean Asher’s sarcophagus was so like the man, sometimes Will half expected for his father to sit up and have a conversation with him, to actually answer the many questions Will had posed to him over the years, wishing he was still able to answer them.
He needed that advice now more than ever. They were at a crossroads. The choices the Alliance had before it would decide the fate of all of them. And the next move he made was bound to burn some bridges.
Well, one good thing about burning bridges—the only way you can go is forward.
Making his decision, Will left the burial chamber, his feet feeling as though they, too, were encased in stone. Each step was heavy as he made his way to the ceremonial chambers aboveground in the newly constructed offices adjacent to the church where his grandfather and the Grand Council waited.
While the burial chamber was entrenched in tradition, the meeting space for the Grand Council was sleek and modern. The men who sat at the table wore three-piece suits and ties; their only noticeable connection to the Alliance was the ring bearing a Templar cross that each of them wore on his right hand.
“Commander Asher,” one of them greeted hesitantly, eyeing Will’s jeans and black leather jacket with obvious censure. “We didn’t have you on the agenda for another twenty minutes. But since you’re already here . . . What brings you to this meeting of the Grand Council?”
Will slapped the flash drive down on the table and slid it across the wood. It came to rest in the center, directly across from his grandfather. “This.”
They exchanged confused glances, one of the other council members finally asking, “What is it?”
“Proof that the Illuminati are rising,” Will told them. “Names, dates, documents, email records. There’s intel going back decades—including the documents they stole from us during the Cold War. Didn’t know about that breach? Well, my father did. And he died for it. It’s all there. Read it. And then deny the truth.”
One of the council members leaned forward, obviously interested in what Will had to say. “But we were assured that the Illuminati had disbanded, that we had eradicated their leadership, leaving them powerless.”
Another nodded. “Their assets were seized. I saw to it myself.”
“This is absurd,” the High Commander scoffed.
“You can’t continue to ignore the truth,” Will argued. “Too much is at stake.”
His grandfather heaved a bored sigh, disregarding the flash drive. “William, we have indulged this erratic behavior long enough. We’ve already made a special concession to allow you to bestow membership upon a woman whom you’ve made an initiate, defying centuries of tradition. And now you have the audacity to storm in here, demanding we take action on evidence that is questionable at best? Had the Illuminati been re-forming, we would’ve known about it. You can’t seriously believe that they have existed secretly, undetected all this time?”
“Wehave,” Will shot back.
This seemed to hit home. Seeing he’d made his point, Will turned and strode toward the door. “Read it,” he called over his shoulder. He paused in the doorway to offer one parting shot. “And give me a call when you’re ready to do something about it. I’ll be waiting.”
* * *
Maddie swept her hair up from her neck, pinning it into a loose knot like the one she’d worn the night of the Boston gala. She picked up another hairpin from the few scattered upon the top of the vanity and slid it into place, offering Jack a soft smile when she caught his reflection in the mirror.
“You look beautiful,” he told her, not bothering to disguise the rough edge of desire in his voice. He came forward, his gaze holding hers in the mirror. Unable to resist, he bent to kiss the side of her neck, his hands resting lightly at her hips.
