The Unspoken
The Unspoken
Heather Graham
1898: Bound for Chicago, the freighter Jerry McGuen goes down in Lake Michigan, taking with it every man aboard.But what other fate could befall a vessel carrying the ill-gotten sarcophagus of an Egyptian sorcerer? Now: A veteran diver and "ghost ship" expert is exploring the legendary wreck for a documentary. He dies inexplicably inside the freighter's main saloon.Then another diver is killed, and panicked rumors rise like bubbles from the lake: ancient demons have awakened below! The expedition's beleaguered financier calls paranormal investigator Katya Sokolov to Chicago to save the film—and perhaps some innocent lives.Along with media forensics guru Will Chan, Kat plumbs the depths of an evil that may date back to the time of the pharaohs. But some secrets are best drowned in the seas of the past….
AN AIRLESS TOMB. AN UNSPOKEN CURSE
1898: Bound for Chicago, the freighter Jerry McGuen goes down in Lake Michigan, taking with it every man aboard. But what other fate could befall a vessel carrying the ill-gotten sarcophagus of an Egyptian sorcerer? Because a curse unspoken is no less deadly.
Now: A veteran diver and “ghost ship” expert is exploring the legendary wreck for a documentary. He dies inexplicably inside the freighter’s main saloon. Then another diver is killed and panicked rumors rise like bubbles from the lake: ancient demons have awakened below!
The expedition’s beleaguered financier calls paranormal investigator Katya Sokolov to Chicago to save the film—and perhaps some innocent lives. Along with media forensics guru Will Chan, Kat plumbs the depths of an evil that may date back to the time of the Pharaohs. But some secrets are best drowned in the seas of the past.…
Praise for the novels of Heather Graham
“Graham wields a deftly sexy and convincing pen.”
—Publishers Weekly
“A fast-paced and suspenseful read that will give readers chills while keeping them guessing until the end.”
—RT Book Reviews on Ghost Moon
“If you like mixing a bit of the creepy with a dash of sinister and spine-chilling reading with your romance, be sure to read Heather Graham’s latest.”
—Miami Herald on Unhallowed Ground
“The Keepers is original and exciting. Constant tension—both dangerous and sexual—will keep readers on the edge of their seats.“
—RT Book Reviews
“The paranormal elements are integral to the unrelentingly suspenseful plot, the characters are likable, the romance convincing and…Graham’s atmospheric depiction of a lost city is especially poignant.”
—Booklist on Ghost Walk
“Graham’s rich, balanced thriller sizzles with equal parts suspense, romance and the paranormal—all of it nail-biting.”
—Publishers Weekly on The Vision
“Great writing and excellent characters make Wicked a terrific read.... The undercurrent of mystery and suspense will keep readers riveted.”
—Romance Reviews Today
“Graham’s tight plotting, her keen sense of when to reveal and when to tease...will keep fans turning the pages.”
—Publishers Weekly on Picture Me Dead
The Unspoken
Heather
Graham
www.mirabooks.co.uk (http://www.mirabooks.co.uk)
In loving and grateful memory of my mom, Violet, who came from Dublin to the amazing city of Chicago.
And for Aunt Amy, Katie and my Irish side of the family, especially my great-grandmother who, when watching my sister and me, would warn us that the banshees “be gettin’ us in the outhouse” if we didn’t behave. (She issued this threat so well, we were teenagers before realizing we didn’t have an outhouse!) Granny, however, had a touch of magic about her, and told wonderful stories. She, my mom and all those who believed in (or pretended they believed in!) banshees, leprechauns, pixies, ghosties and all else gave me my love for what might be in the darkness or in realms we have yet to discover—and for reading.
A book, they taught me, could give me a new world or adventure to explore every day of my life.
What a gift to give a child. I am grateful to them all.
A Note from the Author
Dear Reader,
The Unspoken is the latest book in a series that includes The Unseen and The Unholy. These books follow the activities of the special FBI units known as the Krewe of Hunters.
The Krewe also appears in Phantom Evil, Heart of Evil, Sacred Evil and The Evil Inside. Featuring a mix of the real and the paranormal, these books also contain strong mystery elements.
The Krewe’s origins lie in Adam Harrison, an elderly gentleman first seen in Haunted, who recognizes those who possess a sixth sense—whether they admit it or not. Having worked with the government several times, Adam is asked to form small and distinctive FBI units, to be sent in when traditional methods of investigation need a little boost.
The Unspoken takes the Texas Krewe away from their home state to Chicago, where a newly discovered shipwreck has taken the life of the first diver to see her since she sank at the end of the nineteenth century. But the Jerry McGuen was no ordinary ship… She had carried precious cargo from Egypt—including the mummy of an ancient Egyptian priest. Naturally, the mummy comes with a curse….
The Krewe is out to discover the truth. Can a curse be real? Can it transcend the ages? Or is it the evil in men’s hearts that continues to wreak havoc throughout time?
Texas Krewe member Kat Sokolov—a medical examiner by trade—is sent to work the case. She’s paired with Will Chan, an original member of the Krewe of Hunters and an agent well-versed in the art of illusion. Between them, they must find out what really happened to the diver—and to the ship—if they’re to keep the body count from rising.
I hope you’ll join their investigation and enjoy the adventure!
Heather Graham
A Note from the Editor
I can truly say that Heather Graham has found—or rather, created—a unique niche in contemporary romantic suspense. Her Harlequin MIRA books include mysteries, investigators with “unusual” abilities and…dead people. Yes, ghosts. Her novels have a classic flair; after all, people have been telling ghost stories for millennia. And these books invariably feature interesting, appealing characters, intense romance that’s always an integral part of the suspense plot and fascinating backgrounds.
Each of these stories is set in a great American city—San Antonio (The Unseen), Los Angeles (The Unholy), Chicago (The Unspoken) and Philadelphia (The Uninvited). They’re all places Heather knows well and describes both appreciatively and atmospherically. And, needless to say, they’re all cities that have their share of ghosts and hauntings!
I want to point out that the books can, of course, be read independently; they definitely stand alone. But I’ll bet you can’t read just one! Each story focuses on a particular member or members of the Krewe, but you’ll also meet characters you’ve encountered over the course of the series.
I also want to tell you that in 2013, the Krewe will return with stories set in brand-new (that is to say, old!) American towns and cities, like Tombstone, Arizona, and Savannah, Georgia.
But right now I invite you to come to the great city of Chicago, go diving in Lake Michigan, explore a shipwreck and discover the truth about some ancient Egyptian artifacts…and fall in love!
Paula Eykelhof
Executive Editor, Harlequin MIRA Books
Contents
Prologue (#u6c7721ea-5b3e-5eca-acdb-3d0b02a6f41b)
Chapter 1 (#u83747c5e-3687-53c1-b969-d8e72a73f424)
Chapter 2 (#ufaf08596-098f-5a81-8632-4acf9d8ece36)
Chapter 3 (#uef6e9703-7aab-58b1-a7f9-7a8775f34f64)
Chapter 4 (#ua3dd1bcf-af65-5f7b-bc7d-21a5cc546df9)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)
Prologue
The midnight hour
Austin Miller loved his comfortable home. Built by his grandfather in 1872, after the ravages of the Great Chicago Fire of October 10, 1871, it had the grace—and even opulence—of the mid-Victorian era. The staircase was carpeted in deep crimson, a shade picked up in the period furniture. Swirling drapes in black and cream adorned the parlor, and the windows were etched glass. He had changed little since his grandfather’s day.
It boasted a true gentleman’s den with bookshelves that lined the walls, filled with wonderful tomes, old and new. It also boasted some of his fabulous collections, the most impressive of which was his collection of Egyptian artifacts. They were legally obtained, since Austin’s grandfather had been on the dig when Tut’s tomb was discovered; he had lived much of his life prowling the sands of the Sahara in pursuit of discoveries. Canopic jars were kept in a temperature-controlled display case, along with funerary statuettes that were gilded and bejeweled. A real sarcophagus—that of a king’s illegitimate son, of little import to Egyptians at the time—stood open in a corner of the room. It had been arranged in a display case of its own, built by his grandfather in the mid-1930s. He’d exhibited his collection of mummified snakes and cats behind glass, as well. On one side of Austin’s beautiful desk was an exquisitely crafted statue of the god Horus, adorned with gold paint and fine jewels. On the other side was a carafe, where he kept his finest brandy and glasses for when the need arose.
Yes, Austin loved his den. He held his most important meetings here, with business associates and with fellow members of the Egyptian Sand Diggers, the Society of Chicago and scholars who loved and appreciated all things Egyptian.
He felt the need for a brandy arise at that moment. Tonight, he was happy. So happy. After more than a century of being at the bottom of Lake Michigan and her shifting sands, the Jerry McGuen might well be on her way to twenty-first-century discovery!
He knew he should go to sleep. His doctor had warned him that he had to rest and that he had to avoid sleeping aids, that he needed to take his heart and blood pressure medications and stick to a healthful regimen. He was, after all, eighty-three years old.
But…
They were on the brink of knowledge. Nothing had hit the papers yet, but come morning, divers and documentarians would, at long last, discover the Jerry McGuen.
And, with the ship, untold treasure.
His cat, Bastet, a beautifully marked Egyptian Mau, also seemed restless that night. Bastet meowed and sidled along his leg.
“Tomorrow, Bastet, tomorrow!” He had changed for bed and wore his pajamas and a smoking robe, although he’d long ago given up the cigars he’d once enjoyed so much.
But a little brandy wasn’t a bad thing.
He poured himself a snifter and rolled the tawny liquor against the sides of the glass, smelled it and finally sipped. He let out a soft sigh. “Tomorrow, Bastet, tomorrow,” he said again.
But the cat leaped atop his desk with a screech that was frightening.
“Bastet!” He frowned. He tried to stroke the cat, but Bastet vaulted from the desk and disappeared behind the standing sarcophagus. What could be bothering the creature? Mrs. Hodgkins, his housekeeper, was long gone for the day.
The massive grandfather clock behind him began to toll the midnight hour.
He swallowed another sip of his brandy.
A cool breeze blew from the patio beyond the den; the curtains wafted.
The clock chimed three times, four, five.
And then…
He saw it. Moving in from the patio.
He sat completely still and blinked. He had to be seeing things. But, as if compelled by his vision, he rose, swallowing down the rest of the brandy. He wanted to scream. He couldn’t scream, but somewhere in his mind he knew that even if he could, no one would hear.
The clocked chimed six times, seven, eight.
It was coming…coming…coming for him.
His heart! Instinctively, he clutched his chest and felt the thundering of his heart. He groped in his pocket for his nitroglycerin pills, but just as he reached them, it reached him. The pills were knocked from his hand.
The clock chimed nine times, ten, eleven.
He felt as if he’d been struck by a sledgehammer. The pain was overwhelming. The thing before him was enveloped in the black of his vision.
The clock chimed the hour of midnight.
And he fell down dead.
The wee hours
Kat Sokolov slept deeply, and in that sleep, she dreamed. It was a lovely dream. She was sailing somewhere. She stood on the deck looking out at the darkness of the water and watched the stunning display in the sky overhead. The moon was full, but clouds drifted in and out, and the world seemed beautiful.
She listened to the music from the ship’s grand salon, where someone was playing a Viennese waltz. Attracted to the sweet sound of the music, she turned. She wore a gown as elegant as those she saw around her. Silk and velvet, it swept gracefully as she moved. There was a celebration going on, and she could hear delighted laughter along with the enchanting strains from the piano. At the doors to the grand salon, she felt the breeze and pulled her fur stole more closely around her shoulders. It couldn’t be about to snow! The moon had been too bright, too visible. The breeze had seemed so gentle….
But now it touched her like a blast of ice. When she opened the door to the salon, she felt the wind snatch it from her. It banged hard against the wall, and she was embarrassed for losing it and creating such an awful sound. But before she could apologize to anyone, the ship suddenly pitched and rolled. Glass shattered; people screamed. She thought she heard the blast of a horn, or a high, loud whistle. Then people were shouting, screaming. A voice of authority boomed out, warning people that a storm had come in, that they needed to go to their cabins immediately.
A couple pushed past Kat as if she wasn’t even there. “It’s cursed! The ship is cursed!” the man said to the young woman at his side. “Oh, God! What they should do is cast out the cargo, clear us of the curse!”
“You’re scaring me!” the young woman cried.
“I’m so sorry, my darling!” the man said.
Then the woman seemed to see her. She looked at her with wide, desperate eyes. “It’s the curse,” she said. “It’s the curse!”
“No, no, it’s a storm, that’s all,” Kat heard herself say reassuringly. She smiled at the young woman. But then she turned. There appeared to be something out on the water. Something huge coming toward them.
She felt another blast of cold. Wet cold. The lovely night had become treacherous. It wasn’t snow rushing at her; it was ice. They had sailed into an ice storm.
And still, that thing was out there, mammoth, a dark shadow that couldn’t quite take shape because of the raging elements.
The wind picked up again and seemed to strike her in the face.
Then she awoke, frozen.
Kat blinked. She was still in her room in the lovely California hotel where her Krewe was staying.
She almost laughed aloud. She was cold because she’d kicked away her covers. Jumping up quickly, she hurried over to the thermostat. Somehow, sometime, either she or the maid had set the temperature down to the fifties.
She reset the thermostat to eighty-five.
She was much fonder of heat than cold.
That done, she dragged the extra blanket from the closet, grabbed all her covers again and curled back into bed. She’d practically forgotten the dream, she’d been so cold.
As she lay down, she thought it had been quite absurd. But then, of course, dreams often were.
Next morning
9:00 a.m.
The water of Lake Michigan was eerie, with different shades of gray shadows and darkness, as Brady Laurie plunged into the chilly depths. Only near the surface could anything that resembled natural light or warmth be found; the lake had always been a place of darkness and secrets. Motes seemed to dance before his eyes as the dive light on his head illuminated his journey, ever deeper into the water. Tiny bits of grasses, sand, orts from the meals of the lake’s denizens swirled like dust particles, shimmering as his light hit them.
It was a world of silence down here, making every little noise sharp. The sound of his breathing and the throb of his regulator, the expulsion of his air bubbles, the very pulse of his heart.
It was a world he loved, but today he was on a mission.
He was so anxious. He shouldn’t have been diving alone; he knew that. It was against every rule of scuba and salvage, but people often did it, anyway. In fact, he’d met enough he-man types so sure of their own prowess that they ignored the rule all the time. He didn’t usually—just today.
He knew exactly what he was looking for, and the sonar on his boat seemed to have proven his theories and calculations right.
At long last, he’d found the sunken ship—the Jerry McGuen.
He believed in his heart that he’d found her, the freighter that had carried sixty men and women to their graves, doomed along with the treasures they’d brought from Egypt. The ship had sailed faultlessly all the way across the Atlantic Ocean and up the Saint Lawrence River, only to be lost on December 15, 1898, a day before the journey’s end, battered and buffeted by a sudden, fierce storm. She had disappeared so close to her destination, just east-northeast of Chicago.
People had speculated then, as they still did, that a curse had lain upon the ship. The explorer who’d made the Egyptian discovery, Gregory Hudson, had been aboard. And, of course, there’d been a threat, etched into the stones of the tomb, warning that any man who disturbed the final resting place of Amun Mopat would soon know misery and death. Surely the passengers and crew of the Jerry McGuen had known both—almost able to see Chicago, but storm-tossed in violent, winter-frigid waters, finally succumbing to the brutality of the lake and disappearing.
Yes, the ship had disappeared, never to be seen again.
Until today. He would see her again. He, Brady Laurie, would see her again!
Salvage crews had hunted for her soon after she’d sunk—to no avail. And through the years, time after time, historians and divers had sought her, but like many a ship lost in the murky waters of the massive lake, she was simply not to be found.
Brady had been certain all his life that she had to be there. And he’d excitedly put forth his theory to his coworkers that, following their recent wicked summer storm, there was a chance she could now be discovered. Violent storms altered a lake bed, just as they could alter the seabed in the Atlantic. He had seen what storms could do. A ship sunk in Florida had gone down on her side; one of the storms that had torn apart the Florida Straits had set her up perfectly again. He believed the same strength and force of that phenomenon was going to reveal the Jerry McGuen.
Storms moved sand and dirt. Storms had tremendous power—enough power to right a multi-ton ship. Even one lost for more than a century, a true shipwreck. His calculations had been off, but not by much. Not if what the sonar had shown him was true.
Through the dark, mystic water of the lake, he saw her.
There she was. The Jerry McGuen!
She lay at an angle, starboard hull lodged into the lake bed, as majestic and visible in the glow of his dive light as if she were at dock.
His heart beat fast, and pride surged through him.
They’d done it! They’d found her.
No—he’d found her!
His theory was sound, his calculations making adjustments for time, weather conditions, the power of the recent storm and the earth’s rotations. It couldn’t account for the various unknowns, but he’d been so close. And now, as he saw it looming before him, his time had come. While that kind of storm usually sank ships, this one had removed layers of sand and almost righted the Jerry McGuen.
Yes, there she was, her massive hull tempting and seductive…
Even righted as she was, she had suddenly seemed to loom before him. The lake bed made the water so dark at eighty feet.
Just eighty feet! She’d been there all along, so damned close to Chicago!
He didn’t feel any cold through his dive suit, but he was numb. A shiver of excitement reverberated through his limbs. All around him, the water danced in the wavy shadows of the eighty-foot depths, and he became intensely aware of the sound of his own breathing again, the pump and flow of his regulator. He wanted to shout with happiness and share his discovery with the world. Of course, he would do that soon enough, and if any of his team had followed him out today, they’d already know that he’d been right. Everyone would know that he’d been right, including every salvage diver who had ever dreamed of finding her.
He laughed inwardly, smiling around his regulator. He was pretty sure someone had been behind him. Not that everyone on Lake Michigan had to be following him, but he thought he’d seen a research vessel in the distance when he’d come down.
His coworkers might be angry that he’d jumped the gun, but Amanda had already sold the story of their search to a film producer, who was going to document and finance their historic discovery. He’d supplied money for the search based on Brady’s theory. Now they could begin to chart out and rope off the ship and show the world the remains of the Jerry McGuen. Others interested in pursuits far less esoteric than theirs would be stopped at the gate. No more worries about Landry Salvage or Simonton’s Sea Search beating them to the punch!
He could imagine the treasures in the hold. Priceless Egyptian artifacts, the still-sealed coffin of the high priest known as the Sorcerer of Giza, the sarcophagi, the army of golden figures, the canopic jars, the ancient stones…
Underwater for more than a century, he reminded himself.
But even the Egyptologists of the nineteenth century had known about preservation. Sure, they hadn’t reckoned on toxins and gases, but they knew all about waterproofing—gunpowder and the pursuit of war had certainly furthered man’s knowledge of that!
Of course, the hold might have been compromised, a zillion things might have happened and still…what they might find!
He—they—didn’t seek treasure or the fortune it could bring. The treasures they discovered always went to museums, and he felt a thrill rush through him as he imagined the headlines when they returned the jeweled sarcophagus of Amun Mopat to the Egyptian people. Amun Mopat would be back where he rightfully belonged, and the name Brady Laurie would be revered in Cairo’s museum. Yes, yes, yes!
The Jerry McGuen.
She lay there—exposed! He was so elated his heart seemed to stop.
He checked his air gauge. He had at least another ten minutes to take a quick look at his momentous discovery, another ten minutes to explore, and then time to decompress at thirty-three feet and safely reach his research vessel on the surface.
The Jerry McGuen appeared huge, her forward section still pitched slightly into the lake bed, as if she’d taken a dive while sinking. Parts of the hull were broken, exposing staterooms and a passenger lobby, and what had been the purser’s office. Brady knew the ship; he had studied her plans time and time again. She was a steel-hulled ship, built by the American Stuart Company of Chicago and launched on October 2, 1888. One hundred and eighty-six feet long, thirty-two feet wide, and twelve feet in depth. Her gross tonnage was four hundred and eighty-six, and when she sailed the seas, she’d been powered by a triple-expansion steam engine and two Scotch boilers. There had been fifty-two cabins for guests, captain’s quarters, first mate’s quarters, four cabins for officers and a bunk room, down in the hold, for crew. The ship, chartered by the very rich Gregory Hudson, had been a state-of-the-art beauty.
Her ballast for the trip had been stones—great stones taken from the tomb of Amun Mopat. Before Howard Carter’s discovery of King Tut’s tomb, the discovery of Amun Mopat’s tomb right in the Valley of the Kings had been one of the most important events in the annals of Egyptology. But the treasures had come aboard the Jerry McGuen, and just a few months after that, those treasures and their history had been lost to the ages. They were soon forgotten by the world at large as new findings occurred and the age of Egyptology moved on.
But now…
He eased himself slowly along the hull, fumbling at his dive belt for his underwater camera. As he began to snap photos, the sound of the shutter whirred softly in the water. The flash illuminated bits and pieces of the ship. There it was—the grand salon, exposed by a gaping hole in the port side, encrusted in weeds and grasses, occupied by fish, large and small. The treasures would be down below.
Yes!
The hull was ripped open belowdecks, as well. He didn’t have much time. Just minutes left now, but he could slip through the great tear in the port side, move along the length of the ship….
It was dark within. Eerie. Time had stolen any vestiges of life that might have remained; the cold and the elements would have eaten away at organic fabric—and human bodies.
He found the hold and moved past giant crates, some protected by tarps that had withstood the years. Before him was a door, which swung open when he pushed it. The door hadn’t been sealed, which might have aided in the flooding that had brought about the ship’s demise, he thought, distracted. He didn’t care at that moment how the ship had sunk. He’d nearly reached the treasure….
As he kicked his flippers and swam through, the dive light strapped to his head suddenly went out.
He muttered to himself, tapping the light. It came back on.
He saw the boxes—huge crates, really, wrapped and sealed in waterproof tarps!—and in the midst of them, he could see the giant box with the label peeling and nearly gone, and yet…he could still read the name on it.
Amun Mopat.
There it was! The box containing the sarcophagus holding the inner sarcophagus and then the mummy. It had survived; the men who’d discovered the treasure had stolen it away carefully sealed….
Over there, boxes of jackals and sphinxes and funerary artifacts, bows, quivers—
His light went out again. Cursing silently, he tapped it. As he did, he heard a curious sound. A noise so deep in the water was different from what it would be on the surface, and yet…
It sounded like the hold door was closing on him!
The light came back on.
He stared in horror.
He opened his mouth to scream. Losing his regulator, he sucked in air, and his scream was silent.
He was stunned, terrified….
The curse! The curse, silent, unspoken in these depths…
It was real!
Yes, he had found the Jerry McGuen.
But he would not live to tell the tale.
1
“Amun Mopat,” Katya Sokolov said to Logan Raintree. “You’re kidding me, right?”
The heat that had been shining through the skylight seemed to disappear, as if the sun itself had lost some energy.
The name made her shudder. They’d just finished investigating a death in Los Angeles at Eddie Archer’s special effects studio—a death based on an old film noir remake. The original movie had been titled Sam Stone and the Curious Case of the Egyptian Museum. The new one, fittingly, was called The Unholy.
“No, I’m not kidding,” Logan said.
He had a fascinating face, the result of Native American and European parents, handsome and filled with character. She had learned to read it well, and she knew—he was not kidding.
Amun Mopat.
It was the name of the insidious ancient Egyptian priest who had supposedly come back to life to perpetrate murders. He was a character in a movie.
A character used in the very recent tragedies that had taken place.
And now…Amun Mopat?
“Amun Mopat, yes,” Logan said, almost as if she’d spoken aloud. He leaned back, looking around with a sigh. They sat in the beautiful little lobby-café of their boutique hotel, surrounded by wrought-iron lattice work and art deco design. The past weeks—although somewhat traumatic in the final resolution and cleanup—had still contained some nice upswings. They’d seen tapings of half a dozen TV shows, including Kat’s favorite comedy, spent days at the beach in Malibu, visited the Magic Castle and other attractions, and actually experienced something that resembled a vacation.
This meeting didn’t bode well. She’d received the call to meet Logan while she was enjoying a visit to the La Brea Tar Pits. It had been an urgent call, and she’d known it meant she wouldn’t be seeing a retro performance of the Rocky Horror Picture Show that night with Tyler Montague and Jane, two of the six in their special FBI unit.
She’d wondered if the others were going to be involved, but she was sitting here alone with Logan.
She had all but forgotten her strange dream of the night before. And now, even as it seemed to come crashing down around her, she wondered what a storm at sea could have to do with Amun Mopat.
The curse. She’d heard the words in her dream. Egyptian entities always seemed to come with curses!
“Go figure. After all this—Amun Mopat. In Chicago,” Logan said in a dry voice.
“Yeah, go figure. Chicago,” she repeated blankly.
Logan Raintree was her superior, the head of their team. Their actual boss was the elusive Adam Harrison, who had begun this excursion into the unknown—and the known—combining FBI technology and certain…unusual talents. Logan worked loosely with the head of the first team, Jackson Crow, evaluating information from those who sought help and deciding which cases truly called for their unique abilities. Since the original group of special investigators had become known as the Krewe of Hunters, they’d unofficially been dubbed the Texas Krewe. Their first case had been in San Antonio, home to many of them. Working with Logan and the other team members was thrilling and gratifying at once; it felt as if they spoke an ancient and secret language, and had come together as nationals from the same foreign country.
At the moment, she wasn’t feeling especially thrilled. Or gratified. She wished she was back at the Tar Pits.
“And you want me to go out there now?” Kat asked. She didn’t add alone.
Logan glanced at his watch.
“Yes. It could be nothing.” He shrugged. “And it could be something. But we’re talking about a dead body, and the autopsy is probably being performed as we speak.”
“Chicago is a big city, and I’m sure they have a fine staff of medical examiners and pathologists,” Kat said.
“I’m sure they do, too. But before too much time goes by, I want you in on it. Even the best people in their fields can miss little signs and clues, especially when they’re convinced by the circumstances that they’re looking at an accidental death.”
Everyone on the Krewe had his or her technical or “real world” specialty.
Hers was forensic pathology.
“Amun Mopat,” Kat said again. “In Chicago.”
Logan leaned forward. “As I said, this could be nothing—nothing at all. That’s why I need you there first. Sean is still out in Hawaii, but he’s been alerted,” he said, referring to another of their team members, Sean Cameron, who had been most heavily involved in the recent occurrences. “And we still have a few loose ends here—the last of the legal documents, another deposition—so I’m keeping Kelsey, Jane and Tyler with me. If it’s a tragic but simple case of drowning, there’ll be no need for the whole team. In that case, we’ll meet back at headquarters. But if it’s something else…”
Kat nodded dully. There was a dead body. She was a medical examiner. The dead body, of course, wasn’t an ancient Egyptian priest. It was a historian and diver.
Who had died. Searching for a sunken ship in Lake Michigan.
“I dreamed I was on a ship last night,” she told Logan.
“Really?”
“And the passengers were talking about a curse.”
His expression was serious. “Maybe you’ll be able to use that,” he said.
She smiled. “Maybe it was to warn me I was about to head off—to Chicago. And a sunken ship. And a curse.”
“I think in our line of work,” he said, eyebrows raised, “we’ve learned that curses are pretty much things people invent when they want to do something evil for their own gain. And you may only be there a few hours. Who knows? The situation might just be that this diver went overboard in his excitement when he should have waited for the other researchers. The entire discovery was supposed to be filmed. But, like I said, he didn’t wait. His excitement might have led to carelessness, which is probably what happened. And there’s always competition to salvage the treasure on a sunken trip. But because we’ve been helped by the documentary crew in question, I feel it’s important that we help out in return.”
“Who’s doing the documentary?” Kat asked.
“Alan King. We barely saw him when we were in San Antonio, but he had a bad time with the documentary there, especially losing his star. Apparently the Chicago Ancient History Preservation Center—where our dead man worked—is struggling like the rest of the world. They need funding.” He studied his papers. “One of the staff, Dr. Amanda Channel, sent out queries to various film people and hit upon some friends of ours—you remember Bernie Firestone, right?”
“Of course,” Kat said.
“Yes, well, he’s frequently hired by Alan King, who can make films whenever he wants because he has billions—no, he didn’t make his billions in film. He’s able to do documentary films because he does have billions. Bernie approached Alan, who loved the idea, and there you have it.”
“Sean should be available soon,” Kat murmured. “He’s worked with them before.”
“If he’s needed, he’ll be there. Remember—we don’t know if this is anything at all. Anyway, if you do end up staying, you’ve at least met Alan and you know Bernie and his cameraman, Earl Candy. Right now, you’ll take a look at the deceased, read the autopsy report, talk with a few people—and, if there’s nothing, we’ll all meet back in Virginia. Requests for our expertise are already piling up back at headquarters.” Logan paused. “But like I said, I feel we’re in debt on this one. There’s also the fate of a historical institute on the line, not to mention an incredible discovery.”
“I still say…”
“That it’s ironic?” Logan asked. “I thought that, too, but then, not so much. Not really. When the original Sam Stone was filmed in the early forties, the sinking of the ship in Lake Michigan had occurred half a century earlier. A writer, one who was fascinated by Egyptology, would readily have seized upon a real priest for his story. I looked into it and found out that the original screenplay was by a man named Harold Conway—who was born in Chicago. He grew up going to the Field Museum and hearing stories about the Jerry McGuen. The priest’s actual mummy, with the inner and outer sarcophagi, as well as other treasures, went down with the ship. So our screenwriter would definitely have known about Amun Mopat, and he was obviously interested enough in the historical character to use him in a movie.”
“Great,” Kat muttered.
“Hey, it could be an M.E.’s dream,” he said.
“A mummy? An anthropologist’s dream, not mine,” she retorted. “But…all right, so I’m to examine the body and try to discern if he died by natural means, or…”
She let her voice trail off.
They dealt with the unknown, the world that lay beyond the veil. Their “sixth sense.”
But Logan had a point. In her experience, and in that of the others, they’d never come across a ghost or a curse that killed.
It was human beings who killed other human beings.
“They’re not expecting to find much left of the people who went down with the ship,” Logan was saying. “According to the records, there were no survivors, and no bodies rose to the surface—or none that were found or recognized. But I’ve read that time would have destroyed even their skeletons by now. Is that true?”
Kat nodded. “Unless someone was caught in a sealed area, it’s unlikely that there’d be any remains. Time and sea creatures take their toll. They may find skeletal remnants, but only once they’re into the bowels of the ship.”
“So, it really is one big watery grave.”
“It does seem respectful to salvage what might be important to history and the living, and then let the ship itself stay where it sank, a memorial to those who were lost.”
“I believe that’s the eventual plan.” Logan flipped a page in the file that lay before him on the table. “You won’t be alone,” he told her, grinning as if he’d read her mind. She wasn’t afraid of being alone, nor was she unaccustomed to the strange and unusual.
“Oh?”
“A member of the original Krewe is out there now. He happened to be visiting an old buddy in Chicago when this came down. You’ll meet up with him. His name is Will Chan. He’ll stop by to see Alan, Bernie and Earl this afternoon, and he has an appointment with the people at the Preservation Center bright and early tomorrow morning. He’ll meet you at the morgue at 10:00 a.m.”
“Okay, but do I need to reach him first?”
“No. Head straight to the morgue. Will’s going to catch up with you there.” Logan handed her the folder. “His contact information is in here. Between the two of you, we’ll have a good sense of what’s going on, be it too much enthusiasm by a diving historian—or a predator with an enthusiasm for murder. Oh, and Alan King has hired private security to guard the dive site.”
“You can guard a dive site?”
“I thought you were a diver?”
“Yes, but I dive because I love it, not because I’m looking for lost treasures.” Kat offered him a wry smile. “I’ve seen salvage from the Titanic and the Atocha in museums. I never went looking for them. And I usually dive in nice warm water in the Caribbean or the Gulf.”
“Salvage rights are complicated. Federal law says that all wrecks belong to the state that claims the waters. Depending on what’s found, ownership of artifacts and the wreck itself may wind up in court for years. But the Preservation Center did file papers for the right to dive and work on the wreck. However, it’s not the legal aspect that people worry about as much as the black market.”
“Other divers stripping the site and selling salvage illegally?” Kat asked.
“You can’t begin to imagine what can be bought and sold on the black market.”
“Still…it’s got to be tricky, raiding a dive site.”
“Yes, but it’s been done. Hence, the security.”
“I guess so.”
“You have gone diving in cold water, right?” he asked next.
“Well, yes.”
“Make sure you pack a good dive suit. I understand the water temperature ranges between fifty and sixty at this time of year, and I believe that’s kind of cold when you’re down there.”
“I’ve never been in Lake Michigan.” Kat frowned. “And I’ve never been involved with the discovery of a wreck.”
“See, you’re all excited now.”
“Excited. Well…I’m not sure that’s the best word to describe how I’m feeling, not after we nearly lost Madison Darvil to Amun Mopat—or his look-alike!”
“We knew that Amun Mopat wasn’t the killer. And we know that mummy isn’t swimming around planning to kill anyone who discovers the ship.”
“We don’t know that anyone is killing people at all yet,” Kat said. “We’ve probably been asked in because Alan King is feeling a little worried—since his luck with documentaries hasn’t been so good lately.”
Logan looked up at the skylight. Then he looked back at her. “No, we won’t know anything until you examine the body and get more information. Since Alan has hired private security near the site, hopefully no one else will be exploring the area and ending up dead while the situation is investigated. You’re booked on a 5:40 p.m. flight out of Burbank. You should be in a nice cozy room by midnight, and then tomorrow… I’ll be waiting to hear what you have to say.”
“What if I can’t find the answer in the autopsy?” Kat asked him. “Or in anything else we’re able to examine?”
“Then we’ll join you—and figure out where the answer does lie.”
Kat nodded and sipped her coffee. The sun seemed to come out again and stream through the skylight overhead.
“You have information on the ship, the sinking, the discovery of the tomb—all kinds of stuff—in the folder,” Logan said. “Along with info on all the principle players working on the discovery and preservation of Egyptian antiquities.”
“Anything else?”
He grinned. “Be glad it’s not the dead of winter?”
* * *
There was no keeping down a true scholar.
Will Chan hadn’t come for a lesson in Egyptology, but it seemed to be part of the interview.
Senior researcher Jon Hunt grew animated as he spoke, saying, “Amun Mopat lived and died during the reign of Ramses—Ramses II, the most powerful ruler of the New Kingdom and the nineteenth dynasty and perhaps the most powerful of all the great pharaohs or god-kings of Egypt. Ramses ruled from 1279 BC to 1213 BC, and it appears that Mopat, reputed to be a shady character, was born in the same year and the same month, which seemed to be a great oracle to people at the time. Ramses was first drawn to him, believing in the power of sorcery. Amun Mopat lived a life of luxury, respected and consulted on most important matters of state. Ramses, you’ll remember, was a warrior king. He’s the one with Moses in all the movies—the villain, you know.”
“Except,” Amanda Channel—also a senior researcher—interjected, “historians have argued constantly over the true factual dates of ‘the time of Moses.’ And whether or not he eventually expelled the Hebrews from Egypt, Ramses II was a builder and a soldier and a peacekeeper. In short, a remarkable ruler. Living in a world with a totally different belief system, of course. Must have been nice to be a god, huh?”
Will sat in a conference room at the offices of the Chicago Ancient History Preservation Center as he spoke with—or, more accurately, listened to—Jon Hunt and Amanda Channel. Both of them were trying to explain everything at once, or so it seemed. More than three thousand years of ancient Egyptian history, Brady Laurie’s tragic death and the story behind the Jerry McGuen.
Apparently neither of them needed to take a breath very often. And they switched from Egyptian history to Brady and then to the Jerry McGuen with record speed.
But then, Egyptian history, Brady and the ship were now joined for all eternity.
“Brady loved anything that had to do with ancient Egypt,” Jon said. “He could rattle off every pharaoh in every dynasty in the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom and the New Kingdom more quickly than your average high school kid could come up with all fifty states.”
Will wasn’t sure most high school kids could rattle off all fifty states.
“But,” Amanda jumped in, her voice almost a fluid continuation of Jon’s thoughts, “Brady especially loved the New Kingdom, and everything that’s been learned from excavations in the Valley of the Kings.”
“Howard Carter’s discovery of King Tut’s tomb happened after the discovery of Amun Mopat’s. Since the treasures of Mopat’s tomb—a good portion of them, anyway—went down with the Jerry McGuen, a lot of important artifacts and information were lost to history,” Jon explained. “And Amun Mopat, much as he wanted to be a god, was only a priest. Tut had been a pharaoh.”
He actually paused for breath and Amanda remained silent. Will took the opportunity to survey the conference room; there was an excellent bust of Nefertiti on a counter that stretched out from the back wall. Next to her were a dozen or so canopic jars, all copies, according to Amanda and Jon.
He assumed they were telling the truth. Next to the canopic jars was a large coffee urn, and the usual collection of paper cups, sugar, creamer and whatever else one might desire for a cup of coffee. Nothing truly valuable would have been kept so casually and haphazardly where coffee could spill at any time.
He’d only had a quick glimpse of one of the workrooms. It was sterile in appearance except for a piece Amanda had been working on, a funerary statue that had been dug out of a pit in the city—property of someone who’d lost everything in the Great Chicago Fire. The fire had occurred in 1871, before the sinking of the Jerry McGuen, but collectors had been avid about ancient Egyptian pieces for a hundred years by then, and there’d been those who’d coveted Egyptian art even before Napoleon’s soldier had cracked the code in 1799 and translated the Rosetta Stone.
“Brady was being an ass,” Amanda said mournfully.
Jon Hunt immediately looked offended, and Amanda softened her words.
“An ass in the way we can all be asses. Jon, please, I’m not insulting him. I’d say the same thing about us. We get too excited about a discovery like this.” She sighed. “Brady grew up hearing his great-grandfather talk about the disappearance of the Jerry McGuen. Maybe that’s when he fell in love with Egyptology. Or maybe it started with the visits to the Field Museum. And you can imagine how he felt, considering what he knew about both Egyptology and the Jerry McGuen. We can’t help it. I guess we’re real nerds—oh, my God! Who would’ve thought that being a nerd could be dangerous? We think we know what we’re doing, and then…”
“He was brilliant.” Jon shook his head as if he still couldn’t accept that his friend and coworker was dead.
“Brilliant—and, this one time, so foolish!” Amanda said. “Yes, I admit the rest of us hadn’t totally believed in his theory. I mean, we believed—we just weren’t as insane about it as Brady. That’s how we work. Even when we’re not convinced that someone else is right, we work with them to find out. And all of Brady’s calculations did make sense. We were scheduled to start looking together. If they hadn’t been sound theories and calculations, we wouldn’t have approached the film director—Mr. Firestone. Oh, if Brady could just have waited…”
“We would have been right with him,” Jon said. He gritted his teeth. “I was the one who found him,” he whispered.
“We found him,” Amanda corrected.
“Yes, well, I was the first to see him…floating there.”
“We have two boats,” Amanda said. “He took one out ahead of us. We have a small, exploratory dive boat, and then our larger vessel. It was Saturday and—”
“Yes,” Jon interrupted. “If only it hadn’t been a Saturday!”
“We were supposedly off work, but Brady called both of us that morning. He said he was going to take the boat out and use sonar,” Amanda said. “Seriously, finding anything actually salvageable on the McGuen was always a long shot, but Brady believed that the treasures taken from the tomb had been so carefully packed, there was a real chance. I thought we were going to start on Monday, but he called me. I called Jon, and we agreed we’d go out with him, but he’d already taken the smaller boat. We let him know we were on our way, but I think he ignored us because he had to prove it to himself first. He shouldn’t have gone down to the wreck. He shouldn’t have gone down alone—he knew that. I was furious with him. Before we found him, of course.” She paused, looking at Jon and then at Will and added, “I was afraid. We didn’t want to lose our funding.” She glanced at Jon again, as if feeling guilty about something she’d done while trying to rationalize it at the same time.
“We brought out our second boat—the big one, Glory—and found the Seeker at anchor. There was no sign of Brady. And it was wrong of him, because Mr. King, the producer, said from the beginning that he’d finance us as long as we let him document every step—right or wrong—along the way,” Amanda told Will.
“I think Brady was afraid we’d start work, and there’d be no ship,” Jon said. “And if that was the case—”
“We’d already taken money,” Amanda broke in. “It’s also really competitive, diving for salvage. It can be confusing, too, with U.S. laws, state laws, international laws…except that we’re not in it to make a fortune. A 1987 federal law says the states own all wrecks found in their territorial waters, but there’s still money in salvage. There’s another law about disturbing a grave site, but really, there can’t be anything left of the people…. Except if the mummy itself was properly sealed… The thing is, we believe in returning antiquities. What we’d earn would be a percentage of what Mr. King makes in IMAX films and the like. Of course, he gave us a hefty sum as a down payment.”
“I knew something was wrong when the boat was empty, and Brady’s dive flag was still out,” Jon said.
“So, anyway,” Amanda continued, “Mr. King’s director, Bernie Firestone, and some of his crew came out with us, taking their boat—nice and fancy, all kinds of great stuff on it—and two of his underwater cameramen followed us down. And…and we found Brady.” Tears welled in Amanda’s eyes.
“Yeah. It was great. He’d found the Jerry McGuen,” Jon said bitterly. “And we found him.”
Amanda let out a little choking sound. They both stared at Will, their eyes soulful and wet.
Amanda was thirty-two, a pretty woman, reed-thin and passionate about her work. Jon, her coworker, was a few years older. His brown hair was graying at the temples and he wore bottle-thick glasses and was also thin. He was wiry and seemed fit as the proverbial fiddle.
Their attempt to explain everything to him at once seemed to point to their clinical and obsessive pursuit of knowledge. They both spent hour upon hour—day upon day—in their little cubicles or labs, painstakingly dusting or chiseling away the dirt and dust of the ages. Sometimes, they got to go on a dig or a dive, but most of the time, they were in their offices and labs.
Will liked everything he’d read about the Chicago Ancient History Preservation Center. He’d always been intrigued by history himself, especially by the way many societies—including the ancient Egyptians—used mysticism and magic.
As Amanda had said, the center kept none of the antiquities it discovered or worked on; its sole purpose was to preserve historical artifacts, delve into their secrets and pass them on to their homelands or an institution worthy of guarding and displaying them. It had been founded in the latter part of the nineteenth century by Jonas Shelby, an avid Egyptologist. In the years since, grants and private donations had added to Shelby’s legacy, and while the “treasures” came directly from ancient Egypt, they might also have been discovered in a Chicago backyard.
Amanda suddenly frowned at Will. “I’m not really sure why you’re here, Agent Chan,” she said. “It’s fine, but…”
“We brought Brady right up. He was dead by then. Obviously dead.” Jon grimaced. “When I radioed in the emergency the guy kept telling me to give him artificial respiration. I would’ve done anything for him—but Brady was dead when we brought him up. Like Amanda said, the filmmakers followed us down, so there’s actually footage—” he broke off “—footage of us finding Brady. The film crew has it. And the police have a copy, too.”
Will listened gravely. He knew that already. He’d spent yesterday with Alan King, Bernie Firestone and Earl Candy. Alan didn’t dive, but Bernie and Earl did. Alan was deeply worried about his future in film; it was not a good thing if people kept dying on the films he produced. Will had seen the footage of the two divers coming upon their dead coworker. Luckily, neither of the men was the kind of person to leak such footage to YouTube or any other site.
He didn’t tell Jon or Amanda that he’d seen the film. He wanted to hear their version of everything that had happened.
“And he was taken right…right to the morgue,” Amanda said. She appeared stricken, as if she’d begin crying again. “He drowned down there, and it’s tragic. To us more than anyone else, but…”
“He drowned,” Jon said flatly. “Why is the FBI investigating?”
“Your filmmaker.” Will smiled and leaned across the conference table to pick up a copy of the Sunday paper, lying there. The headline read Historian Dies Tragically During Greatest Discovery—Accident or Victim of Ancient Curse?
“Oh, please!” Amanda said. “Seriously, oh, please! That’s just a reporter scrambling for headlines. I saw Brady. He drowned!” She sighed. “Listen, I loved him like a brother. But we have to keep going on this, and quickly. We’ve gotten the rights to dive her first and salvage what we can. And Brady was absolutely correct. The precious cargo down there was carefully—carefully!—wrapped and stowed. We’d dishonor Brady’s memory if we didn’t complete his mission!”
“Okay, back up for me, please. You have the rights of salvage? Didn’t you need to find the ship first?” Will asked.
Amanda flushed. “Our paperwork is all on file. We have a maritime attorney on hand who has us all ready to go with recovery.”
“But if another person or enterprise had found her first….”
“Well, I suppose someone else could have filed for the rights, as well,” Amanda said. “But no one else had Brady—or studied the effect of storms on the lake like he did.”
Will doubted that a competing group would care how someone had determined the location of a treasure. They would just want the bottom line. “Who else has been searching for the Jerry McGuen?” he asked.
“Through the decades?” Jon shrugged. “Anyone with a ship, sonar or a dive suit.”
Will smiled. “Recently. Do you know of anyone or any other enterprise searching for her?”
“A year ago there was an article about a company called Landry Salvage that was interested. Their CEO was quoted in a local TV piece on the wreck,” Amanda said.
Jon was thoughtful, drumming his fingers on the conference table for a moment before speaking. “There’s also a company called Simonton’s Sea Search that was interviewed briefly for the same piece. It was one of those little five-minute news segments, you know?”
“It never occurred to you that since the treasure on the ship is worth a fortune, someone else might be eager to acquire that fortune?” Will asked.
“It’s not like anyone could just keep everything, or that a salvage effort on the lake wouldn’t be spotted!” Amanda insisted.
“Yes, but whether the treasures were returned to Egypt or turned over to our government,” Will said, “the finder’s fee or percentages could be staggering. Though I’m not seeing a legitimate bid as something that’s likely to supersede yours. The black market is where the real money would be.”
Amanda shook her head. “That’s why we needed to find it. Stop the black market activity. And we still need to get down there fast, although…thanks to Brady, our papers have been filed.”
Will lowered his head, hiding his expression. The world did go on. They’d found Brady’s body in the ship—and they’d made sure their legal work was done, probably as soon as Brady Laurie was on his way to the morgue.
“The mission won’t be stopped—will it? I mean, I know there’s competition out there, but Brady drowned. I saw him.” Amanda’s eyes were anxious as she looked at Will. “Poor Brady—but he must have died happy. He did find the Jerry McGuen.”
Will doubted that Brady had died happy. Drowning was a horrendous death.
“The salvage is not being stopped,” Will said. “And, so far, the medical examiner’s conclusions are that Brady Laurie died as a result of forgetting his deep-water time because of his excitement.”
“So…why the FBI?” Amanda asked, obviously still puzzled.
“The director of the documentary is an old friend of Sean Cameron’s—Sean’s an agent in one of our special units—and the producer, Mr. King, is anxious about what’s happened. Not to mention all these rumors about the curse. Because of their association with us and their concern that the salvage and the documentary go well, they came to the agency. And because our most senior officer, Adam Harrison, has great relationships with state governments, we were invited in. We’re not sensationalists. We’re here to disprove a curse, as much as anything else and, hopefully, make sure there are no more accidents.”
“Oh!” Amanda said, blinking away tears again. “Well, as long as our work isn’t stopped. Brady—oh, God, I miss him, I loved him, but he was acting like a cowboy. He just had to get down there before we were really ready. He knew not to dive alone. I mean, come on, an experienced diver knows never to dive alone. Anywhere. Not even in shallow reefs in the Keys, much less here. He just thought he was better than anyone and… We are diving the wreck tomorrow? An exploratory dive before we start with the salvage?” she asked anxiously.
“Yes,” Will assured her. “Everything will go ahead as planned. Just one change,” he told her pleasantly. “I’ll be joining you, and so will another member of my unit.”
“What?” Amanda was obviously dismayed. “More people down there? You don’t understand how careful you have to be with artifacts. You don’t—”
“I’ll do my best, Dr. Channel,” he said. “My colleague and I will meet you at the dock tomorrow morning.” He rose to signal that he was leaving—and that he’d be back.
“Yes, but…” Amanda started her protest and then frowned. “I could probably answer any other questions you might have right now. Where are you going?”
“I’m afraid I have another meeting,” he informed her, “but I’ll see you tomorrow.”
He smiled politely and exited the room, and then the Preservation Center.
It was situated near the aquarium, on South Lake Shore Drive, and when he stepped out the front door, he saw Lake Michigan. The water glittered in the sun, and he wished he could get out on a boat in a dive suit right away, but he had a meeting with a member of Logan Raintree’s crew.
And with a dead man.
He turned away from the lake and headed for his rental car.
2
More than eighteen thousand deaths were reported to the Cook County office of the medical examiner yearly. Of those, some six thousand received an autopsy.
The office handled investigations for a large part of the state; in January 2011, there’d been such a backup due to the number of bodies and the holidays, they were stacked one on top of the other. The morgue had been overcrowded due to what the press had dubbed “the killing season,” when gang violence had erupted on the South Side.
Kat knew these things because she’d done nothing but read since she’d boarded her plane for Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport.
Cook County wasn’t different from any other large metropolitan area. People died. Thankfully most of them died naturally.
But some did not. Some died because of gang violence, and sometimes they died in police custody or in jail. Some died because of domestic violence, and some were simply and pathetically in the wrong place at the wrong time—victims of random crime. Some died “suspiciously” or without apparent explanation.
Despite the fact that she wasn’t in Chicago because she wanted to be, she wasn’t disturbed by her particular assignment here. While many people feared a medical examiner’s office as a frightening and gruesome place, Kat had always found that an autopsy—though invasive—was a service that man had come to do for man. It was an effort to let the dead speak for themselves, to seek justice, find a killer or, conversely, prove accidental death when no other human was at fault. Autopsy helped the living, too; some medical advances would have never come about without autopsies determining the cause of death. In medical school, she hadn’t started out feeling that she’d rather work with the dead than the living. It had been during her residency that she’d discovered she had a penchant for unspoken truths…and that, even when silent, the dead could sometimes tell their tales.
The Texas Krewe—her unit of their section within the FBI—was supposed to investigate whatever couldn’t be answered by the evidence. Usually it wasn’t because of incompetence or because leads weren’t followed by the local police. They were called in when the leads themselves were unusual. Some people described those leads as paranormal.
But in this instance…
A diver had jumped the gun. He’d jumped the gun on an incredible discovery mainly because he was the scientist who’d been determined to find the wreck of the Jerry McGuen. He’d been looking for ancient Egyptian treasures lost along with the ship.
And those treasures included a mummy.
It just had to be a mummy! she thought, wincing as she conjured up an image of Brendan Fraser and his hit movie. And of course there was the mummy in The Unholy—the recent Hollywood remake of a 1940s film noir—had been that of an evil Egyptian priest who’d turned out to be real.
“Sad beginning to this whole thing, huh?”
Startled, Katya looked over at Dr. Alex McFarland, the M.E. who walked her down the corridors and past offices, vaults and autopsy rooms. He seemed a decent enough sort, cordial and receptive. Bald as a billiard ball and wearing spectacles, he reminded her of Dr. Bunsen Honeydew of Jim Henson’s Muppets fame, the epitome of what the general public expected a doctor or scientist to look like.
“Very sad,” she agreed. The victim had been in his thirties, an expert on Egyptology and an expert diver. A young man with his life stretching out before him.
And now that life was cut short.
McFarland rolled his eyes. “Tragic…and almost no one’s talking about the boy’s death. Of course, the disappearance of the Jerry McGuen has been one of the great mysteries of Lake Michigan since she went down in the late-nineteenth century. There’s more coverage given to the discovery than to the poor boy’s death. And God help us all—the curse! But, then again, although Chicago is hardly considered to be one of the world’s great dive spots, the lakes hold a lot of wrecks where divers frequently go. I don’t dive myself, but we have many professional and recreational divers in the area. Many of them say he was being careless, that he took chances in his excitement and shouldn’t have been diving at seventy-five, eighty feet on his own.”
“You should always dive with a buddy,” Kat said. “Sadly it’s often the divers—even expert divers—who go out on their own who wind up in autopsy. There are no guarantees in the deep.”
“You dive?”
“Yes,” she told him.
“Well, then, I’m sure you’ll enjoy this. Like I said, the Great Lakes are filled with shipwrecks. I find the lakes and wrecks fascinating. I’ve studied them all my life—to the point of obsession, I’m afraid. Many are known, but many are not. Lake Michigan has a surface area of 22,400 square miles and its average depth is 279 feet with its greatest depth being about 923 feet,” McFarland said. “It’s the largest lake completely contained in one country in the world, and ranked fifth largest on the globe.”
McFarland obviously loved Chicago. He sounded very proud of the lake.
But then he sighed. “Lots and lots of room for tragedy over the years, and lots of room for ships to disappear. Sure, finding wrecks in the deep, frigid waters of the North Atlantic is a challenge, but if you’ve ever looked out at the lake, you might as well be staring at an ocean, it’s so immense.”
She glanced over at him; McFarland knew the power of water, and he seemed well up on his history of the area. He was as fascinated as everyone else by the discovery of the sunken ship.
“The exploration is still going on,” she said.
“So I understand. The world doesn’t stop spinning because one person has died.” McFarland shrugged. “You have heard that everyone’s talking about a curse, right?”
“Yes,” she said. That’s why I’m here.
Normally, of course, they would never have been called in because of an accidental death that occurred while a man was scuba diving. Such deaths would be handled by the medical examiner’s office, but there usually wasn’t any hint of paranormal activity, so no reason for their unit to be brought in.
“You can’t stop the wheels of progress when there’s been a great discovery, I guess,” McFarland said.
“Every day is money,” she murmured. “Someone’s livelihood. In this case, many livelihoods.”
That was true. Kat didn’t know nearly as much about film as Sean Cameron or a few of the others who belonged to one of the “Krewe” teams, but from their time in California she’d learned how much money could be involved. In the file Logan had given her she’d read that production prep had already begun; crew and talent had been hired. Of course, Alan King was, according to Forbes, a billionaire, so if he lost money on the enterprise, he’d probably be just fine. But making the documentary meant much more to the struggling historians running a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving the past.
Sean would arrive soon. He’d taken a short holiday with Madison Darvil after their last case. When they got back from Hawaii, Madison would resume her work in California, and Sean would come here.
She smiled just thinking about it. She loved Sean; they were old Texas friends. She felt sure that he and Madison would be able to keep up with their demanding jobs—he with the unit, she with her work at a special effects company—and maintain a relationship.
Kat returned her attention to Dr. McFarland and the situation. At the moment, however, that didn’t seem to help. Whatever had happened to Brady Laurie was still confusing.
But in every case, someone needed to speak for the dead….
“Well, from what I understand, Alan King doesn’t care if he loses money on a film as long as he produces a documentary that makes him proud,” Kat said to McFarland. “King already has his director and shipboard cameraman—who are two men my team and I actually know. They’re from San Antonio. I understand that King also has underwater videographers on-site, ready to detail every single step of the ship’s recovery…and that they were there when members of the Preservation Center found Mr. Laurie.”
“That’s the information I have, too,” McFarland said. “I wasn’t at the site. The body was brought here. And I swear that man hadn’t been out of the water for more than two seconds before the curse hysteria started.”
She didn’t believe in curses; she did believe in the way a curse could be used to prey on people’s minds. She’d seen people die because of what they were convinced was true, hearts that had stopped beating because of fear.
“I don’t think there’s an Egyptian tomb that doesn’t come with a curse—or at least a rumored curse,” Kat said.
McFarland grinned. “I see you’ve read up on all this. The man who discovered Amun Mopat’s tomb, Gregory Hudson, was aboard the Jerry McGuen when she sank, which, of course, gave rise to the belief that the curse is real. To tell you the truth, the only curse I see is the wicked Chicago weather. But you’ve probably heard our old saying. ‘If it weren’t for the weather, everyone would want to live here!’”
“The Jerry McGuen carried the mortal remains and effects of the New Kingdom, nineteenth dynasty priest—or sorcerer—Amun Mopat, beloved of
Ramses II,” Kat said. “He had his own burial crypt and chamber built before his death. He’d filled it with treasures and—in his own hand, the story goes—chiseled a curse into his tombstone, damning anyone who disturbed his eternal life. Or disturbed the place where his body rested while he joined with the pharaohs and gods. He was apparently quite taken with himself. He wanted to be a god like the pharaohs.” She smiled. “According to some of the research a colleague pulled for me, he had blood ties to Ramses II. He felt he should have been seen as a god all his life.”
“Yes, very good. You seem very well informed.” McFarland shrugged. “But I don’t understand why they’ve called the FBI in on this, except that…curses and ghosts are your specialty, right?”
“I assure you, I’m qualified to be here, Dr. McFarland,” Kat told him. “I received my doctorates in medicine and forensic pathology from Johns Hopkins.”
“Yes, I heard you were well qualified, Dr. Sokolov—and I’m sure you’ll understand what we’re dealing with better than the fellow who’s already here.”
“Agent Chan is here now?” she asked. She wished she’d had a chance to meet with him earlier. Introductions over a corpse were always a bit awkward, even if she was a medical examiner and far too familiar with morgues.
“Yes, he arrived about ten minutes ago. He said you were informed that you’d be meeting him. He’s not a doctor,” McFarland said, his tone irritated and more than a little condescending.
“But he is an agent,” Kat reminded him.
McFarland opened the door to the autopsy room; they were both gowned and gloved.
Kat usually noted the corpse first.
But this time she noted the man who belonged to the original Krewe.
He greeted her as she entered, with words rather than a gloved hand. “Hello, Dr. Sokolov, I’m Will Chan. I believe you were expecting to meet me here?”
“Yes, of course. Logan told me you were already in the city,” Kat said.
She didn’t mean to stare at him in obvious assessment.
But she did. She probably would’ve been tempted to stare at him anywhere. He wasn’t just an appealing, attractive or handsome man, he was different, and not merely because of his striking appearance. There was an aura about him, an energy that immediately caught and held her attention.
She had to look up at him, but she was only five-four, so it seemed that she looked up at most of the world. Somehow, with him, it was…disconcerting. Or maybe it was the circumstances that were disconcerting. We don’t know each other, except for what we know about each other. And yet…
She’d been given so many files to read on the plane, she had to mentally put what she knew about Will in order. He’d become an agent with the original Krewe of Hunters when they’d solved a case at a historic mansion in New Orleans. Before that, he’d performed as a magician and an illusionist. He was also astute with video, film and discerning what was really just smoke and mirrors, recognizing what lay beneath the surface. Will had gone through the academy and passed with flying colors. He was a talented agent.
And, of course, he’d happened to be in the city.
She cleared her throat, not wanting to seem gauche. “Logan gave me an extensive file,” she said. “You’re a film expert, as well?”
“I know a few things about it,” he said, lowering his head with a quick smile. “I come from a long line of illusionists.”
He was tall with intriguing features. His background was Trinidadian and he’d spoken with a slight accent that made her think of the Caribbean island. His hair was dark. His eyes, just as dark, were slightly almond-shaped. His features suggested Asian and perhaps Indian antecedents, and then again, there was something classic about them. His face seemed to be sculpted in the mold of a Roman statue, but with the rugged chin of an American cowboy. She found herself studying him—and almost forgetting that he was standing beside a corpse.
“Yes, and I’m one of Jackson Crow’s team, and most important, I was in Chicago when this happened,” he said.
“Right.” Kat nodded. “And so…what have you learned?”
“He hasn’t learned anything yet,” McFarland said. “I haven’t gone over the autopsy report with him,” he added. “We knew you were on your way.”
Kat nodded again, but looked at Will Chan.
McFarland had no idea just what this man—a Krewe member who could speak with the dead—might have learned.
She glanced away from Will Chan with determination, unable to still the curiosity stirring within her. As part of Jackson Crow’s team, he’d been specifically chosen for his position.
Because of a special talent.
McFarland drew out his report and frowned as he studied it. “As we all know, Mr. Laurie was a white adult male, thirty-six years old. No alcohol in the system, no drugs. His body was found drifting in the hold of the Jerry McGuen, at a depth of eighty feet in Lake Michigan, Chicago jurisdiction. Autopsy revealed no sign of violence and showed that Mr. Laurie was in perfect health at the time of his death. The lungs were filled with salt water, so I’m planning to officially sign off on this report as death by drowning, accidental.”
Kat gazed at the corpse. When it came to their unofficial role with the Krewe of Hunters, she was always glad of her medical degree and her specialization in pathology.
People didn’t think she was crazy when she touched the dead.
She moved forward, inspecting the dead man and then touching his arm.
She waited, hoping for something. A sense that he was still there, and that she could communicate with the remnants of his life, spirit or soul.
But she heard nothing in her mind, saw nothing at all in the part of her own soul that was different from other people’s. Her skill, or gift, or whatever one chose to call it, was out of the ordinary—but shared by some. Like Will Chan…
She glanced up at him again. He was watching her, and his striking dark eyes divulged none of his thoughts.
Stepping back, she gave her full attention to the visual aspect of the corpse.
Drowning. She hadn’t done the autopsy herself. She saw that Dr. McFarland’s Y incision was neatly cut and just as neatly sewn with small, competent stitches. It didn’t take a brilliant doctor to detect when the lungs were filled with water, and she didn’t doubt his conclusion on that.
She turned from the body to the report. The man had definitely drowned.
But she didn’t like the coloration of the corpse. Blue lips—natural, given what had happened. However, the lips were also puffy, and one side of his mouth seemed more swollen than the other. And there were curious bruises on the arms.
“You’re aware of the bruising?” she asked McFarland.
“Of course.” He was obviously indignant at her question. “I make painstaking notes. Every bruise is listed in the report, and you will have a copy of it for your files.”
She forced herself to ignore McFarland and Chan, studying the body once again. She was certain that McFarland was adept at his work—and from what she’d seen thus far, his notes were painstaking, just as he’d said. But the medical examiner needed to note the condition of a corpse and assess possible causes for that condition. McFarland’s Y incision on the dead man had been nothing short of artistic, and she was sure he’d inspected the man’s vital organs and taken all necessary samples for the pathology lab.
Brady Laurie showed no postmortem lividity in his lower extremities, which led her to believe that he’d floated, probably upright, after death.
But the bruising on his face still bothered her. So did the bruises on his arms. Those were smaller—the size of fingertips.
“What do you make of these?” she asked McFarland.
“Bruises. As I mentioned, they’re noted in the report,” McFarland said curtly.
Chan cleared his throat as he eased around the gurney. “What would’ve caused bruises on both arms?” he murmured. Kat had the same question. They weren’t as conspicuous, perhaps, as the contusions around his mouth, but unmistakable nonetheless.
“The man was a diver. He was dealing with a lot of equipment. He knocked around in one of the ship’s holds until he was found by other divers from the Preservation Center,” McFarland said. “He could have gotten them from an air tank or from some of the equipment he had piled on him. He was carrying a camera, and he was wearing one of those headlights divers use during night dives or cave dives. There was a dive knife strapped to his ankle. He had a huge light on the camera, as well—and, like I said, he bounced around the hold.”
“Still…I don’t think we should discount these bruises,” Kat said.
Chan seemed to agree. He moved around the corpse again, studying the bruises on Brady Laurie’s arms. Then he angled forward. “They look like fingerprints,” Chan said. “See? If I were to reach out and grab him…”
He demonstrated, putting his fingers just above where the bruises showed on the flesh.
“You think he was held down?” McFarland sounded skeptical.
“I think it’s possible,” Chan said, and he turned to Kat.
“More than possible.” She stepped forward, gently touching Brady’s lips with her gloved fingers. “And there’s some injury around the mouth….”
McFarland seemed troubled now, staring at the corpse and then referring to his notes. Finally, he shook his head. “Mr. Laurie was down in that hold alone. All alone. I don’t know anything about him as a man. Perhaps he had a temper. Maybe he got into an argument with someone before he went down. Maybe someone grabbed him roughly. I imagine he had a few bouts with his fellows at the Preservation Center. He could have gotten these bruises in a scuffle with a friend—even roughhousing for fun.”
Kat looked at him incredulously.
“This isn’t the body of a man who engaged in any kind of serious fight!” McFarland said firmly. “The bruises are small. There’s no injury to any of his bones. There are no real cuts, just some chafing around the mouth. He came in here having drowned. He definitely did drown.”
“But you assumed he might have been in a scuffle?” Will asked. “Do you often hear of fistfights among historians who don’t agree with each other?”
“There’s no real violence to the body. And historians are human like everyone else,” McFarland said.
“That’s true, but I spent the morning with this man’s coworkers—and there was no difference of opinion. They all wanted the same thing,” Will told McFarland. He sighed. “Doctor, please look at these bruises. Look at the way they match my hands. Think about a regulator. If it was ripped out of a man’s mouth…”
“You would have exactly that kind of trauma,” Kat finished.
“And exactly that kind of bruising,” Will said impatiently.
His tone made McFarland bristle, and Kat frowned at Will.
He ignored her.
Despite the tension in the room, Kat kept her hand lightly on the icy-cold arm of the corpse. She knew that Will was right; she had noted the particular patterns of the bruises on Brady’s arms almost immediately. And combined with the marks around his mouth, they suggested certain conclusions. But then, she was a diver. McFarland was not. And the man who’d been brought to him had been floating alone in the hold of a sunken ship.
At this rate, however, they weren’t going to be welcome back at the morgue.
She wished she could get some feel for the man who’d been Brady Laurie.
Nothing. She was getting nothing from the body. If only Brady Laurie was still somehow here…but his body was cold. Empty.
“This is ridiculous. It’s…it’s not like he has massive bruising anywhere,” McFarland sputtered.
“The bruises may darken, giving us a better idea,” Kat said. “He hasn’t been dead that long,” she reminded him.
“He might not have gone ten rounds at the WWE SmackDown,” Will put in, “but it looks to me as if he was held in a firm grip shortly before his death.”
“It doesn’t make sense that one of his coworkers could have gotten angry enough to have killed him. It’s not like they’re out to claim the treasures for themselves,” Kat said.
“So?” McFarland’s voice was strained. “What? A mummy crawled out of an inner sarcophagus and an outer sarcophagus—not to mention careful waterproofing—to rip his regulator out of his mouth?”
“Of course not,” Kat said.
“This man was the one who discovered the ship! He was alone down there,” McFarland emphasized.
“Maybe—and maybe not,” Will said. “Others had to have known. Brady Laurie had done careful charting before the preservation group sent out requests for financial help, trying to sell their research as a documentary. This is the age of computer hackers, so plenty of people could’ve found out. And Lake Michigan hasn’t been closed, has it?”
Kat wanted to kick him for his sarcasm.
“Agent Chan, I have been at this job for over twenty years,” McFarland began.
Kat stepped in quickly. “Of course, Doctor, and your autopsy and notations are commendable. But there are factors involved that weren’t included in the information you were given. You had no reason to suspect foul play. But with the possibilities out there—”
“What possibilities? A curse! A swimming mummy?”
Will shrugged and replied casually, “No, I’m sure the mummy would have deteriorated if it had somehow come to life,” he said. “Money, Doctor. A treasure of inestimable worth. We don’t know if any other party discovered the wreck due to Brady’s research. It might have been a simple drowning. And then again, maybe not. At this point in the investigation, we have no idea who else might have been out on the lake.”
“He died by drowning,” McFarland insisted.
Will raised his eyebrows. “Yes, he died by drowning. But whether it was accidental or not—that’s a completely different question, isn’t it?”
“You’re really suggesting he was murdered?”
“I’m more than suggesting, I’m saying it’s quite likely,” Will said. “Your findings were absolutely correct, Dr. McFarland, except that…they weren’t. Brady Laurie was grabbed and he was held in the water. He drowned not because he ran out of time, but because his regulator was ripped from him. That’s why he has injuries on his lips.”
“Young man, what you’re suggesting is a remote possibility!” McFarland said.
“Remote? I don’t think so.”
“Dr. McFarland, the point is…there is a possibility,” Kat said.
“And not so remote,” Will added.
He looked over at Kat. He was challenging her to step up to the plate. She wasn’t in the least worried about doing that; she just wished she didn’t have to.
She looked back at Will, who watched her steadily. And then, her heart sinking because she’d so badly wanted this to be nothing, she turned to McFarland. “Doctor, this is your morgue and your call. But…under the circumstances, I’d change that report if I were you. At the very least, hold on to it for a couple of days and let us do some more investigating. There’s a good possibility that this was willful death caused by person or persons unknown.”
3
“Could you have been any ruder?” Kat demanded of Chan.
“Could he have been any more incompetent?” he fired back.
They were out on the street. Car horns blared now and then, and the whir of fast-moving traffic seemed to be all around them.
Kat shook her head. “There’s still nothing to actually prove him wrong, Agent Chan. The bruise could conceivably have been caused by jostling around.”
“I never went to medical school, Agent Sokolov, but I don’t think you need a degree to recognize bruises on postmortem flesh. My fingers fit perfectly into those bruises, so I’d say whoever killed him had nice large hands. Brady Laurie wasn’t any kind of a hulk, although he was certainly strong enough to defend himself to some degree. But you dive, so surely you’re aware that a lack of oxygen can quickly deprive you of energy and skill, leaving only the instinct to survive—and fight against whatever is keeping you from breathing. An actor in a James Bond movie may be able to hold his breath forever while waging a heroic battle, but in most instances, you expend what air you have in trying to fight, and then…” He broke off, his implication grim. “And you agreed with my findings. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have said what you did.”
“I believe your findings suggest further investigation.”
“Beyond a doubt.”
“But that would usually suggest not insulting the medical examiner to the point that he doesn’t want you back in the morgue! In any city, we need to be on the best terms with local authorities,” Kat told him.
Will Chan stared back at her for a moment, then shrugged. “All right, fine. I should have tiptoed around his feelings. We should have pleasantly gone along with him—and then he would’ve released the body and we’d be left with nothing. Well, excuse me. You can go back in and ask the good doctor out for coffee or drinks, but I’m headed to the police station.”
He turned and started walking. Kat glared at him, her temper soaring. She decided to go after him and practically had to run to keep up with his long strides. She caught him by the arm and was surprised by her own strength when she spun him around to face her.
“Look, my team was the one called in. You just happened to be here. This is my investigation, and I need you to stop your high-handed behavior before you offend every cop in the city of Chicago, as well.”
“Why would I offend a cop who’s dealt with a situation competently?” he asked. “And I’m sure you’ve been informed that I’ve already begun the investigation. I did so right after Logan Raintree got the request and called Jackson Crow and Adam Harrison with the information.”
“Great. Except that you offended the medical examiner. Did you offend the film people, too? Or any of the others we’ll have to depend on for access and information?”
“I haven’t offended anyone, Agent Sokolov. What I did was conduct a very professional meeting with the film crew and then speak to the two researchers who worked with and found Mr. Laurie. I’ve politely informed them that we’ll be diving with them tomorrow. Unless, of course, you prefer to maintain your investigation here on the surface. I will certainly understand.”
She wondered what would happen if she simply combusted with anger on the street.
“Agent Chan, it was my understanding that I was to examine the corpse at the request of the producer, Alan King, and that if I found anything I didn’t believe to be completely straightforward, then an investigation would begin.”
“Well, Agent Sokolov, I was told last night to step right up and get things going since I was in the city. That’s what I did. When a body pops up, the first hours can be the most important—as you know—so time was of the essence. Would you like me to share what I’ve learned? Or would you rather let someone else die while you start your own investigation?” he asked.
I’m a professional, but I cannot work with this man!
She took a deep breath. “You do realize, Agent Chan, that we didn’t just go in and prove that Brady Laurie was murdered. Yes, it’s possible that he was held in some way while his regulator was ripped from him, but it’s not a foregone conclusion. There are other reasons such bruising might have occurred.”
“Evidence locker,” he said.
“Pardon?”
“Laurie’s dive gear is in an evidence locker down at the police station, since the police were with the rescue units when he was brought in. I’m going down there to meet up with the local investigator and see exactly how much air was left in Laurie’s tank.” He paused. “I was a day ahead of you—although, yes, it’s your case. I’ve seen the footage that was taken when the body was discovered. Laurie was dead when they found him, which wasn’t long after he’d gone down himself. I still can’t accept that it was a simple drowning.”
“Wait—whoa! I didn’t know there was footage!”
“Yes, there’s footage. And you can call Bernie right now, or you can take my word for it. I haven’t been to look at the evidence yet, but I intend to. You can get together with King Productions now or come with me and see the footage later. Your call.”
She really wished it would be professional just to slap his determined and impatient face.
Another deep breath. “It’s my call, yes,” she said. “But I will come with you. As you pointed out, I can see the footage later.”
He stood his ground but seemed slightly taken aback, something of a smile almost curving his lips.
“We’re not on opposing sides,” she said. “It doesn’t matter who makes what call. We’re here to find out if a murder has occurred, and if an investigation is necessary. I’m here for Brady Laurie, Agent Chan, not for a pissing contest with you.”
Now his lips did curve into a full smile. “Sorry. But the M.E.’s findings were just too easy.”
“Look, if there was no reason to suspect foul play, his findings really weren’t negligent.”
“You’re defending him because he’s an M.E.”
“I’m only saying what’s true, especially in a big city where you can have days when the bodies just pile up,” Kat said.
“All right. I’ll apologize when I see him again—if I see him again—and let’s pray I don’t. As to the rest, time can mean everything in this kind of investigation.”
“I know. But I’m not sure whether we can answer all the questions we need answered or if those answers will lead to more questions. If we find air in the tank…”
“Then there’s a good chance he was murdered.”
He’d turned already. She suddenly hated the fact that he was as tall as he was. Keeping up with him was an effort.
“Even if the air is gone, we can’t be certain of what happened. The air might have bled out after he died,” she said, catching up with Will. “And if there is air in the tank, it still doesn’t prove that the regulator was ripped from his mouth.”
He stopped so abruptly that she plowed into him. He reached out one hand to prevent her from falling.
“No, we won’t prove anything one way or another, not without additional evidence. But it will be interesting to find out if there is or isn’t air in his tank and to take a look at the regulator.”
“You have a car?” she asked him.
“You don’t?”
“I got into my room around midnight. I took a cab from the airport.”
“I’m in the garage.”
He started walking again. This time, she kept a certain distance.
He’d rented a Honda. When Kat climbed in, he indicated a folder thrust between the seats. “Notes from my meeting with Amanda Channel and Jon Hunt at the Chicago Ancient History Preservation Center—and what I’ve dug up from recent newspaper clippings.”
Kat quickly leafed through the folder while he maneuvered the car out of the parking garage. The center sounded like a truly commendable enterprise. Nonprofit, it was dedicated to preservation. The staff was small and included three researchers, a receptionist and a general assistant. Grad students came and went. Of course, now with Brady Laurie gone, it was down to two researchers.
“Landry Salvage and Simonton’s Sea Search,” she murmured, skimming various articles written about the elusive Jerry McGuen. “These can’t be the only two parties interested in finding the ship.”
“I’m assuming that over the last century, countless individuals and companies have tried. Think about discoveries in the past. Both the Titanic and the Atocha took years and years of fruitless searches before finally being discovered.” He glanced over at her. “Laurie must have been a brilliant historian and scientist.”
“But not as brilliant a diver,” Kat said. “He shouldn’t have gone down alone.”
Will shrugged. “Maybe it wouldn’t have mattered.”
“What do you mean?”
“Maybe the first person to come across the treasure was supposed to die,” he said cryptically. “Or maybe his coworkers weren’t supposed to be so close behind him, who knows? But I believe we’ll find out.”
“You have a lot of confidence,” Kat told him.
He flashed her a smile that was surprisingly charming. “That’s what we do—find things out. So far, my team hasn’t stopped until we’ve gotten the answers. Don’t tell me your team gives up so easily.”
“We haven’t given up yet!” Kat said indignantly.
His smile remained in place as he drove.
At the station, they were led first to one desk and then to another, and finally to the officer in charge of the accidental death investigation, Sergeant Riley. His supervisor had advised him to expect fed agents, and while he was pleasant and seemed to have no problem offering them assistance, he was confused about why they were there. “Sad, but the way the papers tell it,” Riley said, “Laurie went down on his own and drowned. You would’ve thought he’d know better. Every year, every damned year, there’s a diver lost somewhere in the lake, some fool so convinced of his own ability that he just goes down—and comes up dead.” Riley was in his early thirties, tops. He was medium in height and size, and wore a white tailored shirt with the sleeves rolled up. “At the moment, the personal effects found on the corpse are in the evidence room. We’ll go sign them out and you can study them all you want.”
“Were you there when Brady Laurie was brought up?” Kat asked him.
“They were on the lake. Our marine unit went out to the site. He was declared dead at the hospital, but there’d been attempts at resuscitation before that. I took over the investigation when his wet suit and dive tanks were sent to us, and I’ve been awaiting the medical examiner’s report, but…I have to admit, I wasn’t expecting anything to come of it,” Riley said.
He walked them back to the evidence cage, where they were introduced to the officer in charge and signed in. “Was the equipment tested for leaks?” Will asked.
“Immediately. No problems.”
“Fingerprints?”
“Um, no.”
“Ah,” Chan said.
Riley frowned. “Is that a problem? I doubt we’d have gotten anything, anyway, since divers in the lake wear gloves. And then, of course, our technicians worked with the equipment to find out if it was faulty in any way.”
“But it wasn’t?”
“No.”
In the evidence area where the tank, regulator and buoyancy control belt had been stowed, along with Laurie’s weight belt, Will looked back at Kat. “May I?”
“Go right ahead.” Laurie’s equipment had not been disassembled; the “octopus” with the regulator, secondary system and computer console was still connected to the air tank.
Will examined the computer at the end of one of the hoses. He grimaced and beckoned to Kat. She came over and stood next to him, staring down at the dials. Brady Laurie had died with five minutes of air still available.
“There was air in his tank,” Will explained to Riley. “After it was checked out for leaks.”
“Well, so there is,” Riley said. “Then he must have panicked and spit the thing out.”
“Experienced divers don’t panic when they have a regulator and air. He had a secondary system, too,” Kat said thoughtfully. “Properly attached to his BCV.” Riley was looking at her blankly. “This,” she said, indicating the buoyancy control vest. “He could easily have reached for it if he’d had difficulty with his main regulator,” she said, pointing to the mouthpiece. “It allows for the flow of air.”
Riley shook his head. “We really think it was just a tragic accident.”
Kat stepped in front of Will. “I’m sorry, Sergeant Riley. We don’t.”
“You’re taking over the investigation?” he asked. To Kat’s astonishment, he sounded hopeful.
He must have read her mind. “Hey, big city here, folks. I have my hands full, so…the chief already sent down orders to set you up in one of the conference rooms.”
“Good,” Will said. “Thank you.” He pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket. “Can you see that we have access to this equipment, and a technical officer if need be?”
“Whatever you want that we’ve got,” Riley assured them.
“Can you also connect us with the officer in charge of the marine patrol unit?”
Riley was happy to do so. He was happy, perhaps, to do anything that would make them someone else’s responsibility.
Outside the station, Kat took out her phone. “I’ve got to tell Logan I can’t say for sure that Laurie died by accident,” she explained to Will. “Do you need to call in, as well? Now might be a good time.”
He shrugged. “I don’t have anything to report yet. Jackson Crow knew I’d be staying on for a while.”
“Oh?”
“Hey, I happen to love Egyptian history,” he told her.
“You seem delighted that there might have been a murder,” she said sarcastically.
“Death never delights me.” His voice had grown serious. “You came into this expecting an accidental drowning—which is also what the police believed. But whenever there’s big money involved and a massive black market, I expect trouble. We need to put a stop to it or it’s going to continue.” He studied her for a moment. “Hey, this is what we do,” he said. “You shouldn’t be in this if you can’t hack it.”
“I can hack it just fine,” she snapped. “You forget I’m a doctor—a certified medical examiner and forensic pathologist. I’ve studied all manner of deaths.”
“No, I didn’t forget,” he said. “I couldn’t possibly—you constantly remind me.”
He walked away so she could make her call.
Kat looked after him, frustrated, her temper soaring again. Then she flushed and turned away. Was she afraid she didn’t have control of the situation? Mental note: quit reminding people that I’m an M.E.
Wincing, she made her call.
She told Logan that yes, it appeared that they should investigate, although she had nothing solid as yet. He promised that more team members would be there within twenty-four hours. “I’m assuming that you’ve met Agent Chan?” Logan asked.
“Oh, yes.”
“And he’s capable and professional?”
“All that,” Kat said drily.
“And what else?”
“He’s an ass,” Kat said. “He stomped all over the Chicago M.E. I try to speak first now to protect us from the wrath of local authorities.”
Logan chuckled softly. “I know Chan. I met him at our special units base in Arlington. He’s, shall we say, irreverent, but apparently excellent at what he does. He’s familiar with film, video and computer alteration, so he’ll be great with the film crew. And he dives, which is a major asset on this case. Are you going to see the Jerry McGuen soon?”
“If I know Chan, very soon,” Kat said, glancing over at her new colleague.
“Keep me posted on any developments,” Logan told her. “I should be there by midafternoon tomorrow.” Then he rang off and Kat returned the phone to her purse, signaling that the call was finished.
Chan approached her seconds later. “Ready?” he asked.
She nodded.
Their next stop was the harbor, where the police search and rescue boat that had brought in the body was docked.
The harbor and the lake were beautiful that day. Summer was still with them but would begin to fade in the next few weeks. Today, though, the water glistened under a benign sun.
They were able to see all four officers who’d been on the search and rescue boat. Officer Aldo Reynald had been in charge, and he seemed sincerely interested in their queries.
“When we got there, the woman was crying her eyes out…Amanda. Yeah, Amanda Channel. She was kneeling over the dead man. She said she’d done CPR, but she didn’t think it helped. She said we had to save her friend. The other guy, Jon Hunt, was walking around the dock, rubbing his chin, scratching his head. I tried CPR as we got him to shore. No luck. We have a state-of-the-art truck to deal with emergencies like this. You get a lot of divers who think they know their stuff and don’t, or divers who are used to the tropics and get into trouble in the lake. And naturally we have boating accidents, so…we’re prepared. We used every possible method of resuscitation on the way to the hospital, but…then we got there and they called it.” He shook his head glumly. “I’m assuming we’re going to have to be vigilant as this whole thing proceeds because diving a wreck is inherently dangerous, and a newly discovered one even more so.”
Reynald was lean and fit; he was obviously experienced, practical—and compassionate.
“But you believe he was dead when you arrived?” Kat asked.
He nodded grimly. “Dead as a cold mackerel, I’m afraid.”
“How long?” Will asked next.
“He couldn’t have been dead more than half an hour or so,” Reynald told them. “I’m not sure what I’m basing that on, other than that I’ve pulled more than a few bodies out of the lake. Like I said, he was declared DOA at the hospital.”
“Were there other boats near the dive spot?” Will asked.
“Boating on a good day on Lake Michigan? You bet.”
“Close to the dive site?” Kat continued for Will.
Reynald drew in a deep breath. “Yeah, near enough, I think. The other Preservation Center boat was there—as well as the one the dead man had been on. Oh, and the film crew has a snazzy research boat, too. There was a sailboat maybe two hundred feet away and others farther out….”
One of his fellow officers chimed in. “There were two motorboats nearby. One was a Cigarette—nice speedboat. I noticed that because I always wanted one. The other…a little cabin cruiser. Looked like the people aboard were fishing.”
“Fishing,” Kat echoed dubiously.
The officer grinned. “Not that long ago, Lake Michigan was so polluted you could die from eating fish you caught out there. But it’s cleaned up. You’ll find lots of people fishing in the lake now.”
“Did you notice anything else about the boat?” she asked.
He shook his head. “I’m afraid I didn’t.”
“Either have a dive flag up?” Will asked.
“Neither,” the second officer replied.
“We were called in on an accident, and rescue was our main objective,” Reynald told them. “I feel like a fool because we’re also law enforcement officers. Do you suspect it was more than an accident?”
Kat answered carefully. “We’re not sure yet. We’re just investigating at this point.”
“Well, we’re here anytime you need us,” Reynald said.
They thanked him. As they headed back to the car, Will seemed thoughtful. He glanced over at her. “You tired? You want to call it quits for the day?”
She scowled back at him. If she’d been falling off her feet, she’d never have admitted it to this man. “I’m fine. What do you have in mind?”
“Two quick stops—Landry Salvage and Simonton’s Sea Search. Neither may really help. Salvage companies don’t usually drive around in Cigarette speedboats, but…”
“And if someone else is searching for treasure, that person may not be involved with a salvage company at all,” Kat added.
He paused at the car door, looking over it. “True. But you have to know something about diving to get down there. You’d have to follow the research to find the ship—and you’d have to follow Brady Laurie out to the site…and gone after him right away.”
“Maybe it’s someone who works for a salvage company,” Kat suggested. “Not the company itself.”
“That would be my bet.” Will grinned as she joined him in the front seat. “Your choice—Landry or Simonton’s Sea Search first?”
“Simonton’s. I like the alliteration,” she said.
Simonton’s was just north of the pier. There was a massive vessel with all kinds of cranes and netting at the dock. The office itself was small and looked more like a sea shanty than a professional building. Inside, Kat was surprised to see that it was nicely outfitted with modern office furniture and file cabinets that occupied most of the wall space. The walls were decorated with old anchors, flags and other boating paraphernalia. A receptionist who introduced herself as Gina led them to a back room, where the walls were decorated with sea charts and maps, and the rear wall held the figurehead of a beautiful siren.
The man standing behind the desk was in a windbreaker, deck shoes and jeans. His desk was strewn with papers, despite the computer that took up at least half of it. “Hi. I’m Andy Simonton,” he greeted them. “What can I do for you?”
He was young, maybe thirty, with slightly shaggy blond hair and bright blue eyes. He swept out a hand to indicate the chairs in front of his messy desk. They sat.
“You’re with the FBI?” he asked curiously. He didn’t seem afraid or threatened in any way, but rather intrigued.
“We’re looking into the death of Brady Laurie,” Will said.
“Sad affair, that drowning,” Simonton murmured.
“This is your company?” Kat asked him.
Simonton nodded. “My father’s company, really. He wants to retire. I’ve been handling the business for about a year.”
“And what is your business, exactly?” Will asked.
Simonton looked confused. “Um, salvage.”
Will had the grace to laugh. “No, I’m sorry, what type of salvage? What are you working on now?”
“Oh!” Simonton said. “We’re conducting two recovery missions. A Florida boater underestimated the power of the lake and sank a sixty-foot sailboat, and we’re also working on recovering the cargo from the hold of the Mystic Susan—she’s a merchant vessel that went down with crates of high-fashion clothing,” Simonton explained.
“That does sound like work. Not terribly exciting,” Kat said sympathetically.
Simonton gave a nonchalant shrug. “It pays the bills, and quite nicely, too. Oh, and Mrs. Ciskel—she’s the wife of the Florida boater—is furious because she had a lot of jewelry aboard when their boat went down. I’d like to find that cache myself. To return to her, of course. She’s promised a massive bonus if we get back all her jewels.” He frowned. “Now, what’s this all about?”
“We were wondering if you’d ever had any plans to explore and salvage the Jerry McGuen,” Will said.
“We were invited to the reception put on by the Egyptian Sand Diggers.”
Kat glanced at Will. “The Egyptian Sand Diggers?” he repeated. “Who are they?”
Simonton waved one hand in the air. “They’re a local service club—and they’re just a little nutty, you know? In love with all things ancient Egyptian. Some of them are true scholars, while the rest are more what you’d call armchair historians. They held a reception about six months ago, and they shared all sorts of current information on expeditions into the Valley of the Kings, the closing of the Great Pyramids for maintenance, stuff like that. And they had an exhibit on Gregory Hudson—he’s the guy who discovered the Amun Mopat tomb way back—and the Jerry McGuen. They were trying to encourage local salvage companies to search for her. Unfortunately, I don’t have the time or money to go on a wild-goose chase, although I wish I had gone on that goose chase. I suppose the location is pretty well-known by now and anyone might have found her after she shifted on the seabed. See, it was wide open. The State of Illinois gets everything recovered in this area of Lake Michigan, but the salvage company that finds it does get certain rights. The original company went bust soon after the sinking of the Jerry McGuen and the passengers’ families were paid off with what was left, so any descendants aren’t really a factor. Now, as far as the salvage goes, the State of Illinois would probably return most of it to the Egyptians.”
“Do you know of anyone else who was planning to go after the ship?” Kat asked.
“Landry,” he said. “He and my dad were always competitive. Maybe he wanted to find it just to rub in my dad’s face—or my face now. He was at the reception, by the way.”
“How many boats do you have, Mr. Simonton?” Will asked.
“I have a little Mako for my own pleasure,” Simonton said. “You can go see her if you want. She’s sitting right outside.”
“This looks like a good operation.” Kat smiled. “And obviously a successful one.”
“I’m all about paying the bills,” Simonton said. He tapped a pencil on his desk. “Can I do anything else for you? I’m sorry, but I’m kind of busy and…well, honestly, I’m not really sure what you’re after.”
“We think someone helped Brady Laurie drown,” Will said bluntly.
Simonton gaped at him. “Wow. Well, I can’t see how that could have happened. I mean, his own people were right behind him and they’re the ones who found him.” He sat back, staring at them, still not threatened, just surprised. “Um, you’re welcome to search anything we own or, uh, whatever.”
“Thanks. If we need to search, we’ll get back to you,” Kat said. “What we could use is information on the Egyptian Sand Diggers.”
“Oh, sure!” He started rummaging through his desk. “That invitation is in here somewhere…. They used nice stationery and calligraphy on it.”
He gave up with a sigh and stood, heading out to the receptionist’s desk. “Gina, can you find me that invitation from the Egyptian Sand Diggers?”
Simonton stood by the door as Gina searched for the invitation. Kat leaned over and whispered to Will. “Why don’t you just call the Tribune and announce that we’re looking for a murderer? We’re not even sure of it ourselves!”
He shrugged. “What? You think people will believe the FBI is involved because we want to dive a wreck?”
She gritted her teeth again, but before she could respond, Simonton returned with the invitation. “Here you go. Their address is right there, where it says RSVP.”
“Thank you,” Kat said, accepting it. She smiled. “You were really helpful. I hope we can count on you in the future, if we need to.”
He gave her a warm smile in return. “Oh, you bet!”
“You did a lovely job. Maybe I should let you do all the talking,” Will muttered as they left the office.
“What?”
He turned to her. “Mr. Simonton was quite…taken with you. That’s good. He’ll help us.”
“Agent Chan, that is hardly—”
“Professional? Sorry. But you were being all nicey-nice, and in this case, it seemed to work. I say we go with it.”
“I say it’s better than you offending M.E.s and cops!”
“McFarland needed to know that he’d make a fool of himself if he crossed Laurie off as an accidental death. Now he knows, and he won’t do it. And I was perfectly polite with the cops. I don’t blame them. This is a tough town, and when they can close the books on a situation, they have to do it. I honestly don’t think it occurred to most people working the drowning that it might have been an assisted drowning—or murder. Now, they’ll think about.”
“Are we going out to talk to Landry or the Egyptian Sand Diggers?” Kat asked. She decided to let his previous remarks—a backhanded compliment if ever there was one—slide.
“Let’s check out Landry first,” Will said.
Kat agreed, getting out her phone.
Will glanced over at her. “Are you getting someone to look up the Sand Diggers?”
She nodded.
“Good idea.”
After a brief conversation, Logan promised that he’d learn whatever he could about the avid amateur Egyptologists. By the time she’d finished, they were pulling into a lot by the glass-and-chrome offices of Landry Salvage.
“They seem to be doing a bit better here, don’t you think?” he asked Kat.
“Either that, or they’re more impressed with appearances.”
Where the offices of Simonton’s Sea Search had seemed like an old-fashioned sea shanty, Landry’s was almost sterile. The floors were bare, the white walls adorned with single black strokes of paint. The reception desk was sparse, and the woman who greeted them was young, very pretty and very blank. It seemed to take her several minutes to figure out who they were, and then several more to understand what they wanted. The little sign on her desk identified her as Sherry Bertelli.
“Oh, oh, oh!” she said at last. “Oh! You’re here about the professor or the Egyptologist or the…whatever he was who died so tragically!” She pushed a button on the single piece of office equipment before her. “Mr. Landry, the FBI is here to see you.”
They heard an impatient reply. “The FBI? Whatever for?”
Kat leaned over the desk. “Agents Katya Sokolov and Will Chan, Mr. Landry. We’d like to speak with you. We’re hoping you can help us.”
There was a moment of dead silence, and then Landry said, “Of course. Come on in. Ms. Bertelli will escort you.”
Sherry Bertelli rose quickly. “This way, please.”
It was hard to tell where glass walls and doors met. They went down a long hallway. Eventually Sherry Bertelli pushed on a glass panel, and they were ushered into another state-of-the-art ultramodern office where Landry was standing behind a black chrome desk.
“How do you do, how do you do?” he asked, stepping around to shake their hands. “I’m Stewart Landry. Have a seat, please, have a seat. Would you like coffee or anything?”
“No, no, thank you, we’re fine,” Kat assured him. Will held one of the chairs for her, then took his own. Stewart Landry sat back at his desk. Sherry Bertelli just stood there.
“That’s all, Sherry, thank you,” Landry said.
Without a word she turned and marched out of the office. Landry cleared his throat. “Sherry’s, uh, very popular with our clientele,” he said, as if excusing his receptionist’s undeniable limitations.
Landry was somewhere between fifty and sixty years old. His suit was designer label, his nails were clean and buffed and his silver hair was well groomed. Kat had to wonder if there wasn’t something more intimate going on between him and Sherry than the typical employee-boss relationship.
“Now, how can I help you?” Landry asked.
“Frankly,” Will said, “we’re trying to find out if you’d considered diving the site of the Jerry McGuen. We understand that a group called the Egyptian Sand Diggers was encouraging local interest and, as I’m sure you’ve read or seen on the news, a diver died at the site.”
Landry frowned. “Yes, I saw the news, and I knew Brady Laurie. He was quite angry at that reception and behaved rather badly. He wasn’t a member of the group, made very clear that kind of thing was beneath a true historian such as himself. He argued with the members that he was already on the case, and that he and his colleagues needed to find the treasure, not any of us ‘money-grubbing bastards.’ Don’t get me wrong—the death of any young person is lamentable. But Dr. Laurie was out of line. The Egyptian Sand Diggers invited us all to that soiree, and I think it was because they didn’t believe Laurie was right in his calculations. He was, of course. That’s obvious now.”
“Did you plan to dive the site at all?” Kat asked, returning to the original question.
He shrugged. “Honestly? It was an intriguing thought. But as to planning any operation—no. Our big ship is out in Lake Huron working on a ferry that went down. We have some smaller vessels working more shallow waters, but as to the Jerry McGuen… If Laurie hadn’t found her, we might’ve made an attempt to see what our sonar could identify in the area. Thing is, no one really knew exactly where she went down, other than that she was supposedly near Chicago. You might not realize it, but the lake is huge. Searching it is almost like searching the North Atlantic. When you’re just looking at the lake, it seems to stretch out forever. And when you’re boating on it alone, you can feel as if you’re the last man on earth.”
“But the treasure in the Jerry McGuen is of inestimable worth,” Will commented.
Landry nodded. He smiled suddenly. “But searching for that kind of treasure—needle in a haystack. I can tell you that Brady Laurie was obsessed with it. I wasn’t shocked when I heard about his death. He was threatened by all of us—no, no, that came out wrong. No one ever threatened him, but…check with the Egyptian Sand Diggers. They were pointing out the historic value of the find, which we already knew, and he got furious. Their president is a fellow named Dirk Manning, and what they call their ‘guardian’—an old fellow who’s been involved in it since he was twenty-one—is a man named Austin Miller. Talk to one of them about Brady Laurie. In my opinion, he had no real interest in joining the group, but he probably spoke to those gentlemen more than anyone else. Me? I believe Laurie was so obsessed with the ship that he signed his own death warrant.”
Will stood up and shook hands with Landry. Kat stood, too. “If there’s anything I can do, please let me know,” Landry said.
“Thank you.” Kat smiled—then remembered Will’s earlier remark about her niceness.
“I’ll have Ms. Bertelli show you out,” Landry offered.
“We can find our way,” Will told him, “but thanks.”
When they passed Sherry Bertelli, she was sitting behind her desk, flipping through the pages of a fashion magazine. She looked up long enough to smile vaguely at them and wave. “Ta-ta!”
“Yep, ta-ta,” Kat responded.
She didn’t realize Will was laughing until they were in the car again. “Ta-ta?”
“I simply returned the courtesy,” she said primly.
“I get the feeling they didn’t hire her for her math skills.”
Kat shook her head and turned to him. “This is just about impossible,” she said. “No one, not even the first responders, really knows if anyone else was near the site when Brady died—or was killed. It sounds like he could be extremely hostile about anything concerning the Jerry McGuen. He did dive alone—and went down almost a hundred feet in cold water. This wasn’t a pleasure dive to a warm-water reef.”
Will glanced at her, then looked at the road again. “But you saw his body.”
“Yes. I saw his body. And seeing his body made me believe this is worth investigating. But what we saw doesn’t guarantee that Brady Laurie was murdered. There are other explanations for the bruises. It’s possible that he might have gotten into an altercation with someone. He was furious with the Egyptian Sand Diggers and apparently everyone knew it.”
“So you think one of the Sand Diggers was out on a boat, slipped into the water while pretending to fish and killed Laurie?” Will asked. “Why? The Sand Diggers supposedly wanted someone to find the treasure.”
“I don’t know,” Kat said. “We’ll have to ask them. Logan should be getting back to me with some information pretty soon. We can check them out tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow afternoon. Tomorrow morning we dive the site.”
Kat turned to him. “You sound excited about it.”
“I am. A shipwreck like the Jerry McGuen? Come on, you have to be somewhat excited!”
“Thrilled to pieces,” she muttered. Maybe one day, she’d tell him about the experiences she’d already enjoyed because of Amun Mopat!
“You don’t believe in a curse, do you?” he asked, grinning.
“No. I do, however, believe that people can go a little crazy because of them.”
“I agree,” he said. “I spent a lot of time in the Caribbean. Islanders can be very superstitious. I’ve seen men who felt convinced they were possessed, and women who managed incredible feats of contortion in a ceremonial dance. The mind is a powerful influence on the body.”
Kat nodded.
“You think someone would sabotage the mission to keep Amun Mopat from being brought back to the surface?” he asked. “That’s an idea.”
“Crazy people can latch onto anything, but…at this point, I don’t know what I think or feel,” Kat told him. “Except that it’s been a really, really long day!”
“And it’ll be an early morning,” he said.
She was glad he’d said that; his stamina seemed to be on a par with the Energizer Bunny’s. She hoped he was taking her back to her hotel. “I’m at a place called the Edwardian off Michigan Avenue.”
“Yep.”
“You know that, of course,” she said.
“Of course.”
He didn’t just drop her off; he brought the car in front to the valet. She sighed as she saw him get out and walk around to her. “You’re staying here, too.”
“Government dollar.” He shrugged. “We go where they get their deals,” he said. “I’ll meet you in the lobby at eight.”
“We’re diving at 8:00 a.m.?”
He hesitated. “You’re not required to go down.”
“I wouldn’t miss it. Remember? We’re excited about this.”
“Would you like to get some dinner?”
“I think I’ll just go upstairs and order in,” she said.
“Good night, then.”
There was a small restaurant in the hotel. He walked toward it, a folder and an iPad in his hands. He was going to keep working, she realized.
And she was starving….
He stopped suddenly, a curious frown tightening his brow. She was startled to notice again what a striking and unusual man he was.
He walked back to her. “All day I forgot to ask… Well, I suppose you would’ve said, but…did you get anything from the corpse?”
Kat studied his eyes. She was surprised, after the day they’d spent together, to feel strangely close to him. But then, when you were one of the lucky or the cursed who’d always assumed they were ever so slightly crazy, there was an instant bond with others who shared that luck or that curse. She shook her head. “No, and I was hopeful. We’re always hopeful,” she said quietly. “You?”
“Nothing at all. And I just think that in this situation, with the money involved in salvage, what seems to stink does stink. I really believe he was murdered. I grew up in the islands. I’ve been diving since I was a kid. No, he should never have gone down alone, but from what I’ve learned and seen, there was nothing that should have caused him to lose control. His equipment was in perfect working order. Even after being tested for leaks, his tank had air.” He paused. “It’s strange. We still can’t explain why some souls stay around, and some don’t.”
“Maybe some people who die by violence aren’t compelled to stay on earth to see that justice is done,” she said. “Some may find peace—who knows? There’s an incredible amount that we haven’t begun to understand.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” he said. “Well, get some rest.”
He started to walk again. He was a workaholic, she thought. Usually so was she. But she really was tired.
Still, they were supposed to be working this case together. She sighed.
A mummy. Great. It just had to be a mummy. The mummy of Amun Mopat.
“Wait,” she called. “I’ll join you. We can discuss what direction we’ll take after the dive.”
Yes, she was going to dive. And the idea gave her the creeps.
She suddenly wished the Jerry McGuen had remained lost to the world forever.
4
Will passed his iPad over to Kat as soon as they’d ordered. “Just click Go. You’ll see the footage that was taken when they found Brady Laurie,” Will told her.
Startled, Kat looked at him. “You had this all along?”
“Yes. But the cops who were on duty when Brady was brought up, not to mention the salvage companies, are easier to visit by day—not at night.”
She didn’t respond, thinking he might have told her he had the film footage. Sure, he said he was giving her the lead in their investigation, since her Krewe had been called in. Somehow, he was taking the lead, anyway. She felt like getting up and going to her room, but reminded herself that she was the one who’d said they weren’t in a pissing contest.
Kat touched the icon, and the footage leaped onto the screen. She lowered the volume, not wanting anyone nearby to hear, but there really wasn’t any sound, other than the videographer’s breathing, and then, of course, the muted screams when Amanda and Jon came upon the body of Brady Laurie.
As she’d heard, Brady could be seen floating in the hold. Jon had come upon him first; he’d tried to get the regulator back in Brady’s mouth. Amanda had been at his side soon after. For a few minutes, there was nothing but shots of the inside of the hull and the flooring, covered with plankton and other growth, and strewn with holes. The videographer had momentarily forgotten his task in the horror of their discovery. When he regained control, Kat was glad to see that once they’d found Brady, they had left behind all curiosity and interest in treasure; they started back to the surface immediately. In the course of doing that, they had to make a few safety stops. At the surface, the footage ended.
“I met with Alan King, Bernie Firestone and Earl Candy last evening, as soon as Jackson reached me,” Will explained, studying her across the table. “Earl wanted to destroy his film—he doesn’t want gawkers watching the discovery of a man’s death. I promised him that when the investigation’s over, I’ll destroy this copy.”
“Of course,” Kat murmured. She pushed the iPad toward him, frowning. “I just don’t see how anyone could have gotten to Brady between the time he went down and when his coworkers and the film crew arrived.”
“Easy enough, I suppose. Down in Lake Michigan, it’s damned dark. If someone was already down there, knew the lake and was a good diver, he—or she—could have found Brady’s coordinates just before Brady did…and waited for him. Remember, Brady had made a big thing of his belief that he could find the Jerry McGuen. If someone hacked into his computer or even read his blogs, they could follow his reasoning and figure out where the ship might have ended up. That’s one idea. Or, perhaps, someone could’ve been surprised by Brady. If you know the area, you keep to the depth, follow your compass and then come up at a distant point.”
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Heather Graham
1898: Bound for Chicago, the freighter Jerry McGuen goes down in Lake Michigan, taking with it every man aboard.But what other fate could befall a vessel carrying the ill-gotten sarcophagus of an Egyptian sorcerer? Now: A veteran diver and "ghost ship" expert is exploring the legendary wreck for a documentary. He dies inexplicably inside the freighter's main saloon.Then another diver is killed, and panicked rumors rise like bubbles from the lake: ancient demons have awakened below! The expedition's beleaguered financier calls paranormal investigator Katya Sokolov to Chicago to save the film—and perhaps some innocent lives.Along with media forensics guru Will Chan, Kat plumbs the depths of an evil that may date back to the time of the pharaohs. But some secrets are best drowned in the seas of the past….
AN AIRLESS TOMB. AN UNSPOKEN CURSE
1898: Bound for Chicago, the freighter Jerry McGuen goes down in Lake Michigan, taking with it every man aboard. But what other fate could befall a vessel carrying the ill-gotten sarcophagus of an Egyptian sorcerer? Because a curse unspoken is no less deadly.
Now: A veteran diver and “ghost ship” expert is exploring the legendary wreck for a documentary. He dies inexplicably inside the freighter’s main saloon. Then another diver is killed and panicked rumors rise like bubbles from the lake: ancient demons have awakened below!
The expedition’s beleaguered financier calls paranormal investigator Katya Sokolov to Chicago to save the film—and perhaps some innocent lives. Along with media forensics guru Will Chan, Kat plumbs the depths of an evil that may date back to the time of the Pharaohs. But some secrets are best drowned in the seas of the past.…
Praise for the novels of Heather Graham
“Graham wields a deftly sexy and convincing pen.”
—Publishers Weekly
“A fast-paced and suspenseful read that will give readers chills while keeping them guessing until the end.”
—RT Book Reviews on Ghost Moon
“If you like mixing a bit of the creepy with a dash of sinister and spine-chilling reading with your romance, be sure to read Heather Graham’s latest.”
—Miami Herald on Unhallowed Ground
“The Keepers is original and exciting. Constant tension—both dangerous and sexual—will keep readers on the edge of their seats.“
—RT Book Reviews
“The paranormal elements are integral to the unrelentingly suspenseful plot, the characters are likable, the romance convincing and…Graham’s atmospheric depiction of a lost city is especially poignant.”
—Booklist on Ghost Walk
“Graham’s rich, balanced thriller sizzles with equal parts suspense, romance and the paranormal—all of it nail-biting.”
—Publishers Weekly on The Vision
“Great writing and excellent characters make Wicked a terrific read.... The undercurrent of mystery and suspense will keep readers riveted.”
—Romance Reviews Today
“Graham’s tight plotting, her keen sense of when to reveal and when to tease...will keep fans turning the pages.”
—Publishers Weekly on Picture Me Dead
The Unspoken
Heather
Graham
www.mirabooks.co.uk (http://www.mirabooks.co.uk)
In loving and grateful memory of my mom, Violet, who came from Dublin to the amazing city of Chicago.
And for Aunt Amy, Katie and my Irish side of the family, especially my great-grandmother who, when watching my sister and me, would warn us that the banshees “be gettin’ us in the outhouse” if we didn’t behave. (She issued this threat so well, we were teenagers before realizing we didn’t have an outhouse!) Granny, however, had a touch of magic about her, and told wonderful stories. She, my mom and all those who believed in (or pretended they believed in!) banshees, leprechauns, pixies, ghosties and all else gave me my love for what might be in the darkness or in realms we have yet to discover—and for reading.
A book, they taught me, could give me a new world or adventure to explore every day of my life.
What a gift to give a child. I am grateful to them all.
A Note from the Author
Dear Reader,
The Unspoken is the latest book in a series that includes The Unseen and The Unholy. These books follow the activities of the special FBI units known as the Krewe of Hunters.
The Krewe also appears in Phantom Evil, Heart of Evil, Sacred Evil and The Evil Inside. Featuring a mix of the real and the paranormal, these books also contain strong mystery elements.
The Krewe’s origins lie in Adam Harrison, an elderly gentleman first seen in Haunted, who recognizes those who possess a sixth sense—whether they admit it or not. Having worked with the government several times, Adam is asked to form small and distinctive FBI units, to be sent in when traditional methods of investigation need a little boost.
The Unspoken takes the Texas Krewe away from their home state to Chicago, where a newly discovered shipwreck has taken the life of the first diver to see her since she sank at the end of the nineteenth century. But the Jerry McGuen was no ordinary ship… She had carried precious cargo from Egypt—including the mummy of an ancient Egyptian priest. Naturally, the mummy comes with a curse….
The Krewe is out to discover the truth. Can a curse be real? Can it transcend the ages? Or is it the evil in men’s hearts that continues to wreak havoc throughout time?
Texas Krewe member Kat Sokolov—a medical examiner by trade—is sent to work the case. She’s paired with Will Chan, an original member of the Krewe of Hunters and an agent well-versed in the art of illusion. Between them, they must find out what really happened to the diver—and to the ship—if they’re to keep the body count from rising.
I hope you’ll join their investigation and enjoy the adventure!
Heather Graham
A Note from the Editor
I can truly say that Heather Graham has found—or rather, created—a unique niche in contemporary romantic suspense. Her Harlequin MIRA books include mysteries, investigators with “unusual” abilities and…dead people. Yes, ghosts. Her novels have a classic flair; after all, people have been telling ghost stories for millennia. And these books invariably feature interesting, appealing characters, intense romance that’s always an integral part of the suspense plot and fascinating backgrounds.
Each of these stories is set in a great American city—San Antonio (The Unseen), Los Angeles (The Unholy), Chicago (The Unspoken) and Philadelphia (The Uninvited). They’re all places Heather knows well and describes both appreciatively and atmospherically. And, needless to say, they’re all cities that have their share of ghosts and hauntings!
I want to point out that the books can, of course, be read independently; they definitely stand alone. But I’ll bet you can’t read just one! Each story focuses on a particular member or members of the Krewe, but you’ll also meet characters you’ve encountered over the course of the series.
I also want to tell you that in 2013, the Krewe will return with stories set in brand-new (that is to say, old!) American towns and cities, like Tombstone, Arizona, and Savannah, Georgia.
But right now I invite you to come to the great city of Chicago, go diving in Lake Michigan, explore a shipwreck and discover the truth about some ancient Egyptian artifacts…and fall in love!
Paula Eykelhof
Executive Editor, Harlequin MIRA Books
Contents
Prologue (#u6c7721ea-5b3e-5eca-acdb-3d0b02a6f41b)
Chapter 1 (#u83747c5e-3687-53c1-b969-d8e72a73f424)
Chapter 2 (#ufaf08596-098f-5a81-8632-4acf9d8ece36)
Chapter 3 (#uef6e9703-7aab-58b1-a7f9-7a8775f34f64)
Chapter 4 (#ua3dd1bcf-af65-5f7b-bc7d-21a5cc546df9)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)
Prologue
The midnight hour
Austin Miller loved his comfortable home. Built by his grandfather in 1872, after the ravages of the Great Chicago Fire of October 10, 1871, it had the grace—and even opulence—of the mid-Victorian era. The staircase was carpeted in deep crimson, a shade picked up in the period furniture. Swirling drapes in black and cream adorned the parlor, and the windows were etched glass. He had changed little since his grandfather’s day.
It boasted a true gentleman’s den with bookshelves that lined the walls, filled with wonderful tomes, old and new. It also boasted some of his fabulous collections, the most impressive of which was his collection of Egyptian artifacts. They were legally obtained, since Austin’s grandfather had been on the dig when Tut’s tomb was discovered; he had lived much of his life prowling the sands of the Sahara in pursuit of discoveries. Canopic jars were kept in a temperature-controlled display case, along with funerary statuettes that were gilded and bejeweled. A real sarcophagus—that of a king’s illegitimate son, of little import to Egyptians at the time—stood open in a corner of the room. It had been arranged in a display case of its own, built by his grandfather in the mid-1930s. He’d exhibited his collection of mummified snakes and cats behind glass, as well. On one side of Austin’s beautiful desk was an exquisitely crafted statue of the god Horus, adorned with gold paint and fine jewels. On the other side was a carafe, where he kept his finest brandy and glasses for when the need arose.
Yes, Austin loved his den. He held his most important meetings here, with business associates and with fellow members of the Egyptian Sand Diggers, the Society of Chicago and scholars who loved and appreciated all things Egyptian.
He felt the need for a brandy arise at that moment. Tonight, he was happy. So happy. After more than a century of being at the bottom of Lake Michigan and her shifting sands, the Jerry McGuen might well be on her way to twenty-first-century discovery!
He knew he should go to sleep. His doctor had warned him that he had to rest and that he had to avoid sleeping aids, that he needed to take his heart and blood pressure medications and stick to a healthful regimen. He was, after all, eighty-three years old.
But…
They were on the brink of knowledge. Nothing had hit the papers yet, but come morning, divers and documentarians would, at long last, discover the Jerry McGuen.
And, with the ship, untold treasure.
His cat, Bastet, a beautifully marked Egyptian Mau, also seemed restless that night. Bastet meowed and sidled along his leg.
“Tomorrow, Bastet, tomorrow!” He had changed for bed and wore his pajamas and a smoking robe, although he’d long ago given up the cigars he’d once enjoyed so much.
But a little brandy wasn’t a bad thing.
He poured himself a snifter and rolled the tawny liquor against the sides of the glass, smelled it and finally sipped. He let out a soft sigh. “Tomorrow, Bastet, tomorrow,” he said again.
But the cat leaped atop his desk with a screech that was frightening.
“Bastet!” He frowned. He tried to stroke the cat, but Bastet vaulted from the desk and disappeared behind the standing sarcophagus. What could be bothering the creature? Mrs. Hodgkins, his housekeeper, was long gone for the day.
The massive grandfather clock behind him began to toll the midnight hour.
He swallowed another sip of his brandy.
A cool breeze blew from the patio beyond the den; the curtains wafted.
The clock chimed three times, four, five.
And then…
He saw it. Moving in from the patio.
He sat completely still and blinked. He had to be seeing things. But, as if compelled by his vision, he rose, swallowing down the rest of the brandy. He wanted to scream. He couldn’t scream, but somewhere in his mind he knew that even if he could, no one would hear.
The clocked chimed six times, seven, eight.
It was coming…coming…coming for him.
His heart! Instinctively, he clutched his chest and felt the thundering of his heart. He groped in his pocket for his nitroglycerin pills, but just as he reached them, it reached him. The pills were knocked from his hand.
The clock chimed nine times, ten, eleven.
He felt as if he’d been struck by a sledgehammer. The pain was overwhelming. The thing before him was enveloped in the black of his vision.
The clock chimed the hour of midnight.
And he fell down dead.
The wee hours
Kat Sokolov slept deeply, and in that sleep, she dreamed. It was a lovely dream. She was sailing somewhere. She stood on the deck looking out at the darkness of the water and watched the stunning display in the sky overhead. The moon was full, but clouds drifted in and out, and the world seemed beautiful.
She listened to the music from the ship’s grand salon, where someone was playing a Viennese waltz. Attracted to the sweet sound of the music, she turned. She wore a gown as elegant as those she saw around her. Silk and velvet, it swept gracefully as she moved. There was a celebration going on, and she could hear delighted laughter along with the enchanting strains from the piano. At the doors to the grand salon, she felt the breeze and pulled her fur stole more closely around her shoulders. It couldn’t be about to snow! The moon had been too bright, too visible. The breeze had seemed so gentle….
But now it touched her like a blast of ice. When she opened the door to the salon, she felt the wind snatch it from her. It banged hard against the wall, and she was embarrassed for losing it and creating such an awful sound. But before she could apologize to anyone, the ship suddenly pitched and rolled. Glass shattered; people screamed. She thought she heard the blast of a horn, or a high, loud whistle. Then people were shouting, screaming. A voice of authority boomed out, warning people that a storm had come in, that they needed to go to their cabins immediately.
A couple pushed past Kat as if she wasn’t even there. “It’s cursed! The ship is cursed!” the man said to the young woman at his side. “Oh, God! What they should do is cast out the cargo, clear us of the curse!”
“You’re scaring me!” the young woman cried.
“I’m so sorry, my darling!” the man said.
Then the woman seemed to see her. She looked at her with wide, desperate eyes. “It’s the curse,” she said. “It’s the curse!”
“No, no, it’s a storm, that’s all,” Kat heard herself say reassuringly. She smiled at the young woman. But then she turned. There appeared to be something out on the water. Something huge coming toward them.
She felt another blast of cold. Wet cold. The lovely night had become treacherous. It wasn’t snow rushing at her; it was ice. They had sailed into an ice storm.
And still, that thing was out there, mammoth, a dark shadow that couldn’t quite take shape because of the raging elements.
The wind picked up again and seemed to strike her in the face.
Then she awoke, frozen.
Kat blinked. She was still in her room in the lovely California hotel where her Krewe was staying.
She almost laughed aloud. She was cold because she’d kicked away her covers. Jumping up quickly, she hurried over to the thermostat. Somehow, sometime, either she or the maid had set the temperature down to the fifties.
She reset the thermostat to eighty-five.
She was much fonder of heat than cold.
That done, she dragged the extra blanket from the closet, grabbed all her covers again and curled back into bed. She’d practically forgotten the dream, she’d been so cold.
As she lay down, she thought it had been quite absurd. But then, of course, dreams often were.
Next morning
9:00 a.m.
The water of Lake Michigan was eerie, with different shades of gray shadows and darkness, as Brady Laurie plunged into the chilly depths. Only near the surface could anything that resembled natural light or warmth be found; the lake had always been a place of darkness and secrets. Motes seemed to dance before his eyes as the dive light on his head illuminated his journey, ever deeper into the water. Tiny bits of grasses, sand, orts from the meals of the lake’s denizens swirled like dust particles, shimmering as his light hit them.
It was a world of silence down here, making every little noise sharp. The sound of his breathing and the throb of his regulator, the expulsion of his air bubbles, the very pulse of his heart.
It was a world he loved, but today he was on a mission.
He was so anxious. He shouldn’t have been diving alone; he knew that. It was against every rule of scuba and salvage, but people often did it, anyway. In fact, he’d met enough he-man types so sure of their own prowess that they ignored the rule all the time. He didn’t usually—just today.
He knew exactly what he was looking for, and the sonar on his boat seemed to have proven his theories and calculations right.
At long last, he’d found the sunken ship—the Jerry McGuen.
He believed in his heart that he’d found her, the freighter that had carried sixty men and women to their graves, doomed along with the treasures they’d brought from Egypt. The ship had sailed faultlessly all the way across the Atlantic Ocean and up the Saint Lawrence River, only to be lost on December 15, 1898, a day before the journey’s end, battered and buffeted by a sudden, fierce storm. She had disappeared so close to her destination, just east-northeast of Chicago.
People had speculated then, as they still did, that a curse had lain upon the ship. The explorer who’d made the Egyptian discovery, Gregory Hudson, had been aboard. And, of course, there’d been a threat, etched into the stones of the tomb, warning that any man who disturbed the final resting place of Amun Mopat would soon know misery and death. Surely the passengers and crew of the Jerry McGuen had known both—almost able to see Chicago, but storm-tossed in violent, winter-frigid waters, finally succumbing to the brutality of the lake and disappearing.
Yes, the ship had disappeared, never to be seen again.
Until today. He would see her again. He, Brady Laurie, would see her again!
Salvage crews had hunted for her soon after she’d sunk—to no avail. And through the years, time after time, historians and divers had sought her, but like many a ship lost in the murky waters of the massive lake, she was simply not to be found.
Brady had been certain all his life that she had to be there. And he’d excitedly put forth his theory to his coworkers that, following their recent wicked summer storm, there was a chance she could now be discovered. Violent storms altered a lake bed, just as they could alter the seabed in the Atlantic. He had seen what storms could do. A ship sunk in Florida had gone down on her side; one of the storms that had torn apart the Florida Straits had set her up perfectly again. He believed the same strength and force of that phenomenon was going to reveal the Jerry McGuen.
Storms moved sand and dirt. Storms had tremendous power—enough power to right a multi-ton ship. Even one lost for more than a century, a true shipwreck. His calculations had been off, but not by much. Not if what the sonar had shown him was true.
Through the dark, mystic water of the lake, he saw her.
There she was. The Jerry McGuen!
She lay at an angle, starboard hull lodged into the lake bed, as majestic and visible in the glow of his dive light as if she were at dock.
His heart beat fast, and pride surged through him.
They’d done it! They’d found her.
No—he’d found her!
His theory was sound, his calculations making adjustments for time, weather conditions, the power of the recent storm and the earth’s rotations. It couldn’t account for the various unknowns, but he’d been so close. And now, as he saw it looming before him, his time had come. While that kind of storm usually sank ships, this one had removed layers of sand and almost righted the Jerry McGuen.
Yes, there she was, her massive hull tempting and seductive…
Even righted as she was, she had suddenly seemed to loom before him. The lake bed made the water so dark at eighty feet.
Just eighty feet! She’d been there all along, so damned close to Chicago!
He didn’t feel any cold through his dive suit, but he was numb. A shiver of excitement reverberated through his limbs. All around him, the water danced in the wavy shadows of the eighty-foot depths, and he became intensely aware of the sound of his own breathing again, the pump and flow of his regulator. He wanted to shout with happiness and share his discovery with the world. Of course, he would do that soon enough, and if any of his team had followed him out today, they’d already know that he’d been right. Everyone would know that he’d been right, including every salvage diver who had ever dreamed of finding her.
He laughed inwardly, smiling around his regulator. He was pretty sure someone had been behind him. Not that everyone on Lake Michigan had to be following him, but he thought he’d seen a research vessel in the distance when he’d come down.
His coworkers might be angry that he’d jumped the gun, but Amanda had already sold the story of their search to a film producer, who was going to document and finance their historic discovery. He’d supplied money for the search based on Brady’s theory. Now they could begin to chart out and rope off the ship and show the world the remains of the Jerry McGuen. Others interested in pursuits far less esoteric than theirs would be stopped at the gate. No more worries about Landry Salvage or Simonton’s Sea Search beating them to the punch!
He could imagine the treasures in the hold. Priceless Egyptian artifacts, the still-sealed coffin of the high priest known as the Sorcerer of Giza, the sarcophagi, the army of golden figures, the canopic jars, the ancient stones…
Underwater for more than a century, he reminded himself.
But even the Egyptologists of the nineteenth century had known about preservation. Sure, they hadn’t reckoned on toxins and gases, but they knew all about waterproofing—gunpowder and the pursuit of war had certainly furthered man’s knowledge of that!
Of course, the hold might have been compromised, a zillion things might have happened and still…what they might find!
He—they—didn’t seek treasure or the fortune it could bring. The treasures they discovered always went to museums, and he felt a thrill rush through him as he imagined the headlines when they returned the jeweled sarcophagus of Amun Mopat to the Egyptian people. Amun Mopat would be back where he rightfully belonged, and the name Brady Laurie would be revered in Cairo’s museum. Yes, yes, yes!
The Jerry McGuen.
She lay there—exposed! He was so elated his heart seemed to stop.
He checked his air gauge. He had at least another ten minutes to take a quick look at his momentous discovery, another ten minutes to explore, and then time to decompress at thirty-three feet and safely reach his research vessel on the surface.
The Jerry McGuen appeared huge, her forward section still pitched slightly into the lake bed, as if she’d taken a dive while sinking. Parts of the hull were broken, exposing staterooms and a passenger lobby, and what had been the purser’s office. Brady knew the ship; he had studied her plans time and time again. She was a steel-hulled ship, built by the American Stuart Company of Chicago and launched on October 2, 1888. One hundred and eighty-six feet long, thirty-two feet wide, and twelve feet in depth. Her gross tonnage was four hundred and eighty-six, and when she sailed the seas, she’d been powered by a triple-expansion steam engine and two Scotch boilers. There had been fifty-two cabins for guests, captain’s quarters, first mate’s quarters, four cabins for officers and a bunk room, down in the hold, for crew. The ship, chartered by the very rich Gregory Hudson, had been a state-of-the-art beauty.
Her ballast for the trip had been stones—great stones taken from the tomb of Amun Mopat. Before Howard Carter’s discovery of King Tut’s tomb, the discovery of Amun Mopat’s tomb right in the Valley of the Kings had been one of the most important events in the annals of Egyptology. But the treasures had come aboard the Jerry McGuen, and just a few months after that, those treasures and their history had been lost to the ages. They were soon forgotten by the world at large as new findings occurred and the age of Egyptology moved on.
But now…
He eased himself slowly along the hull, fumbling at his dive belt for his underwater camera. As he began to snap photos, the sound of the shutter whirred softly in the water. The flash illuminated bits and pieces of the ship. There it was—the grand salon, exposed by a gaping hole in the port side, encrusted in weeds and grasses, occupied by fish, large and small. The treasures would be down below.
Yes!
The hull was ripped open belowdecks, as well. He didn’t have much time. Just minutes left now, but he could slip through the great tear in the port side, move along the length of the ship….
It was dark within. Eerie. Time had stolen any vestiges of life that might have remained; the cold and the elements would have eaten away at organic fabric—and human bodies.
He found the hold and moved past giant crates, some protected by tarps that had withstood the years. Before him was a door, which swung open when he pushed it. The door hadn’t been sealed, which might have aided in the flooding that had brought about the ship’s demise, he thought, distracted. He didn’t care at that moment how the ship had sunk. He’d nearly reached the treasure….
As he kicked his flippers and swam through, the dive light strapped to his head suddenly went out.
He muttered to himself, tapping the light. It came back on.
He saw the boxes—huge crates, really, wrapped and sealed in waterproof tarps!—and in the midst of them, he could see the giant box with the label peeling and nearly gone, and yet…he could still read the name on it.
Amun Mopat.
There it was! The box containing the sarcophagus holding the inner sarcophagus and then the mummy. It had survived; the men who’d discovered the treasure had stolen it away carefully sealed….
Over there, boxes of jackals and sphinxes and funerary artifacts, bows, quivers—
His light went out again. Cursing silently, he tapped it. As he did, he heard a curious sound. A noise so deep in the water was different from what it would be on the surface, and yet…
It sounded like the hold door was closing on him!
The light came back on.
He stared in horror.
He opened his mouth to scream. Losing his regulator, he sucked in air, and his scream was silent.
He was stunned, terrified….
The curse! The curse, silent, unspoken in these depths…
It was real!
Yes, he had found the Jerry McGuen.
But he would not live to tell the tale.
1
“Amun Mopat,” Katya Sokolov said to Logan Raintree. “You’re kidding me, right?”
The heat that had been shining through the skylight seemed to disappear, as if the sun itself had lost some energy.
The name made her shudder. They’d just finished investigating a death in Los Angeles at Eddie Archer’s special effects studio—a death based on an old film noir remake. The original movie had been titled Sam Stone and the Curious Case of the Egyptian Museum. The new one, fittingly, was called The Unholy.
“No, I’m not kidding,” Logan said.
He had a fascinating face, the result of Native American and European parents, handsome and filled with character. She had learned to read it well, and she knew—he was not kidding.
Amun Mopat.
It was the name of the insidious ancient Egyptian priest who had supposedly come back to life to perpetrate murders. He was a character in a movie.
A character used in the very recent tragedies that had taken place.
And now…Amun Mopat?
“Amun Mopat, yes,” Logan said, almost as if she’d spoken aloud. He leaned back, looking around with a sigh. They sat in the beautiful little lobby-café of their boutique hotel, surrounded by wrought-iron lattice work and art deco design. The past weeks—although somewhat traumatic in the final resolution and cleanup—had still contained some nice upswings. They’d seen tapings of half a dozen TV shows, including Kat’s favorite comedy, spent days at the beach in Malibu, visited the Magic Castle and other attractions, and actually experienced something that resembled a vacation.
This meeting didn’t bode well. She’d received the call to meet Logan while she was enjoying a visit to the La Brea Tar Pits. It had been an urgent call, and she’d known it meant she wouldn’t be seeing a retro performance of the Rocky Horror Picture Show that night with Tyler Montague and Jane, two of the six in their special FBI unit.
She’d wondered if the others were going to be involved, but she was sitting here alone with Logan.
She had all but forgotten her strange dream of the night before. And now, even as it seemed to come crashing down around her, she wondered what a storm at sea could have to do with Amun Mopat.
The curse. She’d heard the words in her dream. Egyptian entities always seemed to come with curses!
“Go figure. After all this—Amun Mopat. In Chicago,” Logan said in a dry voice.
“Yeah, go figure. Chicago,” she repeated blankly.
Logan Raintree was her superior, the head of their team. Their actual boss was the elusive Adam Harrison, who had begun this excursion into the unknown—and the known—combining FBI technology and certain…unusual talents. Logan worked loosely with the head of the first team, Jackson Crow, evaluating information from those who sought help and deciding which cases truly called for their unique abilities. Since the original group of special investigators had become known as the Krewe of Hunters, they’d unofficially been dubbed the Texas Krewe. Their first case had been in San Antonio, home to many of them. Working with Logan and the other team members was thrilling and gratifying at once; it felt as if they spoke an ancient and secret language, and had come together as nationals from the same foreign country.
At the moment, she wasn’t feeling especially thrilled. Or gratified. She wished she was back at the Tar Pits.
“And you want me to go out there now?” Kat asked. She didn’t add alone.
Logan glanced at his watch.
“Yes. It could be nothing.” He shrugged. “And it could be something. But we’re talking about a dead body, and the autopsy is probably being performed as we speak.”
“Chicago is a big city, and I’m sure they have a fine staff of medical examiners and pathologists,” Kat said.
“I’m sure they do, too. But before too much time goes by, I want you in on it. Even the best people in their fields can miss little signs and clues, especially when they’re convinced by the circumstances that they’re looking at an accidental death.”
Everyone on the Krewe had his or her technical or “real world” specialty.
Hers was forensic pathology.
“Amun Mopat,” Kat said again. “In Chicago.”
Logan leaned forward. “As I said, this could be nothing—nothing at all. That’s why I need you there first. Sean is still out in Hawaii, but he’s been alerted,” he said, referring to another of their team members, Sean Cameron, who had been most heavily involved in the recent occurrences. “And we still have a few loose ends here—the last of the legal documents, another deposition—so I’m keeping Kelsey, Jane and Tyler with me. If it’s a tragic but simple case of drowning, there’ll be no need for the whole team. In that case, we’ll meet back at headquarters. But if it’s something else…”
Kat nodded dully. There was a dead body. She was a medical examiner. The dead body, of course, wasn’t an ancient Egyptian priest. It was a historian and diver.
Who had died. Searching for a sunken ship in Lake Michigan.
“I dreamed I was on a ship last night,” she told Logan.
“Really?”
“And the passengers were talking about a curse.”
His expression was serious. “Maybe you’ll be able to use that,” he said.
She smiled. “Maybe it was to warn me I was about to head off—to Chicago. And a sunken ship. And a curse.”
“I think in our line of work,” he said, eyebrows raised, “we’ve learned that curses are pretty much things people invent when they want to do something evil for their own gain. And you may only be there a few hours. Who knows? The situation might just be that this diver went overboard in his excitement when he should have waited for the other researchers. The entire discovery was supposed to be filmed. But, like I said, he didn’t wait. His excitement might have led to carelessness, which is probably what happened. And there’s always competition to salvage the treasure on a sunken trip. But because we’ve been helped by the documentary crew in question, I feel it’s important that we help out in return.”
“Who’s doing the documentary?” Kat asked.
“Alan King. We barely saw him when we were in San Antonio, but he had a bad time with the documentary there, especially losing his star. Apparently the Chicago Ancient History Preservation Center—where our dead man worked—is struggling like the rest of the world. They need funding.” He studied his papers. “One of the staff, Dr. Amanda Channel, sent out queries to various film people and hit upon some friends of ours—you remember Bernie Firestone, right?”
“Of course,” Kat said.
“Yes, well, he’s frequently hired by Alan King, who can make films whenever he wants because he has billions—no, he didn’t make his billions in film. He’s able to do documentary films because he does have billions. Bernie approached Alan, who loved the idea, and there you have it.”
“Sean should be available soon,” Kat murmured. “He’s worked with them before.”
“If he’s needed, he’ll be there. Remember—we don’t know if this is anything at all. Anyway, if you do end up staying, you’ve at least met Alan and you know Bernie and his cameraman, Earl Candy. Right now, you’ll take a look at the deceased, read the autopsy report, talk with a few people—and, if there’s nothing, we’ll all meet back in Virginia. Requests for our expertise are already piling up back at headquarters.” Logan paused. “But like I said, I feel we’re in debt on this one. There’s also the fate of a historical institute on the line, not to mention an incredible discovery.”
“I still say…”
“That it’s ironic?” Logan asked. “I thought that, too, but then, not so much. Not really. When the original Sam Stone was filmed in the early forties, the sinking of the ship in Lake Michigan had occurred half a century earlier. A writer, one who was fascinated by Egyptology, would readily have seized upon a real priest for his story. I looked into it and found out that the original screenplay was by a man named Harold Conway—who was born in Chicago. He grew up going to the Field Museum and hearing stories about the Jerry McGuen. The priest’s actual mummy, with the inner and outer sarcophagi, as well as other treasures, went down with the ship. So our screenwriter would definitely have known about Amun Mopat, and he was obviously interested enough in the historical character to use him in a movie.”
“Great,” Kat muttered.
“Hey, it could be an M.E.’s dream,” he said.
“A mummy? An anthropologist’s dream, not mine,” she retorted. “But…all right, so I’m to examine the body and try to discern if he died by natural means, or…”
She let her voice trail off.
They dealt with the unknown, the world that lay beyond the veil. Their “sixth sense.”
But Logan had a point. In her experience, and in that of the others, they’d never come across a ghost or a curse that killed.
It was human beings who killed other human beings.
“They’re not expecting to find much left of the people who went down with the ship,” Logan was saying. “According to the records, there were no survivors, and no bodies rose to the surface—or none that were found or recognized. But I’ve read that time would have destroyed even their skeletons by now. Is that true?”
Kat nodded. “Unless someone was caught in a sealed area, it’s unlikely that there’d be any remains. Time and sea creatures take their toll. They may find skeletal remnants, but only once they’re into the bowels of the ship.”
“So, it really is one big watery grave.”
“It does seem respectful to salvage what might be important to history and the living, and then let the ship itself stay where it sank, a memorial to those who were lost.”
“I believe that’s the eventual plan.” Logan flipped a page in the file that lay before him on the table. “You won’t be alone,” he told her, grinning as if he’d read her mind. She wasn’t afraid of being alone, nor was she unaccustomed to the strange and unusual.
“Oh?”
“A member of the original Krewe is out there now. He happened to be visiting an old buddy in Chicago when this came down. You’ll meet up with him. His name is Will Chan. He’ll stop by to see Alan, Bernie and Earl this afternoon, and he has an appointment with the people at the Preservation Center bright and early tomorrow morning. He’ll meet you at the morgue at 10:00 a.m.”
“Okay, but do I need to reach him first?”
“No. Head straight to the morgue. Will’s going to catch up with you there.” Logan handed her the folder. “His contact information is in here. Between the two of you, we’ll have a good sense of what’s going on, be it too much enthusiasm by a diving historian—or a predator with an enthusiasm for murder. Oh, and Alan King has hired private security to guard the dive site.”
“You can guard a dive site?”
“I thought you were a diver?”
“Yes, but I dive because I love it, not because I’m looking for lost treasures.” Kat offered him a wry smile. “I’ve seen salvage from the Titanic and the Atocha in museums. I never went looking for them. And I usually dive in nice warm water in the Caribbean or the Gulf.”
“Salvage rights are complicated. Federal law says that all wrecks belong to the state that claims the waters. Depending on what’s found, ownership of artifacts and the wreck itself may wind up in court for years. But the Preservation Center did file papers for the right to dive and work on the wreck. However, it’s not the legal aspect that people worry about as much as the black market.”
“Other divers stripping the site and selling salvage illegally?” Kat asked.
“You can’t begin to imagine what can be bought and sold on the black market.”
“Still…it’s got to be tricky, raiding a dive site.”
“Yes, but it’s been done. Hence, the security.”
“I guess so.”
“You have gone diving in cold water, right?” he asked next.
“Well, yes.”
“Make sure you pack a good dive suit. I understand the water temperature ranges between fifty and sixty at this time of year, and I believe that’s kind of cold when you’re down there.”
“I’ve never been in Lake Michigan.” Kat frowned. “And I’ve never been involved with the discovery of a wreck.”
“See, you’re all excited now.”
“Excited. Well…I’m not sure that’s the best word to describe how I’m feeling, not after we nearly lost Madison Darvil to Amun Mopat—or his look-alike!”
“We knew that Amun Mopat wasn’t the killer. And we know that mummy isn’t swimming around planning to kill anyone who discovers the ship.”
“We don’t know that anyone is killing people at all yet,” Kat said. “We’ve probably been asked in because Alan King is feeling a little worried—since his luck with documentaries hasn’t been so good lately.”
Logan looked up at the skylight. Then he looked back at her. “No, we won’t know anything until you examine the body and get more information. Since Alan has hired private security near the site, hopefully no one else will be exploring the area and ending up dead while the situation is investigated. You’re booked on a 5:40 p.m. flight out of Burbank. You should be in a nice cozy room by midnight, and then tomorrow… I’ll be waiting to hear what you have to say.”
“What if I can’t find the answer in the autopsy?” Kat asked him. “Or in anything else we’re able to examine?”
“Then we’ll join you—and figure out where the answer does lie.”
Kat nodded and sipped her coffee. The sun seemed to come out again and stream through the skylight overhead.
“You have information on the ship, the sinking, the discovery of the tomb—all kinds of stuff—in the folder,” Logan said. “Along with info on all the principle players working on the discovery and preservation of Egyptian antiquities.”
“Anything else?”
He grinned. “Be glad it’s not the dead of winter?”
* * *
There was no keeping down a true scholar.
Will Chan hadn’t come for a lesson in Egyptology, but it seemed to be part of the interview.
Senior researcher Jon Hunt grew animated as he spoke, saying, “Amun Mopat lived and died during the reign of Ramses—Ramses II, the most powerful ruler of the New Kingdom and the nineteenth dynasty and perhaps the most powerful of all the great pharaohs or god-kings of Egypt. Ramses ruled from 1279 BC to 1213 BC, and it appears that Mopat, reputed to be a shady character, was born in the same year and the same month, which seemed to be a great oracle to people at the time. Ramses was first drawn to him, believing in the power of sorcery. Amun Mopat lived a life of luxury, respected and consulted on most important matters of state. Ramses, you’ll remember, was a warrior king. He’s the one with Moses in all the movies—the villain, you know.”
“Except,” Amanda Channel—also a senior researcher—interjected, “historians have argued constantly over the true factual dates of ‘the time of Moses.’ And whether or not he eventually expelled the Hebrews from Egypt, Ramses II was a builder and a soldier and a peacekeeper. In short, a remarkable ruler. Living in a world with a totally different belief system, of course. Must have been nice to be a god, huh?”
Will sat in a conference room at the offices of the Chicago Ancient History Preservation Center as he spoke with—or, more accurately, listened to—Jon Hunt and Amanda Channel. Both of them were trying to explain everything at once, or so it seemed. More than three thousand years of ancient Egyptian history, Brady Laurie’s tragic death and the story behind the Jerry McGuen.
Apparently neither of them needed to take a breath very often. And they switched from Egyptian history to Brady and then to the Jerry McGuen with record speed.
But then, Egyptian history, Brady and the ship were now joined for all eternity.
“Brady loved anything that had to do with ancient Egypt,” Jon said. “He could rattle off every pharaoh in every dynasty in the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom and the New Kingdom more quickly than your average high school kid could come up with all fifty states.”
Will wasn’t sure most high school kids could rattle off all fifty states.
“But,” Amanda jumped in, her voice almost a fluid continuation of Jon’s thoughts, “Brady especially loved the New Kingdom, and everything that’s been learned from excavations in the Valley of the Kings.”
“Howard Carter’s discovery of King Tut’s tomb happened after the discovery of Amun Mopat’s. Since the treasures of Mopat’s tomb—a good portion of them, anyway—went down with the Jerry McGuen, a lot of important artifacts and information were lost to history,” Jon explained. “And Amun Mopat, much as he wanted to be a god, was only a priest. Tut had been a pharaoh.”
He actually paused for breath and Amanda remained silent. Will took the opportunity to survey the conference room; there was an excellent bust of Nefertiti on a counter that stretched out from the back wall. Next to her were a dozen or so canopic jars, all copies, according to Amanda and Jon.
He assumed they were telling the truth. Next to the canopic jars was a large coffee urn, and the usual collection of paper cups, sugar, creamer and whatever else one might desire for a cup of coffee. Nothing truly valuable would have been kept so casually and haphazardly where coffee could spill at any time.
He’d only had a quick glimpse of one of the workrooms. It was sterile in appearance except for a piece Amanda had been working on, a funerary statue that had been dug out of a pit in the city—property of someone who’d lost everything in the Great Chicago Fire. The fire had occurred in 1871, before the sinking of the Jerry McGuen, but collectors had been avid about ancient Egyptian pieces for a hundred years by then, and there’d been those who’d coveted Egyptian art even before Napoleon’s soldier had cracked the code in 1799 and translated the Rosetta Stone.
“Brady was being an ass,” Amanda said mournfully.
Jon Hunt immediately looked offended, and Amanda softened her words.
“An ass in the way we can all be asses. Jon, please, I’m not insulting him. I’d say the same thing about us. We get too excited about a discovery like this.” She sighed. “Brady grew up hearing his great-grandfather talk about the disappearance of the Jerry McGuen. Maybe that’s when he fell in love with Egyptology. Or maybe it started with the visits to the Field Museum. And you can imagine how he felt, considering what he knew about both Egyptology and the Jerry McGuen. We can’t help it. I guess we’re real nerds—oh, my God! Who would’ve thought that being a nerd could be dangerous? We think we know what we’re doing, and then…”
“He was brilliant.” Jon shook his head as if he still couldn’t accept that his friend and coworker was dead.
“Brilliant—and, this one time, so foolish!” Amanda said. “Yes, I admit the rest of us hadn’t totally believed in his theory. I mean, we believed—we just weren’t as insane about it as Brady. That’s how we work. Even when we’re not convinced that someone else is right, we work with them to find out. And all of Brady’s calculations did make sense. We were scheduled to start looking together. If they hadn’t been sound theories and calculations, we wouldn’t have approached the film director—Mr. Firestone. Oh, if Brady could just have waited…”
“We would have been right with him,” Jon said. He gritted his teeth. “I was the one who found him,” he whispered.
“We found him,” Amanda corrected.
“Yes, well, I was the first to see him…floating there.”
“We have two boats,” Amanda said. “He took one out ahead of us. We have a small, exploratory dive boat, and then our larger vessel. It was Saturday and—”
“Yes,” Jon interrupted. “If only it hadn’t been a Saturday!”
“We were supposedly off work, but Brady called both of us that morning. He said he was going to take the boat out and use sonar,” Amanda said. “Seriously, finding anything actually salvageable on the McGuen was always a long shot, but Brady believed that the treasures taken from the tomb had been so carefully packed, there was a real chance. I thought we were going to start on Monday, but he called me. I called Jon, and we agreed we’d go out with him, but he’d already taken the smaller boat. We let him know we were on our way, but I think he ignored us because he had to prove it to himself first. He shouldn’t have gone down to the wreck. He shouldn’t have gone down alone—he knew that. I was furious with him. Before we found him, of course.” She paused, looking at Jon and then at Will and added, “I was afraid. We didn’t want to lose our funding.” She glanced at Jon again, as if feeling guilty about something she’d done while trying to rationalize it at the same time.
“We brought out our second boat—the big one, Glory—and found the Seeker at anchor. There was no sign of Brady. And it was wrong of him, because Mr. King, the producer, said from the beginning that he’d finance us as long as we let him document every step—right or wrong—along the way,” Amanda told Will.
“I think Brady was afraid we’d start work, and there’d be no ship,” Jon said. “And if that was the case—”
“We’d already taken money,” Amanda broke in. “It’s also really competitive, diving for salvage. It can be confusing, too, with U.S. laws, state laws, international laws…except that we’re not in it to make a fortune. A 1987 federal law says the states own all wrecks found in their territorial waters, but there’s still money in salvage. There’s another law about disturbing a grave site, but really, there can’t be anything left of the people…. Except if the mummy itself was properly sealed… The thing is, we believe in returning antiquities. What we’d earn would be a percentage of what Mr. King makes in IMAX films and the like. Of course, he gave us a hefty sum as a down payment.”
“I knew something was wrong when the boat was empty, and Brady’s dive flag was still out,” Jon said.
“So, anyway,” Amanda continued, “Mr. King’s director, Bernie Firestone, and some of his crew came out with us, taking their boat—nice and fancy, all kinds of great stuff on it—and two of his underwater cameramen followed us down. And…and we found Brady.” Tears welled in Amanda’s eyes.
“Yeah. It was great. He’d found the Jerry McGuen,” Jon said bitterly. “And we found him.”
Amanda let out a little choking sound. They both stared at Will, their eyes soulful and wet.
Amanda was thirty-two, a pretty woman, reed-thin and passionate about her work. Jon, her coworker, was a few years older. His brown hair was graying at the temples and he wore bottle-thick glasses and was also thin. He was wiry and seemed fit as the proverbial fiddle.
Their attempt to explain everything to him at once seemed to point to their clinical and obsessive pursuit of knowledge. They both spent hour upon hour—day upon day—in their little cubicles or labs, painstakingly dusting or chiseling away the dirt and dust of the ages. Sometimes, they got to go on a dig or a dive, but most of the time, they were in their offices and labs.
Will liked everything he’d read about the Chicago Ancient History Preservation Center. He’d always been intrigued by history himself, especially by the way many societies—including the ancient Egyptians—used mysticism and magic.
As Amanda had said, the center kept none of the antiquities it discovered or worked on; its sole purpose was to preserve historical artifacts, delve into their secrets and pass them on to their homelands or an institution worthy of guarding and displaying them. It had been founded in the latter part of the nineteenth century by Jonas Shelby, an avid Egyptologist. In the years since, grants and private donations had added to Shelby’s legacy, and while the “treasures” came directly from ancient Egypt, they might also have been discovered in a Chicago backyard.
Amanda suddenly frowned at Will. “I’m not really sure why you’re here, Agent Chan,” she said. “It’s fine, but…”
“We brought Brady right up. He was dead by then. Obviously dead.” Jon grimaced. “When I radioed in the emergency the guy kept telling me to give him artificial respiration. I would’ve done anything for him—but Brady was dead when we brought him up. Like Amanda said, the filmmakers followed us down, so there’s actually footage—” he broke off “—footage of us finding Brady. The film crew has it. And the police have a copy, too.”
Will listened gravely. He knew that already. He’d spent yesterday with Alan King, Bernie Firestone and Earl Candy. Alan didn’t dive, but Bernie and Earl did. Alan was deeply worried about his future in film; it was not a good thing if people kept dying on the films he produced. Will had seen the footage of the two divers coming upon their dead coworker. Luckily, neither of the men was the kind of person to leak such footage to YouTube or any other site.
He didn’t tell Jon or Amanda that he’d seen the film. He wanted to hear their version of everything that had happened.
“And he was taken right…right to the morgue,” Amanda said. She appeared stricken, as if she’d begin crying again. “He drowned down there, and it’s tragic. To us more than anyone else, but…”
“He drowned,” Jon said flatly. “Why is the FBI investigating?”
“Your filmmaker.” Will smiled and leaned across the conference table to pick up a copy of the Sunday paper, lying there. The headline read Historian Dies Tragically During Greatest Discovery—Accident or Victim of Ancient Curse?
“Oh, please!” Amanda said. “Seriously, oh, please! That’s just a reporter scrambling for headlines. I saw Brady. He drowned!” She sighed. “Listen, I loved him like a brother. But we have to keep going on this, and quickly. We’ve gotten the rights to dive her first and salvage what we can. And Brady was absolutely correct. The precious cargo down there was carefully—carefully!—wrapped and stowed. We’d dishonor Brady’s memory if we didn’t complete his mission!”
“Okay, back up for me, please. You have the rights of salvage? Didn’t you need to find the ship first?” Will asked.
Amanda flushed. “Our paperwork is all on file. We have a maritime attorney on hand who has us all ready to go with recovery.”
“But if another person or enterprise had found her first….”
“Well, I suppose someone else could have filed for the rights, as well,” Amanda said. “But no one else had Brady—or studied the effect of storms on the lake like he did.”
Will doubted that a competing group would care how someone had determined the location of a treasure. They would just want the bottom line. “Who else has been searching for the Jerry McGuen?” he asked.
“Through the decades?” Jon shrugged. “Anyone with a ship, sonar or a dive suit.”
Will smiled. “Recently. Do you know of anyone or any other enterprise searching for her?”
“A year ago there was an article about a company called Landry Salvage that was interested. Their CEO was quoted in a local TV piece on the wreck,” Amanda said.
Jon was thoughtful, drumming his fingers on the conference table for a moment before speaking. “There’s also a company called Simonton’s Sea Search that was interviewed briefly for the same piece. It was one of those little five-minute news segments, you know?”
“It never occurred to you that since the treasure on the ship is worth a fortune, someone else might be eager to acquire that fortune?” Will asked.
“It’s not like anyone could just keep everything, or that a salvage effort on the lake wouldn’t be spotted!” Amanda insisted.
“Yes, but whether the treasures were returned to Egypt or turned over to our government,” Will said, “the finder’s fee or percentages could be staggering. Though I’m not seeing a legitimate bid as something that’s likely to supersede yours. The black market is where the real money would be.”
Amanda shook her head. “That’s why we needed to find it. Stop the black market activity. And we still need to get down there fast, although…thanks to Brady, our papers have been filed.”
Will lowered his head, hiding his expression. The world did go on. They’d found Brady’s body in the ship—and they’d made sure their legal work was done, probably as soon as Brady Laurie was on his way to the morgue.
“The mission won’t be stopped—will it? I mean, I know there’s competition out there, but Brady drowned. I saw him.” Amanda’s eyes were anxious as she looked at Will. “Poor Brady—but he must have died happy. He did find the Jerry McGuen.”
Will doubted that Brady had died happy. Drowning was a horrendous death.
“The salvage is not being stopped,” Will said. “And, so far, the medical examiner’s conclusions are that Brady Laurie died as a result of forgetting his deep-water time because of his excitement.”
“So…why the FBI?” Amanda asked, obviously still puzzled.
“The director of the documentary is an old friend of Sean Cameron’s—Sean’s an agent in one of our special units—and the producer, Mr. King, is anxious about what’s happened. Not to mention all these rumors about the curse. Because of their association with us and their concern that the salvage and the documentary go well, they came to the agency. And because our most senior officer, Adam Harrison, has great relationships with state governments, we were invited in. We’re not sensationalists. We’re here to disprove a curse, as much as anything else and, hopefully, make sure there are no more accidents.”
“Oh!” Amanda said, blinking away tears again. “Well, as long as our work isn’t stopped. Brady—oh, God, I miss him, I loved him, but he was acting like a cowboy. He just had to get down there before we were really ready. He knew not to dive alone. I mean, come on, an experienced diver knows never to dive alone. Anywhere. Not even in shallow reefs in the Keys, much less here. He just thought he was better than anyone and… We are diving the wreck tomorrow? An exploratory dive before we start with the salvage?” she asked anxiously.
“Yes,” Will assured her. “Everything will go ahead as planned. Just one change,” he told her pleasantly. “I’ll be joining you, and so will another member of my unit.”
“What?” Amanda was obviously dismayed. “More people down there? You don’t understand how careful you have to be with artifacts. You don’t—”
“I’ll do my best, Dr. Channel,” he said. “My colleague and I will meet you at the dock tomorrow morning.” He rose to signal that he was leaving—and that he’d be back.
“Yes, but…” Amanda started her protest and then frowned. “I could probably answer any other questions you might have right now. Where are you going?”
“I’m afraid I have another meeting,” he informed her, “but I’ll see you tomorrow.”
He smiled politely and exited the room, and then the Preservation Center.
It was situated near the aquarium, on South Lake Shore Drive, and when he stepped out the front door, he saw Lake Michigan. The water glittered in the sun, and he wished he could get out on a boat in a dive suit right away, but he had a meeting with a member of Logan Raintree’s crew.
And with a dead man.
He turned away from the lake and headed for his rental car.
2
More than eighteen thousand deaths were reported to the Cook County office of the medical examiner yearly. Of those, some six thousand received an autopsy.
The office handled investigations for a large part of the state; in January 2011, there’d been such a backup due to the number of bodies and the holidays, they were stacked one on top of the other. The morgue had been overcrowded due to what the press had dubbed “the killing season,” when gang violence had erupted on the South Side.
Kat knew these things because she’d done nothing but read since she’d boarded her plane for Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport.
Cook County wasn’t different from any other large metropolitan area. People died. Thankfully most of them died naturally.
But some did not. Some died because of gang violence, and sometimes they died in police custody or in jail. Some died because of domestic violence, and some were simply and pathetically in the wrong place at the wrong time—victims of random crime. Some died “suspiciously” or without apparent explanation.
Despite the fact that she wasn’t in Chicago because she wanted to be, she wasn’t disturbed by her particular assignment here. While many people feared a medical examiner’s office as a frightening and gruesome place, Kat had always found that an autopsy—though invasive—was a service that man had come to do for man. It was an effort to let the dead speak for themselves, to seek justice, find a killer or, conversely, prove accidental death when no other human was at fault. Autopsy helped the living, too; some medical advances would have never come about without autopsies determining the cause of death. In medical school, she hadn’t started out feeling that she’d rather work with the dead than the living. It had been during her residency that she’d discovered she had a penchant for unspoken truths…and that, even when silent, the dead could sometimes tell their tales.
The Texas Krewe—her unit of their section within the FBI—was supposed to investigate whatever couldn’t be answered by the evidence. Usually it wasn’t because of incompetence or because leads weren’t followed by the local police. They were called in when the leads themselves were unusual. Some people described those leads as paranormal.
But in this instance…
A diver had jumped the gun. He’d jumped the gun on an incredible discovery mainly because he was the scientist who’d been determined to find the wreck of the Jerry McGuen. He’d been looking for ancient Egyptian treasures lost along with the ship.
And those treasures included a mummy.
It just had to be a mummy! she thought, wincing as she conjured up an image of Brendan Fraser and his hit movie. And of course there was the mummy in The Unholy—the recent Hollywood remake of a 1940s film noir—had been that of an evil Egyptian priest who’d turned out to be real.
“Sad beginning to this whole thing, huh?”
Startled, Katya looked over at Dr. Alex McFarland, the M.E. who walked her down the corridors and past offices, vaults and autopsy rooms. He seemed a decent enough sort, cordial and receptive. Bald as a billiard ball and wearing spectacles, he reminded her of Dr. Bunsen Honeydew of Jim Henson’s Muppets fame, the epitome of what the general public expected a doctor or scientist to look like.
“Very sad,” she agreed. The victim had been in his thirties, an expert on Egyptology and an expert diver. A young man with his life stretching out before him.
And now that life was cut short.
McFarland rolled his eyes. “Tragic…and almost no one’s talking about the boy’s death. Of course, the disappearance of the Jerry McGuen has been one of the great mysteries of Lake Michigan since she went down in the late-nineteenth century. There’s more coverage given to the discovery than to the poor boy’s death. And God help us all—the curse! But, then again, although Chicago is hardly considered to be one of the world’s great dive spots, the lakes hold a lot of wrecks where divers frequently go. I don’t dive myself, but we have many professional and recreational divers in the area. Many of them say he was being careless, that he took chances in his excitement and shouldn’t have been diving at seventy-five, eighty feet on his own.”
“You should always dive with a buddy,” Kat said. “Sadly it’s often the divers—even expert divers—who go out on their own who wind up in autopsy. There are no guarantees in the deep.”
“You dive?”
“Yes,” she told him.
“Well, then, I’m sure you’ll enjoy this. Like I said, the Great Lakes are filled with shipwrecks. I find the lakes and wrecks fascinating. I’ve studied them all my life—to the point of obsession, I’m afraid. Many are known, but many are not. Lake Michigan has a surface area of 22,400 square miles and its average depth is 279 feet with its greatest depth being about 923 feet,” McFarland said. “It’s the largest lake completely contained in one country in the world, and ranked fifth largest on the globe.”
McFarland obviously loved Chicago. He sounded very proud of the lake.
But then he sighed. “Lots and lots of room for tragedy over the years, and lots of room for ships to disappear. Sure, finding wrecks in the deep, frigid waters of the North Atlantic is a challenge, but if you’ve ever looked out at the lake, you might as well be staring at an ocean, it’s so immense.”
She glanced over at him; McFarland knew the power of water, and he seemed well up on his history of the area. He was as fascinated as everyone else by the discovery of the sunken ship.
“The exploration is still going on,” she said.
“So I understand. The world doesn’t stop spinning because one person has died.” McFarland shrugged. “You have heard that everyone’s talking about a curse, right?”
“Yes,” she said. That’s why I’m here.
Normally, of course, they would never have been called in because of an accidental death that occurred while a man was scuba diving. Such deaths would be handled by the medical examiner’s office, but there usually wasn’t any hint of paranormal activity, so no reason for their unit to be brought in.
“You can’t stop the wheels of progress when there’s been a great discovery, I guess,” McFarland said.
“Every day is money,” she murmured. “Someone’s livelihood. In this case, many livelihoods.”
That was true. Kat didn’t know nearly as much about film as Sean Cameron or a few of the others who belonged to one of the “Krewe” teams, but from their time in California she’d learned how much money could be involved. In the file Logan had given her she’d read that production prep had already begun; crew and talent had been hired. Of course, Alan King was, according to Forbes, a billionaire, so if he lost money on the enterprise, he’d probably be just fine. But making the documentary meant much more to the struggling historians running a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving the past.
Sean would arrive soon. He’d taken a short holiday with Madison Darvil after their last case. When they got back from Hawaii, Madison would resume her work in California, and Sean would come here.
She smiled just thinking about it. She loved Sean; they were old Texas friends. She felt sure that he and Madison would be able to keep up with their demanding jobs—he with the unit, she with her work at a special effects company—and maintain a relationship.
Kat returned her attention to Dr. McFarland and the situation. At the moment, however, that didn’t seem to help. Whatever had happened to Brady Laurie was still confusing.
But in every case, someone needed to speak for the dead….
“Well, from what I understand, Alan King doesn’t care if he loses money on a film as long as he produces a documentary that makes him proud,” Kat said to McFarland. “King already has his director and shipboard cameraman—who are two men my team and I actually know. They’re from San Antonio. I understand that King also has underwater videographers on-site, ready to detail every single step of the ship’s recovery…and that they were there when members of the Preservation Center found Mr. Laurie.”
“That’s the information I have, too,” McFarland said. “I wasn’t at the site. The body was brought here. And I swear that man hadn’t been out of the water for more than two seconds before the curse hysteria started.”
She didn’t believe in curses; she did believe in the way a curse could be used to prey on people’s minds. She’d seen people die because of what they were convinced was true, hearts that had stopped beating because of fear.
“I don’t think there’s an Egyptian tomb that doesn’t come with a curse—or at least a rumored curse,” Kat said.
McFarland grinned. “I see you’ve read up on all this. The man who discovered Amun Mopat’s tomb, Gregory Hudson, was aboard the Jerry McGuen when she sank, which, of course, gave rise to the belief that the curse is real. To tell you the truth, the only curse I see is the wicked Chicago weather. But you’ve probably heard our old saying. ‘If it weren’t for the weather, everyone would want to live here!’”
“The Jerry McGuen carried the mortal remains and effects of the New Kingdom, nineteenth dynasty priest—or sorcerer—Amun Mopat, beloved of
Ramses II,” Kat said. “He had his own burial crypt and chamber built before his death. He’d filled it with treasures and—in his own hand, the story goes—chiseled a curse into his tombstone, damning anyone who disturbed his eternal life. Or disturbed the place where his body rested while he joined with the pharaohs and gods. He was apparently quite taken with himself. He wanted to be a god like the pharaohs.” She smiled. “According to some of the research a colleague pulled for me, he had blood ties to Ramses II. He felt he should have been seen as a god all his life.”
“Yes, very good. You seem very well informed.” McFarland shrugged. “But I don’t understand why they’ve called the FBI in on this, except that…curses and ghosts are your specialty, right?”
“I assure you, I’m qualified to be here, Dr. McFarland,” Kat told him. “I received my doctorates in medicine and forensic pathology from Johns Hopkins.”
“Yes, I heard you were well qualified, Dr. Sokolov—and I’m sure you’ll understand what we’re dealing with better than the fellow who’s already here.”
“Agent Chan is here now?” she asked. She wished she’d had a chance to meet with him earlier. Introductions over a corpse were always a bit awkward, even if she was a medical examiner and far too familiar with morgues.
“Yes, he arrived about ten minutes ago. He said you were informed that you’d be meeting him. He’s not a doctor,” McFarland said, his tone irritated and more than a little condescending.
“But he is an agent,” Kat reminded him.
McFarland opened the door to the autopsy room; they were both gowned and gloved.
Kat usually noted the corpse first.
But this time she noted the man who belonged to the original Krewe.
He greeted her as she entered, with words rather than a gloved hand. “Hello, Dr. Sokolov, I’m Will Chan. I believe you were expecting to meet me here?”
“Yes, of course. Logan told me you were already in the city,” Kat said.
She didn’t mean to stare at him in obvious assessment.
But she did. She probably would’ve been tempted to stare at him anywhere. He wasn’t just an appealing, attractive or handsome man, he was different, and not merely because of his striking appearance. There was an aura about him, an energy that immediately caught and held her attention.
She had to look up at him, but she was only five-four, so it seemed that she looked up at most of the world. Somehow, with him, it was…disconcerting. Or maybe it was the circumstances that were disconcerting. We don’t know each other, except for what we know about each other. And yet…
She’d been given so many files to read on the plane, she had to mentally put what she knew about Will in order. He’d become an agent with the original Krewe of Hunters when they’d solved a case at a historic mansion in New Orleans. Before that, he’d performed as a magician and an illusionist. He was also astute with video, film and discerning what was really just smoke and mirrors, recognizing what lay beneath the surface. Will had gone through the academy and passed with flying colors. He was a talented agent.
And, of course, he’d happened to be in the city.
She cleared her throat, not wanting to seem gauche. “Logan gave me an extensive file,” she said. “You’re a film expert, as well?”
“I know a few things about it,” he said, lowering his head with a quick smile. “I come from a long line of illusionists.”
He was tall with intriguing features. His background was Trinidadian and he’d spoken with a slight accent that made her think of the Caribbean island. His hair was dark. His eyes, just as dark, were slightly almond-shaped. His features suggested Asian and perhaps Indian antecedents, and then again, there was something classic about them. His face seemed to be sculpted in the mold of a Roman statue, but with the rugged chin of an American cowboy. She found herself studying him—and almost forgetting that he was standing beside a corpse.
“Yes, and I’m one of Jackson Crow’s team, and most important, I was in Chicago when this happened,” he said.
“Right.” Kat nodded. “And so…what have you learned?”
“He hasn’t learned anything yet,” McFarland said. “I haven’t gone over the autopsy report with him,” he added. “We knew you were on your way.”
Kat nodded again, but looked at Will Chan.
McFarland had no idea just what this man—a Krewe member who could speak with the dead—might have learned.
She glanced away from Will Chan with determination, unable to still the curiosity stirring within her. As part of Jackson Crow’s team, he’d been specifically chosen for his position.
Because of a special talent.
McFarland drew out his report and frowned as he studied it. “As we all know, Mr. Laurie was a white adult male, thirty-six years old. No alcohol in the system, no drugs. His body was found drifting in the hold of the Jerry McGuen, at a depth of eighty feet in Lake Michigan, Chicago jurisdiction. Autopsy revealed no sign of violence and showed that Mr. Laurie was in perfect health at the time of his death. The lungs were filled with salt water, so I’m planning to officially sign off on this report as death by drowning, accidental.”
Kat gazed at the corpse. When it came to their unofficial role with the Krewe of Hunters, she was always glad of her medical degree and her specialization in pathology.
People didn’t think she was crazy when she touched the dead.
She moved forward, inspecting the dead man and then touching his arm.
She waited, hoping for something. A sense that he was still there, and that she could communicate with the remnants of his life, spirit or soul.
But she heard nothing in her mind, saw nothing at all in the part of her own soul that was different from other people’s. Her skill, or gift, or whatever one chose to call it, was out of the ordinary—but shared by some. Like Will Chan…
She glanced up at him again. He was watching her, and his striking dark eyes divulged none of his thoughts.
Stepping back, she gave her full attention to the visual aspect of the corpse.
Drowning. She hadn’t done the autopsy herself. She saw that Dr. McFarland’s Y incision was neatly cut and just as neatly sewn with small, competent stitches. It didn’t take a brilliant doctor to detect when the lungs were filled with water, and she didn’t doubt his conclusion on that.
She turned from the body to the report. The man had definitely drowned.
But she didn’t like the coloration of the corpse. Blue lips—natural, given what had happened. However, the lips were also puffy, and one side of his mouth seemed more swollen than the other. And there were curious bruises on the arms.
“You’re aware of the bruising?” she asked McFarland.
“Of course.” He was obviously indignant at her question. “I make painstaking notes. Every bruise is listed in the report, and you will have a copy of it for your files.”
She forced herself to ignore McFarland and Chan, studying the body once again. She was certain that McFarland was adept at his work—and from what she’d seen thus far, his notes were painstaking, just as he’d said. But the medical examiner needed to note the condition of a corpse and assess possible causes for that condition. McFarland’s Y incision on the dead man had been nothing short of artistic, and she was sure he’d inspected the man’s vital organs and taken all necessary samples for the pathology lab.
Brady Laurie showed no postmortem lividity in his lower extremities, which led her to believe that he’d floated, probably upright, after death.
But the bruising on his face still bothered her. So did the bruises on his arms. Those were smaller—the size of fingertips.
“What do you make of these?” she asked McFarland.
“Bruises. As I mentioned, they’re noted in the report,” McFarland said curtly.
Chan cleared his throat as he eased around the gurney. “What would’ve caused bruises on both arms?” he murmured. Kat had the same question. They weren’t as conspicuous, perhaps, as the contusions around his mouth, but unmistakable nonetheless.
“The man was a diver. He was dealing with a lot of equipment. He knocked around in one of the ship’s holds until he was found by other divers from the Preservation Center,” McFarland said. “He could have gotten them from an air tank or from some of the equipment he had piled on him. He was carrying a camera, and he was wearing one of those headlights divers use during night dives or cave dives. There was a dive knife strapped to his ankle. He had a huge light on the camera, as well—and, like I said, he bounced around the hold.”
“Still…I don’t think we should discount these bruises,” Kat said.
Chan seemed to agree. He moved around the corpse again, studying the bruises on Brady Laurie’s arms. Then he angled forward. “They look like fingerprints,” Chan said. “See? If I were to reach out and grab him…”
He demonstrated, putting his fingers just above where the bruises showed on the flesh.
“You think he was held down?” McFarland sounded skeptical.
“I think it’s possible,” Chan said, and he turned to Kat.
“More than possible.” She stepped forward, gently touching Brady’s lips with her gloved fingers. “And there’s some injury around the mouth….”
McFarland seemed troubled now, staring at the corpse and then referring to his notes. Finally, he shook his head. “Mr. Laurie was down in that hold alone. All alone. I don’t know anything about him as a man. Perhaps he had a temper. Maybe he got into an argument with someone before he went down. Maybe someone grabbed him roughly. I imagine he had a few bouts with his fellows at the Preservation Center. He could have gotten these bruises in a scuffle with a friend—even roughhousing for fun.”
Kat looked at him incredulously.
“This isn’t the body of a man who engaged in any kind of serious fight!” McFarland said firmly. “The bruises are small. There’s no injury to any of his bones. There are no real cuts, just some chafing around the mouth. He came in here having drowned. He definitely did drown.”
“But you assumed he might have been in a scuffle?” Will asked. “Do you often hear of fistfights among historians who don’t agree with each other?”
“There’s no real violence to the body. And historians are human like everyone else,” McFarland said.
“That’s true, but I spent the morning with this man’s coworkers—and there was no difference of opinion. They all wanted the same thing,” Will told McFarland. He sighed. “Doctor, please look at these bruises. Look at the way they match my hands. Think about a regulator. If it was ripped out of a man’s mouth…”
“You would have exactly that kind of trauma,” Kat finished.
“And exactly that kind of bruising,” Will said impatiently.
His tone made McFarland bristle, and Kat frowned at Will.
He ignored her.
Despite the tension in the room, Kat kept her hand lightly on the icy-cold arm of the corpse. She knew that Will was right; she had noted the particular patterns of the bruises on Brady’s arms almost immediately. And combined with the marks around his mouth, they suggested certain conclusions. But then, she was a diver. McFarland was not. And the man who’d been brought to him had been floating alone in the hold of a sunken ship.
At this rate, however, they weren’t going to be welcome back at the morgue.
She wished she could get some feel for the man who’d been Brady Laurie.
Nothing. She was getting nothing from the body. If only Brady Laurie was still somehow here…but his body was cold. Empty.
“This is ridiculous. It’s…it’s not like he has massive bruising anywhere,” McFarland sputtered.
“The bruises may darken, giving us a better idea,” Kat said. “He hasn’t been dead that long,” she reminded him.
“He might not have gone ten rounds at the WWE SmackDown,” Will put in, “but it looks to me as if he was held in a firm grip shortly before his death.”
“It doesn’t make sense that one of his coworkers could have gotten angry enough to have killed him. It’s not like they’re out to claim the treasures for themselves,” Kat said.
“So?” McFarland’s voice was strained. “What? A mummy crawled out of an inner sarcophagus and an outer sarcophagus—not to mention careful waterproofing—to rip his regulator out of his mouth?”
“Of course not,” Kat said.
“This man was the one who discovered the ship! He was alone down there,” McFarland emphasized.
“Maybe—and maybe not,” Will said. “Others had to have known. Brady Laurie had done careful charting before the preservation group sent out requests for financial help, trying to sell their research as a documentary. This is the age of computer hackers, so plenty of people could’ve found out. And Lake Michigan hasn’t been closed, has it?”
Kat wanted to kick him for his sarcasm.
“Agent Chan, I have been at this job for over twenty years,” McFarland began.
Kat stepped in quickly. “Of course, Doctor, and your autopsy and notations are commendable. But there are factors involved that weren’t included in the information you were given. You had no reason to suspect foul play. But with the possibilities out there—”
“What possibilities? A curse! A swimming mummy?”
Will shrugged and replied casually, “No, I’m sure the mummy would have deteriorated if it had somehow come to life,” he said. “Money, Doctor. A treasure of inestimable worth. We don’t know if any other party discovered the wreck due to Brady’s research. It might have been a simple drowning. And then again, maybe not. At this point in the investigation, we have no idea who else might have been out on the lake.”
“He died by drowning,” McFarland insisted.
Will raised his eyebrows. “Yes, he died by drowning. But whether it was accidental or not—that’s a completely different question, isn’t it?”
“You’re really suggesting he was murdered?”
“I’m more than suggesting, I’m saying it’s quite likely,” Will said. “Your findings were absolutely correct, Dr. McFarland, except that…they weren’t. Brady Laurie was grabbed and he was held in the water. He drowned not because he ran out of time, but because his regulator was ripped from him. That’s why he has injuries on his lips.”
“Young man, what you’re suggesting is a remote possibility!” McFarland said.
“Remote? I don’t think so.”
“Dr. McFarland, the point is…there is a possibility,” Kat said.
“And not so remote,” Will added.
He looked over at Kat. He was challenging her to step up to the plate. She wasn’t in the least worried about doing that; she just wished she didn’t have to.
She looked back at Will, who watched her steadily. And then, her heart sinking because she’d so badly wanted this to be nothing, she turned to McFarland. “Doctor, this is your morgue and your call. But…under the circumstances, I’d change that report if I were you. At the very least, hold on to it for a couple of days and let us do some more investigating. There’s a good possibility that this was willful death caused by person or persons unknown.”
3
“Could you have been any ruder?” Kat demanded of Chan.
“Could he have been any more incompetent?” he fired back.
They were out on the street. Car horns blared now and then, and the whir of fast-moving traffic seemed to be all around them.
Kat shook her head. “There’s still nothing to actually prove him wrong, Agent Chan. The bruise could conceivably have been caused by jostling around.”
“I never went to medical school, Agent Sokolov, but I don’t think you need a degree to recognize bruises on postmortem flesh. My fingers fit perfectly into those bruises, so I’d say whoever killed him had nice large hands. Brady Laurie wasn’t any kind of a hulk, although he was certainly strong enough to defend himself to some degree. But you dive, so surely you’re aware that a lack of oxygen can quickly deprive you of energy and skill, leaving only the instinct to survive—and fight against whatever is keeping you from breathing. An actor in a James Bond movie may be able to hold his breath forever while waging a heroic battle, but in most instances, you expend what air you have in trying to fight, and then…” He broke off, his implication grim. “And you agreed with my findings. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have said what you did.”
“I believe your findings suggest further investigation.”
“Beyond a doubt.”
“But that would usually suggest not insulting the medical examiner to the point that he doesn’t want you back in the morgue! In any city, we need to be on the best terms with local authorities,” Kat told him.
Will Chan stared back at her for a moment, then shrugged. “All right, fine. I should have tiptoed around his feelings. We should have pleasantly gone along with him—and then he would’ve released the body and we’d be left with nothing. Well, excuse me. You can go back in and ask the good doctor out for coffee or drinks, but I’m headed to the police station.”
He turned and started walking. Kat glared at him, her temper soaring. She decided to go after him and practically had to run to keep up with his long strides. She caught him by the arm and was surprised by her own strength when she spun him around to face her.
“Look, my team was the one called in. You just happened to be here. This is my investigation, and I need you to stop your high-handed behavior before you offend every cop in the city of Chicago, as well.”
“Why would I offend a cop who’s dealt with a situation competently?” he asked. “And I’m sure you’ve been informed that I’ve already begun the investigation. I did so right after Logan Raintree got the request and called Jackson Crow and Adam Harrison with the information.”
“Great. Except that you offended the medical examiner. Did you offend the film people, too? Or any of the others we’ll have to depend on for access and information?”
“I haven’t offended anyone, Agent Sokolov. What I did was conduct a very professional meeting with the film crew and then speak to the two researchers who worked with and found Mr. Laurie. I’ve politely informed them that we’ll be diving with them tomorrow. Unless, of course, you prefer to maintain your investigation here on the surface. I will certainly understand.”
She wondered what would happen if she simply combusted with anger on the street.
“Agent Chan, it was my understanding that I was to examine the corpse at the request of the producer, Alan King, and that if I found anything I didn’t believe to be completely straightforward, then an investigation would begin.”
“Well, Agent Sokolov, I was told last night to step right up and get things going since I was in the city. That’s what I did. When a body pops up, the first hours can be the most important—as you know—so time was of the essence. Would you like me to share what I’ve learned? Or would you rather let someone else die while you start your own investigation?” he asked.
I’m a professional, but I cannot work with this man!
She took a deep breath. “You do realize, Agent Chan, that we didn’t just go in and prove that Brady Laurie was murdered. Yes, it’s possible that he was held in some way while his regulator was ripped from him, but it’s not a foregone conclusion. There are other reasons such bruising might have occurred.”
“Evidence locker,” he said.
“Pardon?”
“Laurie’s dive gear is in an evidence locker down at the police station, since the police were with the rescue units when he was brought in. I’m going down there to meet up with the local investigator and see exactly how much air was left in Laurie’s tank.” He paused. “I was a day ahead of you—although, yes, it’s your case. I’ve seen the footage that was taken when the body was discovered. Laurie was dead when they found him, which wasn’t long after he’d gone down himself. I still can’t accept that it was a simple drowning.”
“Wait—whoa! I didn’t know there was footage!”
“Yes, there’s footage. And you can call Bernie right now, or you can take my word for it. I haven’t been to look at the evidence yet, but I intend to. You can get together with King Productions now or come with me and see the footage later. Your call.”
She really wished it would be professional just to slap his determined and impatient face.
Another deep breath. “It’s my call, yes,” she said. “But I will come with you. As you pointed out, I can see the footage later.”
He stood his ground but seemed slightly taken aback, something of a smile almost curving his lips.
“We’re not on opposing sides,” she said. “It doesn’t matter who makes what call. We’re here to find out if a murder has occurred, and if an investigation is necessary. I’m here for Brady Laurie, Agent Chan, not for a pissing contest with you.”
Now his lips did curve into a full smile. “Sorry. But the M.E.’s findings were just too easy.”
“Look, if there was no reason to suspect foul play, his findings really weren’t negligent.”
“You’re defending him because he’s an M.E.”
“I’m only saying what’s true, especially in a big city where you can have days when the bodies just pile up,” Kat said.
“All right. I’ll apologize when I see him again—if I see him again—and let’s pray I don’t. As to the rest, time can mean everything in this kind of investigation.”
“I know. But I’m not sure whether we can answer all the questions we need answered or if those answers will lead to more questions. If we find air in the tank…”
“Then there’s a good chance he was murdered.”
He’d turned already. She suddenly hated the fact that he was as tall as he was. Keeping up with him was an effort.
“Even if the air is gone, we can’t be certain of what happened. The air might have bled out after he died,” she said, catching up with Will. “And if there is air in the tank, it still doesn’t prove that the regulator was ripped from his mouth.”
He stopped so abruptly that she plowed into him. He reached out one hand to prevent her from falling.
“No, we won’t prove anything one way or another, not without additional evidence. But it will be interesting to find out if there is or isn’t air in his tank and to take a look at the regulator.”
“You have a car?” she asked him.
“You don’t?”
“I got into my room around midnight. I took a cab from the airport.”
“I’m in the garage.”
He started walking again. This time, she kept a certain distance.
He’d rented a Honda. When Kat climbed in, he indicated a folder thrust between the seats. “Notes from my meeting with Amanda Channel and Jon Hunt at the Chicago Ancient History Preservation Center—and what I’ve dug up from recent newspaper clippings.”
Kat quickly leafed through the folder while he maneuvered the car out of the parking garage. The center sounded like a truly commendable enterprise. Nonprofit, it was dedicated to preservation. The staff was small and included three researchers, a receptionist and a general assistant. Grad students came and went. Of course, now with Brady Laurie gone, it was down to two researchers.
“Landry Salvage and Simonton’s Sea Search,” she murmured, skimming various articles written about the elusive Jerry McGuen. “These can’t be the only two parties interested in finding the ship.”
“I’m assuming that over the last century, countless individuals and companies have tried. Think about discoveries in the past. Both the Titanic and the Atocha took years and years of fruitless searches before finally being discovered.” He glanced over at her. “Laurie must have been a brilliant historian and scientist.”
“But not as brilliant a diver,” Kat said. “He shouldn’t have gone down alone.”
Will shrugged. “Maybe it wouldn’t have mattered.”
“What do you mean?”
“Maybe the first person to come across the treasure was supposed to die,” he said cryptically. “Or maybe his coworkers weren’t supposed to be so close behind him, who knows? But I believe we’ll find out.”
“You have a lot of confidence,” Kat told him.
He flashed her a smile that was surprisingly charming. “That’s what we do—find things out. So far, my team hasn’t stopped until we’ve gotten the answers. Don’t tell me your team gives up so easily.”
“We haven’t given up yet!” Kat said indignantly.
His smile remained in place as he drove.
At the station, they were led first to one desk and then to another, and finally to the officer in charge of the accidental death investigation, Sergeant Riley. His supervisor had advised him to expect fed agents, and while he was pleasant and seemed to have no problem offering them assistance, he was confused about why they were there. “Sad, but the way the papers tell it,” Riley said, “Laurie went down on his own and drowned. You would’ve thought he’d know better. Every year, every damned year, there’s a diver lost somewhere in the lake, some fool so convinced of his own ability that he just goes down—and comes up dead.” Riley was in his early thirties, tops. He was medium in height and size, and wore a white tailored shirt with the sleeves rolled up. “At the moment, the personal effects found on the corpse are in the evidence room. We’ll go sign them out and you can study them all you want.”
“Were you there when Brady Laurie was brought up?” Kat asked him.
“They were on the lake. Our marine unit went out to the site. He was declared dead at the hospital, but there’d been attempts at resuscitation before that. I took over the investigation when his wet suit and dive tanks were sent to us, and I’ve been awaiting the medical examiner’s report, but…I have to admit, I wasn’t expecting anything to come of it,” Riley said.
He walked them back to the evidence cage, where they were introduced to the officer in charge and signed in. “Was the equipment tested for leaks?” Will asked.
“Immediately. No problems.”
“Fingerprints?”
“Um, no.”
“Ah,” Chan said.
Riley frowned. “Is that a problem? I doubt we’d have gotten anything, anyway, since divers in the lake wear gloves. And then, of course, our technicians worked with the equipment to find out if it was faulty in any way.”
“But it wasn’t?”
“No.”
In the evidence area where the tank, regulator and buoyancy control belt had been stowed, along with Laurie’s weight belt, Will looked back at Kat. “May I?”
“Go right ahead.” Laurie’s equipment had not been disassembled; the “octopus” with the regulator, secondary system and computer console was still connected to the air tank.
Will examined the computer at the end of one of the hoses. He grimaced and beckoned to Kat. She came over and stood next to him, staring down at the dials. Brady Laurie had died with five minutes of air still available.
“There was air in his tank,” Will explained to Riley. “After it was checked out for leaks.”
“Well, so there is,” Riley said. “Then he must have panicked and spit the thing out.”
“Experienced divers don’t panic when they have a regulator and air. He had a secondary system, too,” Kat said thoughtfully. “Properly attached to his BCV.” Riley was looking at her blankly. “This,” she said, indicating the buoyancy control vest. “He could easily have reached for it if he’d had difficulty with his main regulator,” she said, pointing to the mouthpiece. “It allows for the flow of air.”
Riley shook his head. “We really think it was just a tragic accident.”
Kat stepped in front of Will. “I’m sorry, Sergeant Riley. We don’t.”
“You’re taking over the investigation?” he asked. To Kat’s astonishment, he sounded hopeful.
He must have read her mind. “Hey, big city here, folks. I have my hands full, so…the chief already sent down orders to set you up in one of the conference rooms.”
“Good,” Will said. “Thank you.” He pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket. “Can you see that we have access to this equipment, and a technical officer if need be?”
“Whatever you want that we’ve got,” Riley assured them.
“Can you also connect us with the officer in charge of the marine patrol unit?”
Riley was happy to do so. He was happy, perhaps, to do anything that would make them someone else’s responsibility.
Outside the station, Kat took out her phone. “I’ve got to tell Logan I can’t say for sure that Laurie died by accident,” she explained to Will. “Do you need to call in, as well? Now might be a good time.”
He shrugged. “I don’t have anything to report yet. Jackson Crow knew I’d be staying on for a while.”
“Oh?”
“Hey, I happen to love Egyptian history,” he told her.
“You seem delighted that there might have been a murder,” she said sarcastically.
“Death never delights me.” His voice had grown serious. “You came into this expecting an accidental drowning—which is also what the police believed. But whenever there’s big money involved and a massive black market, I expect trouble. We need to put a stop to it or it’s going to continue.” He studied her for a moment. “Hey, this is what we do,” he said. “You shouldn’t be in this if you can’t hack it.”
“I can hack it just fine,” she snapped. “You forget I’m a doctor—a certified medical examiner and forensic pathologist. I’ve studied all manner of deaths.”
“No, I didn’t forget,” he said. “I couldn’t possibly—you constantly remind me.”
He walked away so she could make her call.
Kat looked after him, frustrated, her temper soaring again. Then she flushed and turned away. Was she afraid she didn’t have control of the situation? Mental note: quit reminding people that I’m an M.E.
Wincing, she made her call.
She told Logan that yes, it appeared that they should investigate, although she had nothing solid as yet. He promised that more team members would be there within twenty-four hours. “I’m assuming that you’ve met Agent Chan?” Logan asked.
“Oh, yes.”
“And he’s capable and professional?”
“All that,” Kat said drily.
“And what else?”
“He’s an ass,” Kat said. “He stomped all over the Chicago M.E. I try to speak first now to protect us from the wrath of local authorities.”
Logan chuckled softly. “I know Chan. I met him at our special units base in Arlington. He’s, shall we say, irreverent, but apparently excellent at what he does. He’s familiar with film, video and computer alteration, so he’ll be great with the film crew. And he dives, which is a major asset on this case. Are you going to see the Jerry McGuen soon?”
“If I know Chan, very soon,” Kat said, glancing over at her new colleague.
“Keep me posted on any developments,” Logan told her. “I should be there by midafternoon tomorrow.” Then he rang off and Kat returned the phone to her purse, signaling that the call was finished.
Chan approached her seconds later. “Ready?” he asked.
She nodded.
Their next stop was the harbor, where the police search and rescue boat that had brought in the body was docked.
The harbor and the lake were beautiful that day. Summer was still with them but would begin to fade in the next few weeks. Today, though, the water glistened under a benign sun.
They were able to see all four officers who’d been on the search and rescue boat. Officer Aldo Reynald had been in charge, and he seemed sincerely interested in their queries.
“When we got there, the woman was crying her eyes out…Amanda. Yeah, Amanda Channel. She was kneeling over the dead man. She said she’d done CPR, but she didn’t think it helped. She said we had to save her friend. The other guy, Jon Hunt, was walking around the dock, rubbing his chin, scratching his head. I tried CPR as we got him to shore. No luck. We have a state-of-the-art truck to deal with emergencies like this. You get a lot of divers who think they know their stuff and don’t, or divers who are used to the tropics and get into trouble in the lake. And naturally we have boating accidents, so…we’re prepared. We used every possible method of resuscitation on the way to the hospital, but…then we got there and they called it.” He shook his head glumly. “I’m assuming we’re going to have to be vigilant as this whole thing proceeds because diving a wreck is inherently dangerous, and a newly discovered one even more so.”
Reynald was lean and fit; he was obviously experienced, practical—and compassionate.
“But you believe he was dead when you arrived?” Kat asked.
He nodded grimly. “Dead as a cold mackerel, I’m afraid.”
“How long?” Will asked next.
“He couldn’t have been dead more than half an hour or so,” Reynald told them. “I’m not sure what I’m basing that on, other than that I’ve pulled more than a few bodies out of the lake. Like I said, he was declared DOA at the hospital.”
“Were there other boats near the dive spot?” Will asked.
“Boating on a good day on Lake Michigan? You bet.”
“Close to the dive site?” Kat continued for Will.
Reynald drew in a deep breath. “Yeah, near enough, I think. The other Preservation Center boat was there—as well as the one the dead man had been on. Oh, and the film crew has a snazzy research boat, too. There was a sailboat maybe two hundred feet away and others farther out….”
One of his fellow officers chimed in. “There were two motorboats nearby. One was a Cigarette—nice speedboat. I noticed that because I always wanted one. The other…a little cabin cruiser. Looked like the people aboard were fishing.”
“Fishing,” Kat echoed dubiously.
The officer grinned. “Not that long ago, Lake Michigan was so polluted you could die from eating fish you caught out there. But it’s cleaned up. You’ll find lots of people fishing in the lake now.”
“Did you notice anything else about the boat?” she asked.
He shook his head. “I’m afraid I didn’t.”
“Either have a dive flag up?” Will asked.
“Neither,” the second officer replied.
“We were called in on an accident, and rescue was our main objective,” Reynald told them. “I feel like a fool because we’re also law enforcement officers. Do you suspect it was more than an accident?”
Kat answered carefully. “We’re not sure yet. We’re just investigating at this point.”
“Well, we’re here anytime you need us,” Reynald said.
They thanked him. As they headed back to the car, Will seemed thoughtful. He glanced over at her. “You tired? You want to call it quits for the day?”
She scowled back at him. If she’d been falling off her feet, she’d never have admitted it to this man. “I’m fine. What do you have in mind?”
“Two quick stops—Landry Salvage and Simonton’s Sea Search. Neither may really help. Salvage companies don’t usually drive around in Cigarette speedboats, but…”
“And if someone else is searching for treasure, that person may not be involved with a salvage company at all,” Kat added.
He paused at the car door, looking over it. “True. But you have to know something about diving to get down there. You’d have to follow the research to find the ship—and you’d have to follow Brady Laurie out to the site…and gone after him right away.”
“Maybe it’s someone who works for a salvage company,” Kat suggested. “Not the company itself.”
“That would be my bet.” Will grinned as she joined him in the front seat. “Your choice—Landry or Simonton’s Sea Search first?”
“Simonton’s. I like the alliteration,” she said.
Simonton’s was just north of the pier. There was a massive vessel with all kinds of cranes and netting at the dock. The office itself was small and looked more like a sea shanty than a professional building. Inside, Kat was surprised to see that it was nicely outfitted with modern office furniture and file cabinets that occupied most of the wall space. The walls were decorated with old anchors, flags and other boating paraphernalia. A receptionist who introduced herself as Gina led them to a back room, where the walls were decorated with sea charts and maps, and the rear wall held the figurehead of a beautiful siren.
The man standing behind the desk was in a windbreaker, deck shoes and jeans. His desk was strewn with papers, despite the computer that took up at least half of it. “Hi. I’m Andy Simonton,” he greeted them. “What can I do for you?”
He was young, maybe thirty, with slightly shaggy blond hair and bright blue eyes. He swept out a hand to indicate the chairs in front of his messy desk. They sat.
“You’re with the FBI?” he asked curiously. He didn’t seem afraid or threatened in any way, but rather intrigued.
“We’re looking into the death of Brady Laurie,” Will said.
“Sad affair, that drowning,” Simonton murmured.
“This is your company?” Kat asked him.
Simonton nodded. “My father’s company, really. He wants to retire. I’ve been handling the business for about a year.”
“And what is your business, exactly?” Will asked.
Simonton looked confused. “Um, salvage.”
Will had the grace to laugh. “No, I’m sorry, what type of salvage? What are you working on now?”
“Oh!” Simonton said. “We’re conducting two recovery missions. A Florida boater underestimated the power of the lake and sank a sixty-foot sailboat, and we’re also working on recovering the cargo from the hold of the Mystic Susan—she’s a merchant vessel that went down with crates of high-fashion clothing,” Simonton explained.
“That does sound like work. Not terribly exciting,” Kat said sympathetically.
Simonton gave a nonchalant shrug. “It pays the bills, and quite nicely, too. Oh, and Mrs. Ciskel—she’s the wife of the Florida boater—is furious because she had a lot of jewelry aboard when their boat went down. I’d like to find that cache myself. To return to her, of course. She’s promised a massive bonus if we get back all her jewels.” He frowned. “Now, what’s this all about?”
“We were wondering if you’d ever had any plans to explore and salvage the Jerry McGuen,” Will said.
“We were invited to the reception put on by the Egyptian Sand Diggers.”
Kat glanced at Will. “The Egyptian Sand Diggers?” he repeated. “Who are they?”
Simonton waved one hand in the air. “They’re a local service club—and they’re just a little nutty, you know? In love with all things ancient Egyptian. Some of them are true scholars, while the rest are more what you’d call armchair historians. They held a reception about six months ago, and they shared all sorts of current information on expeditions into the Valley of the Kings, the closing of the Great Pyramids for maintenance, stuff like that. And they had an exhibit on Gregory Hudson—he’s the guy who discovered the Amun Mopat tomb way back—and the Jerry McGuen. They were trying to encourage local salvage companies to search for her. Unfortunately, I don’t have the time or money to go on a wild-goose chase, although I wish I had gone on that goose chase. I suppose the location is pretty well-known by now and anyone might have found her after she shifted on the seabed. See, it was wide open. The State of Illinois gets everything recovered in this area of Lake Michigan, but the salvage company that finds it does get certain rights. The original company went bust soon after the sinking of the Jerry McGuen and the passengers’ families were paid off with what was left, so any descendants aren’t really a factor. Now, as far as the salvage goes, the State of Illinois would probably return most of it to the Egyptians.”
“Do you know of anyone else who was planning to go after the ship?” Kat asked.
“Landry,” he said. “He and my dad were always competitive. Maybe he wanted to find it just to rub in my dad’s face—or my face now. He was at the reception, by the way.”
“How many boats do you have, Mr. Simonton?” Will asked.
“I have a little Mako for my own pleasure,” Simonton said. “You can go see her if you want. She’s sitting right outside.”
“This looks like a good operation.” Kat smiled. “And obviously a successful one.”
“I’m all about paying the bills,” Simonton said. He tapped a pencil on his desk. “Can I do anything else for you? I’m sorry, but I’m kind of busy and…well, honestly, I’m not really sure what you’re after.”
“We think someone helped Brady Laurie drown,” Will said bluntly.
Simonton gaped at him. “Wow. Well, I can’t see how that could have happened. I mean, his own people were right behind him and they’re the ones who found him.” He sat back, staring at them, still not threatened, just surprised. “Um, you’re welcome to search anything we own or, uh, whatever.”
“Thanks. If we need to search, we’ll get back to you,” Kat said. “What we could use is information on the Egyptian Sand Diggers.”
“Oh, sure!” He started rummaging through his desk. “That invitation is in here somewhere…. They used nice stationery and calligraphy on it.”
He gave up with a sigh and stood, heading out to the receptionist’s desk. “Gina, can you find me that invitation from the Egyptian Sand Diggers?”
Simonton stood by the door as Gina searched for the invitation. Kat leaned over and whispered to Will. “Why don’t you just call the Tribune and announce that we’re looking for a murderer? We’re not even sure of it ourselves!”
He shrugged. “What? You think people will believe the FBI is involved because we want to dive a wreck?”
She gritted her teeth again, but before she could respond, Simonton returned with the invitation. “Here you go. Their address is right there, where it says RSVP.”
“Thank you,” Kat said, accepting it. She smiled. “You were really helpful. I hope we can count on you in the future, if we need to.”
He gave her a warm smile in return. “Oh, you bet!”
“You did a lovely job. Maybe I should let you do all the talking,” Will muttered as they left the office.
“What?”
He turned to her. “Mr. Simonton was quite…taken with you. That’s good. He’ll help us.”
“Agent Chan, that is hardly—”
“Professional? Sorry. But you were being all nicey-nice, and in this case, it seemed to work. I say we go with it.”
“I say it’s better than you offending M.E.s and cops!”
“McFarland needed to know that he’d make a fool of himself if he crossed Laurie off as an accidental death. Now he knows, and he won’t do it. And I was perfectly polite with the cops. I don’t blame them. This is a tough town, and when they can close the books on a situation, they have to do it. I honestly don’t think it occurred to most people working the drowning that it might have been an assisted drowning—or murder. Now, they’ll think about.”
“Are we going out to talk to Landry or the Egyptian Sand Diggers?” Kat asked. She decided to let his previous remarks—a backhanded compliment if ever there was one—slide.
“Let’s check out Landry first,” Will said.
Kat agreed, getting out her phone.
Will glanced over at her. “Are you getting someone to look up the Sand Diggers?”
She nodded.
“Good idea.”
After a brief conversation, Logan promised that he’d learn whatever he could about the avid amateur Egyptologists. By the time she’d finished, they were pulling into a lot by the glass-and-chrome offices of Landry Salvage.
“They seem to be doing a bit better here, don’t you think?” he asked Kat.
“Either that, or they’re more impressed with appearances.”
Where the offices of Simonton’s Sea Search had seemed like an old-fashioned sea shanty, Landry’s was almost sterile. The floors were bare, the white walls adorned with single black strokes of paint. The reception desk was sparse, and the woman who greeted them was young, very pretty and very blank. It seemed to take her several minutes to figure out who they were, and then several more to understand what they wanted. The little sign on her desk identified her as Sherry Bertelli.
“Oh, oh, oh!” she said at last. “Oh! You’re here about the professor or the Egyptologist or the…whatever he was who died so tragically!” She pushed a button on the single piece of office equipment before her. “Mr. Landry, the FBI is here to see you.”
They heard an impatient reply. “The FBI? Whatever for?”
Kat leaned over the desk. “Agents Katya Sokolov and Will Chan, Mr. Landry. We’d like to speak with you. We’re hoping you can help us.”
There was a moment of dead silence, and then Landry said, “Of course. Come on in. Ms. Bertelli will escort you.”
Sherry Bertelli rose quickly. “This way, please.”
It was hard to tell where glass walls and doors met. They went down a long hallway. Eventually Sherry Bertelli pushed on a glass panel, and they were ushered into another state-of-the-art ultramodern office where Landry was standing behind a black chrome desk.
“How do you do, how do you do?” he asked, stepping around to shake their hands. “I’m Stewart Landry. Have a seat, please, have a seat. Would you like coffee or anything?”
“No, no, thank you, we’re fine,” Kat assured him. Will held one of the chairs for her, then took his own. Stewart Landry sat back at his desk. Sherry Bertelli just stood there.
“That’s all, Sherry, thank you,” Landry said.
Without a word she turned and marched out of the office. Landry cleared his throat. “Sherry’s, uh, very popular with our clientele,” he said, as if excusing his receptionist’s undeniable limitations.
Landry was somewhere between fifty and sixty years old. His suit was designer label, his nails were clean and buffed and his silver hair was well groomed. Kat had to wonder if there wasn’t something more intimate going on between him and Sherry than the typical employee-boss relationship.
“Now, how can I help you?” Landry asked.
“Frankly,” Will said, “we’re trying to find out if you’d considered diving the site of the Jerry McGuen. We understand that a group called the Egyptian Sand Diggers was encouraging local interest and, as I’m sure you’ve read or seen on the news, a diver died at the site.”
Landry frowned. “Yes, I saw the news, and I knew Brady Laurie. He was quite angry at that reception and behaved rather badly. He wasn’t a member of the group, made very clear that kind of thing was beneath a true historian such as himself. He argued with the members that he was already on the case, and that he and his colleagues needed to find the treasure, not any of us ‘money-grubbing bastards.’ Don’t get me wrong—the death of any young person is lamentable. But Dr. Laurie was out of line. The Egyptian Sand Diggers invited us all to that soiree, and I think it was because they didn’t believe Laurie was right in his calculations. He was, of course. That’s obvious now.”
“Did you plan to dive the site at all?” Kat asked, returning to the original question.
He shrugged. “Honestly? It was an intriguing thought. But as to planning any operation—no. Our big ship is out in Lake Huron working on a ferry that went down. We have some smaller vessels working more shallow waters, but as to the Jerry McGuen… If Laurie hadn’t found her, we might’ve made an attempt to see what our sonar could identify in the area. Thing is, no one really knew exactly where she went down, other than that she was supposedly near Chicago. You might not realize it, but the lake is huge. Searching it is almost like searching the North Atlantic. When you’re just looking at the lake, it seems to stretch out forever. And when you’re boating on it alone, you can feel as if you’re the last man on earth.”
“But the treasure in the Jerry McGuen is of inestimable worth,” Will commented.
Landry nodded. He smiled suddenly. “But searching for that kind of treasure—needle in a haystack. I can tell you that Brady Laurie was obsessed with it. I wasn’t shocked when I heard about his death. He was threatened by all of us—no, no, that came out wrong. No one ever threatened him, but…check with the Egyptian Sand Diggers. They were pointing out the historic value of the find, which we already knew, and he got furious. Their president is a fellow named Dirk Manning, and what they call their ‘guardian’—an old fellow who’s been involved in it since he was twenty-one—is a man named Austin Miller. Talk to one of them about Brady Laurie. In my opinion, he had no real interest in joining the group, but he probably spoke to those gentlemen more than anyone else. Me? I believe Laurie was so obsessed with the ship that he signed his own death warrant.”
Will stood up and shook hands with Landry. Kat stood, too. “If there’s anything I can do, please let me know,” Landry said.
“Thank you.” Kat smiled—then remembered Will’s earlier remark about her niceness.
“I’ll have Ms. Bertelli show you out,” Landry offered.
“We can find our way,” Will told him, “but thanks.”
When they passed Sherry Bertelli, she was sitting behind her desk, flipping through the pages of a fashion magazine. She looked up long enough to smile vaguely at them and wave. “Ta-ta!”
“Yep, ta-ta,” Kat responded.
She didn’t realize Will was laughing until they were in the car again. “Ta-ta?”
“I simply returned the courtesy,” she said primly.
“I get the feeling they didn’t hire her for her math skills.”
Kat shook her head and turned to him. “This is just about impossible,” she said. “No one, not even the first responders, really knows if anyone else was near the site when Brady died—or was killed. It sounds like he could be extremely hostile about anything concerning the Jerry McGuen. He did dive alone—and went down almost a hundred feet in cold water. This wasn’t a pleasure dive to a warm-water reef.”
Will glanced at her, then looked at the road again. “But you saw his body.”
“Yes. I saw his body. And seeing his body made me believe this is worth investigating. But what we saw doesn’t guarantee that Brady Laurie was murdered. There are other explanations for the bruises. It’s possible that he might have gotten into an altercation with someone. He was furious with the Egyptian Sand Diggers and apparently everyone knew it.”
“So you think one of the Sand Diggers was out on a boat, slipped into the water while pretending to fish and killed Laurie?” Will asked. “Why? The Sand Diggers supposedly wanted someone to find the treasure.”
“I don’t know,” Kat said. “We’ll have to ask them. Logan should be getting back to me with some information pretty soon. We can check them out tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow afternoon. Tomorrow morning we dive the site.”
Kat turned to him. “You sound excited about it.”
“I am. A shipwreck like the Jerry McGuen? Come on, you have to be somewhat excited!”
“Thrilled to pieces,” she muttered. Maybe one day, she’d tell him about the experiences she’d already enjoyed because of Amun Mopat!
“You don’t believe in a curse, do you?” he asked, grinning.
“No. I do, however, believe that people can go a little crazy because of them.”
“I agree,” he said. “I spent a lot of time in the Caribbean. Islanders can be very superstitious. I’ve seen men who felt convinced they were possessed, and women who managed incredible feats of contortion in a ceremonial dance. The mind is a powerful influence on the body.”
Kat nodded.
“You think someone would sabotage the mission to keep Amun Mopat from being brought back to the surface?” he asked. “That’s an idea.”
“Crazy people can latch onto anything, but…at this point, I don’t know what I think or feel,” Kat told him. “Except that it’s been a really, really long day!”
“And it’ll be an early morning,” he said.
She was glad he’d said that; his stamina seemed to be on a par with the Energizer Bunny’s. She hoped he was taking her back to her hotel. “I’m at a place called the Edwardian off Michigan Avenue.”
“Yep.”
“You know that, of course,” she said.
“Of course.”
He didn’t just drop her off; he brought the car in front to the valet. She sighed as she saw him get out and walk around to her. “You’re staying here, too.”
“Government dollar.” He shrugged. “We go where they get their deals,” he said. “I’ll meet you in the lobby at eight.”
“We’re diving at 8:00 a.m.?”
He hesitated. “You’re not required to go down.”
“I wouldn’t miss it. Remember? We’re excited about this.”
“Would you like to get some dinner?”
“I think I’ll just go upstairs and order in,” she said.
“Good night, then.”
There was a small restaurant in the hotel. He walked toward it, a folder and an iPad in his hands. He was going to keep working, she realized.
And she was starving….
He stopped suddenly, a curious frown tightening his brow. She was startled to notice again what a striking and unusual man he was.
He walked back to her. “All day I forgot to ask… Well, I suppose you would’ve said, but…did you get anything from the corpse?”
Kat studied his eyes. She was surprised, after the day they’d spent together, to feel strangely close to him. But then, when you were one of the lucky or the cursed who’d always assumed they were ever so slightly crazy, there was an instant bond with others who shared that luck or that curse. She shook her head. “No, and I was hopeful. We’re always hopeful,” she said quietly. “You?”
“Nothing at all. And I just think that in this situation, with the money involved in salvage, what seems to stink does stink. I really believe he was murdered. I grew up in the islands. I’ve been diving since I was a kid. No, he should never have gone down alone, but from what I’ve learned and seen, there was nothing that should have caused him to lose control. His equipment was in perfect working order. Even after being tested for leaks, his tank had air.” He paused. “It’s strange. We still can’t explain why some souls stay around, and some don’t.”
“Maybe some people who die by violence aren’t compelled to stay on earth to see that justice is done,” she said. “Some may find peace—who knows? There’s an incredible amount that we haven’t begun to understand.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” he said. “Well, get some rest.”
He started to walk again. He was a workaholic, she thought. Usually so was she. But she really was tired.
Still, they were supposed to be working this case together. She sighed.
A mummy. Great. It just had to be a mummy. The mummy of Amun Mopat.
“Wait,” she called. “I’ll join you. We can discuss what direction we’ll take after the dive.”
Yes, she was going to dive. And the idea gave her the creeps.
She suddenly wished the Jerry McGuen had remained lost to the world forever.
4
Will passed his iPad over to Kat as soon as they’d ordered. “Just click Go. You’ll see the footage that was taken when they found Brady Laurie,” Will told her.
Startled, Kat looked at him. “You had this all along?”
“Yes. But the cops who were on duty when Brady was brought up, not to mention the salvage companies, are easier to visit by day—not at night.”
She didn’t respond, thinking he might have told her he had the film footage. Sure, he said he was giving her the lead in their investigation, since her Krewe had been called in. Somehow, he was taking the lead, anyway. She felt like getting up and going to her room, but reminded herself that she was the one who’d said they weren’t in a pissing contest.
Kat touched the icon, and the footage leaped onto the screen. She lowered the volume, not wanting anyone nearby to hear, but there really wasn’t any sound, other than the videographer’s breathing, and then, of course, the muted screams when Amanda and Jon came upon the body of Brady Laurie.
As she’d heard, Brady could be seen floating in the hold. Jon had come upon him first; he’d tried to get the regulator back in Brady’s mouth. Amanda had been at his side soon after. For a few minutes, there was nothing but shots of the inside of the hull and the flooring, covered with plankton and other growth, and strewn with holes. The videographer had momentarily forgotten his task in the horror of their discovery. When he regained control, Kat was glad to see that once they’d found Brady, they had left behind all curiosity and interest in treasure; they started back to the surface immediately. In the course of doing that, they had to make a few safety stops. At the surface, the footage ended.
“I met with Alan King, Bernie Firestone and Earl Candy last evening, as soon as Jackson reached me,” Will explained, studying her across the table. “Earl wanted to destroy his film—he doesn’t want gawkers watching the discovery of a man’s death. I promised him that when the investigation’s over, I’ll destroy this copy.”
“Of course,” Kat murmured. She pushed the iPad toward him, frowning. “I just don’t see how anyone could have gotten to Brady between the time he went down and when his coworkers and the film crew arrived.”
“Easy enough, I suppose. Down in Lake Michigan, it’s damned dark. If someone was already down there, knew the lake and was a good diver, he—or she—could have found Brady’s coordinates just before Brady did…and waited for him. Remember, Brady had made a big thing of his belief that he could find the Jerry McGuen. If someone hacked into his computer or even read his blogs, they could follow his reasoning and figure out where the ship might have ended up. That’s one idea. Or, perhaps, someone could’ve been surprised by Brady. If you know the area, you keep to the depth, follow your compass and then come up at a distant point.”
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Heather Graham
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Эзотерика, оккультизм
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: 1898: Bound for Chicago, the freighter Jerry McGuen goes down in Lake Michigan, taking with it every man aboard.But what other fate could befall a vessel carrying the ill-gotten sarcophagus of an Egyptian sorcerer? Now: A veteran diver and «ghost ship» expert is exploring the legendary wreck for a documentary. He dies inexplicably inside the freighter′s main saloon.Then another diver is killed, and panicked rumors rise like bubbles from the lake: ancient demons have awakened below! The expedition′s beleaguered financier calls paranormal investigator Katya Sokolov to Chicago to save the film—and perhaps some innocent lives.Along with media forensics guru Will Chan, Kat plumbs the depths of an evil that may date back to the time of the pharaohs. But some secrets are best drowned in the seas of the past….