Covenant (42 page)

            “Where to?” Valdez asked.

            “Just drive around,” Anthony said.

            Grumbling, she hung a right.

            The property was meticulously landscaped, with lush trees, abundant beds of flowers, and swaths of trimmed grass that reminded Anthony of the putting greens on a golf course.  The assortment of brick buildings—housing such amenities as the medical clinic, fitness center, and post office—looked brand new.

            Armor of God soldiers were out in full force, too.  They whisked across the wide sidewalks on Segways, their ivory cycling helmets matching their uniforms, weapons bristling from their utility belts.  Others cruised in black Dodge Chargers with “NKC Security” splashed on the door in bold white letters.

            But there were also signs of ordinary life in progress.  Many people were out walking or riding bicycles.  A group of teenagers played touch-football in a field, a woman jogged on a paved path with her dog alongside her, and families were having picnics in a park area.      

            “I hate what Bishop Prince stands for,” Anthony said, “but on the flip side, so many of the people living here look perfectly happy.”

            “It’s ‘cause they don’t know what goes on behind the curtain,” Valdez said with a nonchalant shrug.  “Most of these people don’t wanna know the price they pay to live like this.”

            “Ignorance is bliss,” Lisa said.  “Give us bread and circuses, and we’ll support anything.”

            “I wonder what they’ll do when they find out the real deal,” Mike said.

            “They’ll get over it,” Valdez said.  “People adapt.  They always do.  Till the next crackpot comes along, then they’ll be standing in line to be brainwashed again.”

            Anthony winked at Lisa.  “I think we’ve finally met someone who’s more cynical than I am.”

            “That’s what I was thinking,” Lisa said.

            “I call it as I see it, guys,” Valdez said. 

            She braked at a four-way intersection.  A shuttle bus filled to capacity rumbled past, an electronic signboard above the windshield announcing that it was bound for the Kingdom Megaplex.  Anthony saw a gold geodesic dome on the horizon, which he knew from his online tour was part of the church’s main sanctuary.

            On their right, in the hazy distance, the bishop’s mansion floated like a heavenly castle in the hills.

            “Got any idea where we need to go yet?” Valdez said. 

            “Make a right,” Anthony said as he stared at the mansion, thoughts churning. 

            Valdez followed his gaze.  “The bishop’s estate?”

            “I want to see it up close.  I’m curious.”

            “Curious, my ass,” Valdez said, but she made a sharp right turn.

            The road was divided by a grass median lined with red crepe myrtles, flowers waving in the breeze.  They cruised past the Kingdom Academy, which accommodated grades kindergarten through twelve, a baseball field, a football stadium, and a preschool center, Kingdom Kids.  Like the other buildings, all of the facilities appeared new, and were as well-designed as schools one might find in a moneyed suburb, the better to influence the children, fertile young servant minds, to feel proud of their education.         

            “The bishop lives near the schools,” Anthony said.           

            “He visits them weekly,” Valdez said.  “Lets him keep tabs on the angels-in-waiting.”

            “Disgusting,” Lisa said.        

            Once beyond the schools, woodlands bordered the road on both sides, dense with oak, elm, maple, pine.  The street converged to two lanes, growing steeper as it wound through the hills, and the sidewalks vanished, too.

            There was no traffic.  But after about a quarter of a mile, the forest began to thin, and there was a rightward bend in the road marked by a twenty-foot-high column of stacked stone.  A sign in front of the rock warned: PRIVATE PROPERTY - NO TRESPASSING. 

            Valdez brought the SUV to a stop before they emerged from the canopy of trees.

            “This is as far as we go,” she said.  “Around that bend is the gate to his mansion.”

            “Guards?” Anthony asked.               

            Her gaze lacerated him.  “Why do you want to know?”    

            “Indulge me, please,” Anthony said.

            “At least two at the gate,” she said.  “If the bishop is home, there’ll be another three inside the house.  His personal security detail.”

            “Anyone else in there?” Mike asked.  “Like a maid or butler or something?”

            “He’s got a house staff, but they’re ordinary civilians, harmless.”

            “So five goons,” Anthony said.  “Not great odds, but not impossible to handle.”

            “We can take ‘em,” Mike said. 

            Anthony bent to unzip his duffel bag at his feet.  He removed two handguns, his Glock and his Colt revolver, to complement the Beretta he already wore in his waistband holster, and he fished out extra ammo, too. 

            “Whoa, you guys aren’t going in there,” Valdez said.  She took out her cell phone.  “I’m calling my team—and
we’re
going in with our search warrant.” 

            “You wait for your search warrant—we don’t need one.” Anthony finished holstering his guns and pocketing the extra ammo in his pouch.  He turned to Lisa in the backseat.  “We’ll be right back, sweetheart.  Keep the engine warm.”

            “Be careful,” Lisa said.  She clasped one of his hands, her eyes glistening with a mixture of worry and cautious hope.  “I’ll be waiting for you.”

            “Ready?” Anthony asked Mike.  Mike had two guns slotted in his shoulder holsters, body armor protecting his chest, and a waist pouch that held plenty of ammo.  

            “Let’s do it,” Mike said. 

            They climbed out of the truck. 

            “Both of you assholes, stand down!”  Valdez charged out of the SUV, phone pressed to her ear.  “I’m not gonna let you screw up my investigation!”

            Ignoring her, they marched in step along the side of the road.  Anthony inhaled deeply of the pine-scented air.  Calmness had settled over him like a coat—his heart beat at a moderate rate, his muscles were loose and relaxed, and the guns on his person felt like natural extensions of his own body.     

            “Hey!” Valdez shouted.        

            “She’s plenty pissed,” Mike said to Anthony.  “Makes her even hotter.”

            “I wouldn’t say that to her right now if I were you,” Anthony said.  “She might beat your ass like a pinata around the road.”

            Cursing in English and Spanish, Valdez caught up to them.

            “Look, my team’s on their way,” she said.  “ETA sixteen minutes.”

            “Great,” Anthony said.  “They’ll be just in time to clean up after us.”

            “Jesus, Thorne.”  Her cheeks bloomed red.  “Why are you so goddamn stubborn?”

            “You must’ve been talking to my wife.  She asks me that every day.”

            “Fine.”  She planted her fists on her waist, squinted as she surveyed the road ahead.  “If you two clowns are determined to go in there, then you better let me help you.”

78

            Marching at a brisk pace, they neared the giant stone formation at the curve in the road.  Valdez edged in front of them.

            “I’m wearing the Armor of God uniform,” she said.  “You guys hang back and I’ll take them by surprise.  Be ready.”

            “I was born ready,” Mike said.

            “Never been more prepared,” Anthony said, and meant it.  Adrenaline buzzed through his blood, but that sense of calm remained with him, that feeling of implacable purpose.  As if all his training, all the fights he’d endured, all the grief his family had suffered, had been to prepare him for this day, this moment.      

            “On my right-hand signal,” Valdez said. 

            She rushed around the stone pillar.  Mike and Anthony peered around the corner, watching. 

            “Look at her, man,” Mike whispered.  “I’ll be damned if I don’t ask her to marry me.”

            “Maybe you should ask her to dinner first, do things in logical order.  Just a thought.”

            “Don’t rain on the parade, AT.”

            Ponytail swinging, Valdez sprinted down a long, steep driveway flanked on both sides by sheer rock walls.  At the end of the drive, there was a set of wide, wrought iron-gates.  The entrance was fronted by a guard booth stationed atop a squat stone foundation.

            Beyond the gates, nestled behind oaks and pines, the mansion stood on a sloped crest of grassy land.

            At Valdez’s approach, a guard in a white tracksuit emerged from the booth.  He called out a greeting that Anthony could not hear.  Valdez raised her right hand, as if waving.

Game time.

            Anthony exploded from hiding, the wind at his back like the urging of an avenging angel.  Mike brought up the rear. 

            Spotting them, the guard shouted, “Halt!” and started to draw his pistol, but Valdez swung her upraised hand like a hatchet and chopped it against the guy’s throat.  He let out a garbled scream.  Whirling like a dust devil, she nailed him with a brutal roundhouse kick to his temple, and he dropped to the ground.

            Another guard bounded out of the station, pistol drawn.  But Anthony had been expecting him, already had his gun chambered, and squeezed off a shot.  The round punched the guard in the chest and plunged him backward into the doorway almost comically, as if he were a drunk who had fallen on his butt while trying to make his way outside. 

            Valdez had flipped over the first guard onto his stomach and was slapping a pair of handcuffs on him.  The guy’s eyes were dazed, and he breathed in ragged bursts. 

            Anthony charged into the booth.  The agent was rising on wobbly legs.  Although Anthony’s hollow-point round had hit him in the chest, the agents wore Kevlar vests, so the round had not penetrated his tissue, only knocked him down and temporarily stunned him. 

            Anthony rapped the butt of his pistol against the man’s head, and the blow sent him spilling back to the floor, unconscious.  He grabbed the guard’s ankles and dragged him out onto the driveway, turned him face-down. 

            Mike used the guard’s own restraints to cuff his wrists.

            As they finished securing the sentry, Valdez scrambled into the booth. 

            “You’ve got about two, three minutes to get inside,” she said.  “After that, this area is gonna be swamped with reinforcements.  We sacked these dirt bags here, but on the surveillance cameras the others will have seen what went down.”

            “You’re staying out here?” Anthony asked.

            She mashed a button on a control panel, and the motor-operated gates began to whir open.

            “I’ve risked my job by going this far, Thorne,” she said.  “I’ve gotta hold them off here and wait for my team and our warrant.  But this is only my job—it’s your life, like you said.”

            “Thanks for everything, Valdez.”

            “
De nada
.  Here, take one of these.” 

            There were two tactical rifles stored in racks on the booth’s interior wall.  She strapped one over her shoulder, and offered the other one to him.

            Anthony passed the gun to Mike. 

            “Watch my flank,” Anthony said. 

            Mike flipped the strap over his shoulder and checked the rifle’s chamber to confirm that it was loaded.             

            “We’re good,” Mike said.  He blew a kiss to Valdez, turned to Anthony.  “Lead on.”

79

            After enjoying quality time with his angel, Bishop Prince left her to shower in his private quarters.  The girl was reluctant to see him go, but he counseled her that selfishness was sin, and patience was a virtue.  With that, he promised to return to her soon.

            The angel, of course, was still a virgin, still ripening on the vine of womanhood.  He was waiting for the perfect time, enjoying the delicious heightening of intimacy, and when release arrived at last, it would be all the sweeter for his having waited. 

            Sometimes, he didn’t wait.  There were instances when his urges overwhelmed him, and he immediately took advantage of an opportunity.  The thorn in his flesh resisted total control, or else it would not have been a thorn; it would have been sinful perversion, and he would have been doomed to hellfire.

            But God had better things in store for his prophet. 
My grace is sufficient . . .

            In his master bathroom suite, in a marble-tiled shower enclosure with twenty-four-carat gold taps, he showered.  He showered after each visit with his angels, even if he hadn’t removed any of his clothing during the encounter.  It was, he admitted, compulsive behavior, as if he believed on some level that frequent purification could wash away the stain of what his flesh had done, as if mere bathing could dislodge the thorn. 

            He hummed an old Negro spiritual as he lathered soap across his lean physique.  The song was a favorite of his maternal grandmother’s, a knobby-knuckled woman who had picked cotton in Mississippi:
We shall overcome . . . we shall overcome . . . we shall overcome, someday . . .   
When he reflected on overcoming, however, he thought about Kingdom rule vanquishing secular society once and for all.

            He was in the enviable position of having the entire day to do with as he wished.  Tomorrow was Sunday, and he was scheduled to give a sermon to his congregation, but he never prepared sermons in advance, and indeed, would not know the message he was to deliver until he arrived at the podium and gazed into the hungry eyes of the devoted.  When you were God’s sanctified instrument, you didn’t require notes or planning; you needed only to listen.  As the King had taught:
He that hath ears to hear, let him hear . . .