Twisted Linen (8 page)

Baculo chides, “You forgot to ask how to
contact me. You know…to make the exchange in two days.”

Simon is done looking foolish and cannot
restrain his fury any longer. He knows Grace has the money now, and
the thought of Baculo going free infuriates him.

Simon turns back to confront Baculo.

“It took 271 attempts to make Dolly,” he says
while leaning down into Baculo’s face. “Two hundred seventy sheep
died before one survived. You accounting for that?”

Baculo smiles, even more wickedly this time,
then slowly stands and buttons his suit jacket. Baculo’s face
hardens and his eyes glow with a sinister glare; he enjoys the
intensity of the circumstances and he is ready to raise the
stakes.

“Now I am done playing games,” Baculo
declares.

“So am I!” Simon zings with a tensed body,
contemplating whether to do something – maybe throw a punch or
perhaps chop Baculo’s throat.

“I can’t let you disappear with our gold, now
can I?”

Simon is perplexed by that comment. That
wasn’t what he expected. Maybe a head-butt, but not more talk.

Baculo exhibits an eerie look that forms
suddenly and then vanishes. “It's time for my collateral,” he says
with a dark look.

Simon cocks his head, evaluating Baculo’s
words. At that very moment Grace’s distressed voice is audible over
the comms.

“
Simon!
” Grace murmurs as if a hand is
covering her mouth, stifling her shout.

The audio comms begin to screech and then
change to a loud static noise. Simon yanks out his ear piece and
uncontrollably yells, “Grace!”

Simon immediately flips back his jacket, and
in one motion unclips his holstered 9mm pistol and flicks the
safety off. His hand firmly grips the pistol, ready to draw.

“Stay calm, Simon. We don't want to call
attention.”

Baculo smirks as if this was all planned,
posturing like he is in complete control. Baculo then turns around
and does something unsuspecting: He shouts, “Help! He has a
gun!”

The two men Simon noticed earlier, the
“dark-suits”, rush toward them as Simon grabs the back of Baculo’s
collar. He draws the 9mm and pushes its muzzle into the back of
Baculo’s head.

“You bloody bastard! If you touch her...” he
warns.

Baculo faces away from Simon with his hands
up, trying to garner attention. “Touch who? I don't know what you
are talking about,” Baculo shouts so it’s audible to the crowd
around them.

“I'll blow your head off!” Simon shrieks in
panic.

The two dark-suits close-in on Simon. The
first man grabs Simon before he has time to react, expertly
disarming Simon with a wrist lock, then forcing his arm behind his
back. The other dark-suit addresses Baculo's claims.

“Officer, help! This man thinks I've taken
his wife. I think he’s deranged.”

Simon struggles with the dark-suit
restraining his arm.

“Get off of me! He’s kidnapping my wife!”
Simon yells.

Baculo pleads, “I assure you I'm not involved
with this man's wife. I’m a banker at the Banco Nacional, visiting
here on business.”

The first dark-suit directs his partner to
further restrain Simon. “Take him into custody.”

Simon violently resists, instinctually using
hand-to-hand combat techniques: He spots the foot of the man
restraining him and delivers a vicious heal stomp to the top of it.
This move opens a small window of opportunity for Simon to turn and
strike; he executes a well-targeted throat chop with the edge of
his hand. The dark-suit clutches his throat with both hands,
gasping for air, grimacing in pain.

Simon turns back for Baculo, but the other
dark-suit taser-shocks Simon before he can take action. The
electrical shock causes Simon’s entire body to spastically tighten
into one big cramp. He stiffens upright onto his tippy toes before
losing balance and falling face first onto the floor. Simon lets
out a loud grunt, his body still showing signs of involuntary
motion.

Baculo coolly backs away, putting on a false
front of shock and awe. The two dark-suits restrain Simon with
cinch-ties around his wrist, then pull him to his feet and drag him
toward the train station exit.

Baculo pretends to be shaken and offended,
and then strolls away, melding into the crowded train station.

* * *

20

Deep Undercover

The train station doors burst open with Simon
violently resisting. There’s a dark-suit on each side of him,
controlling him as best they can, but Simon’s strength and wits are
back. He yanks and pulls on the dark-suits like rag dolls.

“You don’t understand!” Simon yells as he
flings one dark-suit off his arm.

“Stop resisting,” commands the remaining
agent.

“Look here! I'm a Special Agent…in charge of
Vatican security.”

The suits are unresponsive to Simon’s pleas
and they wrestle him around the corner. With his hands tied behind
his back, Simon launches his shoulder into the jaw of one of them.
The targeted blow knocks the agent to the ground. Simon tries to
launch a second attack but the agent prevents it with another
taser-shock. The painful body cramp makes Simon’s muscles feel like
they are vibrating and it overwhelms him. Simon falls to the ground
and the agent covers his head with a black hood.

While travelers in the background shout in
confusion, the dark-suits drag Simon to his feet and force him into
the back of a waiting Hummer. The first agent tries to wave off the
agitated crowd and shouts something about it being “police
business” as he jumps into the driver's seat. The other agent
skirts the side of the Hummer, wanting to address a third man
sitting in the front seat. It’s Genovi, and he is furious.

“I told you to stick with Baculo!” Genovi
angrily yells.

The agent is frozen by Genovi’s lambasting;
his bug-eyes buzz Genovi’s face. The agent failed to follow
Genovi’s clear orders: he was to keep eyes on Baculo no matter
what. But the agent let himself get completely consumed with Simon,
and now Baculo is nowhere to be seen. The agent turns and darts
back into the train station in a desperate and futile search for
Baculo.

In the back seat of the Hummer Simon screams
from under his hood, “Get this off my head!”

Genovi immediately turns his attention to
Simon and demands, “Where is Grace?”

“Genovi?” Simon bellows in a tone of
confusion.

“Drive!” Genovi shouts, directing the
remaining agent.

Genovi is extremely frustrated with the
debacle. This is the exact outcome he came to prevent. Genovi
reaches into the back seat and rips the hood off Simon’s head.

“Answer me! Where is she?” Genovi demands
again.

Simon, still baffled, stares at Genovi with
wide eyes. Finally he mutters a response. “In the car. Across the
bridge.”

“Turn left!” Genovi barks to the agent
driving.

The Hummer squeals left across two lanes of
traffic and flies across the river’s bridge. The Hummer’s engine
roars as it accelerates down the remote road of Paseo Nuevo,
heading toward the parked VW Pollo.

“What are you doing here?” Simon asks in
frustration and confusion.

Genovi is unresponsive while his head swivels
back and forth, searching the side of the road as it whizzes by too
fast to comprehend.

“Where! Where is her car?” Genovi asks in
desperation.

Simon hastily nods to go farther down the
road, and the Hummer roars even louder.

“There!” Simon shouts, nodding with his chin
at the VW Pollo just ahead. “That’s the car…now get these wrist
ties off me.”

* * *

21

The Appointed
Time

Baculo walks briskly across the grass of the
Gipuskoa Gardens. This quaint and charming green space adjacent to
the train station resembles a small English wood. It is home to a
large variety of trees, flowers and plants. Ducks and swans often
bathe in a small water pond in its center, but there is no wildlife
present tonight. It’s as if they sensed Baculo was coming and
fled.

Baculo skirts by a life-sized, marble statue
of a virgin female and then stops to look back over his shoulder to
see if anybody is following him. There is nobody; Baculo has the
gardens all to himself tonight.

He continues across the tiny wooden bridge
into the center of the garden where an ornate structure stands.
It’s a small gazebo-like structure, and Baculo finds cover in its
shadows so he can make an urgent phone call.

“Do you have her?” he asks.

“Yes,” a squawking voice replies. “She is
restrained, but unharmed.”

“Get her to the extraction point.
Immediately!”

Baculo quickly terminates the call and again
scrutinizes the garden area, searching for anybody in pursuit of
him. Only the trickling sounds of water hail his presence. His
insidious plan is working perfectly.

Baculo steps out of the cover of shadows and
looks up to the dark heavens. The constellation Virgo shines bright
in the sky directly overhead; it’s an encouraging sign to
Baculo.

“Our virgin Gracie. The appointed time is
near.”

* * *

22

Remember Me

The Hummer is stopped diagonally next to the
white VW Pollo. The VW’s door is wide open and the communication
equipment is in disarray. Everything is still and Grace is
gone.

Simon is distraught, locked in the back seat
of the Hummer with his hands bound behind his back, while Genovi
and his agent make a mad scramble to find any sign of Grace. Genovi
peers over the tide-wall railing, down to the water's edge, while
the agent frantically searches around the base of Urgull Hill.

“Who are these greenhorn agents?” Simon
ponders in frustration. They couldn’t track a bulldozer through a
corn field. The agents are young and appear to be just out of
training and Simon won’t stand for their ineptitude.

Simon flips himself on his back and kicks at
the back window of the Hummer. The first kick fails so he kicks
harder a second time, and the window shatters.

Simon effortlessly slides his hands down the
back of his legs and around his feet, bringing his hands in front.
He sits up and rakes his wrists along shards of glass left in the
window frame. It cuts the ties; his hands are free.

Just as Simon exits the car, an agent jumps
on him from behind. Simon hip-throws him to the ground and then
heel stomps his sternum. The agent gasps for air and curls into a
ball.

Then a faint whooshing sound emanates from
above; it draws Simon’s attention and he strains to locate the
source. It’s the sound of a helicopter approaching in the distance,
headed toward the top of Urgull Hill. Simon looks up the large hill
in front of him and assumes the peak is where the helicopter is
going to land. The path before him is heavily wooded but it’s the
most direct route to Grace.

Simon glances back toward Genovi who stands
across the street at the water’s edge. Genovi is pensive but calm,
gazing deep into Simon's soul. Simon looks down at the agent
moaning on the ground, and then runs off, up the steep embankment
toward the peak of Monte Urgull.

As Simon scrambles up the hillside, the huge
monument of Jesus Christ points the way from above. Occasionally
Simon hears Grace's muffled screams echoing in the night air. Her
distressed voice sickens him with nauseous fear, but his rage pumps
adrenalin through his veins.

Simon spots the helicopter, preparing to land
just above the next embankment. Grace screams again, driving him
forward. He takes a step in that direction when suddenly he’s
knocked off his feet by one of Baculo's goons.

The goon is a rough looking fellow, short and
stocky, and surprisingly strong. He threw an unexpected punch that
knocked Simon to the ground, leaving him dazed and bleeding. The
goon continues his attack with a swift follow-up kick into Simon’s
gut, but the blow will be his last.

Simon staggers to his feet, now ready to end
the scuffle. The stocky goon is no match for Simon’s grappling
skills, and Simon systematically chops him down, one strategic
strike at a time. The scrapple ends with a vicious hip-toss,
leaving the goon hanging over a steep drop off in the embankment.
Simon is holding his forearm, preventing him from falling.

“Who are you working for?” Simon demands.

The goon doesn’t respond. His feet scrape the
cliff face, searching for some type of foothold. He looks down at
the drop below him; it’s a fatal fall. He then looks back at
Simon.

“Where are you taking her? Tell me!” Simon
threatens with a “tell me or I’ll let you go” action.

A short distance up the hill, the loud whirl
of the helicopter captures Simon’s attention as it throttles-up its
engine in an effort to take off. The helicopter slowly pulls itself
upward, out over the dark ocean water. The goon’s head follows it
as it flies off into the distance, cloaked by the dark night sky.
Satisfaction grows across the goon’s face. It’s the satisfaction of
a mission accomplished.

The goon utters with contentment, “She's
gone.” And then he looks up into the heavens. Like Baculo, he too
is emboldened by the prophetic sign of Virgo in the sky – a
confirmation of what the cult is fighting for.

The goon exhales his last words.

“Lord, remember me when you come again.”

He then he lets go of Simon's arm.

Simon is stunned as he watches him fall,
scraping along the cliff face. The goon’s feet catch a small ledge,
sending him into a wild, out-of-control tumble.