“Which means nothing to me. Caedmon’s the one who speaks Latin.”
“You have to—” Grimacing, Lovett fumbled with a Velcro flap on his cargo pants.
“Don’t move,” she ordered, afraid he might cause greater harm. If such a thing was possible.
Lovett ignored the order, grunting as he ripped open the flap and shoved his hand into his pants pocket. A prescription bottle plunked loose, rolling a few inches on the parquet floor. Edie glanced at the label. Xanax. An antidepressant. Jason Lovett liked to pop pharm candy.
“The ambulance is on the way,” she told him, wondering how much longer Lovett could hold out. “We’ll have you at GW Hospital in a jiffy. It’s a straight shot down New Hampshire Avenue. Won’t take but a few minutes to get there.”
Again, Lovett fumbled with the flap on his cargo pants. Wincing, he raised himself up slightly, struggling to remove something from his pocket.
Edie reached over to help him — only to jerk backward when she saw the glint of a gun.
CHAPTER 9
Caedmon pushed open the swinging door.
Aware that he might be walking into a trap, he cautiously advanced into a small reading room. Glass display cases lined one wall; a wooden table laden with stacked volumes dominated the center of the space.
He scanned the cozy jumble. Marble busts of famed Greek philosophers. A stuffed bald eagle. A glass case displaying Abraham Lincoln’s death mask. As near as he could tell, the room contained nothing but old books and morbid curiosities. Lovett’s assassin was nowhere in sight.
About to take his leave, his nostrils suddenly twitched, his olfactory senses detecting a scent other than old leather and aged paper.
Cologne.
Yes, he was certain of it, a faint scent of sandalwood clinging ever so gently to the molecules in the air.
He followed the scent.
Entering a two-story library, he approached an oversized desk nestled between two freestanding cabinets. A narrow staircase on his right led to a cantilevered catwalk suspended overhead.
The scent of sandalwood grew stronger.
The assassin is near.
No sooner did that thought take root than Caedmon heard a quick intake of breath — the only warning he had before the assassin lunged at him. Grabbing hold of the metal post that secured one side of the staircase to the floor, the other man catapulted his body into the air.
Before Caedmon could register what was happening, two leather shoe soles forcefully slammed against his chest. Hurled backward, his head violently swung to the right, his skull smashing into one of the cabinets, causing the imposing piece to totter precariously.
Christ!
A nauseating bolt of pain instantly surged from his right temple all the way down his arm. He spat out a mouthful of blood, red spittle flying through the air, spattering the inlaid glass on the cabinet door. He staggered several feet. Proverbial stars erratically flickered. Disoriented, he heard a low cackle.
The bastard is laughing at me.
He shook off the pain.
Jaw clenched, Caedmon charged his attacker.
Quick on his feet, the other man grabbed a heavy bookend from the desk, hurling the gold-leafed monstrosity at Caedmon’s chest. He dodged to one side. Unarmed, he snatched the nearest item at hand — a brass lamp on a nearby end table. He roughly yanked the cord from the wall as he ripped off the lamp shade. Makeshift club in hand, he went on the offensive.
Bugger! he silently cursed when the other man seized a pair of scissors from the desktop arsenal.
Mirthlessly smiling, the assassin came at him, the scissors aimed at his soft underbelly.
Tempted to go for a head shot, Caedmon, instead, swung the brass lamp at the killer’s right hand. Metal slammed against flesh, making a hideous sound. Thwack! Like a carrot snapped in two. The scissors clattered onto the floor.
“Argh!” the assassin bellowed.
Galvanized into action, Caedmon made a quick, left-handed grab, wrapping his fingers around a suede-clad arm. Snarling, his adversary parried with a vigorous knee jab. A direct hit to the kidneys.
Caedmon grunted. Swallowed back a mouthful of stomach bile. The assassin pulled free from his grasp, dashing up the staircase that led to the second-story catwalk. Gasping for breath, he gave chase, clambering up the narrow flight of steps. At the top he saw a flash of brown suede; the assassin was some twenty feet ahead of him on the catwalk. Ten feet beyond that, the catwalk dead-ended.
Tightening his grip on the brass lamp, Caedmon slowed his step, the game finally drawing to a finish. Cornered, the assassin stood with his back to him.
“Why did you kill Jason Lovett?”
The question met with a soft chuckle.
“Do you find that amusing?”
“I find this entire situation amusing,” the assassin replied — just before he vaulted over the railing.
In stunned amazement, Caedmon watched the other man sail through the air, nimbly landing on his feet.
“Bloody hell!”
Flinging the brass lamp aside, Caedmon ran down the staircase. Heart pounding in his ears, he headed for the atrium, bursting through the swinging double doors just in time to see Lovett’s killer run past the abandoned security station.
Still determined to catch the bastard, Caedmon raced across the atrium and out the front door. Too late! The assassin had already descended the flight of steps and was sprinting toward an idling bus.
I don’t bloody believe it… He’s going to make his escape on a city coach.
His energy flagging, Caedmon gracelessly charged down the granite stairs.
By the time he reached the thirty-third step, the assassin was already onboard, the coach doors pneumatically closing behind him. An instant later, the vehicle pulled away from the curb. Rushing forward, he swung his arms above his head, signaling the vehicle. The stone-faced driver didn’t give him so much as a sideways glance.
“Shag it!”
Furious, Caedmon banged his palm against the side of the departing coach. In the far-off distance he heard the blare of multiple sirens.
Having seated himself at the rear of the bus, the assassin calmly turned and looked at him.
Caedmon returned the impudent stare, imprinting the man’s face on his memory — dark shoulder-length hair, wide-set brown eyes, a proud nose, slightly pouting full lips. Expecting coarse, even loutish, features, he was taken aback by the assassin’s physical beauty.
I’ve seen his face before, he realized with no small measure of surprise. At London’s National Gallery there was a painting by Botticelli, Portrait of a Young Man. Jason Lovett’s assassin could have stepped right out of the fifteenth-century canvas, the resemblance uncanny.
Smiling slightly, the assassin raised his right hand to his lips, blowing Caedmon a kiss.
“Cheeky bastard,” he disgustedly muttered, the killer’s smugness the last insult. The “Young Man” well aware that he had just gotten away with murder.
CHAPTER 10
The American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer.
The thought popped into Caedmon’s head as he reentered the Masonic reading room, D. H. Lawrence’s assessment strangely apropos.
Although he wasn’t altogether certain that Jason Lovett’s assassin was an American. The audacious young man had the air of a fashionable boulevardier combined with the physical beauty of a Mediterranean gigolo. Not exactly the image that came to mind when envisioning a cold-blooded American hit man.