Wildcard. Rachel Lee
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Название: Wildcard
Автор: Rachel Lee
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Полицейские детективы
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Links. They were there. And for a quarter of a million, they meant something.
He returned his attention to the computer. By now the FBI had the names of all the agents assigned to Grant Lawrence’s protection. And while they had probably only taken statements, since the Secret Service was virtually above reproof, one FBI agent, semi-suspended or not, was going to do some background checking.
It was another link, possibly accidental, but his nose was twitching like mad.
After all, those guys were trained never to look at the principal.
Actium, Greece
31 B.C.E.
Osarseph stood beside his queen and watched the Roman ships doing battle in the clear blue waters below. This was not what he, or his queen, had wanted to see.
Marc Antony, the handsome Roman general whose heart she had won, was watching with a knitted brow, leaning over to an aide, who relayed instructions to a signalman, who in turn stood on the cliff to wave flags in encoded sequence. It was a vain attempt to control what had spun badly out of control.
Since the murder of Julius Caesar, Cleopatra had steered a dangerous course through Roman politics. Ten years had passed since she had arrived in Tarsus and invited the young general to dinner. Since then, she and Antony had increasingly cast their lot together. That much, at least, had gone as Osarseph had planned.
Antony had all but guaranteed that, once he disposed of Octavian, Cleopatra would retain control over Egypt as a sovereign ally of Rome. Indeed, more than once he had hinted at permitting the Ptolemaic Dynasty to rule the eastern half of the empire, while Rome governed the west. With no other power sufficient to challenge her, and the throne of Egypt both secured and enhanced, Cleopatra would be uniquely positioned to permit Osarseph and the Guardians to bring mankind forward into a new age of Light.
Osarseph had no such hopes for Octavian. A hardline Roman to his core, Octavian, if allowed to rule, would enforce Roman law—and, worse, Roman religion—throughout his reach. The prophesies had warned of a religion that would rise from Rome to dominate the world. Though by no means a superstitious man, Osarseph could feel in his bones the tingling of those prophecies emerging on this warm autumn morning.
Antony had hoped for a land battle, his army against Octavian’s. Antony was the better general, and his nineteen legions were better trained and more experienced than Octavian’s largely home-guard force. Weeks before, he had sent his twelve thousand cavalry on a raid to cut off Octavian’s water supply and force his army into battle. The raid had come to naught, and the campaign had ground to a stalemate.
A stalemate that had favored Octavian’s lies, for now Antony’s own troops were hearing rumors of a Roman general who had abandoned Rome for Egypt and a queen-sorceress who held him in thrall. Day by day, desertion and disease bled Antony’s once-proud legions. Finally he had been left with no choice but to meet Octavian in a sea battle. That battle was now proving why it had been Antony’s last resort. His fleet was simply no match for Octavian’s.
“You must prepare to escape, my queen,” Osarseph said.
Cleopatra—intelligent, charming, attractive despite her hooked nose, perhaps the most powerful woman the world had ever known—nodded slowly. “So it appears. Tell them to prepare my flagship, with sails at the ready.”
She turned to Antony. “We must go, my love. There is nothing left here to be won. We will fight that man at another time, in another place.”
Antony seemed poised to refuse, though in the end he gave the orders. “You get away first. If they catch you, Octavian will kill you. I will stay with my men until you are safely away.”
“No,” she said. “We go together. As we have always gone. Together.”
“I will permit no other course,” Antony said. “I must see to my men. Arrange for their withdrawal. Many have abandoned me, but I will not abandon those who have stayed by my side. They deserve my loyalty, as they give theirs.”
Osarseph knew this was not a battle Cleopatra could or would win. Antony was a soldier to his soul, and he would not leave his men leaderless. “Come, my queen. Let us away, and quickly.”
By the time they boarded her flagship, the captains had finalized the details of the breakout. Octavian’s ships, though greater in number, did not carry sails into battle. The excess weight merely slowed the oared vessels. But Antony and Cleopatra had insisted their captains be ready to raise sail. A freshening afternoon wind would be their deliverance.
If only for today.
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