Pompeii's Ghosts (A James Acton Thriller, #9) (19 page)

“Hold
your breath for as long as you can!” she yelled, huddling with the others in
the farthest corner. She took a deep breath, realizing it was horrible air she
was proposing they hold, but the wind outside was strong and she hoped that
whatever it was they were smelling would soon be blown past them.

After
what seemed an eternity, but was barely a minute, her son gasped, sucking in
lungsful of air. His nose curled up and his eyes watered, but he seemed none
the worse for wear. She let the breath she was holding out then drew in her own
first breath. It was still pungent, but not like before, and she tapped the
others around her.

“It’s
okay to breathe,” she said. “It still smells, but it seems safe.”

Gasps
and cries of relief erupted from the others as everyone took their fill. Avita
tossed the blanket aside, it now stifling under its cover, and stood, looking
around for what she did not know, she just felt she needed to look like she was
taking action for the children’s sake.

Flora
stepped to the door and opened it slightly just as the ground began to vibrate,
shaking everything in the small house. A clay jar danced across a wood table
then shattered on the floor, keepsakes hung on the walls swayed back and forth.

“Come
here children!” she ordered, gathering them in the center of the room where
there was little that could fall on them. She looked to Flora who shook her
head.

“It’s
not safe outside, the ash is even thicker.”

Avita
nodded, now on her knees, holding her children tight. “Join us,” she said, the
tone of her voice revealing to the only other adult in the room exactly the
state she felt they were now in. Flora smiled, tears glassing over her eyes as
she knelt beside them. The two boys made room for her to join their tiny circle
of humanity, and they all put their arms around each other.

As the
vibrations increased, she found it harder to keep her balance, all of them
gripping each other harder and harder as whatever it was neared. The children
were crying now, and the room began to glow an unholy orange. Avita held her
children as tight as she could and, looking up at Flora, began to sing a
lullaby she knew her daughter loved.

Flora,
tears pouring down her face, looked down at her swollen belly and joined in,
the first words gasps of agony as she realized her child would never be born,
and would never hear its mother sing. They made eye contact, both faces burned
by salty tears, their expressions ones of twisted torture as the rumbling
continued to approach, the sound deafening to the point where they were now
shouting the words at the top of their lungs. Her daughter screamed first, then
the boys and when Avita finally registered what was happening, she saw Flora’s
eyes widen in agony just as Avita felt her own clothes catch fire, her skin
melting in an instant, the intense heat pulling at her, causing her to fall to
her side and slowly curl up into a ball beside her children and a stranger with
child, to be discovered millennia later, exactly as they had died, their agony
and horror preserved for all time.

Asmara International Airport, Eritrea
Present Day, Day of the crash

Acton gave Laura a final wave as she ducked into the Boeing 737
carrying her and their archeological find to Rome. He had been asked by Reese to
travel with the gold, along with the other UN observers, and had readily
volunteered, hoping to steal a few moments to simply be in the presence of so
much wealth and history.

He also
felt responsible for it somehow.

They had
been able to excavate and preserve the skeletons of the crew that had been
exposed in the collapse, and they were now on the plane with Laura, along with
dozens of artifacts that in Acton’s opinion—an opinion shared by his
fiancée—confirmed this was a boat and crew that had witnessed the disaster at
Pompeii in 79AD. The theory he and Laura had batted back and forth on the flight
to Asmara was that Emperor Vespasian had hidden a stash of gold in Pompeii or
the surrounding area, most likely as a hedge against a coup attempt, and his son’s
soldiers had tried to evacuate it during the eruption.

And they
had almost succeeded, escaping by boat with the hoard but not before the flash
of superheated gases killed them instantly, leaving their ship to sail itself
along the prevailing winds of the season, and toward the mighty Nile, where if
greeted as a ghost ship, would have been given a wide berth and left to its own
designs, finally washing ashore in what was now Eritrea. Time and superstition
would have it buried, only to be discovered two thousand years later by a goat
herder, a simple widower with a history of tragedy.

And the
allure of Pompeii’s gold would claim another life.

During
the flight Reese had time to fill them in on the whole story. The goat herder had
murdered his friend in a greed infused rage over what was more than enough to
change the lives of every citizen in his country, then only to be turned in to
the local priest by his daughter, the priest nearly dying while trying to
protect the daughter from the victim’s family.

Reports
indicated the father had apparently been hacked to death in the village square,
his body scattered, his daughter repeatedly raped in revenge before the priest,
badly beaten, was able to save her by organizing a group of the local women to
come to her aid.

Laura
had cried when she had heard the story.

The
local priest managed to get word to the Holy See who then contacted the UN.
Once the Eritreans found out what they had on their soil, they had very
cleverly—or at least that was Acton’s opinion—leveraged its intrinsic value,
rather than its raw value. They announced that in exchange for a substantial
sum of money, they were willing to hand over the find, otherwise they’d melt it
down and use it to fund the state treasury. Negotiations ensued between the Eritreans
and the Italians, along with many other universities and countries, all trying
to come to some agreement, quietly behind the scenes.

It
wasn’t until economic sanctions were threatened that a deal—a very generous
deal—was struck. It was amazing how quickly governments became agreeable when
faced with the threat that any precious metal held by that country wouldn’t be
recognized on the international markets.

The
massive Antonov began to power up nearby, the engines so loud any hope of
conversation was impossible. As he watched the Boeing carrying most of the UN
delegation including Laura back to Rome taxi onto the runway, he turned to
Dawson and Niner, both watching the last of the coffins being loaded into the
cargo hold of the Antonov.

Six had
died.

The
same number of skeletons found on the wreck.

He
frowned as he thought of Tucker, a man he had only known for hours but who was
so friendly, so jovial, he knew his impact would be felt for some time. The two
Russian observers had been killed as well, along with one from the British and
French teams. The sixth had been a UN bureaucrat that Acton hadn’t met,
apparently the first to die in the command tent.

Reese
walked over, clearly not happy, her head still shaking from an animated
conversation that had been taking place out of earshot with several Eritrean
bigwigs. Her face was flushed.

“What’s
wrong?” asked Acton, but Reese couldn’t hear him, the roar of the Antonov’s
engines now overwhelming. She shook her head, pointing at her ear, then
motioned that they should follow her to the waiting plane. They boarded through
the cargo door, Acton looking at the coffins for a moment, his attention
diverted almost immediately to the cellophane wrapped pallets of gold bars.
Even muted behind the semi-translucent wrap, it was mesmerizing, and he noted
that none could take their eyes off the stacks of bullion until they entered
the part of the plane set up as a passenger cabin near the front.

As soon
as the door was closed behind them the roar of the engines was subdued
significantly. Acton turned to Reese. “What’s wrong?” he asked again.

She
leaned in, as did Dawson and Niner.

“First
off, this wasn’t the agreed upon transportation. There was supposed to be a
special UN charter but the Eritreans cancelled it, instead arranging this
behemoth.”

“And
that’s a problem, how?” asked Acton.

“That
wouldn’t be a problem except that they insisted on providing private security,
six of them. They all work for the company this plane was chartered from.”

Dawson
frowned. “Let me guess, Russian?”

Reese’s
eyebrows narrowed. “How’d you know?”

Dawson
shrugged, motioning at their surroundings with his eyes. “It’s an Antonov in
good condition. It’s a fairly safe bet it’s Russian or former Soviet Union.”

“Well,
you’re right. It’s Russian. And the agreement was there would be no more than
two security personnel from each Security Council nation. Now there are six,
and if the original two hadn’t been killed, there’d be eight.”

“Not to
mention crew,” added Niner.

“So at
least another two!” cried Reese. “This is totally unacceptable!”

As if to
punctuate her point, an announcement over the PA was made in Russian only as
the plane began to taxi.

“It
looks like we have little choice,” said Dawson. “Let’s just keep an eye on
things.” He eyeballed two of the security guards standing near the cockpit
door. “Are they armed?”

“No!”
Reese shook her head vehemently. “I insisted on no weapons and they agreed. As
far as I know, there isn’t a weapon on this plane.”

Dawson
didn’t say anything, none of them did, but Acton could tell the two Delta
operators were thinking the same thing he was.

No
weapons? Yeah, right!

Acton
took his seat, buckling in, Dawson and Niner sitting beside him, Reese in the
row ahead. The plane raced down the runway and they were airborne in seconds,
the powerful engines thrusting them into the back of their seats. As the
vibrations worked their magic, Acton found his eyes closing, his body starting
to drift into sleep as he gave in to his exhaustion.

But
something gnawed at the back of his mind, his subconscious replaying the day’s
events, trying to figure out what was bothering him. Suddenly he bolted upright
in his seat, Dawson and Niner staring at him.

“What’s
wrong?” asked Dawson.

Acton
looked around to see if anyone else had noticed his sudden movements, but no
one seemed to be paying him any mind. He turned to Dawson.

“I might
be going crazy, maybe I miscounted, but…” His voice drifted off as he began to
doubt his own memory. He shook his head. “No, I must be wrong.” He shook it
again, this time with more certainty. “No, I’m definitely wrong.”

“What
are you
definitely
wrong about?” asked Niner.

Acton
smiled, a little embarrassed. “Well, I was pretty sure for a moment there that
I remembered seeing seven coffins in the cargo hold, not six.”

“Maybe
we should check it out.” Dawson undid his lap belt and leaned over the seat,
tapping Reese on the shoulder. She jumped, apparently still wired, then undid
her own belt, turning around to face the three men.

“What’s
wrong?”

Apparently
their concern over something was obvious. “Probably nothing,” replied Dawson.
“But we’d like to take a look at something in the cargo hold.”

Reese
shook her head. “Not possible. The agreement is that once this thing is
airborne, nobody is allowed in the back until we land. That way nobody can be
accused of tampering with the gold.” She nodded toward the two doors in the
rear that led to the hold. Acton turned and saw two guards standing at each
door. “Their orders are to let no one by, and they don’t answer to me.”

“Who do
they answer to?” asked Niner as he turned back to face the top UN
representative on the plane.

“I have
no idea. The Eritreans, perhaps? They’re the ones that hired them. This entire
situation is bullshit, like I said before—it wasn’t part of the plan. Right now
we’re just trying to get the gold to safety, then we can point all the fingers
we want at who screwed up what. But for now?” She shrugged. “There’s eff all I
can do about it.”

Acton
didn’t like the sounds of that, but then again this was a UN operation. It
should come in ten times over budget and not accomplish its goals, other than
to line pockets of people both inside and outside the organization.

Cynical
much?

He knew
from countless encounters with the UN that they were an inept, bloated bureaucracy
that spent other people’s money haphazardly with few if any checks and
balances. Yes, many of their mandates and many of their people had good
intentions, it was simply that they were staffed far too often by people from
countries where graft was a way of life, and to suggest anyone was
untrustworthy within the bureaucracy would immediately label you a racist or
bigot.