In Case of Death (The Adventures of Gabriel Celtic Book 3) Read online

  In Case of Death

  By J.T. Lewis

  Copyright 2013-2015 by J.T. Lewis

  License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com or any other vender and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Dedication

  I would like to dedicate this book to my son, Tristan Lewis, who took his life during the writing of this story. While I work at living in a world of fiction, he could never find a reality that suited him. The chemical balance that determines in all of us if we are considered ‘normal’ never quite balanced with him, and he could simply not live with that reality any longer.

  To say that his passing has changed me would be an understatement. For one, the writing of this novel ceased for at least three months as I fought a conflict within myself over the importance of entertaining fiction versus that of the loss of a loved one.

  How important could it be anyway? Tristan didn’t even like to read!

  Months later, when I finally let myself read through what I had already written, it struck me that he would have loved the story if it had been a movie.

  He would have declared it AWESOME!

  So I started writing again, though with a renewed purpose. Even though finishing the book would not bring back my son, I felt the need to finish the story once again…for him! With Tristan now looking over my shoulder, we breezed through the evolving mystery and action sequences until we had a story worthy of a movie… for him.

  Even though I still miss him every day, bringing this book to a conclusion has in many ways, helped me to heal. And as I picture him sitting down to finally watch the movie that played out in my head, a snack and a beer beside him, I see him clicking the remote and leaning back with a smile.

  “This is gonna be AWESOME!”

  Prologue

  March 5, 1999

  Cairo, Egypt

  The American reached into his pocket and dug out some piasters to pay for his purchase. Handing over the coins in exchange for the sack from the robed woman, he quickly popped one of the sweet dates into his mouth. Crumbling the bag closed once again, he slipped it into his oversized safari vest’s pocket as he continued walking through the bazaar.

  He loved this place.

  He made sure that he always had one morning open on his monthly trips to Cairo to visit his Khan Al-Khalili. The deals he could make here seemed to satisfy his seldom used negotiating skills like nowhere back home. Every transaction was a new negotiation; here he was just another customer to haggle with.

  He was very good at his job. Although a senior manager in his department, Petroleum Engineering no longer held his interest like it did when he was younger. Thirty years with basically the same job at the same company had left him yearning for retirement.

  He considered this as he paid for yet another purchase, a hard-fought negotiation for a brightly colored stuffed parrot for his new granddaughter. He hadn’t even laid eyes on her yet, as she had been born while he was on the plane during the trip over.

  “It won’t be long now,” he thought to himself.

  He had made the final arrangements before leaving on this trip. In six months he would be taking early retirement. He was looking forward to it with excitement. His wife and he would travel the world, enjoying time together as he tried to make up for the years apart that his job had demanded of him.

  And now that the grandkids were starting to appear, they would have time for extended visits to their boys and their families. His mouth spread slowly at the thought. He was certain that his wife was looking forward to that part of retirement more than the travel.

  A sudden prick in his back brought his mind back to the present.

  “What the hell is that?” he thought as he reached behind himself, feeling a short piece of hard plastic sticking out of his vest.

  Confused, he pulled his hand back and was shocked to see it covered in blood. As he stared at his blood covered fingers, he noticed his vision closing in, blackness forming around the edges of his sight as it worked its way quickly toward the center.

  “Shit!” was all he could mutter before collapsing onto the dusty path next to one of the booths. As he stared out of sightless eyes, he could feel the life draining out of him as it spilled onto the path.

  With his last labored breath, he exhaled a single word, the final thought on this earth.

  “May”

  ***

  A small monkey sniffed the air and jumped from the counter to the back of the now dead body. A pet of the owner of the nearest booth, the monkey chattered away as he reached deftly into the man’s vest pocket and pulled out the bag of dates.

  Sitting comfortably on the back of the man, the little animal quickly bit into one of the sweet fruits. Holding up the half eaten piece like a trophy, the monkey let out another loud string of chatter as he jumped up and down with excitement.

  The passing shoppers all smiled as they watched the antics of the little animal, stepping carefully around the pool of blood so as to not get any of it on their feet.

  Stories of the funny monkey’s frolics would be the highlight of many of the bazaar’s patrons that night.

  Chapter 1

  September 14, 1999

  The old man appeared to be around eighty.

  His unkempt, curly gray hair stuck out wildly from under his ball cap as he stared ahead out of the yellow tinted glasses. His unshaven chin moved up and down almost comically as he seemed to be gumming his meal of soup and crackers.

  A hand reached into view, the napkin in it wiping his chin. The middle-aged Asian woman sitting next to him let out a string of words that no one in the restaurant understood as she doted over the old man. She absentmindedly pushed an errant lock of graying dark hair behind her ear before pulling a colorful scarf down over her ear to cover it.

  “Sey wan me take care you, not wripe you,” she spouted off in accented English, “You trub-oh too much, I not rike sis”

  “They is payin you, ain’t they?” the man mumbled as he reached down with his spoon for another bite.

  Another string of unintelligible words escaped the woman’s mouth as she held up her hands in defeat.

  A loud round of laughter from a table three booths down suddenly drowned out her words. A large man with a shaved head punched one of his seatmates in the shoulder in fun at the joke. The second man stopped smiling as he started rubbing his shoulder with a grimace while the third man pointed with renewed hilarity.

  The old man stopped gumming his food as he stared for a few moments at the large man, seeming to size him up. Satisfied, he continued eating his soup, finally scooping the last of the liquid into his mouth.

  A nervous breath escaped the woman before she said, “You okray? We gro now?”

  Nodding his head, the man reached over for his cane, and slowly pulled himself up from the table. The Asian woman quickly grabbed onto his left arm, but the old man looked at her and shook his head imperceptibly. Nodding, the woman went around the old man and grabbed his right arm while shifting something under her coat to her right side.

  “You’re a pain in the ass sometimes,” she whispered to the old man in clear English.

  A small smile passed the stooped old man’s lips for a moment before he started forward in slow, halting steps.

/>   Approaching the booth with the three loud men, the large one sitting on the outside of the booth finished another joke and the table again erupted in laughter. As the old man passed, the cane in his left hand came down hard on the giant’s foot.

  A howl escaped the man’s lips as he quickly unfolded himself from the booth, “Who in the hell do you think you are!”

  The stooped old man had backed up a step in apparent fear as he grabbed the bottom of the cane with his right hand. Seeing the opening he had been looking for, he lunged forward quickly, hooking the cane behind the ankle of the man and giving it a jerk.

  A look of confusion passed across the giant’s face as he toppled over backwards and landed hard on his back. The old man quickly stood up to his full height and jumped forward, tucking his feet back as his knees harshly pounded into the other man’s chest.

  Whipping out a gun in one hand, he stuck it under the man’s nose as his other hand flashed a badge in front of the prone man’s eyes.

  “My name is Gabriel Celtic, Mr. Ames. It would seem that Allen Vanguard has requested your return to southern Indiana.”

  The man’s startled seatmates started to get out of their seats to help their friend until they heard the click.

  “You might wanna stay there boys,” Abby said with a wry smile while steadily holding her gun on them. Pushing back her scarf and revealing her long dark hair, “This has nothing to do with you…yet!”

  Both men nodded meekly as they looked down at their plates, trying to ignore their friend’s plight.

  “Adam Ames,” Gabriel said as he fitted the immobilized prisoner with handcuffs, “you are under arrest for skipping out on your bail and missing your court appointment last month. You have the right to remain silent…”

  Chapter 2

  September 14, 1999

  “Why is it again that we have become bounty hunters?” I asked Abby as I rubbed a hotspot on the back of my neck. The Interstate droned past under the SUV as we headed home from Gary, Indiana. We had finally tracked down the elusive Mr. Ames in the greasy diner earlier in the day. Although it was slightly gratifying to find and apprehend these missing felons, I didn’t enjoy these long drives at all.

  Abby and I had started a private detective agency a year ago, and so far I was happy with the work…except for the money thing. Worrying about how much to charge, and sometimes how to get the money out of your customers when it was owed was a headache I had not counted on.

  “For the money, baby,” Abby exclaimed with a smile, looking up from the paperwork she had been working on in her lap. “If we don’t have any other cases, we gotta do something! Besides…that was fun!”

  I disliked this type of work. Not that it was beneath me, I just didn’t like hunting down and transporting people just because I needed money. Besides, the capture earlier could have easily gone in another direction, and I worried more than a little about Abby…my daughter. (1)

  Not knowing I even had a daughter at the time, I met Abby on a plane coming back from South America last year. Somehow finding out my location, she had made the trip to Peru just to meet me on the ride home. I thought she was just a nice young woman helping out an old man. She had kept the pertinent details of our relationship from me until later when we had gotten to know each other.

  I have to admit however, that even before I knew she was my daughter, I had come to respect her insight and strength. After the initial shock of discovering I had fathered her while in Vietnam, it was an easy jump to acceptance of the facts. Not that I claim any special parenting abilities, mind you.

  Smiling now at Abby, “I have a feeling that we will have a real case waiting for us when we get back.”

  “Oh yeah,” she said as she looked back down at her papers again. “Is this one of your intuitions speaking…one of your visions?”

  “No,” I laughed, “just a hunch.”

  I would often have dreams that gave me clues to a big case when I was working one. They had been long absent since Abby and I had broken our last murder case. A monk in the Catholic Church had taken it upon himself to weed out the sinners of the various parishes he would be assigned.

  The weeding out was of the permanent nature! (1)

  I was disturbed by a couple of dreams that I had experienced lately though. Nothing to do with the mysterious room I usually visited when I had a vision, but of an old girlfriend from high school. I hadn’t thought much about her in years before the dreams started coming, especially since I had met and married Betty.

  My lovely Betty had been murdered over two years ago now, and I still missed her daily. (2) But I had finally come somewhat to terms with her death last year, and even though I still missed her, I now knew that I could keep on living without her.

  Abby had been very instrumental in bringing me to that point.

  “Hunches are good!” Abby said while looking over her shoulder at the prisoner we had handcuffed in the back seat. “I’ll take one of your hunches any day!”

  Looking into the rearview mirror, I spotted our prisoner; a trickle of dried blood had run down his forehead onto his nose. Having attached his handcuffs to a special steel ring we had installed in the back seat, he had worked for the first hour to get out of them. Failing that, he had decided it would be a good idea to beat his head against the steel mesh divider we had installed between the front and back seats.

  He had finally calmed down after almost knocking himself out, drawing blood in the process.

  “I have to go to the bathroom,” he said when he caught me looking back at him.

  “We will be back home in an hour,” I said as I again concentrated on the road ahead, “You can hold it that long.”

  “I’m gonna piss myself in like five minutes!” he puffed out loudly, “You better pull off!”

  “Everything’s vinyl back there Adam…go for it!”

  Looking up in the mirror again I saw a confused look cross his face, surprised I guess by my cavalier attitude. Anytime you could avoid releasing a secured prisoner, you were better off.

  Seeming to give up on the idea, and apparently not that bad off after all, he finally leaned back in his seat. Time would tell if he tried something else before we got back to Allenville.

  I hated bounty hunting.

  Chapter 3

  March 5, 1999

  Cairo, Egypt

  Lieutenant Botros pulled up to the bazaar in his faded blue Nasr automobile. Turning the key to shut off the motor, the car continued to rattle and sputter for several moments before finally dying. By the time it stopped however, the officer was several feet away as he walked toward his men.

  Seeing the Lieutenant approach, a private whispered to him, “another American.” Lifting the yellow tape erected to keep others away from the crime scene, Botros nodded, feigning boredom as he proceeded toward the body sprawled on the ground.

  Noticing the owner of the bazaar standing off to the side of the path, the policeman changed directions, making his way over to him instead of the body.

  “Good morning Omar,” he yelled in his native language as he flashed his best fake smile. “Sorry to hear about yet another murder in your fine establishment.” Stopping directly in front of the man now, “I’m afraid we will have to maintain the crime scene for several hours until we can get to the bottom of this. It is indeed unfortunate that your business will be hampered in such a way. ”

  Placing his hand on the officer’s shoulder, Omar gently turned Botros so that they were facing away from the crowd.

  Handing him an envelope, he uttered, “250 pounds as usual…for you and your fine men, Lieutenant.”

  Pocketing the envelope with a smile, the policeman assured him that he would handle the situation.

  Turning to his men, he yelled, “Just another accident men, call the funeral house and let’s get him ready to transport back to his home country!”

  Turning back to Omar, “These Americans, such a careless people.”

  Returning to his car, he re
moved two hundred pounds and placed them into his pocket…he would split the rest with his men later.

  As the car sputtered back to life, Botros smiled as he shifted it into gear.

  It has indeed been a good day.

  Chapter 4

  September 14, 1999

  I turned on the kitchen light as we piled into the house carrying our equipment. It had been a long couple of days, and we were both exhausted.

  “I’ll take care of the costumes if you get the weapons,” Abby mumbled tiredly. I nodded and grabbed up the guns to deposit into the safe. I figured that cleaning them could wait until the morning.

  Abby took the clothes we used for our disguises and deposited them into the washing machine, everything except my ratty gray wig. She lovingly deposited this on the head of a plaster bust of Caesar, patting it playfully with a smile before reentering the kitchen.

  “I’m beat!” she exclaimed as she came over and gave me a peck on the cheek. “I’m going to bed.”

  I reached around her shoulder with one arm and gave her a quick hug.

  “Ok kid, see ya in the morning.”

  I had invited Abby to live at the house with me when we had started our business. She had happily accepted, setting herself up in the unused downstairs bedroom. Having been apart for most of her life, we both still relished any time that we could spend together.

  Her sometime guest and boyfriend, Nathan Stafford, was not here tonight, as we had not known when we would return. When he was here however, he was a welcome addition to the family. The old house hadn’t known this much activity in years.

  Heading into the office from where we ran the agency, I contemplated making a pot of coffee. Looking at the clock, I realized that it was almost 10:00, and decided against it. Not that I ever had trouble sleeping after drinking coffee late, I just didn’t have the energy to make it.