God's Lions - House of Acerbi Read Online Free PDF

will need both of you at my side when I make my final decision concerning Orsini’s replacement. How did you ever convince our good friend the cardinal to take a sabbatical?”
    “It was easy. I simply told him you ordered it.”
    Both men laughed as Morelli took a sip of wine and rolled it over his tongue.
    “California Cabernet Sauvignon?”
    “Yes, excellent, isn’t it?” The pope held his glass up and watched the light pass through the red liquid swirl. “But I’m afraid you know your wine too well to have to ask me a question like that, Bishop. Something else is troubling you, my friend, and you’re stalling for time. What’s on your mind?”
    Morelli realized his friend had seen right through his efforts at small talk. Setting his glass on the table, he clasped both hands together before leaning forward.
    “Yes, Your Holiness, there is another problem. It concerns our old friend, Lev Wasserman.”
    “Was he also on the plane?”
    “No, sir. He’s quite safe at his villa in Israel.”
    A look of relief crossed the pope’s face, for it was well known that Lev Wasserman, the famous Israeli mathematician who had discovered the hidden code in the Bible the year before, was also a close friend of the Church and sometimes flew to meetings with top Vatican officials.
    “What’s our Israeli friend got to do with all of this?”
    “It has nothing to do with the plane crash, Your Holiness. He’s requesting a meeting with you.”
    “Of course. Lev knows my door is always open to him. What’s on his mind?”
    “He’s just informed me that ...” Morelli’s words drifted off as he stood to watch the rain pelting the windows in the darkness outside.
    “Informed you of what, Anthony?”
    “The code , Your Holiness ... it is speaking to us again .”

CHAPTER 3
    Closing the back door to her condo, Sarah Adams stepped out into the early morning darkness and shivered in the cold air as wisps of steam rose from the cup of hot coffee in her hand. Her only consolation at being awake at this hour of the morning was the realization that the days were growing longer and that her drive to the train station would soon be in brilliant sunlight as the seasons rotated in a slow dance with the rhythms of life.
    Although she sometimes complained about the time it took to travel from her suburban home on Long Island to her new job at a Madison Avenue advertising agency, she secretly loved the train ride into the city. Now that it was springtime, she was looking forward to watching the new green leaves re-populate the trees outside the windows of the fast-moving commuter train as it sped toward the faint gray outlines of the giant skyscrapers that rose in the distance.
    Her new life was so completely different from the familiar surroundings of her home town. There were no commuter trains in West Texas, or giant skyscrapers for that matter. Six months ago, Sarah had moved to New York after finally earning a marketing degree at Texas Tech University. Her new career in advertising was a radical departure from her former job as a flight attendant, and at times it seemed more confining, but she had decided to give it a year and see what developed. After that, who knew? She was still involved in a long-distance relationship with Daniel Meir, the young Israeli mathematician she had shared an adventure with in Italy the year before, and the pull there was strong. Now in her mid-twenties, she was rapidly approaching the established age limit for making life decisions, and the clock was running.
    Thinking of time, she jumped into her small green Mini Cooper and gunned the car out onto the tree-lined highway that ran next to her condo. Approaching a curve, she tried to peer through the low ground fog hugging the dark road ahead, looking for the outline of a police cruiser lying in wait. Her heart jumped when she flew past a parked car locked in shadows. Damn ! Was that a police car? Glancing up into her rear-view mirror, she held her