The Templar Conspiracy Read Online Free PDF

mind; we’re running out of time.”

    Holliday was on the telephone in the study when a bleary-eyed Brennan appeared in the doorway at ten thirty the following morning.
    “Sweet Jesus, man, why did you let me sleep so long?” the priest said.
    “Because you would have been useless otherwise,” said Holliday. He scribbled something on a yellow pad. From the rear of the town house came the smell of fresh-brewed coffee. A few moments later Peggy appeared with a tray in her hands. Brennan flopped down onto one of the old, worn club chairs.
    “Anything new?” Brennan asked.
    “I’ve been on the phone since eight,” said Holliday. Peggy poured everyone coffee and sat down in one of the other chairs, tucking her legs under her like only women seem able to do. “I’m calling in markers and favors from old friends. We’ve got some names.”
    “Bad guys?” Peggy asked.
    “The worst,” said Holliday, glancing down at the pad in front of him. “It’s like a top-ten list. Four of them stand out because they specialize in very-long-range targets.” He paused. “Dimitri Mikhailovich Travkin, GRU Spetsnaz in Afghanistan and Chechnya. He’d be in his early forties, but no one has seen him in years. There’s a rumor that he retired when he first showed the early symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, which would rule him out. The second name is a Frenchman, Gabir Francois Bertrand, part Algerian, worked with the French Parachute Regiment, which is the equivalent of our Delta Force. Bertrand was involved in some sort of sex scandal involving a superior officer’s wife and they turfed him. He’s supposedly living in Switzerland and taking contract work, mostly mercenary jobs in Africa.”
    “The third name?” Brennan asked, gratefully sipping his coffee and looking a little more alert.
    “Edward Adler Fox, the top sniper in the British SAS. He was cashiered for insubordination, refusing to leave the front lines in Afghanistan. He wanted to stay with his men. Lives in a remote corner of England like some sort of hermit. Word is he’s a little wacky in the head. No indication that he’s active in any way.”
    “And the last?” Peggy asked.
    “The only American. William Tritt. A good old boy from West Virginia. Shot squirrels as a kid because that’s all they had to eat. Wound up in the SEALs and got an education—chemical engineering, and then a second degree in mechanical engineering. Apparently a whiz with any kind of machinery. He’s also a dead shot. He won the Wimbledon Cup at Camp Perry three years running.”
    “Where is he now?” Brennan asked, helping himself to more coffee.
    “He’s a ‘consultant’ to both the CIA and the National Counterterrorism Center. They find the terrorists; Tritt gets rid of them. They learned their lesson at Guantánamo; it’s more cost-effective to kill terrorists than it is to capture them.”
    “You’re saying that one of these men is responsible for killing the Holy Father?” Brennan asked.
    “I’d bet on it,” replied Holliday. “My sources are pretty sure of it, too.”
    “Then why aren’t they looking for them?” Brennan asked.
    “Maybe they are but no one seems to want to talk beyond the hypothetical. Something’s scaring them off.”
    “What could scare such people off?” Brennan said. “You’d think finding the killer of the Pope would be a coup for everyone.”
    Peggy spoke up. “If nothing else, it’s the politics of necessity,” she said. “The Pope has been murdered. We in this room know there are four possible assassins—a Russian, a Frenchman, a Brit and an American. The last thing the governments of any of those countries want is to be associated with the assassin. The diplomatic damage would be enormous. Even the Italians are probably shying away from it. An Italian assassin killing the Pope? Absolute heresy. It would bring down the government.” She took a sip of her coffee.
    Brennan lit a cigarette, his first of the day, and gave a