CS 01 The Grail Conspiracy (15 page)

"This is SNN correspondent, Cotten Stone," the aide said.

Cotten and Vanessa had waited in the reception line for about ten
minutes when their turn came to meet Robert Wingate.

"It's a pleasure, Ms. Stone." Wingate extended his hand. "Congratulations on your exclusive coverage of that amazing Grail story. It's
not often that a reporter gets to make the news and then report it.
Great job."

"Thank you."

"I caught some of your appearances on the talk shows, too. You've
become quite a celebrity."

"It's been fun to share what happened with so many." Cotten
turned to her right. "I'd like you to meet-"

"Another celebrity," Wingate said, shaking hands with Vanessa.
"It's impossible to stand in a grocery checkout line these days without
seeing you on a magazine cover, Ms. Perez."

"Somehow, I can't imagine you standing in a checkout line,"
Vanessa said.

"You might be surprised to find I'm just an ordinary guy."
Wingate met her smile with an equally enchanting one. "Are you
Cuban?"

"My parents were born in Cuba. I'm a Miami-Jackson Memorial
Hospital-born American." Vanessa's chin rose slightly.

Cotten flinched. Wingate had picked on Vanessa's pet peevebeing proud of her Cuban heritage but not liking people to assume
she was anything but American.

"Then we're both native-born Floridians-rare birds in these
parts," Wingate said.

Before Cotten stepped away, she said, "Could I schedule an interview with you, Mr. Wingate?"

"I can't think of anything I would enjoy more," he answered.
"Give me a call."

Then as if changing TV channels, he turned to the next person in
the reception line and said, "And how are you tonight?"

The candidate's aide motioned for Cotten and Vanessa to move
on.

"He's definitely charming," Vanessa said.

"Just another politician," Cotten said. But something had upset
him in the Secret Garden. Had she discovered a crack in his perfectly
polished veneer?

"Can we go have some fun now?" Vanessa asked, pretending to
tug at Cotten's arm.

"I'm ready."

COTTEN FELT THE THUNDERING bass like a fist on her chest. Strobes
flashed in a continuous storm of color. She was immersed in a sea of
swirling motion, pounding Latin music, and tightly packed bodies.
For the last two hours, she and Vanessa had moved from club to club
along Calle Ocho in the Little Havana section of Miami. Every street,
ally, room, and corner overflowed with Miami Phantasm Jubilee partygoers. Now her head spun from too many exotic drinks, and her
legs wobbled. Sweat soaked her dress, its filmy fabric clinging like cellophane. She felt queasy and needed to get some fresh air and use the
bathroom.

She grabbed Vanessa's arm, pulling her close. "I've got to use the
ladies room;" she shouted.

Nodding that she understood, Vanessa kept on dancing.

In the back of the room, Cotten found a hallway with women
waiting in a long line.

"Shit," Cotten said. She looked at a girl next to her, hoping she
spoke English. "Is this the only bathroom?"

The girl stared at her questioningly.

Relying on her high school Spanish, Cotten asked again, "Otros
banos?"

"Afuera, the woman said.

Cotten shrugged.

The woman's wide mouth slackened, and she put a knuckle to her
lips as if thinking. Finally, she pointed over the heads of those in line
and said, "Outside."

Cotten worked her way around the dance floor to the entrance.
Once she had pushed through to the sidewalk, she was immediately
caught up in the crowd. Blaring music from a live band on a stage in
the middle of the street made it impossible to ask for directions.

She moved through the crowd for about a block, then turned
down a side street. A teenage couple, wound together in a mad
embrace, leaned against a wall. She hated to disturb them, but she
really needed to find a bathroom.

"Excuse me," she said. "Can you tell me where I can find a
restroom?"

The boy looked around, clearly annoyed at the interruption.

"Bathrooms?" Cotten asked. Her voice softer with an apology riding on it.

"S2," the girl said. "There is a little restaurant down there," she
said, looking further down the street.

"Thanks." Cotten passed several closed stores before she got to the
sandwich shop, its front window filled with pictures of Cuban sandwiches and hoagie-style ham and cheese called media noches. The
inside was filled with people either eating at small Formica tables or
waiting in line to place an order.

"Banho?" she asked a black woman wearing an apron bearing the
shop's name, Badia's Cafe.

But the woman either ignored her or didn't understand.

Where was the frigging bathroom for God's sake?

Bathrooms had to be in the rear of the place, she thought. Making
her way to the back of the shop, Cotten saw two unmarked doors. She
pushed open the first and entered a storeroom filled with boxes of
cooking supplies. There was an additional door beyond the shelves.
She found it already open a few inches, and she pushed on it.

What she saw stunned her-a small room shimmering with candles through a thick smoky haze. A handful of people knelt on the
bare concrete floor, chanting. At the other end of the room stood a
table covered with wooden, African-art-style statuettes along with
many of Jesus and the Virgin Mary. Circles, arrows, and strange symbols that Cotten didn't recognize covered the wall.

She found herself mesmerized by the scene. Stepping into the
room, she quietly watched as an old woman, some kind of priestess,
Cotten assumed, stood before the group. The old woman had rutted
ebony skin stretched tightly over her face and wore a long white dress
with her head wrapped in a white scarf-the end falling down over
her shoulder. A large yellow flower rested over her left ear. Her eyes
were closed, her head bowed in what appeared to be deep prayer or
meditation.

No one seemed to notice Cotten, nor acknowledge her presence
as the incantations continued. From a corner of the room came the
jingle of a tambourine-its player tapping in rhythm to the prayers.

Was it Voodoo? Cotten wondered. Santeria? Black Magic? There
was such a mix of cultures in Miami-this could be any number of
Caribbean religions. Although she found it fascinating, she suddenly
remembered how much she needed to locate a bathroom.

As she started to leave, the chanting stopped abruptly and the old
woman looked up at her.

"I didn't mean to interrupt;' Cotten said, taking a step backward.

The worshipers stood and moved aside, clearing a path to the
front.

The priestess approached, raising her bony hand until her finger
pointed at Cotten.

Cotten froze, transfixed. With the smoke of hundreds of candles
encircling them, the priestess stepped so close that their bodies
almost touched.

The rattle of the tambourine started its tinny music. Like the
sound of buzzing insects, the congregation resumed chanting, their
gaze fixed on Cotten and the priestess.

Cotten's eyes burned from the smoke as the priestess leaned forward, her lips touching Cotten's ear. She strained to hear the old
woman over the noise. "What?" she said, working at understanding
the frail voice buried in the thick island accent.

The woman whispered again, but his time not in English. "Geh el
crip ds adgt quasb-"

Cotten's eyes grew wide and her head jerked up, her hand covering her mouth. She stared in disbelief as the woman returned to
stand beside the altar. "What did you say?"

THE OLD PRIESTESS DIDN'T answer Cotten. Instead, she closed her
eyes and seemed to return to her meditation.

"Oh, my God, this can't be," Cotten whispered, backing through
the door.

Cotten pushed her way past the sandwich shop customers until
she was again in the side street. Holding back a scream, she ran toward
Calle Ocho and the sound of the blaring street band.

Like swimming against the current, she forced her way through
the mass of dancing bodies and partygoers along the sidewalk until
she was in front of the club. The whole scene seemed to swallow her
up as she tried to remember where they had parked her rental car.
Then she heard a familiar voice.

"Cotten?" Vanessa emerged from under the club's awning and ran
to her friend's side. "What is it, baby? Are you all right?"

Cotten stared at Vanessa as if she were a stranger. Her world spun.

"What's wrong?" Vanessa asked.

"Get me out of here, Nessi, please. Get me out of here."

Cotten squinted into the bright sunrise as she stood with her feet in
the surf behind Vanessa's South Beach apartment. Sunbeams glistened off the water like iridescent jewel filaments. The nip in the
morning air felt good. She aimlessly chewed on a thumbnail cuticle
while staring through dark sunglasses at a container ship on the horizon. From a quick glance in the mirror earlier, she knew that her eyes
were puffy and red from crying.

"See this shell," Vanessa said, picking up a half an angel wing
seashell and casually examining it. "You'll only find single ones
washed up on the beach. Know why?"

"No. But you're going to tell me, aren't you?"

Vanessa grinned. "Angel wings don't have any ligaments that hold
them together. They burrow down tightly in the sand and count on
the sand and these little adductor muscles to keep them closed."

"How do you know stuff like that?" Cotten asked.

"I dated a marine biologist."

"I remember her. Didn't she go to work for Sea World in
Orlando?"

Vanessa nodded.

"Nessi, about last night. I told you what the old woman said-it
was the same thing Archer said when he gave me the box-about me
being the only one who could stop the something or other." Cotten
pressed her hand to her trembling lips and fought back tears. "It
wasn't what they both said, Nessi, it was how."

"Like a threat?"

"No," Cotten said. "Remember me telling you that I had a twin
sister who died at birth?"

Vanessa thought for a second. "Yes, you called her Motnees."

"Right. And remember how I said when I was little I could see her
and talk to her in our secret made-up language."

"But you said she wasn't real-just an imaginary playmate."

"I said I made her up because I didn't want you to laugh at me.
But I did believe she was real, very real."

"Cotten, she died. So you had to have made up all that stuff."
Vanessa gathered her hair to the side. "And what's that got to do with
the old woman last night? Or the guy in Iraq?"

Cotten removed her dark glasses and looked deep into her
friend's eyes. "The old woman and Archer spoke in the same language
Motnees and I used. Nobody knows that language. Nobody! I'm surprised after all this time it even came back to me."

Vanessa's mouth opened slightly as if she was going to say something, but before she could, Cotten said, "Let's say Motnees really was
a figment of my imagination. Let's also say I made up our twin talk
and pretended to talk to her-just kids' stuff, okay? How would anyone else know that?"