Marcus said nothing for a few seconds. “Why’d you come out here, Alicia?”
“Maybe because I didn’t like the way our conversation ended in the parking garage, or maybe because I didn’t sleep well last night. I wanted to start over, if possible, and not have suspicions between us. It’s important to me.”
Marcus nodded and smiled. “Okay. No problem.”
She smiled and took in the property, her eyes drifting to the horses in the pasture. “This is a lovely home. I recall you telling me your grandfather had bought it years ago.”
“But he kept it in better shape than I’m doing. Barn needs a new coat of paint.”
“When you make coffee, do you boil it on the stove in one of those tin coffee pots, you know, the blue ones with the white spots on them?” She grinned.
“It’s a drip machine. Would you like a cup? I just put on a pot.”
“I’d love a cup.”
“Please, come in.”
“Can we drink it out here on the porch?”
“Sure.” She followed him inside and into the kitchen where Marcus poured steaming coffee into two large ceramic mugs.
“Your home is warm, comfortable.”
“Jen did all that. I haven’t touched a thing since…since she was killed.”
“We’ve all followed the case. No arrests yet, right?”
“Not even any suspects, so I’m told. How do you take your coffee?”
“A little cream and a touch of sugar.”
He fixed the coffee and handed a cup to Alicia. He could smell her perfume, the trace of a flowery shampoo lingering in her thick hair. He felt something stir deep inside his chest. “Let’s sit on the porch,” he said, walking to the front door.
Alicia followed him, stopping to look at a framed picture hanging on the wall. The image was of Marcus, Jennifer and Tiffany on a ski trip, mountains of snow in the background. Alicia blinked a few times, exhaling a deep breath, wrapping both hands around the cup.
“That was our last vacation together — Telluride.”
“Such a beautiful family.”
They stepped on the porch and sat in large, white wicker chairs with plump cushions on the back and seat. Buddy lay down on the oak wood porch. A blue jay fluttered from the trees, chirping, as a robin hunted for insects in the grass, which was still coated silvery white from frost.
A breeze puffed across the yard, scattering leaves and making music with the wind chimes on the porch. Alicia looked at the chimes and smiled. “If you decide to accept the Nobel Prize, it’d look good on that mantle inside, above the fireplace.”
Marcus sipped his coffee. He watched a red leaf flutter from an elm tree. “You sure Secretary Hanover didn’t send you out here?”
Alicia shook her head and laughed. “No, she did not, and no one from the agency asked me to come here either. Although I’m sure Bill Gray would love for you to come back to your old job. You mentioned Secretary Hanover, I want to ask you something.”
“Okay, what is it?”
“Do you remember me telling you about my sister, Dianne?”
“I remember her picture on your desk at work. I remember that her husband was one of the people killed when the jet crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11.”
Alicia looked down at her coffee cup before raising her eyes up to Marcus. “About two months ago, her only child, my niece Brandi, was hiking in the eastern border region of Turkey. She and her boyfriend, Adam, were there working for the Peace Corps, teaching school in the area. Iranian border guards arrested them for allegedly crossing into Iran. Paul, they’re holding them as U.S. spies. They’re just kids, both barely twenty.”
“I heard about the arrests. I didn’t make the connection because of the difference in last names. What’s being done to free them?”
“They’ve become poker chips in an international game. Tehran wants the U.S. to release four people we’re holding in exchange for the release of Brandi and Adam. It’s going nowhere.” Alicia pushed a strand of brown hair behind her ear. “My sister…Dianne went through hell after the death of her husband. Now, it’s this horrible kidnapping, and that’s what it really is, a damn kidnapping. Dianne is at the breaking point. I can’t imagine what Brandi and Adam are experiencing.”
“It wouldn’t be smart for Iran to hurt them or treat them inhumanely.”
“What’s smart in this crazy world anymore, Paul? The Iranians could falsely convict them and issue the death penalty. We’re desperate. Maybe you could do something.”
“Me? What could I do?”
“I’d read that the daughter of Ali Assimi, the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, has a heart condition maybe similar to what affected Tiffany. Maybe you could look into it and offer some advice.”
“Alicia, I’m not a doctor. I managed to figure a way to help doctors prevent ventricular arrhythmia in some hearts by subjecting the heart to intense electromagnetic impulses that help the heart regulate itself. This can provide a new option to the practice of ablation surgery, which destroys tissue in the heart muscle to regulate the electrical circuit.”
“Since you know Secretary Hanover, maybe you could ask her to try to expedite their release.”
“I’m not sure how much pull I have.”
“She and the president want you to accept the Nobel Prize. That’s a lot of pull.”
He looked at her a moment, the sound of church bells coming up through the valley. “I’ll speak with Secretary Hanover.”
Alicia smiled. “Thank you. I’ve been thinking about the stuff you mentioned concerning your contact from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and the newly discovered notes from Isaac Newton. This could be a tremendous opportunity for you, Paul. What if Newton left behind something?”
“What do you mean?”
“I did a little research on the man, Sir Isaac.”
“Find anything new?”
“For starters, he definitely had a most beautiful mind. Three hundred years later, we’re still using his math to fly rockets and satellites. He was a hybrid kind of scientist. Apparently, the science stuff was the least of his interests, the theological material, the why we’re here, the living a life of meaning, kind of thing was what drove him and pushed his buttons. Not well known, eh? But he thought the answers were in the Bible, and it’s believed he wrote more than a million words on the subject.”
“Maybe he has a condensed version somewhere on one piece of paper.”
Alicia smiled. “After a little digging, I found that Newton was very interested in a supreme knowledge or absolute knowledge.”
“Does it exist? Can absolute in anything be demonstrated?”
“Newton researched the ancient Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, Babylonians, and people like Copernicus, da Vinci, Plato and Archimedes — looking for some kind of secret or handed-down ancient knowledge, maybe to help him understand or research the Bible. What if he found something?”
“Then why don’t we know about it? He left us calculus, the theory of gravity and motion. Why wouldn’t he have left that, too?”
“Maybe he found something too frightening or too large for the world to fully grasp. The theory of destiny certainly would be a bigger concept than gravity to comprehend. He could have taken it to his grave, or like you say, left it on a slip of paper. Maybe he needed more time to prove it. But unless we know what to look for, the world might never have an answer.”
“A million words can create quite a haystack.”
Alicia scratched Buddy behind the ear. “Go search for the needle in the haystack. I have a feeling that if anyone on earth can find it…it’s you.”