"The Atlantis Prophecy" - читать интересную книгу автора (Greanias Thomas)

SUN

He quickly deciphered the next two numbers and stared at the note:

The sun was probably a final, invisible celestial marker, and what it was shining over was the final terrestrial landmark-the location of something his father thought was so important.

He flipped to page 111. The next word was SAVAGE.

He was about to flip to page 54 and the last word when he heard the bathroom door creak upstairs and he froze.

"Conrad?" a voice called out. "Is that you?"

Brooke! She had been home the whole time. He didn't expect her so early, but a glance at his watch told him she finished her show two hours ago.

Conrad slapped Tom Sawyer shut, slipped it under the sofa, picked up a remote and turned on the plasma television. Brooke TiVo'd her weekend sports show on Fox. He found it on the program guide and tuned in.

On the screen the logo for her show came up with the Wagnerian music score before the commercials. It mixed sports and politics. All of the sponsors, it seemed, were powerful, industrial global giants involved in "communications" and "energy" and "financial services." The average viewer was a white, middle-aged man with a bulging stock portfolio and golf pants to match as he ogled Ms. Scarborough and sipped his Arnold Palmer in the clubhouse.

"Why don't we declare war on Muslim terrorists?" she chirped to baseball's A-Rod, shown on the field. The New York Yankee looked at her like he had woken up in an alternative universe. "They've declared war on us for years," she went on. "The Crusaders had it right: We need to sack them or put them in our jerseys."

Conrad had fought his own battles with Islamofascists and was all for winning the war on terror. But he couldn't believe they let her say this stuff on the air. Yet hers was one of their highest-rated political talk shows. It was better watching her with the TV muted, but instead he turned up the volume for the benefit of anybody listening.

The real show involved gratuitous, low-angle full shots of her legs and her flipping her long blonde hair while she blathered conservative social commentary-lower taxes, no more affirmative action, and guns for everybody. He knew she kept a loaded.357 Magnum in a Manolo Blahnik shoebox at the top of her bedroom closet upstairs. Of course, since she had about 200 shoeboxes, he could never be sure which one it was.

He craned his neck and looked up the stairs as a pair of long legs stepped into view. It was Brooke in a pair of strappy Jimmy Choos and a green Elie Saab evening gown that showed off her faultless figure to full effect.

"There you are," she said, eyeing the pasta bowl and Sam Adams on the coffee table. "Where were you?"

"The graveyard," Conrad said.

"I know, sweetie, I'm sorry I wasn't there." Brooke walked over and kissed him on the lips. "But that's why we planned to go out tonight, remember? To put the past behind you and to celebrate us and the future. The Olympics reception at the Chinese Embassy is tonight. Everybody from the network is going to be there."

Conrad stared. He had completely forgotten.

"I just buried my father, Brooke," Conrad said, his thoughts on the book under the sofa. "I'm not in a party mood."

She frowned and her crystal blue eyes, which at times could look vacant, seemed to come into sharp focus like the automatic lens of a camera.

He expected her to say, "You hated your father," but what came out was sugary sweet. She was great that way.

"I know it must be hard, Conrad," she cooed. "But at least yours went out with a bang. My grandfather was a veteran who died in a retirement condo in Florida while he nodded off watching Errol Flynn in Night of the Dawn Patrol."

"So you think I'm going to kick off watching Top Gun while you're out?"

"No, you're going to kick off being my Top Gun tonight," she said with shining eyes. "If you're lucky."

Conrad smiled as he looked at her. Although she had quite a killer body now, with a kick-ass personality, Conrad had met her and dated her when they were but gawky teenagers at Sidwell Friends School after his father had dragged him to live in D.C. for two years. Now she was poised, confident, sexy, having filled out her curves and buffed her body to perfection. She seemed to have all the answers.

"Wake me up when you get back," he told her.

Brooke sighed, picked up his raincoat from the bench and put it in the closet. She turned to the foyer mirror and started to apply more lipstick. "I might bring somebody home with me."

"More the merrier." Conrad turned the sound back on the TV. "Make sure she's a brunette."

"I hate you," she said.

"Everybody does in time."

She marched over and took the remote from him.

"Hey, I was looking for Top Gun."

"The only thing you're watching tonight is me."

"But I was watching you."

"In the flesh, Con. We're staying home together."

She leaned over, her cleavage practically enveloping his head, and kissed him full on the lips with passion. That she would stay home for him spoke volumes about her devotion, and her soft lips lifted his mood in spite of himself.

"What about the Chinese?" he asked.

She smiled. "We'll order take-out."

She took him by the hand and led him upstairs. Only once did he glance back at the book under the corner of the sofa.