Chapter 123 - The Normandy Extraction
The roar of the twin turboprops cut through the howling North Atlantic gale as our transport touched down on an unlit military runway outside Bayeux, Normandy.
Rain lashed against the cockpit glass in violent, deafening sheets. Ethan pulled his tactical windbreaker tight around his broad shoulders, his dark hair damp with sweat and salt spray, checking the slide on his suppressed sidearm with practiced, muscle-memory speed.
"Sister Beatrice is seventy-eight, Victoria," Ethan said, his gray eyes catching the green tactical instrument glow of the cabin. "She spent thirty years in the cloister after your father moved the records. If Dominic's private contractors reached the abbey before us—"
"Sister Beatrice was an army nurse during the Algerian conflict before she took her vows, Ethan," I replied, fastening the belt of my dark trench coat. "She isn't an ordinary nun. And my father trusted her with the lives of those twins for a reason."
Three minutes later, our convoy of two unmarked black Land Rovers turned off the coastal highway onto an ancient, muddy track bordered by towering stone hedgerows.
At the end of the lane stood the Abbey of St. Jude—an eleventh-century fortress of gray granite perched high above the churning, froth-covered waves of the English Channel. The stone gargoyles were slick with rain, and the tall, arched stained-glass windows were pitch black.
The heavy oak gates of the outer courtyard were swung wide open.
Ethan moved instantly.
He didn't wait for our tactical escort to set a perimeter. He slipped through the arched stone entry like a shadow, carbine raised, sweeping the cloistered courtyard where fresh tire ruts had chewed through the centuries-old gravel.
"Two commercial vans," Ethan muttered into his comms. "Mercedes Sprinters. Engines cut less than twenty minutes ago. Heat signatures on the catalytic converters are still glowing hot."
I sprinted up the granite steps of the chapel behind him, my heart hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird.
Inside, the nave was cold, smelling of ancient incense, damp stone, and the unmistakable, sharp ozone tang of discharged taser cartridges.
At the foot of the altar, two men in black tactical gear lay unconscious on the flagstones, their wrists bound with heavy hemp bell-ropes, zip-ties still trailing from their belts.
Standing over them, holding an antique double-barreled ten-gauge hunting shotgun with rock-steady, weathered hands, was a frail woman in a traditional black Benedictine habit.
"If you take one more step toward the sacristy, young man," a crisp, aristocratic French voice echoed off the vaulted ceiling, "I will test whether your body armor stops lead birdshot at seven yards."
Ethan lowered his rifle, snapping the safety on with a soft click. A slow, respectful smile broke across his rugged face.
"Sister Beatrice," Ethan said, stepping into the golden light of the beeswax candles. "Arthur Vance sends his regards."
The old nun looked over the iron barrels of the shotgun, her piercing blue eyes sweeping across Ethan’s scars, then landing squarely on me.
The shotgun barrel slowly dropped.
"Victoria," Sister Beatrice breathed, crossing herself with two fingers. "You took your father's chin, child. And his stubbornness."
I ran down the stone nave, falling to my knees on the cold flagstones before her, taking her wrinkled, freezing hands in mine. "Sister... the records. Did they get the records?"
Sister Beatrice gave a dry, raspy chuckle that sounded like stones grinding together in a creek bed. She reached into the deep folds of her habit and pulled out a heavy, leather-bound register with yellowed parchment pages, sealed with red wax bearing the crest of the French Ministry of Justice from 2016.
"The Count sent four mercenaries with crowbars to dig up our basement archives," Sister Beatrice said calmly, nudging one of the bound men with the toe of her orthopedic boot. "They forgot that this abbey was built to withstand Viking raids. The original baptismal and adoption registers for Noah and Sophie have been sitting in the tabernacle since the night your father carried them out into the blizzard."
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She placed the heavy ledger into my hands.
"Take them, Victoria," she whispered, her voice rich with solemn, unshakeable authority. "Take your children's birthright. And tell Dominic Sterling that the blood of an innocent mother does not belong to a monster’s ledger."
