Free Chase Baker and the Seventh Seal (A Chase Baker Thriller Book 9) by Vincent Zandri Page A

off down one of the many blind alleyways, Magda and I proceed toward the road that splits off to the left.
    Al-Wad Street.
    “There it is,” she says, pointing directly at a shop covered with an old brown awning that’s so torn and ratted it looks like it’s been there since Jesus walked these roads.
    She stops in front of the shop.
    The exterior walls of the place are hidden behind bookcases stuffed with old volumes of one kind or another. By the looks of it, Bibles, Old Testaments, New Testaments, Siddus, Korans, bound Torahs, and more. Books on travel in Israel, none of them new but used and as ragged as the awning that protects them. A little red paperback catches my eye, the spine of which reads, The New Testament .
    Seek the three sevens . . .
    I pull it off the shelf.
    “Found something you like?” Magda says.
    “Something I think I need,” I say. “I’ll explain later. We going in?”
    Unlike a lot of the shops we’ve passed, this one has a door that separates it from the outside. The door is heavy and wooden, and I can bet it’s there not to keep out the noise or the dust, but to act as a protective barrier for some valuable antique books the owner is surely housing on the inside.
    Magda opens the door, and we step inside. All four of us.
    The big, rectangular room is dim and smells of must, mold, and age. Bookshelves cover every square inch of wall space, and even the shelves themselves are stuffed with volumes both vertically and horizontally. Electric metal lamps shaped like acorns hang from the wood beam-supported plaster ceiling by thin black chains. Dull electric light oozes out of their green, red, and clear glass. There is the distinct odor of burning incense in the air. It combines with the sweet smoke that can only come from a hookah pipe.
    The place seems abandoned until I spot something in the corner. A man dressed in a long bone-colored robe. He’s wearing a knit kufi skull cap, and the flesh on his face is hidden behind a long, salt and pepper beard. He’s got the metal tip of the hookah hose in his mouth, and he sets it down before slowly standing, exhaling the blue smoke through his mouth and nostrils.
    “I am Mahdi,” he says, his voice low-toned and surprisingly British accented. “How may I be of service to you?”
    “You’re English?” Magda says.
    “I was born and raised in London,” the man says, his hands hidden under the long sleeves of his tunic. “I moved back to Jerusalem after the first Intifada in 1993 to be closer to my people.” His eyes shift from Magda and me to the Hasidic brothers who are both standing at the front of the store, one man planted on each side of the door as if guarding it. And they are.
    I clear my throat.
    “You are a believer in Palestine,” I say.
    He smiles, but it’s a bitter smile.
    “Such struggles are not only lifelong, but generational. Multi-generational. Or in the case of Palestine, sadly, perhaps forever.” He grins. “But you are not here to discuss politics.”
    A laugh erupts from one of the Hasidic brothers. Itzhak to be precise.
    “Itzy,” Moshe says. “Show some respect for the shop owner. We are standing in the Palestinian Quarter after all. This is his home. The Israeli soldiers outside prove it.”
    “We’re here searching for a book,” I say, trying my best to divert the subject before a major violent political event erupts. “A series of books actually.”
    Mahdi raises his arms, and his hands emerge from under his sleeves. His hands are big and dark, fingers long, nails yellowed and sharp. He crosses his arms over his chest.
    “What kind of books?” he asks, his dark, almost black, eyes slanted, his brow furrowed, as if to demonstrate his piqued interest. Then, his eyes shift to the New Testament held in my hand. “Are you interested in Biblical texts, perhaps?”
    “Precisely,” I say.
    Magda takes a step forward. So close to the man, I feel she might put her hands on him.
    “I visited this very