Free The Templar Salvation (2010) by Raymond Khoury

car—hard—winding him as more cops piled in to join them.
    He yelled at them as they pinned him down, pressing his face against the roof of the car, crushing his cheek and ear, Reilly fighting back, desperate to lift his head up and see what was inside the trunk of the car. And then he heard it—a cop who’d moved back for a look went ballistic and started shouting wildly.
    Tess .
    Reilly stiffened as fear and hope ripped through him, his mind scrambling to understand what the man was blurting out. “English,” he shouted. “Say it in English, damn it. Is she in there? Is she okay?”
    He read the panic in the cops’ eyes and heard the word “ Bomba ” blurted repeatedly, its meaning glaringly obvious. Then he heard another word, “ Donna ,” over and over—the word shredding his heart. Donna —woman. But—alive? Or—
    He drew on reserves of strength he didn’t know he possessed and heaved back, shoving the cops off of him, then fought his way to the back of the car and looked in.
    She was there.
    Wrapped up inside a sleeping bag, strapped down to the base of the trunk, silver duct tape across her eyes and mouth, her nose and two strips of her cheeks the only visible skin on display.
    She wasn’t moving.
    And next to her, in the right corner of the trunk, a jumble of gray Semtex packs, wires, and a digital detonator with a small red LED indicating that it was armed.
    Reilly didn’t give it a second glance. He reached in and settled his hands softly against Tess’s neck, his thumb brushing against her cheek, looking for a pulse.
    Her head twitched sideways.
    His face flooded with relief. He glanced at the cops next to him, who were watching in silence, dumbstruck—then carefully peeled the tape off Tess’s face, first the strip across her mouth, then the one around her ears and eyes.
    She looked up at him, her eyes brimming with tears of fear and joy, her upper lip trembling.
    It was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

Chapter 9

    M ansoor Zahed glanced into his rearview mirror one last time before he pulled into the driveway. He didn’t spot anything that gave him cause for concern. The house that the agency had rented for him was on a quiet residential street. Curious eyes weren’t a problem, especially given that the small driveway was shielded from the street by tall metal gates.
    He wasn’t planning on sticking around too long. Now that what he’d come for was lying in the foot well of the passenger seat, he thought he was probably done with Rome. The American historian, Simmons, would soon confirm whether or not that was the case. In doing that, Zahed hoped, the man would also figure out what their next destination would be. Zahed’s instincts told him he’d be on the move again soon, leaving the Eternal City behind as just another blood-soaked entry in his infamous—if anonymous—resume.
    He reflected back on his day and felt reasonably satisfied. Things hadn’t gone as smoothly as he’d hoped, but all that mattered was that he was here, he was safe, and he had the codex with him. Mission accomplished , he thought with a small smirk—he just loved that expression and its recently minted, delicious irony. But as he replayed the day’s events in his mind’s eye, his mind kept latching on to the actions of the FBI agent, and he felt a murmur of unease about him. Which wasn’t something Mansoor Zahed was used to. Nor was it something he tolerated.
    The agent had been easy to manipulate. Zahed had managed to lure him to Rome. He’d fooled him into believing he was the spineless scholar Sharafi. He’d pushed enough buttons to get the agent to take him into the deepest recesses of his religion’s inner sanctum. Sean Reilly hadn’t flinched then, and he hadn’t flinched in all that followed. He’d done what was needed of him without hesitation. He’d turned himself into a criminal and ridden roughshod across the very epicenter of his faith without worrying about the