The Sacred Cipher by Terry Brennan Page A

stepped to the chair, and wearily
     lowered himself into its embrace. “Maybe, some other day, if you really want to continue
     this fight—if you still feel compelled to defend a man who abused your good faith—then
     we can go back and revisit that time. I did what I had to do, what I was trained to
     do. Swinton deserved to be caught and convicted, judged, not murdered. You? I can’t
     judge you. Only you can judge yourself, judge your motives. But I can’t judge you.”
    Bohannon took a deep breath. The next move was Johnson’s. He could sit down, or he
     could pick up the phone and call the muscle with the gun at the front door.
    More ashen, less confident, Johnson edged himself back to the sofa. He fell into the
     well-worn leather like a wet sack of sand.
    Johnson folded his hands together, stared at his knuckles. “There were times I wanted
     to kill you, have somebody kill you.” The voice was dark, a far distance from where
     they sat. “And there were times when I thought I could have killed Randall myself.”
    Surprisingly to Bohannon, he began to feel sorry for this man, publicly betrayed by
     a friend he had trusted.
    Johnson’s eyes didn’t move from his knuckles. “I wanted you to be wrong. God, how
     I wanted you to be wrong. Randall kept assuring me these were vicious lies. Even after
     his bogus sales had been revealed, he was passionate about his innocence and certain
     of your ‘collusion,’ he called it, with these scalawags who were determined to swindle
     him and send him to jail. You were the basest of scoundrels, Mr. Bohannon, so easy
     to hate.”
    Both of them jumped when the phone rang. Bohannon was trying to coax his heart from
     his throat as Johnson reached for the handset. “Yes? . . . yes, Beth,” Johnson said,
     looking across at Bohannon. “I’m fine. Yes, you may go home. Thank you . . . yes,
     I’ll see you in the morning. Good night.”
    Stillness settled.
    Finally, Johnson pushed himself up from the corner of the sofa to its edge. “I appreciate
     your courage in coming here. And I even appreciate your candor about what was, at
     that time, a very passionate topic for both of us. You were doing your job; I can
     accept that. And Randall was a crook. I can accept that, too. But he had also been
     a close, personal friend for many years,” Johnson said, sitting back again, wearily
     draping one leg over the other. “He was wounded, and I was wounded for him. Once you
     and I collided, I was not about to back down. Pride, I’m afraid.”
    Once again, Johnson’s twisted hands absorbed his attention.
    “Still, my friendship with Randall gave me no license to butcher your reputation or,
     more accurately, to attempt to butcher your reputation in public. It was wrong of
     me to descend into the realm of such vindictive persecution. And for that, I ask your
     forgiveness.”
    Momentarily, a silence separated them, a divide neither one of them could cross. Then
     Bohannon finished building the bridge that Johnson had just started.
    “I forgive you,” Bohannon said, standing and reaching out his right hand.
    Johnson rose from the sofa and firmly grasped Bohannon’s hand with his. “Thank you.
     You have lifted a weight that I’ve been carrying far too long.”
    Knowing grimaces gave notice of each man’s disappointments, their clasped hands communicating
     a message of their own. “Don’t thank me too much,” said Bohannon. “You may not be
     as gracious when you see what I’ve brought you.”
    Emitting a sigh, Johnson gestured for Bohannon to sit with him again. “Well, I am
     certainly quite curious about the purpose of your visit, what it is that could have
     coerced you to come searching for me.”
    “First, and I know this may sound ludicrous right now, but first, I need to ask for
     your word of honor that you will reveal to no one what I am about to share with you.
     I need to have certainty in your promise to keep this information confidential.