The Thieves of Darkness by Richard Doetsch Page A

father she never knew, the father who died a criminal. Did he start out like her, eventually becoming the horrible man who left a wife and two daughters to the vagaries of life? She wondered if he had begun as innocent as she; was his heart filled with greed or was he just misguided? And what would time do to her? Would she end up like him, dying in some godforsaken prison or in an alley with a knife in her belly?
    She prayed every night for forgiveness for her moral indiscretions, praying that God would understand her motivation.
    Cindy never had any idea what her sister did. She was too young when it started, thinking that the money was just there, and as time rolled on KC began to fabricate another life, a fictitious tale of a consultant who worked for the European Union giving tours and consulting with the various nations.
    As a result of KC’s efforts, Cindy thrived. She grew up in a loving home, excelled in school, wanted for nothing as they moved to a nice small house outside London. And when the time came, Cindy entered Oxford, KC paying her way. KC couldn’t have been prouder.
    As time moved on and Cindy went off on her own at the age oftwenty-three to pursue a career in business, KC was left alone. The house was empty, she had no education, she had no boyfriend—she had sacrificed it all for her sister. She had no other career opportunity, but she had an expertise, a gift that thrilled her, all the while filling her with remorse. But she knew nothing else.
    She had no regrets. She had set out to raise her sister, to keep them together, a feat that had seemed impossible at the time, but love has a way of motivating, of creating the drive necessary to prevail. KC had become a thief, an excellent thief who was but a whisper on the wind, an unimagined ghost to Scotland Yard and Interpol.
    And of all the things KC was thankful for—for Cindy’s success, for the life they created, that she had never been caught—she was thankful for one thing above all: that Cindy never knew how she did it, that Cindy never found out her sister was a thief.

CHAPTER 6
    Everyone on the jet was asleep. Everyone except for Simon, who stared out the portside window at the eastern horizon, at the sun slowly rising, painting the sky in pastels of purple and pink. It had been his favorite part of the day since he was sixteen. It was a fresh start, the world beginning anew, a reminder that no matter how dark life might get, nothing could stop the light of a new day.
    Simon had grown up within the walls of Vatican City. His mother, a former nun, had been the director in charge of the Vatican Archives, of its history, of its dealings, of its secrets. After enduring a heinous, blasphemous assault at the hands of her estranged husband, she slipped into insanity and took her own life. With his father’s subsequent execution, Simon was left alone in the world at the age of sixteen.
    He had done a stint in the Italian army, purging his anger while becoming skilled in weapons, hand-to-hand combat, and military strategy. Upon his discharge, he returned to the only family he had known: his mother’s friends, the priests and bishops who ran the Holy See, the smallest country in the world. They welcomed him back with the offer of a future. Because of his recently acquired skills and his high degree of intelligence, they proposed he assume his mother’s old job as keeper of the Church’s vast collection of religious artifacts, of its history, and as the protector of its secrets.
    As the plane banked left on its final approach, Simon couldn’t help being overwhelmed as he looked down from the jet’s window on the city of twenty million, a world that had survived crusades, invasions, kings, and sultans to become a metropolis of unending beauty. The early-morning sky was a brilliant orange that provided the perfect contrast to the skyline of minarets and domes whose tips seemingly reached out to heaven.
    Istanbul, Turkey, was the center point of the