Rise of the Beast: A Novel (The Patmos Conspiracy Book 1) Read Online Free

intended for a Russian oil baron who was experiencing a temporary cash flow crisis. The drop in the price of a barrel of crude oil and the enormous cost of expanding a private army to protect oneself from emboldened enemies took a bite from his capital. Alexander knew firsthand the cost of mercenaries.
    The Gulfstream wasn’t his most expensive or spacious jet, but it had a strategic advantage. Having bought it in the secondary marketthrough a distant company he owned, it was not yet known by friends and enemies that he was the passenger. Anonymous travel was one of the most difficult tasks for a man of his stature and reputation.
    Whenever he traveled anonymously, he took extra precautions, including sending his doppelgänger—the Frenchman bore an incredible resemblance to Alexander—to one of his island properties on the big jet, a beautiful woman or two at his side. Alexander paid the man handsomely but suspected he would volunteer for his assignments without remuneration.
    Still, every time he flew this route in the Gulfstream he was taking the risk of discovery. Only one man in Northwest Arkansas knew his identity—and despite trusting no one, Alexander trusted him.
    It was a crisp late October morning. Alexander’s cashmere camel sport jacket would provide him plenty of protection from the chill. He planned to be back in the air within five or six hours. He told Pauline, his most recent traveling companion, she could shop and do her daily ten-kilometer run—the latter was such a strange obsession—but she was to be back at the jet no later than three p.m. They would eat dinner at Per Se in Midtown and then spend the night at his townhome on the Upper East Side off Park Avenue.
    He could hear the shower in the stateroom turn off. He wasn’t happy that Pauline would not be presentable to see him off, a courtesy that was expected in her role—and it was never good to let hired help think that anything less than excellence was acceptable—but he waved off his irritation for the moment. He had a more important matter on his mind.
    Alexander’s long time pilot dropped the craft into a soft and perfect three-point landing on the runway of the Louise M. Thaden Field of the Bentonville Municipal Airport. Normally they would land at the Northwest Arkansas Airport, but he preferred to be even more cautious and discrete this trip.
    The Gulfstream taxied to a pair of waiting gleaming black Range Rovers and the stairs were quickly lowered.
    “Darling, I’ll be just a second if you can wait,” Pauline called from behind the closed door. “I want to see you off.”
    He ignored her.
    “Jonathan?”
    He paused, irritated again.
    “Jonathan darling?”
    He put on sunglasses and a fedora, and then stepped through the door into the streaming sunshine.
    Pauline had been quite excited about finally being included on a long flight in the Gulfstream. Too bad it will be her last trip with me, he thought. She’s beautiful; a remarkable beauty that stirred bittersweet memories of distant time in his past. She is intelligent. She is charming. But she’s sloppy. You can take the girl out of Belgium, he thought, but you can’t take Belgium out of the girl.
    He would have Klaus, his personal secretary, work with his lawyers to execute their separation agreement. He wondered if she was bright enough to realize how little she was walking away with when she got a tidy little check for a hundred thousand euros. Not bad for a young person just starting out in life. But the sum paled in comparison to the opulent lifestyle she was experiencing by his side. Her modest payout wouldn’t book her two trips on a chartered Gulfstream. He doubted she would have any of the money left by years’ end. Young people had little sense of delayed gratification. They wanted things now. No matter. He liked her but wouldn’t miss her. Not for long. There were more Paulines out there.
    “As is always the case, the flight was a work of art. Such a fine