Leyland jumped to his feet, fury pouring off him. “No. I will not go along with this. We will not be forced into yet another new member, not until Alfie’s papers are located and we can actually read his wishes and reasons.”

Weston met his eyes and asked in a very quiet voice, “Are you calling me a liar, Leyland?”

“I don’t see Alfie nominating Gernot,” Leyland said. Of course Weston was lying. But why? Leyland looked around the room at the faces that seemed content and those that were clearly disturbed. He took a mental count. Something was very wrong here.

He turned back to Weston. He had to stay calm. “You already seem to have a majority vote, Edward. Another few days without a fifteenth member won’t matter and you all know it. We should wait until we actually have the key and the weapon is secured before reworking nearly three centuries of practice.

“Gentlemen, allowing Havelock to join is a mistake, one we will come to regret. Adding Gernot is insanity.”

Leyland was eloquent, damn him. The other members began talking among themselves. Weston threw up his hands. He knew better than to push Leyland further. “Fine, fine. We will wait. But there is one more bit of business. We need a pro tem leader until all fifteen members can meet and vote for a new one.” He cleared his throat. “I am willing to proceed in the role until such time as we can have a clear vote.”

Leyland met Weston’s eye, and barked a short, humorless laugh. “It seems you’ve already taken over, Weston. We’ll see how long that lasts.”

He stalked out of the room, leaving the remaining Order members to look after him.

Weston watched him go, and calculated. Could Havelock safely eliminate Leyland?

He turned back to the group. They looked uncertain. Get them back on board, man, or you might have trouble. While Havelock had been voted in, he still wasn’t a full member and wasn’t supposed to be given the secrets of the Order until that ceremony was complete. But Havelock already knew as much as any of them. Weston had seen to that. He thought briefly of the ten million pounds safe in four different Swiss bank accounts. He thought of the power Havelock promised him once they had Madame Curie’s weapon, once he and Havelock together would decide what to do with it.

He held up his hands. “All will be well, my friends. Leyland is right, these are difficult times for us all. We can table the newest member for the time being, until this crisis has passed,” and he nodded to each of them in turn, now the man in charge, their leader. He fully intended to remain in charge.

—

ON THE STREET BELOW, Oliver Leyland stepped into his waiting Jaguar XJ, slammed the door, and waved for his driver to proceed. He immediately rang one of his oldest friends. Thankfully, Harry Drummond answered on the first ring.

“Harry? It’s Leyland. We have a very serious problem.”

52

Over the Atlantic

8:00 a.m. ET

Nicholas’s fingers hadn’t stopped flying over the keyboard since they’d left Teterboro. Mike had heard him talking to Gray, much of their language too technical for her to get more than the gist.

She’d eaten her fill, then set a steaming cup of coffee and a few muffins at his right hand. He’d eaten and sipped from the coffee absently, never stopping. She’d never seen him coding before; he wasn’t kidding about being in another world.

She was on her second cup of coffee and debating a third when she spotted a report from deep in the FBI files about an organization they’d identified as the Highest Order. What a highfalutin moniker that was.

Then she read on and her heart began a wild hoedown. This was it, she was sure of it. She finished reading the dossier. It was maddeningly brief, but gave her at least some background on who they might be dealing with.

“Nicholas. Take a break. I’ve found something.”

He didn’t miss a beat. “Is it important? I’ve only a few minutes left here until Gray and I are done.”

“Stop, now. You need to hear this.”

He stood, stretched, and actually focused on her now. “Ah, that’s better. I’m very close here. What’s your news?”

“It’s a dossier, prepared about seven years ago about a group called the Highest Order. I think this is who we’re looking for. These are the fifteen men from Pearce’s files.”

“The Highest Order?”

She nodded. “The information was lifted off the computer of a diplomat who visited the U.S. with a British delegation a decade ago. It’s incomplete, but at least we can get an idea of what we might be up against.”

He stood over her, hands braced against the ceiling of the fuselage. “Rather rude to invade the computers of a foreign delegate. Is that common practice? And how’d you do it?”

“The easy way. The Brit logged in to an unsecured wireless network in his hotel, and welcomed us right in. But no, this isn’t common practice. He must have been under surveillance and tracking software was put on his computer.”

“Who was the diplomat?”

“Well, he’s dead now. Callum Chatterton was his name. They were here to speak at the UN. He worked as a researcher in the office of Stuart Niles.”

Nicholas whistled. “Stuart Niles is now a leading member of Parliament, and would have your heads if he knew his people had been spied upon.”

“But he didn’t know. This is from the dossier: ‘The Highest Order was formed in 1714 before the death of Queen Anne by a small group of powerful Englishmen and Germans who did not want to see the son of the deposed James the Second make a grab for the crown when the crown should rightfully go to the Hanoverians because of the standing law forbidding Catholics to rule England, thus taking away the risk that England would again be plunged into bloody religious persecution. Through their efforts, the Jacobites were defeated in the rebellion of 1715 and the Hanoverian George the First was crowned king of England.

‘The Highest Order’s goal immediately shifted to stand as protectors of England’s supremacy. They were successful in maintaining England’s stability during all the revolutionary unrest throughout Europe in the mid–nineteenth century, an extraordinary accomplishment. They were succeeding admirably until the onset of World War One, which they fought to prevent but failed due to the extreme fanaticism of Kaiser Wilhelm the Second.

‘After the Great War, the group expanded to include members from America, and in the seventies and eighties, they added Israel, representatives from the Middle East, India, Russia, and China.

‘The members themselves are in positions of power in their respective countries, and are incredibly wealthy. They quietly effect change in their individual countries by open communication with other Order members, and exacting influence and pressure in the appropriate quarters.

‘Today, the Highest Order remains a small but powerful multinational group of fifteen high-powered men whose primary goal is to maintain the safety and security of the world by helping countries avoid wars and other destabilizing events.

‘In the beginning of the twenty-first century, however, it became obvious that a new element began to make inroads into the Order. Questionable actions were taken, deals were struck with questionable allies. They should be watched to ensure they don’t use their power to subvert the peaceful objectives of the Order.’”

She looked up. “They sound like something like the Trilateral Commission.”

He nodded. “And different as well, since the Trilateral Commission is a more public group and their actions are both well documented and incredibly controversial.”

Mike was nodding. “But like this Highest Order, the commission is also a consortium of influential leaders who work together to help the world stay safe.