‘You can’t allow that to happen, Mr. President,’ objects the colonel. ‘The unborn Gabriel child may represent our only means of accessing the Balam.’

‘Easy, Colonel, let’s give the girl a break. Dominique’s been through a lot over the last few months. It’s her life, her decision, not ours.’

‘Homeland Security has set her up with a new identity,’ Marvin says. ‘She’s living in south Florida under the alias, Andrea Smith. We’ve tried to keep her under twenty-four-hour surveillance.’

The colonel shakes his head. ‘MAJESTIC-12 should be in charge of the girl. Homeland Security has more holes in it than a Swiss cheese factory.’

‘We’ll let them handle it for now,’ Chaney says. ‘Dominique’s in no immediate danger, and locking her up in an underground bunker might negatively impact her decision about keeping the child. Anything else?’

‘Just one last thing,’ Marvin says. ‘In reviewing Julius Gabriel’s journal, I came across a passage that referenced a necromancer.’

‘A who?’

‘A necromancer. Comes from the Greek words necro, meaning death, and mancy, describing divination. A necromancer is one who claims to be able to communicate with the souls of the dead for the purpose of obtaining useful information. A few years prior to his own death, Professor Gabriel sought out the services of a necromancer named Evelyn Strongin, hoping to communicate with his deceased wife, Maria. We’ve been trying to locate Ms. Strongin, hoping she might be able to shed some light on Michael Gabriel’s genetic abilities. Unfortunately, her last reported address was in Peru. We can’t seem to locate any current information about her or her whereabouts.’

Chaney shakes his head. ‘Extraterrestrials. People talking to the dead. Whatever happened to the good ol’ days when all a president had to worry about were economic reforms and war in Iraq.’

4

FEBRUARY 3, 2013: CHICHÉN ITZÁ, YUCATÁN PENINSULA

The beige 2001 Dodge with the dented rear bumper turns off Mexican Route 180, following a local road through the poverty-stricken town of Pisté.

Dominique slows the rental car, her dark eyes scanning the dilapidated stucco homes lining the roadway. The village is just like a thousand others located throughout Central America along the ‘Maya Route,’ a 120,000-square-mile area stretching east from the Isthmus of Tehuantepec through the Yucatán Peninsula, extending into Belize, Guatemala, and parts of Honduras and El Salvador.

A thousand years ago, the Maya were the dominant civilization in all Central America. Unable to rise against their Spanish oppressors, the Indians were left behind, their decreasing crops unable to compete in the marketplace. The culture is still very much alive, but the Maya are at the bottom rung of society’s ladder.

Dominique’s maternal ancestors were Yucatec—direct descendants of the Maya, and she bears the dark complexion and sculpted cheekbones of her people.