Sands of Time (Out of Time #6)

by Monique Martin

  Simon didn’t say anything. What was the man up to?

  The manager looked nervously between Simon and Jouvet. “Do you want—”

  Jouvet raised his hand to silence the man. “It is a private matter. But thank you for your assistance, Monsieur Taylor. You may return to your work.”

  The manager hesitated, but bowed and hurried off again.

  Simon, his chest still heaving from his efforts, glared at Jouvet.

  “Despite your…feelings,” Jouvet said as he smoothed his jacket down. “I would never do anything to harm a woman. Especially—”

  Simon clenched his jaw and his fist, but Jack stepped in again.

  “Better stop while you’re ahead, pal,” Jack advised him.

  Jouvet cocked his head to the side and looked back into Simon’s eyes. He raised a hand in surrender and nodded with a small smile.

  Jouvet was damned lucky Jack was there. The rage that had built up inside Simon had only partially been sated. He would have happily wiped that smug smile off the man’s face with his fist.

  “Come on,” Jack said, tugging on Simon’s arm.

  Reluctantly, Simon let Jack pull him away.

  “I am happy she was unharmed,” Jouvet called out to him.

  Simon paused for a moment, clenched his jaw, and then kept walking.

  ~ ~ ~

  Elizabeth checked her pillows, again, before piling them up behind her against the headboard. She smoothed out the blanket. Any wrinkles or rumples looked too much like hidden snakes. Not that there were any snakes in the room. She and Diana had given it a thorough going over, something Simon had repeated when he’d returned from his errand.

  He’d calmed considerably since then, but the tension in his jaw and shoulders was still noticeable as he took off his robe.

  He reached to turn off the lamp on the end table.

  “Would you mind? Just for a while?” she asked, looking meaningfully at the light.

  He smiled, a little sadly, and shook his head. “Of course not.”

  He pulled back the covers and climbed into bed. Leaning closer, he kissed her temple before shifting his pillows to sit against the headboard with her.

  He folded the sheet down around his waist and smoothed it with his hands. The ice had done its job; the knuckles of his right hand looked almost normal.

  Elizabeth felt a pang of guilt. She should have stopped him. Jouvet hadn’t deserved his anger, not all of it anyway. She reached out and let her fingers trace the strong contours of Simon’s hand.

  “Why do you think Hen—Jouvet didn’t want the manager to call the police?” Elizabeth asked.

  Simon turned his hand over and held hers. “I don’t know. Perhaps he and Vale don’t want the police poking around. Might stumble onto something.”

  Elizabeth hadn’t thought of that. “Maybe.”

  Simon sighed. “It was a mistake. Don’t get me wrong,” he amended quickly. “It felt incredibly good to hit him, but I’m afraid it might have been short-sighted.”

  Elizabeth knew what he meant. “We need him to get into the tomb.”

  Simon nodded. “As much as I hate to admit it, yes.”

  Elizabeth shifted toward him. “Jack said he looked surprised at the whole snake thing and he didn’t call the cops. Maybe he’ll look past it, if…”

  Simon closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the headboard. “If you ask him.” He turned his head toward her. “There are not enough words to express to you how much I hate that.”

  Elizabeth smiled and kissed him.

  He grunted again, and tried to hide his smile. “That helps a little.”

  “Just a little?” she said.

  He leaned toward her, one hand on the back of her neck as he guided her into a deeper kiss. Elizabeth’s heart sped up the way it always did when he touched her.

  After a lingering moment, he pulled back and smiled. “More than a little.”

  Elizabeth nestled into his shoulder and he put his arm around her.

  “Do you think she can really talk to the dead?” Elizabeth asked.

  She could feel Simon’s body move as he shifted to look down at her. “Vale? I doubt it. Once an impostor, always an impostor.”

  “I don’t know.” Elizabeth tilted her head to look up at Simon. “She knows things.”

  “Nearly all of which can be explained without witchcraft.”

  He sounded so sure. Elizabeth wished she shared his certainty. “Why does she keep bringing up children?”

  Simon’s hand slid down to her arm and urged her to sit up. He looked at her with his Most Serious Face. “It’s part of her act, Elizabeth. She finds weaknesses in people and exploits them.”

  “How does she know that’s mine?”

  “Ours,” Simon said, brushing his knuckles along her cheek. “She’s observant, clever,” he added reluctantly. “Too clever. But there’s no evidence she has any supernatural powers or can speak to the dead the way—”

  “Old Nan did?”

  Simon paused and then nodded. “Yes.”

  Elizabeth settled back against Simon, laying her arm across his bare chest. She let the strong steady beat of his heart soothe her for a moment.

  “You know when I thought I’d been bitten,” she said, “I expected my life to flash in front of my eyes. Like in the movies.”

  Simon’s hand covered hers.

  “I guess it did in a way, just not the way I thought it would,” she continued. “I saw everything I haven’t done yet.”

  Simon lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it.

  Elizabeth remembered the moment, a future life passing by in an instant. “Did you know, I’ve never been to the top of the Eiffel tower?”

  She felt and heard Simon’s laugh. “We can easily remedy that, darling.”

  She smiled against his chest. “It all flashed by so quickly. Going to the Super Bowl, seeing Yellowstone, taking little Charlotte to school…”

  “What?”

  Elizabeth laughed, a little embarrassed. “When we were first in New York, I sort of fantasized about us having a family. And well, Charlie sort of brought us together…”

  She tilted her head up briefly to see Simon’s expression, but it was enigmatic.

  She knew they both wanted children someday. They’d talked about it in Natchez. But talking about it in theory and giving future children actual names were different things. Not that she was ready to have a child yet, but the image had been clear, so real in her mind.

  “Anyway,” she said, resting her head back on his chest. “It just surprised me.”

  Simon’s fingers gently touched her hair. “Things to look forward to.”

  Elizabeth nodded. They were. She stifled a yawn.

  “Best to get some sleep if you can,” Simon said. “Who knows what excitement tomorrow will bring.”

  “You can shut off the light now, if you want.”

  Simon turned the switch and the room fell into darkness. He lay down and Elizabeth repositioned herself in his arms. She’d thought she wouldn’t be able to sleep, but felt the weight of it coming on. Simon would stay up worrying, she knew, possibly all night.

  Her head felt heavier as she sank into sleep. Just on the edge of consciousness, she heard Simon’s voice. Just a whisper in the dark.

  “Charlotte.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Simon tried to enjoy the brief, peaceful, twenty-minute carriage ride from the hotel to the party. He knew that once they arrived, the relative safety they’d enjoyed during the day, where they’d lingered close to home at the hotel, would be lost in the darkness and the crowd of the Winter Garden’s Karnak Gala.

  He really would rather have stayed at the hotel and skipped this altogether, but Elizabeth had convinced him otherwise. She’d been right, of course, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

  “It won’t be so bad,” Elizabeth said next to him.

  He looked down at her with a curious frown. “Reading minds now?”


  She smiled. “You were grinding your teeth.”

  She squeezed his arm and moved a little closer to him. “Just look at how beautiful it is,” she said, gazing out of the open air carriage.

  The Nile stretched out beside them, the moon reflecting off the smooth, glassy surface. A single felucca drifted on a gentle night wind just off the far bank. It was beautiful. Under different circumstances, he would have been happy to enjoy the beauty of Egypt, the pleasure of simply being with his wife, here, now, but not tonight.

  Between the what had been and the what was yet to come, Simon couldn’t allow himself to relax. When they were home, when the job was done, when she was safe, then, he would rest.

  The line of carriages slowed as they turned east away from the river and toward Karnak, a building complex of temples built over the course of 1500 years. Their carriage pulled to a stop at the edge of the massive compound.

  Ahead of them, dozens of guests in black-tie walked up the long processional way toward the immense first pylon that served as the portal to the temples inside. Fires from small braziers flickered in front of the two dozen ram-headed sphinxes that lined either side of the pathway.

  Simon handed the attendant their tickets and they passed into the Temple of Amun. Most of the great courtyard was in ruins, only a bit of columns, badly damaged statues, and crumbling walls remained.

  Music from a small orchestra drifted toward them from somewhere deep inside the complex where the party proper was taking place. Reluctantly, Simon continued on toward it.

  Two torches marked the next gateway at the second pylon; beyond that was the Hypostyle Hall and its gigantic columns. Whiteside had said in his pre-party lecture that there were 134 columns in the hall, some measuring as tall as 70 feet and nearly 30 feet around. The ceiling they’d supported was gone and the moon shone down into the temple, the tall columns casting long, dark shadows across the floor.

  “It’s like a forest,” Elizabeth whispered as she looked up at the imposing columns. “Some eerie, stone forest.”

  It was an apt and unnerving simile and Simon quickened their pace through it and into the next courtyard where a lone remaining obelisk stood sentinel in the dark.

  They made their way through the rest of the temple and followed the crowd toward the main party, emerging from the buildings into the middle of a European gala. White linen-covered tables and several bars lined the grounds above a brackish, man-made lake. Tall palm trees and dozens of torches marked the perimeter of the open courtyard where the gala was in full swing.

  A waiter, making the rounds with a tray of champagne, paused in front of them. Simon declined and scanned the crowd for the reason they’d come. The sooner he could get this over with, the better.

  “Over there,” Elizabeth said.

  Simon grunted and rolled his shoulders. Standing in a small crowd was Jouvet, laughing with them and regaling them with some ridiculous story, no doubt.

  Elizabeth grinned at him, amused by the situation, but her smile faded and she grew serious as she saw the distinct lack of humor in Simon’s expression. “I can talk to him,” she offered.

  Simon sighed, resigned to his fate. “No. I should be the one.” He tugged on his cuffs and then held out his arm for Elizabeth. “Let’s get this over with.”

  Jouvet’s smile at seeing Elizabeth lost its luster as he noticed Simon by her side. He regained his composure quickly and raised a hand in front of him in dramatic mock surrender. “I do hope we are not in for another round, Monsieur Cross. I am one handed,” he said, holding up his champagne glass.

  “Jouvet.”

  Jouvet nodded his head slightly and turned to Elizabeth. “I am so pleased to see that you appear to be in fine health,” he said, letting his eyes linger long enough to make the vein in Simon’s temple throb. “After your…unpleasant experience.”

  “I am,” Elizabeth said with a warm smile. “Thank you.”

  Jouvet bowed slightly and then turned back to Simon. He straightened his shoulders and lifted his chin in an imperious and maddeningly French way, as he made a show of waiting for Simon to speak.

  Simon cleared his throat. “It appears,” Simon said. “That I owe you something of an apology.”

  He had hoped that Jouvet might have picked it up from there, but, Jouvet cocked an eyebrow and waited, more than content to watch Simon squirm a little.

  “I won’t lie and say that it wasn’t satisfying—”

  “Simon,” Elizabeth cautioned under her breath.

  “But I’ve since learned that it wasn’t entirely deserved,” Simon continued. Jouvet’s expression was bland and unappeased. “I acted hastily, and quite rudely. I can only say in my defense that I love my wife. However, I realize that does not excuse my behavior. And for that, I am truly sorry.”

  It took all the strength he had to muster, but Simon held out his hand. “I hope you will accept my most sincere apologies, Monsieur Jouvet.”

  The damn Frenchman let him stand there hand out for a long moment, before stepping forward and shaking it. With a broad smile, played to the crowd of onlookers, he said, “If I had your wife, I would have probably thrown me into the Nile by now. Hmm?”

  Simon managed to force what might pass as an amiable smile on his face as he imagined doing just that. “Very gracious.”

  “Now,” Jouvet said, in full command of the moment. “You will join us tomorrow for the opening of the chamber, yes? I am quite curious to see what treasures await us.”

  “As am I,” Simon said.

  “Very good. Ah, Lord Carnarvon,” Jouvet said, seeing the tall man arrive with a wake of lackeys and admirers. “You will excuse me?”

  Simon did, happily, and let out a sigh of relief as Jouvet hurried over to glad-hand the new arrival.

  Elizabeth nudged him once they were alone again. “See? That wasn’t so bad.”

  “I think I’m bleeding internally.”

  Her laughter was a welcome salve to his bruised ego. As was the glass of champagne she held out. “Have a drink. You’ve earned it.”

  Simon took her up on the offer and had to admit the champagne did help wash away the sour taste of the crow he’d just eaten.

  Elizabeth stepped forward and placed one hand on his chest. “Better?”

  He nodded. She smiled and then looked wistfully out at the torches and moon reflecting off the sacred lake and the fairy lights flickering in the palm trees. He knew she didn’t want to go back to the hotel, and that she’d humored him by staying in most of the day.

  “I suppose we could stay for a bit,” Simon said. “Try to enjoy ourselves.”

  Elizabeth turned back, her smile broad and beautiful. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Jack scanned the carvings on the outside of one of the temples at Karnak. “History has always been written by the winners, I guess.” Having seen some rather interesting history himself, he knew just how much was left out of the official records.

  “It’s the ritual massacre of the vanquished,” Diana said, leaning in to get a closer look at the reliefs on the temple wall. “The kings’ military exploits are carved all along here. Some right on top of the others.”

  “Literally rewriting history,” Jack said.

  Diana smiled. “Exactly. Not that anyone would do such a thing today,” she added with a wink. “One of the spoils of war.”

  Diana took a sip of her champagne and continued walking along the perimeter. Jack followed her, enjoying the view of her wearing a filmy dress instead of her more practical, mannish clothes. She should do that more often, he thought, knowing just what she’d say to him if he ever voiced that opinion. And somehow he found that even more appealing than the dress.

  Jack nursed the same drink he’d gotten when they’d arrived at the gala and caught up with her. As much as he’d like nothing more than to enjoy the party and a private after party with Diana, he had to stay alert. If Katherine Vale was as nutty as Elizabeth said she was, and
Jack had no reason to doubt her, there wasn’t going to be any downtime from here on out. It wasn’t just his life on the line, but hers and Simon’s as well. Vale had a personal grudge against them and that made people reckless, unpredictable, and very, very dangerous.

  Never let your guard down, had been one of the basic rules of his training. That one moment when you think you’re safe, where you light that cigarette you’ve been craving, that’s when the bullet with your name on it finds you. He’d seen it happen more times than he cared to count. And it was not going to happen here.

  “These are the Hittites, I think,” Diana said, her fingers gently tracing a relief.

  Jack asked her questions, and listened to her answers, but his attention was really focused on a movement in the shadows, a change in the tenor of someone’s voice, a man with his hat on and eyes cast down…”What the hell?”

  Jack touched Diana’s arm to get her attention. “Isn’t that—?”

  Her expression darkened. “Nico. That little weasel. What’s he doing here?”

  The last time they’d seen Nico was in the marketplace in Cairo. Seeing him here was a hell of a coincidence and Jack didn’t like coincidence. Coincidence wasn’t happenstance, it was a pattern he’d failed to see. And that meant surprises, and this kind didn’t end with a naked girl popping out of a cake.

  Nico tugged down on the brim of his hat and disappeared around a corner. Silently, Jack and Diana followed. Nico hurried along the edge of the walls of the main gate, and looked around cautiously, before stepping inside the wall. Or at least that’s what it looked like. As they arrived at the spot, Jack saw that there was a hidden doorway and narrow stairs.

  Diana glanced at him briefly before starting toward the stairs. He reached out and gripped her arm, and then nodded that he should go first. Diana frowned, rolled her eyes and kept going. He wasn’t sure whether to feel impressed or emasculated. He settled on a little of both and followed close behind.

  The inner section of the rough stone stairwell was pitch black. They had to feel their way along toward the spot of moonlight sixty feet away at the top. As they neared the end of the stairs and the opening to the rooftop, Jack could hear voices—Nico’s and one he didn’t recognize.