by Lori Wilde
“The Minotaur?”
Ahmose gave her a humorless smile. “I know this is not solid proof of their involvement in the Minoan Order, but collectively, these things make one wonder. That and the fact their mother was kicked out of Egypt fifteen years ago for performing a Minoan Order ritual at an excavation site.”
No. Cassie couldn’t buy into what Ahmose was telling her.
Could she say she trusted Harrison enough to side with him over a high-ranking member of the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities? Could she so easily dismiss the possibility that Harry was not everything he seemed to be?
“For the sake of argument, say your suspicions are correct. None of that explains why Harrison and Adam would steal the amulet halves from the Kimbell instead of just taking them from the dig sites when they discovered them,” she argued.
“You obviously don’t understand how excavations work in countries like Egypt and Greece who’ve had antiquities pillaged for centuries. They’re very sensitive about it.”
“Please,” she said. “Explain it to me.”
Ahmose seemed endlessly patient, unlike Phyllis, who kept scowling deeply at her and pacing the carpet.
“There are armed guards at the sites. There’s a great deal of paperwork, and everything must be approved and supervised by many people and recorded in many places. The Ministry of Antiquities takes immediate possession. It is very difficult to steal something, either at an excavation site or in the country of origin. The best opportunities for thieves occur when the artifacts are loaned to museums outside their homeland.”
“Oh,” she said.
“Then there is the political element,” Ahmose continued. “One-half of the amulet was found in Egypt, the other in Greece. Neither country was willing to allow the other country access to their half of the amulet. In pieces, the amulet is useless to the Minoan Order. It is only through reunification that they can regain their long-lost secrets.”
“Why didn’t you come forward last night when the amulet first disappeared? Why didn’t you call the police then?”
“For one thing, I do not trust the authorities in your country, and alas, I had no hard evidence against Dr. Standish. But that’s where you come in.”
“So what’s the bottom line?” Cassie nervously drummed her fingernails on Phyllis’s desk until the curator shot her a quelling glance.
“We need more evidence before we connect Dr. Standish to either the thefts or the Minoan Order. We want you to get very close to him. Gain his trust. If he thinks you are a fool, his guard will be down,” Ahmose said. “It should not be so difficult for a beautiful woman like you.”
“I don’t know. It’s underhanded. Sneaky.”
“Your hesitation is understandable.”
“I just need a little more time to think this through.”
“Bullshit.” Phyllis splayed both palms against her desk. “You want me to lay it on the line for you, Cooper? Here are your choices. Cooperate with us, and you’ll get your dream job at the Smithsonian. Or side with Standish, and end up imprisoned for stealing priceless relics.”
CHAPTER 14
Harrison couldn’t help fretting as he drove to Ambassador Grayfield’s mansion in Westover Hills. Why had Phyllis called Cassie at six-thirty in the morning? Had he made a serious error in judgment by letting her go see the curator alone?
It had seemed to make sense to split up. They were running short on time and needed to cover as many bases as possible, but in retrospect it might not have been such a hot idea.
One persistent question circled his brain. What if Cassie cracked and ratted him out? How much did he really trust her? After all, trust wasn’t his greatest virtue.
He arrived at Tom Grayfield’s front gate, entered the security code at the call box, and the gate swung open. He had expected to speak with the housekeeping staff, to see if anyone had seen or heard from Adam, but he was surprised to find Tom’s personal chauffeur, Anthony Korba, puffing a cigarette on the back porch.
The minute Anthony spotted him coming up the driveway, he crushed the cigarette out beneath his heel. “Harrison,” he greeted and smiled broadly. “It’s good to see you again. It’s been a long time. No?”
“A long time, yes,” Harrison said and embraced the man who used to drive him and Adam to and from the Athens airport whenever they visited Tom on holiday.
“You look good.” Anthony sized him up.
“So do you. Is Tom here?”
Anthony nodded. “He came into town for the museum exhibit, and he’s been invited to an event in Austin at the governor’s mansion later today.”
“Tom was at the museum for the exhibit? I didn’t see him there.”
“No, no.” Anthony shook his head. “Plane delay.”
“Harrison, how are you?” Tom’s rich voice greeted him like a warm hug as he stepped out onto the back porch. “Don’t stand on the stoop gossiping with the help, come in, come in.”
“Hello, Tom.” Harrison followed him into the house. Tom clapped him enthusiastically on the back. Over the years, the ambassador had been very generous to him, at times even assuming a surrogate father role.
“Let’s go to my study.” Tom led the way through the foyer, to the great hall, and on into his study. The lavish room was filled with expensive leather furniture, lots of animal trophies, and the finest aged scotch and Cuban cigars.
It had been several years since Harrison had visited the mansion, but not much had changed. He’d always felt uncomfortable in this house. It was too big, too ornate, too filled with dead things.
“Have a seat.” Tom nodded at a chair and seated himself on the corner of his desk, fishing a Cuban from the humidor. “How’ve you been?”
“I’m doing great. How about you? How’s the ambassador business?”
Tom laughed and waved a hand at his surroundings. His gold signet ring flashed in the light. “Obviously, I can’t complain.”
Harrison plunked himself down. A bull moose stared accusingly at him from the opposite wall.
“I did hear through the grapevine that you and Adam had decided to drag out the reunification ceremony with a little murder mystery theater concept. Good advertising ploy.” Grayfield nodded and clipped the end off his cigar with special gold-handled scissors. “I’m guessing it was Adam’s idea. He is gifted when it comes to bullshit. Takes after his old man.”
“There’s no murder mystery theater. It was a desperate stall tactic on my part.” Harrison wondered exactly how much to reveal about Adam’s disappearance. He didn’t want to upset Tom unduly, but then again, if his son was in trouble, the man had every right to know what was going on.
“Oh?” Tom flicked his Zippo, lit the cigar, took a long puff, and then blew a smoke ring. “Why’s that?”
He decided to tell him. Maybe Tom could help. “Adam never showed up at the Kimbell with Solen.”
“What?” Tom groaned. “Don’t tell me that kid is up to his old tricks.”
“You haven’t heard from him either?”
“No.”
This had gone beyond pranks and publicity stuff. How could his brother just vanish into thin air? This was serious. “Adam didn’t know you were coming into town for the exhibit?”
“It was last-minute. Wasn’t sure I could make it in time, and as it turns out, I didn’t. My plane was delayed. There were storms over the Atlantic.”
Harrison shifted in his seat and clutched the leather armrests with both hands. He thought of his brother. Of the underlying tension that had always existed between them. He had a sudden urge to start over, to absolve Adam. For having a father, for stealing Jessica, for being the fun, charismatic one.
Desperately, he wished his brother was in the room so he could apologize for having been so judgmental and withdrawn over the years. For not being the kind of big brother he should have been. He wanted to ask for a second chance. He didn’t know if forgiveness was even possible now.
He felt despondent and somehow responsibl
e.
If anything had happened to Adam, he didn’t know how he was going to live with himself.
Tom studied Harrison’s face. “Adam left you high and dry again.”
“I really think this time is different. I have a gut feeling that he’s in real trouble.”
“I respect your concern, but let’s not beat around the bush, Harrison. You’re not a guy who’s real in touch with his gut feelings. No offense.”
“None taken.”
Tom was right. What could he say? He’d been trained to shun his feelings in favor of logic. Anyone who knew Diana knew that. Except the training hadn’t taken with Adam.
“Have you told your mother?”
Harrison shook his head.
Tom smiled. He loved being one up on Diana. “So you came to me first.”
“Adam wouldn’t want me to involve Mom unless I had no other choice.”
“Wise move. No one wants an ass-chewing from Diana.” Grayfield uncocked his leg and walked to the wet bar in the corner. “What makes you think Adam is in trouble?”
He poured himself a scotch. Drinking at seven-thirty in the morning? Tom must have noticed the look because he said defensively, “It’s late afternoon in Greece.”
Harrison ignored that comment and instead answered the question. “I can’t reach him on his cell phone. I’ve left a dozen messages, and he’s not calling me back. I’m really starting to get worried.”
“Sounds like same old same old with Adam to me.”
Harrison drew in a deep breath. “Okay. I didn’t want to alarm you, but here’s the whole story.” Then, blow by blow, he told Tom everything that had transpired the previous evening.
Tom took a long pull of his drink. “Let’s give Adam the benefit of the doubt, not that he deserves it, and we’ll say that there is someone after him. What’s your theory?”
“I was thinking he got in deep to loan sharks again. Maybe he gambled the money he borrowed to finance the Solen dig.”
Tom shook his head. “Nope.”
“Why not? It’s happened before.”
“Because I gave him the money this time.”
Harrison was surprised. Adam had never taken Tom’s money for a dig. He didn’t like having to do things Tom’s way. “Mind my asking why?”
The ambassador grinned. “Because of you.”
“Me?”
“Couldn’t let you take all the glory. Particularly after you found Kiya; that really fanned Adam’s competitive streak. Why do you think I was trying to make it to this exhibit?”
“To see Adam show me up?”
Tom looked like a proud father for all of two seconds. “But once again, the kid let me down.”
Conflicting emotions surged in Harrison. Feelings he used to be able to beat back, ignore. But ever since he had started hanging out with Cassie, he was having a harder and harder time suppressing his feelings.
“You’re overanalyzing things again.” Tom polished off his drink and got up. He came over to clamp a hand on Harrison’s shoulder, his signet ring digging uncomfortably into his skin. “Don’t worry. Adam will turn up. Always does. And usually with a very tall tale to tell.”
Harrison started to ask if Tom knew that Adam had decoded the Minoan hieroglyphics, but he held his tongue. It was Adam’s news to break to his father. Especially since Tom was such a Minoan Order buff. It was as big a deal as finding Solen. And for some strange reason, talking about it felt like admitting he might never see his brother again.
“I’m sure you’re probably right,” Harrison said, wanting to believe Tom’s reassurances but deeply concerned that they weren’t true. He got up to leave.
“If you hear from Adam, please tell him to call me. As much as he antagonizes me, I do love my son.”
The minute Cassie left Phyllis’s office, she phoned David, her brother-in-law with the FBI.
“Hey, Cass, how’s my favorite sister-in-law?”
“I’m your only sister-in-law, David.”
He laughed. “You’re still my favorite.”
“Flatterer.”
“What’s up?”
“I need a favor.”
“For you? Anything.”
“Run a background check on someone.”
“Cassie, you aren’t in any trouble, are you?” She could hear David rapping a pencil against something.
“Keyed up, Dave?”
“I’m always keyed up. It’s dead around here. But stop avoiding the question. Are you in trouble?”
“No. Not really.”
“Not really? I don’t like the sound of that.”
“Will you just do this for me and not ask a lot of questions, please?”
“Come on, don’t make me promise that. I ask questions. It’s my job.”
“I thought you said you would do anything for me.”
He sighed. “All right. Give me the details.”
“He’s an archaeologist named Harrison Standish. Someone in the Egyptian government just gave me bad news about him, and I want to know if it’s true.”
“What’s the deal?”
“This Egyptian official suspects Harrison of being a member of the Minoan Order. You ever heard of them?”
“Yeah, and they’re bad news.”
“So the Minoan Order really exists?”
“Unfortunately, yes. Honey, I’ve got just one piece of advice. Run, don’t walk, away from this guy. Why take the chance?”
“I can’t walk away.”
“Somehow I knew you were going to say that. You want to tell me why you need to know this?”
“I can’t talk about it. Not now.”
“All right,” he said. “I’ll look into it. In the meantime, if you get into any trouble, you call me. I’m a three-and-a-half-hour plane ride away.”
“Thanks, David. I really appreciate it.”
“No problem, kiddo.”
“Um, there’s just one other thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Please don’t tell Maddie. She’ll just think this is Duane Armstrong all over again.”
Over at the warehouse, the mummy finally found his sarcophagus.
He’d spent the night gathering his strength, trying fruitlessly to recover his memory, and sawing the duct tape off his wrists with the sheet metal. He’d sliced his wrists to ribbons, but he didn’t care. He had to get out of here before his captors returned to torment him anew.
And he had to find Kiya.
The men had hidden his sarcophagus behind a tall stack of corrugated tin sheet metal. Because he had been forced to make concessions for the piercing pain between his shoulder blades, it had taken him more than three hours to crawl his way around the warehouse looking for an escape route. His initial intent had been to grapple enough sheet metal over to the window and stack it high enough to reach the ledge.
Rationally, he had known that wouldn’t work, that the sheets of metal were too large and unwieldy for him to handle. But he had no other plan, so he’d clung desperately to his illusion.
And then, when he was wrangling the metal, he’d discovered the sarcophagus.
A pleasant surprise.
If he could drag his ornate coffin to the window, it would make a much more effective ladder than sharp-edged, slippery, flat pieces of tin.
The unpleasant surprise came when he tried to move the damned thing. With his diminished strength, it wouldn’t budge more than a few inches at a time. He sat panting on the floor and staring at the sarcophagus, his lungs almost bursting from the strain.
Kiya. He had to rescue Kiya. Had to get to her before Nebamun discovered his secret scroll.
He did not know where the thought about the scroll sprang from or what it meant. He closed his eyes and tried to concentrate.
Think.
A fleeting wisp of memory floated. Just out of reach.
Come on, come on.
In an instant the ephemeral remembrance was gone. And yet he could not shake the feeling of impendin
g doom winding its way around his heart.
Why couldn’t he remember?
Just get out of here. You can worry about your recall later. Out. Out. Out.
Get to Kiya.
He braced himself against the floor with his hands, bent his knees, and used his feet to push the sarcophagus forward through the narrow lane between the tall stacks of sheet metal. This time he moved it three inches instead of one.
Never mind the ripping sensation in his shoulder blades. He had to get out of here. The mummy wriggled forward on his butt, cocked his legs against the coffin, and shoved again.
And again.
And again.
And again.
An hour later, the sarcophagus was positioned beneath the window, a springboard to the world outside his warehouse prison.
He almost giggled. He felt that giddy. Grasping the gilded faceplate with both hands, he hauled his trembling body up onto the coffin. Once he reached that small four-foot summit, he lay resting, head tilted upward as he studied the window.
Sweet freedom.
He could almost taste it.
Except the window was still several more feet above the top of the sarcophagus. He stood on tiptoe, rested his chest against the cool wall, and stretched for the window ledge.
His fingers were just millimeters short of it. He was going to have to use the sheet metal after all. That meant climbing down, hoisting those hunks of sharp unfinished metal onto his raw, aching back, and dragging them across the warehouse space many, many times.
The wound in his back was already a boiling cauldron of pain.
He felt like crying. He clenched his teeth to stay the tears stinging the back of his eyelids. He’d never felt so alone, so empty, so hopeless.
At least not that he could recall. He had a hard time remembering.
To hell with self-pity. Get off your ass and get moving.
He didn’t know where the tough inner voice came from, but it galvanized him. He slid off the sarcophagus, steeled his mind, and set off again.
Hours later, he was back atop the sarcophagus with a stack of sheet metal draped over the top and dipping over onto the floor. It was enough to boost him an extra foot if he didn’t slip off his precarious perch.
This time when he reached for it, his fingers found the ledge. Now all he had to do was drag his body weight up to the window.