by Cherry Adair
The wall before them—a hundred feet high, by that and more wide—was a solid sheet of gleaming hammered gold. Bas-relief gods and goddesses, birds and soldiers, sparkled with jewels and semiprecious stones. In the very center, about halfway up, a twenty-foot-tall couple stood, hands clasped as they looked over the vast chamber.
The carving was more three-dimensional than everything else on the wall, and so lifelike Isis wouldn’t have been surprised if they stepped down off the wall where they had stood joined together for thousands of years. Wearing the royal raiments of Isis and Osiris, they were surrounded by the sun god Ra and the seven venomous scorpions.
Isis brought Thorne’s hand, clasped in hers, to her heart, and swallowed a lump in her throat. “Cleo and Mark.”
Bittersweet tears welled, making the gold wall shimmer. She wished her father could see this. “I have to take pictures.” Unsnapping the catch of her case, Isis took a rapid succession of images, barely taking time to frame her shots.
The perimeter walls had, until recently, been packed with artifacts. And while there were still thousands of things to catch her eye, it was clear that at least half of the items, if not more, had been dragged out. Streaks of dust on the floor where boxes had been pulled, and put onto some sort of wheel cart for transportation out of the tomb, told the story. She got dozens of shots of those, too.
A stack of gilded and bejeweled chariot wheels were braced against the far wall along with ritual couches, beds, chairs, and tables. Isis figured the assorted furniture was worth a queen’s ransom, all of it just piled one on top of the other as if this were an ancient Egyptian thrift shop. Intricately carved ivory chests embedded with gemstones awaited pickup by the front entrance.
And a fifty-gallon barrel with a spigot on it. “Dear God. Is that water? Thank you, modern times.” She tugged at Thorne’s hand, hauling him over to the plastic container. “You go first.” She expected him to dip his head under the spigot to drink, but he surprised her by cupping his hands.
“Pour,” he said, catching the stream until his hands were full. “Drink.” Not looking a gift horse in the mouth, Isis drank from his cupped hands, a surprisingly intimate thing to do. Before her thirst was quenched, she lifted her head. “Your turn. There’s plenty.”
She held the spigot until they each slaked their thirst. “I’ll never take water for granted again,” she said.
Satisfied, she waited her turn and splashed room-temperature water on her face. Thorne took her elbow as she used her T-shirts to dry off.
“We’ve got to go. Who knows when they’ll be back?”
“They’ll know we were here. Does that matter?” She walked beside him, taking pictures as they crossed the space.
“We’ll be long gone. It’s a good thing you’re getting shots of this—no time for cataloging, but it might be the last image anyone will see of this place. So much empty space means they’ve already taken a lot. The organization for this kind of operation had to take months, if not longer.” He waved his hand at what was left. “If this is what they decided to leave for last, imagine what they did take.”
Her chest ached. Her father had worked his entire life to see this, to prove that this tomb existed. “They’ll sell off everything to private collectors, and the public will never know that Cleopatra’s tomb was discovered.”
Thorne stopped walking, to turn to her. “The items will have no monetary value unless they can be tied unequivocally to Cleopatra’s final burial place.”
Anger made her heart beat too fast as she said with uncommon bitterness, “Which will be filled with water.”
“No. It just came to me, as I saw all of the tags on the items. I think they want to reconstruct the find—what if this site is suddenly ‘discovered’ a hundred miles away at Abusir by your friend Dylan Brengard?”
“Oh, my God.” Her stomach rolled and the water rose up in her throat. “That’s—that means that Dr. Najid and Dylan must have been working together all along.” She ran to a tag, then another one, realization dawning with acrid horror. “My father came here, found Cleo”—she met Thorne’s compassionate gaze—“and of course he would tell Dylan, who planned with Najid to kill my father and take the glory.” Her eyes burned and her fist clenched. “There aren’t enough curse words to describe them,” she said in short syllables, furious beyond anything she’d ever felt before. Heat pulsated behind her eyes and her body shook.
“I’m sorry, Isis.” His hand on the small of her back was a comfort, but also a prod to keep moving. “I’d hazard a guess,” he said, “that Yermalof is up to his eyeballs in this as well. Once the tomb is found at Abusir, where most Egyptologists have long believed it to be, and there’s an official provenance for the items, he’ll sell whatever they siphoned off the top. The rest will be artistically placed in the new tomb. No one any the wiser. It’s actually quite brilliant, and almost flawlessly executed.”
“It seems to me that it was absolutely damned flawlessly executed. Dylan will get his amazing discovery in the history books, Dr. Water District will get his beautiful rec area, and your Russian thief will make all three of them a shitload of money. Seems like a win-win-win situation to me. Slime buckets!”
“There are two glitches to their plans,” Thorne pointed out dryly. “Us. We’ve seen the evidence, and your photos are proof.”
EIGHTEEN
A light wind moved sand and water particles, ruffling Isis’s hair around her face as they stepped outside the tomb entrance. The black-streaked sky was a soft, predawn, dove gray, the air cool from the mist coming off the rising waters. Thorne sucked in a deep lungful of fresh, damp air. They’d never get the bat stink out of their clothes, but of prime importance now was seeing the spillway from the higher dam pouring hundreds of thousands of gallons of water in a gleaming ribbon to pound and froth with hellaciously loud sound effects into the valley below. Hence the roar filling the air and the mist. Felt damn good on his skin, but the ramifications of the early water release were huge.
Isis gripped his hand, squeezing as she looked across the valley where a sheet of rippled pewter stretched as far as the eye could see. “Najid opened it a week early!”
It was impossible to tell how long the spillway had been open, or how deep the water in the hundred-mile-long valley was. Suffice it to say the entire length held water, and while its rising was too slow for Thorne to discern, he suspected by the hard rush of water coming from the spillway across the basin that it would fill quickly.
“It’ll take days for the water level to reach this high, even longer to reach the actual tomb,” he assured her. “We have time.” Not plenty of time, but some, if he could move fast and call MI5 into play.
Thorne surveyed their options for getting to the rim. He’d worry about the next step when he got there. The tomb entrance was approximately three thousand feet below the rim of the proposed lake. Half a mile. Above and surrounding the entrance was a vertical ridge of rough rock, loose shale, and sand. Even if he didn’t have a bum leg, Isis wouldn’t be able to scale that.
A barely perceptible track indicated where the thieves had driven their vehicles close to the tomb entrance. The track led to the tarred road that had, at one time, bisected the valley floor. But that was gone now, part of it already submerged in the deepest part of the valley. There was, of course, no vehicle standing by for them to help themselves to. The road up to the rim was at least a mile away. Not a bad walk all things considered.
“Let’s head that way. Once we’re up top we’ll find a vehicle.”
The dirt track—clearly recently in use—was a downhill trek and not too arduous, unless a person had already put in several hours of walking and a torturous stair climb on no food and little water. “Okay?” he asked as Isis trudged silently beside him, her fingers still tight around his. The few rocks were easy to avoid, and the hard-packed sand was a fucking cakewalk compared to the path they’d just traveled.
The paved road, running from north to south through th
e valley, was submerged, but at the north end it was still viable. A steep uphill grade, but doable.
“Where are we going to find a car?” Isis asked, between fast breaths, as they came to where the dirt met the paved road. The sky had lightened to a dirty gray pink, smudged with thick charcoal clouds. Would people start appearing to go to work? Or to see why the spillway had been opened early? The Minister of Water could easily account for the precipitous opening with any manner of reasons. No one would question him.
“No idea.” He walked a little faster, and Isis kept pace, even though her breathing quickened and sweat streaked the dirt on her face. He should be horsewhipped for not getting her on that flight back home before she was thrown into the middle of all this. Thorne, furious with himself for not protecting her properly, said, “We just will.”
“Okay. Just don’t expect any scintillating conversation, because I’m now officially pooped.”
And still no complaints. He lifted their joined hands to brush a kiss across her knuckles. Isis was more priceless than any artifact in that tomb. “Keep that shower and big bed in mind as we go.”
He could tell she was on her last legs. The farther they went, the slower her pace became. “You need to rest?”
She lifted her chin, a determined slant to her eyes. “No. But I want to know, what are we going to do with Dylan when we find him?”
“You mean besides stringing him up by his balls?”
She laughed a little, apparently cheered by the thought. “Well, that might improve his singing voice, but it’s not going to make him fess up to what he and Dr. Najid have done. My father is still getting screwed out of his life’s work.”
“What did you have in mind, then?”
“What if we bury him with the artifacts and come back in twenty years?”
Thorne kissed her forehead, the skin salty but soft to the touch. “And you say I’m harsh. Remind me never to give you a reason to hold a grudge against me, love.”
“Seriously, though.” She took a breath and tugged at him. “What are we going to do if he’s being protected by Yermalof?”
He narrowed his eyes. “Then perhaps we ought to turn them against each other and let them have at it.”
She twisted her mouth slightly in a way that begged to be kissed. “Do you really think we could do that?”
He winked, determined to be as upbeat as Isis, though his leg was killing him. “Bait and switch. One of the oldest tricks in the book. And I think Yermalof and Brengard are greedy enough to fall right into it. If they each think Dr. Najid intends to cut the other out by pinning the blame of our deaths on them, it just might work.”
“Can we do that?”
He kissed the back of her hand. “Together, my queen, we can do anything.”
The thought of besting their enemies brought a little more bounce to her step as she walked beside him, her hand in his. He’d never had anyone look up to him like that. A distinctive ache built in his chest. What would happen to them when this was all over? He shook his head. He couldn’t afford to think of tomorrow. All he could do was focus on the road that was growing closer one step at a time.
It took almost an hour to cover the distance, but they were rewarded when the valley road ended in a compound for service vehicles. “Pay dirt.” The fenced-off area was full of backhoes, heavy-duty trucks, flatbed vehicles for hauling pipe, and small specialized vehicles used in construction. “Let’s take that one.” Thorne indicated a dusty, battered-looking pickup truck at the other end of the lot near the gate.
Dog tired, he jimmied the driver’s-side door lock with a screwdriver he’d found when they’d passed an unlocked tool chest. He hiked Isis up into the seat. “See if you can find anything useful while I get her started.”
“You have the most unusual, yet useful, skill set,” she said with an accepting smile.
Getting up into the cab was a feat in itself, but Thorne used his arms and his good leg to get the job done.
Isis knelt on the seat rummaging through a compartment behind it, as Thorne peered under the dashboard and yanked out the wires.
“My namesake is smiling on me right now. I just found a Coke!” Isis said with a tired laugh. “There are a couple of bottles of water, and one PowerBar. A feast. We’re all set.” At the deep purr of the engine, she plopped her arse down on the bench seat, her treasures in her lap. “Oh, you did that quickly! I’m impressed by your hotwiring prowess, Thorne. If Lodestone or MI5 doesn’t pan out for you, you can always take to a life of crime. I’ll share my Coke with you…”
“I’m impressed that you’d share. Water’s good.”
Isis twisted the cap off a bottle of water, handing it to him as he headed for the locked gate. She popped the tab on her can and took a long drink. “Ahhh, ambrosia… Should I get out to open the gate? How will I open it, though?”
“I’ve got it.” Thorne revved up the engine, slammed the gas pedal to the floor, and hit the gate at sixty per, then drove over the metal, smashing it into the dirt. He floored the engine and shot down the road in the semidarkness.
“There is something very satisfying in that.”
He smiled, finishing off another bottle of water. Their headlights bounced over the road as he pushed the lumbering vehicle to its maximum speed. Isis laughed. “Dirty Harry has nothing on you, Thorne.” She drank half her cola in one long draft, curling her feet up beneath her on the seat. “How are we going to implement Operation Striking Cobra?”
“Striking what?”
She gifted him with a wide smile. “Striking Cobra. Our plan to bring down these thieves and kidnappers needed a name. I thought it had a nice ring to it.”
He chuckled. Striking Cobra. The boys back at MI5 would be rolling on the floor with that one. “I don’t suppose you found a phone back there, did you?”
“Unfortunately not. Here, honey, I made you dinner.” She handed him three-quarters of the protein bar.
He didn’t argue, eating it in two bites. He glanced into the mirrors just to be sure Yermalof didn’t have eyes on them. “We need to ditch this and find something else in case someone sees us.”
“Ew! That was disgusting.” Isis pulled a face, hastily washing down the bar with her drink. “I’ll make you a real dinner, Thorne, when our lives are back to normal. Something much better than that mummified protein bar.”
“I promised you room service, remember?”
“It’s all that keeps me going. Oasis in an hour.”
“Sooner if we see anything we can help ourselves to.”
There was nothing available to steal any sooner than the oasis, and since the truck was gassed up, and they were halfway there, he decided to keep going. They made good time, reaching the center of Cairo right in the middle of the early morning commute.
“Where now?” she asked, using both hands to push her hair off her face. It was a lost cause. The mist and sweat had sprung her hair into wild curls, which Thorne found both charming and sexy.
“We need to ditch the truck and find a phone.”
“I didn’t see anyone, but is there any chance we were followed?”
“No one was behind us on the road from the hydroelectric plant to here. I kept a close eye out. No one is that good at tailing, especially when we traveled fifty miles with no one in sight either way. I think we escaped undetected. Why?”
“Husani probably hasn’t left for the shop yet. And even if he went in early, Rabiah works from home. We’ll have the use of a phone, or computer, and a shower.”
“Sounds good. We’ll head out there.”
It took forty minutes to cross town, and another fifteen for Thorne to find a parking garage with a big enough entrance to hide the truck.
BOTH RABIAH AND HUSANI were home when Thorne and Isis arrived at their apartment. The couple looked slightly stunned by their appearance but didn’t ask questions. While Rabiah supplied Isis with a change of clothing for both of them, Thorne made a couple of calls to set the ball rolling.
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br /> Isis went into the small bathroom to wash before eating. Horrified, she stared at herself in the mirror. “Dear God, seriously?” After all they’d endured it was no wonder she looked as bad as she did, but somehow it was worse seeing herself up close.
Her hair was out of control. Wild and frizzy, and curly around her head and shoulders like the Wild Woman of Borneo. Her pale face wasn’t just dirty, it was filthy, the sand and grit smeared around from her hasty attempt at washing while in the tomb. Her sunken eyes looked bruised, her lips dry and cracked. Her clothing was beyond filthy. Hastily yanking off the top two T-shirts, she was marginally cleaner. And while washing her hands and face several times with soap and hot water helped, she was dying for a hot shower and a scrub brush. She left the bathroom and, seeing that Thorne was off the phone, said, “It’s all yours.”
He passed her in the short hallway and closed the bathroom door behind him. The mouthwatering, stomach-rumbling smell of frying eggs, toast, and coffee lured her to the kitchen.
Rabiah motioned Isis to a seat at the kitchen table, where a glass of Coke on ice waited for her. “I love you, Rabiah! Thank you.”
Her hostess smiled. “You look much better.”
“Hard to look worse,” Husani told her grimly, ducking when Isis threatened to bop him on the head with her glass. “Are you sure you two don’t need a doctor? I have a friend I can call to come here—”
“I’m okay, but I’m worried about Thorne’s leg. He needs a cane, and since he won’t ask, I will. Do you have anything for him to use temporarily?”
“I have some in the storeroom downstairs. Why don’t I get him a cane while he’s getting cleaned up? I’ll be right back.”
Husani went off to get the cane.
“Your Thorne is very nice-looking, even when he’s scruffy,” Rabiah observed as she slid more bread into the toaster.