If he found Ella.
That was the first time he had faltered in his conviction that Ella was just out of reach, just out of sight. He hadn’t had any more dreams about her since arriving in Cairo. He didn’t know if that meant she was safe. Or not alive.
He had been tempted to visit Olna again to see if he had waited long enough and could put his search into hyperdrive somehow. But the two times he had gone looking for her, she was nowhere to be found. How could he search without clues? How could he pick up Ella’s trail when he had no idea where in history the trail was? If she were really pregnant, wouldn’t she go back to 2013?
“Penny for your thoughts, handsome?” Marvel wiped the condensation from her lemonade glass and tossed down her napkin.
It occurred to Rowan that Marvel was bored. She had left the States to come to Luxor to be a part of Carter’s big discovery. It dawned on him that, thanks to his need to be in Cairo waiting for word on Ella, Marvel was missing all the fun.
“Why don’t we take the dahabiya to Luxor?” he asked. “Get you out of town for a change of scenery.”
“What’s the point? Carter won’t let me anywhere near his precious dig site. And you’ve seen all the American journalists lining up to get first crack at him. We’d never get near enough to see a royal toenail being discovered.”
“Carter owes me.”
She raised her eyebrows. “I’m listening,” she said, the coquettish smile back once more.
* * * *
“I’m told it’s all in the breathing,” Ella said, shifting uncomfortably in her cross-legged position in front of Halima. “That and, of course, timing the epidural.”
“Yes, breathing is very important,” Halima said, massaging Ella’s back. “When the pains come, it will be important to breathe through them so that the child’s spirit can be born.”
“He kicks so much I think the world can do with a little less of his spirit and a little more pain relief for his mama. Whoa! Hold on there, Tater! Did you see that? I actually saw his foot that time!”
“You have named your baby?”
“Not really. Rowan called him Tater Tot in one of my dreams. Now that I know it’s a boy, I like it. Makes me feel that Rowan is close.”
“Of course. And I am sure you are missing your mother at a time like this.”
“I never knew my mother. She died when I was young.”
“I am so sorry, Ella.”
“You know, sooner or later we are gonna have to talk about what I need to do.”
“What can you do?”
“Okay, see, right there shows the difference between us, Halima. I know it looks bad but there is no way I’m giving my baby away.”
“I understand how you feel, Ella, but just as birth is a natural act for all women, bowing to what must be is your only recourse.”
“Excuse me, but that is total bull crap. Personally, I think the more you bow to what must be, the more angry and messed up you get inside.”
“But what can you do? You are guarded every moment. Horus would like nothing more than for you to attempt to escape. I do not know his physical capabilities but I am sure he will try to mount you if he catches you outside the palace. Look at yourself, my friend! You can barely waddle to the bath unaided! How are you to avoid your fate?”
It was true. Ella did not know how she could prevent the terrible future that awaited her once she was delivered of her child. She did know she couldn’t let it get that far. She hadn’t told Halima yet, but she knew she must escape before the baby was born.
Sometimes, when Halima left Ella alone, she would sit in her bed, one hand on her swollen belly and stare at the beautiful tattoo of symbols Halima had inked on the inside of her arm. She could make out a lamb and what looked like a crèche. She would trace the cryptic drawings with her finger and wonder if they really held magic. She wondered if they could help her find Rowan.
Rowan.
When she thought of him she was filled with both hope and despair. The mere thought of his dear face, laughing, confident, and sexy, lifted her spirits only to have them crash down on top of her when she realized how far away he must be.
Would she ever see him again?
What she loved to do the most during these quiet times was place both hands on her stomach to feel little Tater kick and squirm and think of Rowan at the same time. For just a moment, it made her feel like they were all together. A family. And when she focused on her love for the two of them and her intense desire to be with them, she felt a strength of purpose that made her believe she could really make it happen.
Whatever it took.
* * *
Julia sat in her tent—the one she had shared with Ella—and, for the first time since coming to live with the Bedouins, she smelled a sour mustiness in the canvas. She tossed down the piece of goatskin she had been attempting to mend with a long, thick needle and moved to stand in the flap opening of the tent. Standing there she could see the other women standing around the center cook fire, gossiping, cooking and tending to the children. The little band had moved continually since Ella’s escape, never staying longer than two days in one spot. She lifted a hand to her hair and wondered when the last time was that she had seen her reflection. Her ran her tongue over her chapped lips.
The men had gone out. After the first few times of bringing her with him, Ammon seemed to have tired of the novelty. Or maybe he was concerned about the attention she inevitably drew to their raids when she accompanied him. She hated being left behind. The other women wouldn’t speak to her unless it was absolutely necessary. Even the children had picked up on her role as outsider and stayed away.
Now that Ella was gone, she only had Ammon.
Julia returned to the interior of her tent and found herself looking at it as if seeing it for the first time. It took her breath away to think that she had been living like this for so many weeks. Was it really months? She didn’t know how long she had been with the desert people. Her bed was a collection of not very clean rags that sat directly on the sand. Regardless of whether the wind blew or not, she always woke up with sand in her hair, on her lashes, and a light dusting in her nostrils.
She no longer felt like Ammon’s prisoner, she realized. But neither did she feel like his wife. If he lost interest in her, what would become of her? She would not be able to join the sisterhood by the cook fire. They wouldn’t have her. Would he return her to her own people?
Her own people. Who were they? she wondered, as she looked down at her worn and tanned hands. If he lost interest in her, she would have nowhere to go. Just imagining her father welcoming her back after her failed marriage to Digby and two months of living with a desert tribe was laughable. She would be disowned. And if the truth ever came out that she hadn’t been forced to submit to the desert renegade chief? She shivered to think of it although she knew that, willing or not, she was ruined in the eyes of her family—indeed her whole stratum of society.
No, she must ensure that Ammon continued to want her. She reseated herself and picked up the torn piece of goatskin. When she did, her eyes fell upon the one item from her old life that she still carried with her, her wedding ring. Suddenly, she realized exactly how she might ensure her place with Ammon. It was a desperate, criminal idea and many people might die as a result of it.
But at least he would continue to love her.
The Nile River
Was she somewhere out there? Underneath that same Egyptian moon, below those hundreds of dazzling stars? Was she looking up as he was right now, having her breath taken away by their beauty, their timelessness? Was someone keeping her warm tonight? Holding her? Feeling her soft skin beneath his caressing fingertips…
“The night is beautiful, isn’t it?”
Rowan was startled out of his reverie by Marvel’s silent appearance at his side at the boat railing. They had been sailing for only a few hours but the light had left the sky and the dark banks of the river slid relentlessly by.
�
��It is,” he said gruffly, annoyed that her perfume which wafted so delicately around her was so pleasantly familiar to him now. Annoyed too that he had found himself hoping she would come to him.
“I’m glad we decided to do this, Rowan,” she said, leaning over the railing and affording him a luscious view of her breasts as she did.
He couldn’t help but grin ruefully. Marvel would never quit. He kind of liked that about her. “Yeah, it was time to break free of the city,” he said, forcing his eyes back to the starry sky.
She turned to face him, her back at the railing and when he looked down at her he couldn’t help but notice how the moonlight made her skin look like flawless ivory. Her lips were full and stained pink, and her hair was caught up in a ceramic clasp that left her neck bare and vulnerable. It would only take the barest minimum of efforts to lean over and taste those lips. He felt the front of his khaki trousers shift as he hardened at the thought.
“You were quiet at dinner tonight,” she said, her voice throaty and low.
Rowan felt his pulse quicken and dragged his gaze from the tops of her perfect breasts, pushed up by her dress as if on a platter for him. If he knew Marvel, that’s exactly what they were. He cleared his throat and looked away. “You tell me I’m always quiet,” he said.
“That’s true. Sometimes I notice it more.”
Rowan clenched the boat railing in both hands to prevent himself from gathering her to his chest and kissing her for all she was worth. Good God! How much must a man take?
“Oh!” Marvel said and her hands flew to her eye.
Rowan frowned at her. “What is it?” The sailors and dragomen had a small fire burning in a shallow can on the deck where they were smoking some fish they had caught earlier. Rowan noted a few cinders floating in the air.
“Something in my eye,” Marvel said, turning away as she tried to hide her tearing eyes.
It was the fact that she turned from him that made him reach for her. Believing it couldn’t be a feminine wile but actual distress that made her try to hide from him gave him a rush of needing to care for her that he had been slowly and methodically developing for weeks. To cup those perfect breasts—his in every sense of the word if her messages of the last two months could be believed—to feel that full bottom in his hands, and lifting her to him. He took her by the shoulders and pulled her close and tilted her head back, enjoying the small gasp she gave when he did. The cinder was posed on the bottom of her lashes. He leant over her face and flicked it away with the tip of his tongue and felt her relax in his arms when it was gone.
His mouth was covering hers before he even knew he was doing it. Hungrily, exploring her mouth with his tongue. And she wanted him. Her arms laced behind his neck and she pressed her breasts against his chest.
“Take me,” she gasped between kisses. “Rowan, yes. Take me now.”
* * * *
The morning Ella awakened with her plan fully formed in her mind was a hot cloudless day under a startlingly blue sky. As Halima helped her into the bath and then dressed her, Ella couldn’t help think that the most desperate moments in life often began with something ordinary. The smell of coffee percolating, the sight of a butterfly on a bush, a lilac-scented bath.
Her plan was desperate. And vile. If it weren’t for the fact that her life and the life of her unborn child depended on it, she could never bring herself to attempt what she knew she must. As foul as the details of her plan were, Ella was surprised that she felt no weakening revulsion in reviewing them.
Only single-minded determination.
After she was dressed, she drew Halima to her side and took her hand. Sensing what Ella was about to say, Halima shook her head and tried to pull away. “No,” she said. “You mustn’t even think of it.”
“I have to think of it. And so do you. Look at me, Halima. Today I need three things from you.” Ella squeezed her friend’s hand to give her courage. “First, I need you to understand why I am doing this.” Halima looked away as if refusing to even listen.
“Second,” Ella said, unperturbed, “I need you to help me. And lastly, I need you to leave the palace. For good.”
“I will not leave you.”
“If you don’t, Zimmerman will have you killed when he discovers I’m gone. I can’t do this knowing the cost of my freedom was your life. I’ll risk everything but not that.”
“I do not fear death.”
“I’m not surprised. But I fear a world without you in it, even if I never see you again. Promise me, Halima, you will leave and go far away so they won’t find you.”
Halima wrapped her arms around Ella and the two women clung to each other. “If I leave, they will bring Horus to take my place.”
“I’m counting on it.”
Halima pulled back to look into Ella’s eyes. “He will torture you, Ella. No one cares what happens to your baby. As long as you are unmarked, they won’t care what he does to you.”
“It doesn’t matter, Halima. Nothing matters except the future and I won’t have one if I don’t go through Horus first. Promise me you’ll leave.”
Halima looked down at her hands; tears streaked down her cheeks. “I promise,” she whispered.
“I need the drug you were giving me when I first came.”
Halima shook her head. “If your plan is to poison him, it will not work. Horus takes no food save from his own hand.”
“Leave that to me,” Ella said grimly. “How far along am I?” She placed her hand on her abdomen.
“The doctor expects you to deliver by the next moon,” Halima said. “But it could happen any time. Are you feeling pains?”
“Not really. I’m agitated and I’m sure Tater feels that. It’s probably nothing.”
Halima placed her hand on Ella’s stomach for a moment as if to calm the baby. Ella felt herself relaxing under her gentle touch. “I know, Ella, that there is no happy ending for your family except the one you make for yourself.” She wiped her tears away. “I will get you the drug.”
“Thank you, Halima.”
The following morning, Ella walked with Halima in the garden. It was a fine day and the sun was not too hot. She tired sooner these days but so enjoyed the walks, she wouldn’t give them up. This morning, she could tell Halima had news for her. Halima matched her gait, her hand under Ella’s elbow to support and catch her should she take a misstep. Her face was tense and drawn. Twice Ella saw her look over her shoulder at Horus who walked twenty yards behind them. His skin glistened in the sunlight as if he’d oiled himself. At the belt of his breechcloth, a long sword hung between his legs. He walked bowlegged to accommodate it. To Ella, rather than looking comical and ungainly, he looked insane.
“The Shah is coming in three days’ time,” Halima said in a low voice. Ella felt her fingers tighten on her arm.
“To see the merchandise,” Ella said, nodding, trying to keep her head down so that Horus would not suspect she wasn’t drugged.
“No,” Halima said, “he comes to take you with him.”
Ella felt her stomach tighten. She put a hand on her abdomen to soothe away the flutters. Things were happening too fast.
“Before I’ve given birth?” she said. “So you won’t be with me when the time comes?”
Halima said nothing for a moment and they walked in silence.
“There’s more,” she said finally. “It’s about Horus.”
“You found out he can perform?”
“It appears so. He raped the kitchen maid yesterday.”
“Dear God! And he’s still free?”
Halima ignored Ella’s question. “The girl lived to tell,” she said, “but she was badly injured.”
Ella tried to continue to walk but she felt a desperate need to sit down. “Injured how?”
“Horus wrote on her.”
“Wrote on her?”
“With his knife.”
“Halima, I have to sit down.”
Halima led Ella to a small stone bench. “Do you fee
l faint?” Ella saw Halima glance at Horus who stopped walking and stood watching them.
“More like throwing up,” Ella said. She directed her focus to the ground at her feet. “Is there more?”
“The rumor is that he has done this before in his village.”
“Raped and carved up his victims?” Ella felt the heat rise up her throat into her cheeks.
“The others he cut their throats.”
“I’m…he can’t mark me, can he? I mean, didn’t you say I had to be unharmed for the Shah?”
Halima pulled out a small cloth and pressed it to Ella’s forehead. “All of what I know is gossip,” she said.
“But?”
“But the gossip is that the Shah grows impatient waiting for the babe to be born.”
Ella instinctively covered her stomach with her hand. She was rewarded by a gentle kick into her palm. Hey, there, Tater, she thought as she rubbed the little round head or bottom. Everything’s going to be fine.
“Horus brags that he will cut the child from your womb.” Halima said the sentence in a rush, as if speaking it quickly, like ripping a bandage from a wound would make it hurt less.
It took every ounce of strength for Ella not to look at the monster who calmly stood at a distance, watching them.
“That would kill us both,” Ella said, her voice coming in a rasping breath.
“But if it doesn’t,” Halima said, “he will be generously rewarded.”
“And if it kills us?”
“He will pay with his life. A man like Horus would welcome such a trial. To succeed would erase his shame. His arrogance will not entertain failure.”
“Take me back, Halima,” Ella said, her knees shaking. She reached for Halima’ arm and her friend pulled her to her feet.
“I didn’t want to tell you,” Halima said.
“You must leave tonight, Halima.”
“Ella, no…”
“You promised. I can’t do what I must do if I know you will be punished for my actions. I am begging you to go tonight.”
Journey to the Lost Tomb (Rowan and Ella Book 2) Page 24