Journey to the Lost Tomb (Rowan and Ella Book 2) (19 page)

           
To
be so close!

           
He
left the tent and walked to the center of the camp where the rest of his group stood.
He could see Marvel with her hands on her hips confronting the head foreman. He
knew how stubborn she could be when she wanted something but a quick look at
Spenser’s face made it pretty clear he was at the end of his patience. Rowan
didn’t know what had happened in the camp to make Ella leave in the middle of
the night. His glance fell on the reedy, unctuous looking Englishman they
called Digby.
But he would damn sure find
out.

           
“We
have
just
arrived!” Marvel said,
following Spenser as he attempted to circumvent her in order to approach Rowan.
Whether he detected a vein of common sense in Rowan or was just drawn to
another American male, Spenser had quickly looked to Rowan in the midst of the
growing contretemps.

           
“You
must all leave and go back where you came from,” Spenser growled in frustration.
“Pierce? We’ve got a situation on our hands here.”

           
“Marvel,”
Rowan said. “You need to head back.”

           
“Rowan,
no!” She turned on him, allowing Spenser to retreat. He tapped Digby on the
chest in passing as if to indicate he should follow.

           
Rowan
took Marvel by the arms and watched the transformation as she became an
obedient schoolgirl for him, looking up into his eyes as if he could but
command her.

           
“I
need you to head on back,” he said firmly but kindly.

           
“But,
Rowan,” she said, her bottom lip beginning to stick out. “We just got here.”

           
“Which
has nothing to do with the fact that they are in no shape to receive us right
now.” He ran a hand down her arm and gave her a light push toward her party of
gawky relatives and simpering nieces. He turned to Ra who was holding the reins
to Rowan’s horse and his own donkey. “Escort her back, Ra,” he said.

           
“Rowan,
no,” she said softly, but he could tell she would go.

           
“Go
on back to Cairo, Marvel,” he said. “I’ll send for you when things have calmed
down here, okay?” Without waiting for an answer, he jerked his head to Ra who
handed him the reins of his horse and turned back toward Marvel’s group. “Send
Ra back once you’re safely on the boat. I’ll let you know when it’s okay to
return.”

           
“You’re
going after her,” she said. It wasn’t a question.

           
“Go
on now,” he said, patting her shoulder. Out of the corner of his eye, he could
see that Spenser was mounted and waiting for him.

*
                     
*
                     
*
         
           
*

           
“You’re
telling us she is your
wife
?” The
English fop gave Rowan a look of incredulity. “Why didn’t she mention she was
married? Why should we believe you are who you say you are?”

           
“I
don’t give a shit what you believe.”

           
Rowan
stood up in the stirrups and scanned the horizon. Because they had seen no one
on the trip from the boat to the camp, Rowan had suggested they fan out in any
of the three other directions possible except for the one leading to the river.
It didn’t make obvious sense, he knew. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t right.

           
The
American foreman, Spenser, seemed like a solid sort, although he was clearly
frustrated with the whole mess. For whatever reason, Rowan saw him eagerly push
off the leadership of the expedition onto Rowan, who was watching Digby’s
surreptitious conference with his big Arab.

           
Ella
and Julia had been gone nearly seven hours by this time. Rowan had no idea how
much water they had with them or how long they could last. It was perplexing
that they had not ridden straight to the river. He wracked his brain to
understand what their reasoning might have been.
Was there a village they were aiming for?

           
“What’s
near here?” he asked Spenser.

           
The
big man shook his head.
  
“Fuck
all,” he said. “Some broken down huts they call a village. And of course the
desert. About twenty-five thousand miles of sand.”

           
“If
they didn’t head to the river,” Digby said, pursing his lips as if he was
encountering a bad smell by riding so close to Rowan, “then they have decided
to commit suicide by desert.”

           
“They
probably made a mistake,” Rowan said, looking at him in disgust. “A
miscalculation.”

           
What
in the world had Ella been doing out here?

           
“Their
miscalculation
was when they stole
two horses and slipped out into the night,” Digby said.

           
“Yeah,
about that.” Rowan twisted in his saddle. “What made two civilized women so
desperate that they ran away in the middle of the night?” He spoke to Digby, taking
in his recently broken nose.

           
“There
was a misunderstanding,” Digby said stiffly.

           
“They
both
misunderstood something?” He was
talking to Spenser now.

           
The
foreman sighed. “We had it all sorted out,” he said, glancing over at Digby.
“They were to be escorted to Cairo. Today, in fact.”

           
“Did
they
know this?”

           
“They
hadn’t been told yet,” Spenser admitted.

           
“Who
was to do the escorting? You?”

           
Spenser
glanced at Digby. “
He’s
her husband,”
he said.

           
“What
happened to make them run?” Rowan asked again.

           
“None
of your damn business, Yank! Lady Digby is my
wife
. This isn’t the United States of Do As You Please. I don’t
answer to you.”

           
“The
woman your wife ran off with is
my
wife,” Rowan snarled. “And she’s not in the habit of doing that unless
something is very wrong and she has no other option.”

           
“I
have no idea about any of that,” Digby said, backing his horse away from Rowan.

           
“Look,
Pierce,” Spenser said, “The Viscount and his wife had some problems. And your
wife got in the middle of it.”

           
Rowan
looked at him and had to admit that sounded like Ella.

           
“Lady
Digby probably overreacted,” Spenser continued, “and your wife went along to be
a good friend. We’ll find them, okay?”

           
“We’d
better,” Rowan muttered, giving Digby a last angry glance. He didn’t know the
specifics of the man’s involvement
yet
but he would.
Oh, he would.

           
Ella
was worried. They should have made up their lost miles and reached the river by
now. She didn’t dare look at the sun. Although it was steadily dropping, it was
still hot. Her pith helmet felt like a toaster oven sitting on her head. But removing
it was not an option, so punishing were the sun’s rays. At one point, she had
the mad idea that she and Julia could make the horses stand still long enough
that they could sit under them. A
nything
for a bit of shade
!

           
She
thought of the old saying that when the gods want to punish you, they answer
your prayers. She knew her prayers were about to be answered when dusk
came—only to be replaced by a drastic drop in temperature that neither
woman was dressed for.

           
How
could this have happened?

           
Parched,
exhausted and nearly hysterical with fear and dread, they had both stopped
speaking hours earlier. There was nothing to say. Every step might take them
closer to the river or a village so they had to keep moving. Ella was surprised
that Julia hadn’t fallen from her pony in a dead faint yet. She stayed mounted,
although Ella could see she had let go of her reins and was now clutching the
pommel to stay upright.
How much longer
could they continue like this?

           
She
was grateful that Julia had not succumbed to crying.
 
As thirsty and dry as they were, it was almost
as if she knew on some basic level that that would be the last thing that would
help.

           
Ella
had planned on riding through the night when the sun wasn’t bearing down upon
them, but they were both so tired that the thought of continuing was ludicrous.
As the light faded above the far-off cliffs on the horizon, she felt the first
chill breeze gently ripple her cotton shirt. Damp from sweat, she shivered.

           
“Julia,”
she croaked. “Let’s stop.”

           
Without
looking to see if she had heard her, Ella slid out of the saddle to the ground,
feeling her knees instantly give way as she tumbled to a seated position next
to her horse’s legs. Before she gained the strength to pull herself back up
using the saddle’s stirrups, she heard the distant howl of the first jackal.

           
“I
say, a fool could see that they didn’t come this way, and meanwhile we are
ill-provisioned to continue this folly!” Digby stood on the ground, the foot of
his horse in his hands. He had stopped to remove a stone.

           
In
all this sand, Rowan didn’t find the excuse plausible. Digby had been falling
further and further behind.

           
“It
is now, officially, a wild-goose chase,” Digby said to Spenser. Rowan was concerned
to see that Spenser appeared to be listening. Rowan knew the foreman would
prefer to quickly resolve the crisis and get back to work at the dig site.

           
Digby
pointed to the sun which was now just above the horizon. “We are not equipped
to spend the night out here,” he said. “And we have no idea of which direction
they went.”

           
“He’s
got a point,” Spenser said, removing his pith helmet and scratching his head.
“We’re nearly at the point where we can’t see anything even if there is
something to see.”

           
“They
can still
hear
us,” Rowan said,
bringing his horse back to where the other two were standing. “I say we go on.
They could be right over that rise for all we know.”

           
“The
key phrase being
for all we know
,”
Digby said, positioning his foot in the stirrup and hoisting himself up in the
saddle. “It makes more sense to go back and properly provision for a longer
expedition.”

           
“That’s
bullshit,” Rowan said. “Every minute counts and you know it. Going back would
sign their death warrants out here in the desert.”

           
Spenser
held up a hand to stop the bickering. With what looked like a longing glance in
the direction of the Valley of the Kings, he said, “We’ll camp here tonight and
restart the search at dawn.”

           
“That’s
madness!” Digby said.

           
“We’re
losing time!” Rowan said at the same time.

           
Spenser
ignored Digby and turned to Rowan. “You don’t know this desert like I do,” he
said. “They should be able to survive one night now that the sun’s gone down.
I’ll bet we find them as soon as it’s light. We’ve got enough water for at
least two more days.”

           
Rowan
let out an agonizing breath. “Okay. But at the very first light.” He could see
that Digby was not at all pleased to be continuing the search on any terms.

           
Now
why would that be, I wonder?

           
Spenser
built a small fire and the group bedded down near it in blanket rolls. Rowan
watched as Abdullah moved furtively into the shadows toward the horses and
disappeared into the night.

           
Julia
could not stop convulsing. It had started out as simple trembling from the cool
night air and quickly escalated into uncontrollable body shakes. While the
temperature had dropped significantly, Ella couldn’t believe it was cold enough
for them to actually die of hypothermia. They were in a
desert
for heaven’s sake! She held Julia and rubbed her shoulders
through her thin cotton blouse to create some warmth. She spoke to her, too, as
if her voice might reach the irrational part of Julia that was insisting on
expiring from the simple state of being extremely uncomfortable.