The Five-Day Dig (28 page)

“I’m in no state of mind to ...” She put a hand up to her forehead. “Oh, why am I always making excuses for myself?”

“You were drugged, Winnie. That’s not your fault.”

She took a deep breath. They were walking on thin ice – or more like the thin crust of a smoldering volcano – but the thought of him leaving seemed unbearable. “Can you come in for a few minutes? Just until I make sure no monsters are going to jump out at me.”

“Of course.”

“Thanks.” She opened the door, switched on a light, and they went into her room.

Together, they checked under the bed, in the bathroom, and in the closet. Everything appeared normal.

“I guess everything seems OK.” She looked at him uneasily. “Can you stay until I’m ready for bed? I mean, while I change in the bathroom and brush my teeth.”

“Sure. Take as long as you like.” He glanced at her laptop on the desk. “Do you mind if I check seismic activity online?”

“Good idea. Take a look at the Vesuvius monitoring station, too. I have it bookmarked.”

While he sat down and turned on her laptop, she went to the dresser and pulled out a T-shirt and shorts. “I can’t wait to get out of this silly sheet.”

“You look great in it.” He didn’t look away from the computer screen, but she saw him smile to himself and felt pleased. “Do you have a T-shirt I can wear, too?

She rummaged through the drawer. “My souvenir tee from the conference should fit you, but what will you do for pants?”

“I have shorts on under this.”

She found the tee and gave it to him, then went into the bathroom.

After a moment of struggling to unpin the brooches on her shoulders, she stepped out of the costume and hung it on a hook on the door. She pulled the T-shirt over her head and looked in the mirror while she smoothed down her hair. Her pupils were still dilated, making her eyes look big and doll-like. As she stared at herself, they grew smaller, then bigger again.

Disturbed, she looked down. The Madonna and Child statuette on the shelf caught her eye. She noticed the tree crown on the mother again.

“Is that a juniper?” she wondered out loud, bending down to get a better view.

The tree lacked enough detail to identify the species. Her gaze shifted to the figures with their black complexions and golden hair. She remembered reading that hundreds of Madonna statues and paintings in
Europe
depicted the Virgin with black skin. Legends associated with some of them attributed the shade to darkening from soot, but there were far too many examples for coincidence, in her opinion. Another theory held that the black skin harkened back to traditional depictions of a pagan goddess.

Staring at the strange figure, Winnie tilted her head. “
Who
are you?”

As she watched, the Virgin’s closed eyes opened, and she smiled gently, like the priestess in the temple fresco. Her gold crown began to glow, first faintly, like a halo, then brighter until small flames shot out of it.

Winnie squealed and looked around frantically for a way to put out the fire. Snatching a plastic cup from the shelf, she filled it with water. But when she looked back at the statue, it appeared normal – no sign of burning.

She dropped the cup in the sink, shut off the faucet and ran out of the room.

Chaz, in the T-shirt and boxers, stood by her bed folding his toga. She rushed over to him and wrapped him in a bear hug.

He put his arm around her and looked down at her with a lopsided grin. “Did you see a spider?”

“The Madonna statue smiled at me, then burst into flames. Now it’s back to normal again.”

He smothered a laugh. “Sorry. But if it’s back to normal, what’s the worry?”

His composure and the warmth of his body reassured her, but her thoughts still tumbled out of control. “An inanimate object smiled at me and spontaneously combusted. ... What does it
mean
?”

Grinning, he pulled her tight against him. “It means you had too much of Dunk’s bloody purple beer.”

He felt wonderful – warm and hard-muscled. Spreading her hands over his back, she absorbed the experience of holding him. “I know, but it seemed so real. ... I think I need someone to stay with me tonight. If not, I’m going to have a panic attack.”

“Perhaps you could ask Amara.”

Horrified, she looked up at his face. He would abandon her at a time like this?

He laughed at her.

Her desperation for him amused him, she realized. It wasn’t smart to give him so much power, but tonight she didn’t have the strength for anything else. “All right, I admit I want
you
to stay, not Amara. Not
anyone
else. Are you happy now? I need
you
. ... But even you have to admit it would be incredibly foolish to have sex in this state of mind.”

His eyes widened. “Who said anything about having sex?”

“You’ve hinted around about it a thousand times.”

“I suppose I have, but it never felt like we were discussing it ... until now.”

Ugh,
she’d misinterpreted things after all. Extricating herself from his arms, she covered her eyes. “Oh, of course you’re not serious about it. What a fool I’m making of myself.”

He hesitated, and she grew more embarrassed by the second. Finally, he said, “I would protest that I’m serious, but if it comes to proving it, well, you’re painting us into a corner.”

She uncovered her eyes to look at him.

He stood grinning at her by the end of her bed in his boxers – looking delectable, frankly. He was a guy in his twenties, and she wasn’t completely past her prime. So, yes, he would be open to the idea of sex.

Instant heat converged between her thighs. It would be very easy to push him down on the bed and climb on top of him. Physically, she was ready. Mentally, she was a mess.

She pressed her fingertips into her forehead. “That damned purple beer.”

His expression sobered. “Winnie, I’m here now as your friend, even if you don’t seem to know it.”

She chose her words carefully, wary of saying something else stupid. “I appreciate it.”

“My pleasure. Now, did I see a cot in your closet when we were checking for monsters?” He opened the door then dragged out a foldable steel-framed bed, already made up with sheets.

She plopped down on her own bed, frustrated. “You’re a true gentleman. I wish I could tell you everything I’m thinking right now, but I can’t.”

Without looking at her, he set up the cot. “Thank goodness for your discretion.”

She leaned back on her elbows and sighed. She had to think about
something else. “Did you learn anything online about the tremor?

“No. That is, there haven’t been any significant tremors in the area.” He got a pillow and blanket from the closet and tossed them on the cot. “A meteor fell nearby, in Bellona, but it wasn’t big enough to cause a tremor.”

“In Bellona?” A connection clicked in her brain. She sprang back up into a sitting position. “Bellona is the goddess of war, isn’t she?”

“Yes.” A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. Narrowing his eyes, he sat down on the cot. “Interestingly, at her temple in
Ostia
, she seems to have been worshiped as Magna Mater – the Great Mother.”

Excitement shot through her. “Holy cow. Bellona is our goddess. She’s sending us signs.”

He laughed. “You know another thing not good to do on hallucinogens? Theorize.”

“Oh.” So, he thought her revelation was a pink elephant conjured up by purple beer. When she reconsidered it, her shoulders sagged. She lay back down. “I guess you’re right.”

“Would it bother you if I looked at your father’s journal for a while?”

“What? Oh.” Strangely, in her state of mind, she didn’t have it in her to be angry at her father. “Go ahead.”

He took the book from where it still lay on the bed and settled back in the cot, opening to the first page.

While he examined the journal, her thoughts drifted back to her reaction to it the night before. Tonight, she felt distant from those emotions, as if the experience had happened to someone else.

She swung around toward the foot of the bed and lay on her stomach, watching him page through the book. “How naïve I was, spending two decades wishing my father had the chance to finish his work.”

“He didn’t have to finish it. You’re finishing it for him.”

“Chaz, he was a treasure-hunter.”

He looked up at her. “But he raised a classicist. Indirectly, your work is his legacy. Of course, you get credit for the hard part.”

She laughed. “Then he was fortunate to have me for a daughter.”

“Yes, he was.” His gaze rested on hers, serious, full of meaning.

“Kiss me,” she heard herself say before the words even formed in her brain.

He stared at her for a long moment, then smiled faintly and looked back down at the journal. “Tomorrow.”

She searched his averted face, trying to decide whether to feel rejected or relieved. “Promise?” she asked, her voice coming out weak, cracking with yearning.

“Yes.” He didn’t look at her. “Just make sure you don’t get drugged again, because I won’t accept that excuse a second time.”

A wave of overwhelming feeling for him made her lightheaded. He was funny and smart and shared so many common interests with her – not a minor thing, considering how weird her interests were. She adored him.

Sighing, she rolled back to the head of the bed and got under the covers. “It’s going to be a long night.”

“Yes, it is.”

And it was. Whenever she shut her eyes, colors swirled behind her lids. That freaked her out, and several times she couldn’t resist asking him if he was still awake. A few words from him calmed her each time, but she still didn’t feel sleepy.

Eventually, she heard him breathing steadily and didn’t want to disturb him anymore. She noticed she’d left the bathroom light on, but she didn’t want to go in there, and the thin stream of light coming into the bedroom lent her some security. She stared at the ceiling, overly aware of Chaz’s presence, fantasizing about him getting into her bed during the night. If he did, she would be all over him.

But he didn’t.

At last, she got so tired that she closed her eyes, despite the circus of colorful patterns playing on her retinas. If she kept herself calm, the moving shapes weren’t scary. In fact, once she got used to them, watching them actually felt peaceful.

She dozed off-and-on until at some point she heard Chaz get up and go into the bathroom.