Chapter 16 #2
“Ah.” An instant smile touched her lips at the question.
“My dad. Photography was his hobby, and he taught me everything I know. I was always so excited to go to the store and get my rolls of film developed every weekend. To find out what beauty I’d managed to capture for all of time,” she said, feeling as though she were glowing while reliving her past. “I even hid a few rolls inside a box at my parents’ beach house, like a time capsule hoping one day when I was older I’d develop them and .
. .” She chewed on her lip for a moment at the memory she’d suppressed over the years.
“My dad eventually built us a darkroom so we could develop our own film. There’s something so raw about being alone in that room, watching the images magically appear during the development process.
Alone with the moments you captured. It was my safe space. ”
“Sounds nice. You’re close with your parents?”
She nodded. “Yes,” she added in case he was being good and keeping his eyes on the road and off her.
“And then Tucker died. And the last time I went into the darkroom at my parents’ summer house .
. . I was surrounded by photos I’d developed and left behind, the last photos Tucker had taken of me.
I didn’t like the woman I saw in those pictures, and I was hurting, so I asked my dad to lock up the room. I didn’t want to see it again.”
She expected a sympathetic I’m sorry from Finn, but instead, he whispered, “I don’t think that’s what Tucker would’ve wanted. He wouldn’t want you to give up on yourself and what you love because of him.”
“Maybe you’re right.” She released a shaky exhale. “But the dead can’t want anything, can they?” Her eyes fell shut. “Can we, um, maybe talk about something else?”
He turned up the volume of the radio a bit in response. “Of course,” he answered, his tone a touch distant, like he struggled with something himself.
They listened to music for a bit as they headed for the man-made archipelago, Palm Jumeirah, part of a larger series of developments called the Palm Islands.
Sand had been brought in to create the man-made islands in the shape of a palm tree that were now home to the uber-wealthy.
Mya had done her research on Kaira, and since she was such a public figure because of her billionaire husband and her royal connections, there was a Wikipedia page on her, which helped construct the big picture as to who she was.
But it hadn’t helped Mya discover what went wrong back in January that landed Oliver in the middle of everything.
Kaira and Ario had purchased their home fifteen months ago after briefly living in Florida. They owned a fifty-million-dollar four-floor mansion on the island. From the photos Julia had viewed, it was more modern and eclectic than Arabic in design.
“Kaira still lives in that huge mansion on the islands by herself. I was expecting she might move after her husband died,” she spoke her thoughts aloud twenty minutes later after deciding the silence was too much to handle.
Finn peeked at her for a second before eyeing the road. “And that’s why Wyatt and the others are staying at a hotel on the island. With Harper’s intel reporting that Tariq showed up at her house today, we should stay as close to them as possible.”
“How did Wyatt react when you messaged him while I was asleep on the plane?”
“DEFCON 1,” he quickly said. “He didn’t buy the story that you abducted me,” he teased. “But he did believe you were stealthy enough to arrange a flight, and you’d go with or without me.”
“I know my brother is still on his way to Egypt, but did they get word to him via message that I’m not there anymore?”
“Luke did.” Finn’s voice was now somber.
“Go that bad?”
“He got the angry, all-caps kind of message back.”
“Ah. Very shouty, then.” She thought about her overprotective brother. He’d forgive her. Maybe not Finn and his men, though.
“Very.” Finn’s smile was unexpected when he peeked at her for a moment, careful not to swerve again.
“I promise to stand between you two when he shows up here. Protect you from a punch.” She thought back to her abduction and those men Finn had handled. “Not that you can’t protect yourself.” She swallowed. “Um. How’s your chest?”
“Still purple.” He sounded so nonchalant.
“And has that happened to you before?”
“Yes.” He delivered his answer with a hint of hesitation, as if afraid to admit it, causing her stomach to turn.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” His mood shifted like the summer winds on the beaches of North Carolina when a storm was about to roll in.
He looked at the GPS on his phone, which was mounted to the dash of the vehicle near the wheel.
“Shouldn’t be too much longer.” He leaned to the side a bit, slipped his hand into his pocket, and produced a ring box she was clueless had been there.
He’d changed into khaki cargo pants and a white tee before the flight, so the pockets were large enough to conceal it, she supposed.
“What’s this?”
“Wedding rings,” he said as if that were totally normal.
Two gold rings were inside the black velvet box. “You carry rings with you wherever you go?”
“You never know when you need, um, a prop for a . . . job.”
Job, huh? “Why do we need the rings? I thought unmarried couples are now allowed to stay in the same room together. Live together, too.”
“It’s a little iffy. And I’d rather not draw suspicion.”
She slipped the gold band onto her ring finger, a touch loose, so she hoped it didn’t fall off. She handed Finn his ring once they pulled off the highway, and he put it on at a red light.
“What’s my name? I assume you thought that far ahead, too.” The man must have done a lot of planning while she was asleep.
“Checking in as Evelyn and Richard O’Connell.”
“You’re kidding?” She lightly laughed, but he kept his eyes on the road as if he had no clue why that was so funny. “You looked up the movie, didn’t you? The Mummy? I’m Evie and you’re my hero.”
“Hero? No, I’m no hero. If a mummy comes swirling out of the desert at some point, I’m hiding behind you, missy,” he said in a serious tone.
“Right. A gun wouldn’t work. And your fists—you’d be swinging at sand.”
“Exactly.” He smiled this time, his focus on the road, and she was unable to take her eyes off him as he maneuvered the Range Rover after pulling through the now-green light as if they were in a Lamborghini.
“What am I going to do with you?” she teased.
He stopped at yet another red light, rested his forearm over the wheel, and focused on her this time. She wished his sunglasses weren’t shielding his eyes so she could get a better read as to what was going through his head. “And you see, that’s exactly what I’m trying to figure out about you.”