Chapter 14
The next morning, Saffron stood before the storeroom, lantern in one hand and notebook in the other.
“Are you—are you sure, Miss Everleigh?” Martin whispered at her side.
“Yes,” she said firmly. “I will go inside. If I don’t go now …
” She perhaps never would. The bone-deep fear that had shackled her when she’d been trapped had not disappeared when she’d emerged.
It lingered, threatening on the edges of her mind.
She needed to banish it by walking back into that room.
And she wouldn’t be doing it with an audience.
She’d told Martin last night to be ready to go to the agora bright and early.
She’d had trouble finding him until nearly eleven in the evening, when most of the party had drifted to their rooms to rest, but he agreed readily enough to be in the hotel lobby just before dawn.
This early, only three or four of the local men were on the site, as well as one of the Turkish guides who’d looked nonplussed when she and Martin showed up at the gate just as the call to prayer sounded from the mosque in the kemeralti.
He agreed to accompany them into the pit, and now they stood, ready to go into the storeroom.
With no one to tell them they couldn’t go inside without an archaeologist, for that was generally the protocol, she was going to do just that.
She took three steps into the darkness, forcing air out through her nose so she wasn’t immediately overtaken by the earthy smell. Her eyes traced the shelves, the vessels, the stone structures and wooden poles holding it all together.
It was fine. Really. She would just stay near the door for a minute.
Martin had already ventured deeper into the room, eager to explore on his own.
Saffron focused on her breathing, deep and slow, just as Alexander had demonstrated to her. His habit of meditation was not for her, she’d found, but the breathing method did help to settle her nerves.
“Ow!”
Opening her eyes, she saw Martin on the ground, rubbing his knees. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” Martin said breathlessly. “Just tripped on that rock there.”
It was the same one she must have tripped on herself. A squarish stone set in the floor, one corner not quite level with the ground.
“They ought to fix that,” Saffron said, peering around. “Someone else might trip and drop something important. Hello there?”
The Turkish guide appeared in the door, and Saffron asked him to call for a few of the workers to move the stone.
It wasn’t until they had the rock nearly out of the floor that Martin asked, “Will we get into trouble for moving this without approval?”
“I hadn’t thought of that,” Saffron said, biting her lip. “I just figured we’d mark it and set it in the field, and the men could pack in some dirt.”
They did so, managing to fill the hole and set the rock in the field just as the beginnings of the crew showed up to start work. The sky was now a cheerful blue, and sunlight streamed between the buildings of the kemeralti.
Not wanting to be present when the archaeologists found they’d altered the storeroom, Saffron retreated to the field, where she looked over the relocated rock.
If she was sure it was unimportant, just a fallen piece of wall or arch, it wouldn’t be a problem.
They’d marked it properly, after all, numbering it in the same manner that Clark had explained to their group.
She knelt to examine the pattern of the stone. Color caught her eye, surprisingly vibrant against the dirty gray rock. Had the locals already marked it? She didn’t recognize the marking at all.
She looked up and caught sight of Banks striding toward the tent.
“Mr. Banks,” she called to him, waving a hand.
He changed direction and approached her with a smile. “Good morning, Miss Everleigh.”
“Good morning,” she said quickly. “Would you mind looking at this?”
Banks crouched next to her, setting his satchel down on the ground. He removed his hat, pushed his overlong auburn hair from his eyes, and squinted at the markings. “What … what is this?”
He sounded rather strangled. She peered again at the markings. “You can’t read it? I was hoping you could make it out. I fear I’ve made a mistake …” Her words faded as Banks sat straight up, pressing a hand to his mouth.
“This is—Miss Everleigh.” He swallowed, blinking hard. Then he turned to her and gripped her arm tightly. “Miss Everleigh. Where is this stone from?”
“The storeroom,” she said gently, easing her arm away. “It was buried in the floor and we kept tripping over it. You can read it, then?”
He shot to his feet, then sat down on the ground again, hard. “This is incredible. This is incredible. Yes, I can read it. I’m probably the only one here who can. This is—” Banks looked like he might start laughing or crying at any moment. “You’ve discovered graffiti. Third century graffiti.”
It took some maneuvering, some bribery, and a lot of tamping down on smug smiles, but Saffron managed the revelation of the graffiti’s discovery without a hitch.
Martin was the easiest to convince. Saffron explained to him that they would get into horrible trouble for ordering the removal of the graffitied stone from the storeroom, and he was ready to do anything to avoid that.
The locals who had done the actual removal were also easy to convince; they didn’t want to be sacked for breaking protocol.
The Turkish guide, however, required a bribe.
Saffron had never bribed anyone but her cousin John and Elizabeth on occasion as children, and so went about it in a clumsy way that left her several pounds poorer, but confident she wouldn’t be sacked.
Banks, she decided, would be the one to take credit.
He wasn’t an archaeologist, but he had enough clout that she thought any trouble he might be in would be easily mitigated by the importance of the find.
She certainly wasn’t handing over such an incredible discovery to Clark.
Banks agreed, hesitantly, both because of the lying and because it didn’t give any credit to Saffron or Martin, but was too caught up in excitement to fret for long.
That evening, more secreted champagne flowed freely. Banks was toasted a dozen times, and nearly every time, he glanced guilty over at where Saffron stood with Alexander in the corner of the hotel’s parlor. Perhaps Banks was regretting the lie now, but it was too late.
“Is there anything you want to tell me?” Alexander murmured.
“Hm?”
He leaned closer, lips almost on her ear. “Do you want to tell me the real story of how that stone was discovered?”
“What do you mean?” she asked in a very unconvincing tone.
“I rode in the motorcar with Banks this morning,” he said quietly, “I know he did not get to the site early enough to have the stone dug out before anyone else showed up. I also know your handwriting very, very well.”
That brought a blush to her cheeks, not from his words, but from how his hand had slipped around her back. A finger brushed over the thin silk of her gown at her hip. She swallowed. “If you’re suggesting I was the one to mark up that stone with ancient Greek—”
“I know you were the one to mark it with the location.”
“I was available to lend a hand.”
“You were on the site with Banks at dawn with nobody else around?”
She couldn’t help a smirk. “Are you jealous, Alexander?”
“It’s not Banks I’m supposed to be worried about,” he said dryly.
She turned to him, and they were so close she could count his eyelashes. “What is that supposed to mean?” He looked like he regretted his words, but Saffron certainly would not let it go. “Alexander?”
Resigned, he took her by the hand. She followed him through the open double doors leading to the lobby. There was a small alcove under the stairs, and that was where he came to a stop.
Saffron crossed her arms. “Well?”
“People are being stupid,” he said.
“That isn’t an explanation.”
“The idiots among the crew—”
She scoffed, and he smiled slightly, softening his words. “They’re making much out of Martin Neill’s presence in our group.”
“His presence with me, you mean.”
“Yes.”
“The presence you insisted on, in fact.”
“Yes.”
“And now they’re saying, what? He’s trailing me like a puppy because he has a—a romantic interest, or something?”
He hesitated before nodding. She narrowed her eyes. “Is that what they are saying?”
He shrugged. “I wouldn’t put too much store in what they say.”
“You obviously put enough store in it to bring it up.”
“It was a poor attempt at a joke.”
Saffron hummed in response. She found she didn’t have anything to say. In fact, she was rather done with this conversation. She had been having a good time, for once, and now the weight of her frustrations was back, squashing any bit of pleasure from the evening. She might as well go up to bed.
She pushed a smile on her lips. “Good joke. Good night.” She started toward the stairs.
“Saffron …”
She allowed him to tug her back to him, and he took her in his arms. He pressed his lips to her neck, just below her ear. She tried not to melt against him.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “Let me make it up to you.”
That sounded promising. “How?”
“This Friday. Let me take you somewhere after we’re finished at the agora,” he whispered.
“Where?”
“I’ll find somewhere.”
“Somewhere private?”
He sighed against her neck and drew back enough to give her a sardonic look. “Probably not private enough for your liking.”
She ran a hand through his hair affectionately. “Honestly, after the last few weeks, I’ll take moderately private.”
He looked alarmed. She grinned.
“I’m looking forward to it.” She pressed one last kiss to his lips and sauntered away, suddenly feeling much more positive.