Suddenly the alarms were going off on the ship. Alarms telling them of water seeping into the holds and a possible fire somewhere on the ship.
“What is happening?”
They raced toward the bridge, the captain smiling at them with a calm expression.
“Don’t worry. It’s just an error. Everything is fine,” he said casually pushing them aside as he hit buttons and barked orders.
“Everything is fine?” asked Amber glaring at the old man. “Fine? Our equipment is at the bottom of that cliff over there and your ship is sending warnings that it’s about to sink. Things are not fine!”
“Settle down,” he laughed. “You English were never good sailors. These things happen. We’ll be fine.”
“Charles do something about this!” she snapped. “I’m sick of living on this disgusting ship with these disgusting men!”
“Hey! I’m a woman,” said a girl seated at the controls.
“A woman? You look like a man!” she snapped.
“Wow, that’s hurtful but fine. I can’t dress in my Prada slip-ons and my Chanel suits while working on a ship. Some of us have to have real jobs instead of robbing innocent people blind.”
“Mitza,” warned the captain. “Take your break now.”
“Fine,” she said walking out of the bridge. “I’ll go powder my nose.”
“Ughhh!” screeched Amber. “I want her gone!”
“Sorry lady, but she’s my daughter,” smirked the captain. “She stays. Besides, we’ve got it all under control now. The sirens have stopped and we’re all good.”
“This is why we’ve not had success,” said Amber pointing to the old man. “You hired idiots to do the job. You should have hired professionals.”
“We needed to watch the overhead, Amber. Look, we can still get this done. I’ll get more crews out there, more equipment and we’ll have something to show the investors in six weeks.”
“What? What are you going to show them? Two eyes and a mouth? There’s nothing to show them. Even if we could get close enough to unload the heads of the gods, it’s not enough to show them what we we’re trying to do.
“That island is ideal because of the location and because of the natural terrain. It makes it perfect and it’s the only island that we could get our hands on. This has to work Charles or we’re broke again.”
“Have you always been this dramatic, Amber? I don’t remember you being this dramatic as a young girl.” Her face was so red from anger her brother nearly laughed aloud. But he knew that her anger would lead to arguments he didn’t wish to have.
Only thirteen months apart, they were close as children and became even closer as adults. Determined to marry well, Charles married an aristocratic lady whom he believed was completely ignorant of her own wealth. It proved problematic in the end when she divorced him, citing his irresponsible spending.
Amber decided she would not follow in his footsteps. Instead, she found the one student she could tolerate with a title. Nicolai Christodoulou, apparent prince and possible relation to Alexander the Great. He would do.
Except it took Amber much longer than expected to get to what she needed. With no apparent wealth, riches, inheritances, or real estate other than that damn island, she waited for her brother to build the perfect plan.
More than thirty years she waited until she finally got the call. Then another year of planning their deaths and the perfect scenario. It would have been easy if those damn islanders would have only left willingly. But they refused.
Now, she was standing with her brother wondering if they would ever get the accolades and wealth they deserved.
“Just get this done, Charles. If I don’t see progress by the end of the week, I’m leaving and going back to England,” she said in a threatening tone.
“Oh, darling. We both know you can’t do that,” he grinned. “You are officially forbidden to return to England. Remember.” With a red face and fire in her eyes, she pushed past him and made her toward her own luxurious stateroom.
“Just get it done, Charles.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
With the workers stuck on the island, it was easy for Greek forces to go around to the opposite side of the island, make their way toward the temporary housing and caves, and arrest everyone under cover of darkness.
By the morning, the workers were gone, the forces were gone, and work was once again at a standstill.
