Claude clutches at his chest, shock scoring his features as the Luger tumbles out of his hand. Red blood spurts out between his fingers and drips down the front of his white shirt. Another second or so goes by before he collapses to the sand, lifeless.
I’m both horrified and…relieved.
For a single, terrifying moment, a trickle of regret races down my spine at what I’ve just done. My muscles harden and I can’t move, can barely breathe. Pulse thundering inside my head, my vision blurs again, and I have to remind myself to suck in breaths through my nose and mouth, to allow more oxygen to my brain. I unintentionally pull dust and hot desert air in with it, but I barely notice.
Whatever I’m doing isn’t helping anyway. My head swims and my stomach roils—
The amulet warms once more against my chest, like it did beneath the water inside the temple. It cuts through the haze and allows me to hear the painful hiss nearby. My mind clears completely and my nausea instantly settles.
Bes.
Scrambling to my feet, I slide into the sand beside him, ignoring the way it coats my still-bleeding knee. I throw the soldier’s gun to the ground like it burned me, and take stock of Bes. He grips his right arm tight, his face pinched in agony. Bright crimson trickles out between his fingers, plopping delicately onto the desert floor.
“Are you alright?” I ask, louder than I mean to.
“Fine,” he bites out through his teeth, “no thanks to you.”
I scoff. The audacity of this man.
“Thanks to me, he never got a second shot off,” I argue, even as my voice trembles slightly. “The hand holding the gun was unsteady, and I had to force him to make a move before I could; I’m surprised his aim was so true.”
Bes grunts. “I would’ve liked to have questioned him.”
“And I would’ve liked to never have met him in the first place, but we can’t always get what we want, Mr. Belzoni.” I clear my throat. “Now, move your hand so I can get a look at the wound.”
I reach for him, then stop myself. I don’t know this man, and though he proved his identity to me, I have no idea if I can trust him. He still has a lot to answer for, and I haven’t forgiven him yet for being late to the airfield in Luxor.
Doesn’t mean you should let him die either.
Finally, he moves his hand, watching me intently.
Examining it, I think,I’ve had worse. The bullet sliced open a straight line through the skin of his upper arm, the outer edges of it slightly burned. The wound is already starting to clot, and based on the size of it, I can say with certainty he’s not in any danger of dying.
Wincing, he sucks in a breath. “Just a graze.” He repeats my first thought back to me: “I’ve had worse.”
I glance up at the sky.Men.
Tearing off the rest of his ruined sleeve from the seam without asking, I rip it longways before tying it tight above, below, and directly on top of the wound. His toned muscles are on full display now. I fleetingly wonder how he has any time to maintain them when he’s working inside the museum all day. There must be more to him than meets the eye.
As I tie the final knot, I swear I still feel his eyes on me, watching me. My cheeks warm at the attention, even as I realize what a foolish notion that is.Good God, I need sleep.
When I glance up, he looks away.
I stare back down at the wound. “That should hold for now.”
He nods and I get to my feet.
Though he follows, he doesn’t otherwise move. I glance over at his blank face, brown eyes staring off in Claude’s direction. Has he never seen a dead person before? My stomach roils at the reminder. More likely he’s in shock from being shot. He’s a museum employee for God’s sake—this is probably the first time he’s had a gun pointed at him, much less marred by one of its bullets.
In my mind’s eye, I remember the first timeIgot shot. I was somewhere deep in the South American jungle, being chased by a pair of ruthless poachers who thought I stole their compass. Which, admittedly, I did.
I had a hard time believing it happened, like it wasn’t real. But the pain felt real, like I’d been stung by a hundred bees in the same exact spot, their poison spreading to my entire leg. And that was merely a through-and-through in the fleshy part of my outer thigh.
Bes hisses again when he moves his arm too quickly, drawing me back to the present.
We need to get the hell out of here.
Finding my bearings once more, I glance at the British soldier who’s still unconscious, Claude who’s quite dead, and finallyto Bes who’s already bleeding through his bandage. Sighing, I beckon him to me so I can wrap it looser this time with a second strip of his mangled sleeve. After a moment, he complies, leaning closer than before to give me a better angle.
