He watched Mike hug Amos, whisper to him, hug him again.
“What?”
“Amos is from Horton, Nebraska, close to Omaha. I told him to call my dad, he’ll see he gets a good job.”
They shook Grant’s hand. Then Nicholas turned to Kitsune and took her red blistered hands in his, leaned in close. “Thank you for my life. Again. And, Kitsune? Next time you want to steal a biblical artifact, think long and hard.” And he handed her up to her husband.
“Go, Rafael. Mike and I will wait here for you to come back for us.” Because he and Mike were Rafael’s meal ticket, he knew he’d come back, and be sharp about it. They stood together in the boat, waving as Rafael skimmed over the waves, gained speed, and lifted into the air, heading back to Cuba.
Nicholas looked back at the ash cloud rising high into the air. His shirt was nearly ripped off, his pants were torn and filthy, and everything hurt, his head, his hands, even his hair. He didn’t even think he’d have energy for a shower; sleeping for a week was what he wanted most in the world.
As for Mike, her hair was straggling around her face, streaked with ash, her face as dirty as his, her clothes just as torn and filthy. She looked beautiful. She was smiling up at him and how could she smile? After all this, and yet she was smiling. She lightly touched her fingertips to his cheek. “How long do you think Rafael will take to get back here?”
“An hour, maybe less.”
“Nicholas, did you see James Bond movies when you were a kid?”
“Never missed one. But my favorites were the old Sean Connery ones. Why?”
“Did you see the one where James and the heroine are alone in a boat waiting to be rescued?”
“Oh, yes, I think they were supposed to be in the Sea of Japan, but I found out it was filmed off Bermuda. Unfortunately, I also remember a submarine came up under their Zodiac, and they were busted.”
Mike shaded her eyes, did a complete 360. “I don’t see any submarines.”
Nicholas thought about all the unexpected twists his life had taken, how his life was now intertwined with people he hadn’t known the year before, good people, people who would fight until they had no more breath. He realized he cherished life more this moment than he ever had. Both he and Mike were alive, they’d made it. He grinned. “Well, then.”
CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE
Mysore Base
Gobi Desert
2006
Helen Kohath shielded her eyes from the setting sun. She stood over a large pit, being shored up by her foreman, Dr. Thomas Zahn.
“Thomas, how much longer?”
“I’m going as fast as I can, Helen. We don’t dare move quicker, the whole desert could collapse in on us.”
“I know it’s here. I can feel it.”
And she could. Her ears buzzed with it. She hadn’t needed the spectrometer, she was able to stand right over the spot where the Ark was resting and sense the energy flowing up through her feet into her body, flooding her brain with light and flashes of long-ago memories, memories that weren’t hers, but maybe those of long-ago ancestors whose blood she carried. She saw a mass of people walking, pulling carts, carrying children—the flash was gone, but she knew to her soul it was an original memory. When she was one with the Ark, she would see everything, understand everything.
She felt incredibly blessed, and impatient. So many years she’d waited for this moment, prayed for this moment. She stood motionless, watching, saying over and over under her breath: Come on, come on, come on.
It was hot, small, biting flies buzzed around her head, the sand kept falling back into the pit, but finally, finally, they had the sands moved away and the pit reinforced.
Thomas whispered, “It’s here, Helen. It’s here. There’s a crate, it’s marked with a simple cross, just a cross, nothing else. Come see.”
She closed her eyes in a silent prayer, then walked to the edge of the pit. The buzzing grew stronger. “Do any of you hear that?”
Blank faces stared at her. So it was only her. The Ark of the Covenant was hers alone.
“Bring it out.” Saying the words aloud made her tremble.
They’d long perfected the rope pulley system and the crate was quickly brought up. Brown and orange scorpions fell from the wood and scrambled away. They set the crate gently on the ground.