was around, and while they didn’t actually come right out and say so, I know they never liked Dylan.”
“Good instincts.”
She frowned, apparently at her own lack of instinct about the man. “Apparently.”
“We’ll call the minister and confirm that. Also confirm exactly what Brengard’s location is. Either he’s located Cleo’s tomb at the Abusir site, or he hasn’t. Your amulet tells me it was found near the dam. Perhaps your father told you he purchased it so that if anyone asked you about it, that’s exactly what you’d tell them. All I know was where it was found. I have no idea what archaeological significance it might have. A hundred miles separate the two locations. One thing we know for sure: Cleopatra wasn’t buried in two places at once.”
She leveled her gaze at him, the knots of her fists turning whiter. “Do you think he suspected I’d come back to see what my father found the last time? Maybe he had someone watching for me at the airport?”
“Maybe.” Thorne pulled out of a side street and merged into the free-for-all that was normal traffic. Lifting his hip, he took out his phone and handed it to her. “Call the ministry and get that ball rolling, unless you want to stop by their offices?”
“No, a call should do it.” Isis took the phone and keyed in the number, clearly from memory. “It’ll take—what? A couple of hours to get out to the dam? Half the day will be gone by the time we get there.”
He’d give her this, an afternoon to at least see where her amulet had been found. Then he was putting her on a plane back to Seattle, if he had to hogtie her to do it. He’d hire Doug Heustis to accompany her, instruct him to sit on her if necessary.
His preference was to make a U-turn and take her to the airport right now. But he knew Isis-bullheaded-Magee well enough now to know she’d refuse to go.
No. He had to show her what she needed to see, then he’d use all his negotiating skills to make her see things his way. The trip there and back would take the better part of the day. But he’d still have time to get her on an evening flight.
Thorne headed west as Isis talked to someone at the MSA, then handed him his phone. Since he’d overheard the conversation there was no need to recap. Brengard had all the correct permissions filed.
“If he really has found Cleo,” Isis said tightly, “I’m going to have to do him serious bodily harm. Son of a bitch did steal my father’s maps. And I wouldn’t be surprised if he was involved in the attack—our attacks, plural—and also responsible for putting Beniti al-Atrash in the hospital. And if he’s glomming on to my father’s dig with an Egyptian fly’s tenacity, then perhaps he had a part in my father’s attack three months ago as well.”
Oh, Thorne didn’t doubt that one for a minute.
She massaged her forehead, then took off her glasses to rub her eyes. “It seems surreal, but someone’s responsible for everything that’s happened, and he sure fits the bill.”
He kept a firm grip on the steering wheel, weaving in and out of traffic. There was less time than she thought. “We know where he wasn’t during those few days—in any hospital. So his whereabouts are unaccounted for. So, yes, I’d put my money on him being neck deep in all this.”
A mixture of betrayal and fierce anger flitted across her features. “My father trusted him. Hell, I trusted him. Dad shared everything with Dylan, past, present, and future—”
“He didn’t tell him about the carpet tassel clue.”
She leaned her elbow on the window and cupped her forehead in her hand. “You know that sounds ridiculous, right?” she said with a return to her pithy self. “That we know of,” she answered his rhetorical question.
“Do you still feel as strongly that her tomb is about to reside at the bottom of a lake, and not thirty miles from Alexandria as Brengard claims?”
“That’s what my gut feeling is. But honestly? That’s not based on anything tangible.”
“My reading on your amulet is about the only solid clue we have, and that says, unequivocally, that it was found in the Valley of the Scorpions.”
She patted her back pocket. “Yes, but it doesn’t say Queen Cleopatra’s tomb.” She curled her leg beneath her and faced him with a heavy sigh. “Dylan is a braggart and an opportunist. But