"I saw you on CNN."
"Didn't everyone?" He'd seen the news coverage in the airport, too, and it had confirmed his worst fears.
"Mr. Hardwick was talking about you."
"Good old Hardwick." The foreman at the dig and, Rurik now realized, a grandstander with a thirst for publicity.
"You're the guy everyone thought was crazy who started digging around on the tiny little island and now they've found a huge stash of gold."
With the innate caution of an experienced archaeologist, he said, "Actually, I got funding from the National Antiquities Society, so I always had a team, and there's something that looks like gold, maybe, inside what looks like a tomb, maybe, but until I get there and we can finish opening it, we won't know what's really going on."
He needed to be there now, to see whether Hardwick had found the box Rurik had been searching for, the box containing a far greater treasure than gold.
"Wow. Just . . . wow." The girl's eyes were big and worshipful, and she offered her hand reverently. "I'm Sarah."
He shook it.
"Why do you have nightmares?" She smiled at him, and rubbed her fingertips over his white knuckles.
"Because I'm . . . afraid to fly?" Ridiculous, of course, but better than telling the truth. "You poor thing." She smiled at him again. It took that second smile before he realized—he had a nineteen-year-old making a pass at him. He jerked his hand out from under her touch. He glanced over to see if the dark-eyed grandmother had noticed.
Of course she had. She was glaring knives at him, her heavy black and gray eyebrows meeting over her narrow nose.
Sarah leaned toward him. "I could be a big help to you at your dig."
He averted his gaze, and mentally urged the pilot to put the damned plane on the ground. "I would love to have you, but we only hire experienced archaeologists. Besides, aren't you meeting someone?"
She shrugged. "Just my church group."
So she was nineteen, part of a church group, and trying to seduce him.
Great. Just great. He'd grown up knowing he was going to hell. He just hadn't realized the handcart would be doing 120 on the Road to Hell Autobahn.
"A church group is exciting."
"Exciting?" Her voice rose incredulously. "Have you ever been part of a church group?"
Why, no. No, he hadn't. Churches didn't exactly welcome a family like his.
The plane jolted as the wheels hit the runway—he was almost out of here. "Are you going to Paris? You'll love it. Grand cathedrals. Nice little churches."
Not that he'd ever been in any of them.
He got on his feet before the flight attendants
opened the door. "Some great choirs. Don't forget to go to Rome. The Vatican's there!"
Another place he'd taken care to stay far away from.
While Sarah struggled to get her bag out of the overhead, he grabbed his carry-on and muscled his way past her.
His mother would have killed him for being such a jerk, and his brother would have died of laughter. But my God. An underage kid making a pass at him—that officially made him a dirty old man at the ripe old age of thirty-three. He hurried toward baggage claim. A nineteen-year-old made a pass at him, and Tasya Hunnicutt couldn't get away from him fast enough. He'd gone home to his folks' place for the Fourth of July celebration that had started out great and ended in Swedish Hospital in Seattle, and at the same time, the tomb he'd been painstakingly excavating opened itself to reveal the glint of gold. What a bitch of a month it had been. Now it was going to take him a hard day of driving along increasingly narrow roads to get to the ferry at John O'Groat's and from there to the Outer Orkneys, and he'd be lucky if, when he made it, a gale hadn't kicked up, keeping the ferry in port.
Not that he hadn't been amazingly lucky since he started the dig. There'd been storms, of course—one didn't go through the winter in northern Scotland without some blistering cold winds and freezing-ass rain, but he'd had to knock off only a couple of days, and he would
"Didn't everyone?" He'd seen the news coverage in the airport, too, and it had confirmed his worst fears.
"Mr. Hardwick was talking about you."
"Good old Hardwick." The foreman at the dig and, Rurik now realized, a grandstander with a thirst for publicity.
"You're the guy everyone thought was crazy who started digging around on the tiny little island and now they've found a huge stash of gold."
With the innate caution of an experienced archaeologist, he said, "Actually, I got funding from the National Antiquities Society, so I always had a team, and there's something that looks like gold, maybe, inside what looks like a tomb, maybe, but until I get there and we can finish opening it, we won't know what's really going on."
He needed to be there now, to see whether Hardwick had found the box Rurik had been searching for, the box containing a far greater treasure than gold.
"Wow. Just . . . wow." The girl's eyes were big and worshipful, and she offered her hand reverently. "I'm Sarah."
He shook it.
"Why do you have nightmares?" She smiled at him, and rubbed her fingertips over his white knuckles.
"Because I'm . . . afraid to fly?" Ridiculous, of course, but better than telling the truth. "You poor thing." She smiled at him again. It took that second smile before he realized—he had a nineteen-year-old making a pass at him. He jerked his hand out from under her touch. He glanced over to see if the dark-eyed grandmother had noticed.
Of course she had. She was glaring knives at him, her heavy black and gray eyebrows meeting over her narrow nose.
Sarah leaned toward him. "I could be a big help to you at your dig."
He averted his gaze, and mentally urged the pilot to put the damned plane on the ground. "I would love to have you, but we only hire experienced archaeologists. Besides, aren't you meeting someone?"
She shrugged. "Just my church group."
So she was nineteen, part of a church group, and trying to seduce him.
Great. Just great. He'd grown up knowing he was going to hell. He just hadn't realized the handcart would be doing 120 on the Road to Hell Autobahn.
"A church group is exciting."
"Exciting?" Her voice rose incredulously. "Have you ever been part of a church group?"
Why, no. No, he hadn't. Churches didn't exactly welcome a family like his.
The plane jolted as the wheels hit the runway—he was almost out of here. "Are you going to Paris? You'll love it. Grand cathedrals. Nice little churches."
Not that he'd ever been in any of them.
He got on his feet before the flight attendants
opened the door. "Some great choirs. Don't forget to go to Rome. The Vatican's there!"
Another place he'd taken care to stay far away from.
While Sarah struggled to get her bag out of the overhead, he grabbed his carry-on and muscled his way past her.
His mother would have killed him for being such a jerk, and his brother would have died of laughter. But my God. An underage kid making a pass at him—that officially made him a dirty old man at the ripe old age of thirty-three. He hurried toward baggage claim. A nineteen-year-old made a pass at him, and Tasya Hunnicutt couldn't get away from him fast enough. He'd gone home to his folks' place for the Fourth of July celebration that had started out great and ended in Swedish Hospital in Seattle, and at the same time, the tomb he'd been painstakingly excavating opened itself to reveal the glint of gold. What a bitch of a month it had been. Now it was going to take him a hard day of driving along increasingly narrow roads to get to the ferry at John O'Groat's and from there to the Outer Orkneys, and he'd be lucky if, when he made it, a gale hadn't kicked up, keeping the ferry in port.
Not that he hadn't been amazingly lucky since he started the dig. There'd been storms, of course—one didn't go through the winter in northern Scotland without some blistering cold winds and freezing-ass rain, but he'd had to knock off only a couple of days, and he would
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