Liz Fielding - Wedded in a Whirlwind

She stopped herself from leaping to such obvious conclusions.

To the outside world she had no doubt that her trust problems would have looked that simple, too. Dismissed as the result of a couple of disastrous relationships with men who had commitment problems. She’d seen the grow-up-and-get-over-it looks from people who hadn’t a clue.

Nothing was ever that simple.

It wasn’t the men. They were no more than a symptom…

She jumped as loose stones fell in a clatter.

‘Are you okay?’ she asked nervously. What would she do if he wasn’t?

‘Just peachy,’ he replied sarcastically.

Cute. ‘You don’t actually live down here, do you?’ she asked in an effort to keep him talking.

‘No. I’ve got a house down in the village,’ He admitted, ‘but I keep a camp-bed here. I can get a lot more writing done without the constant interruptions.’ His voice seemed to come from miles away. And above her. ‘It’s about fifteen miles back.’

‘Yes, we drove through it.’

She hadn’t given a thought to the villagers. She’d seen them working in their tiny fields as they’d driven by. Small children, staring at the bus. Skinny dogs, chickens, goats…

‘I hope they’re okay down there,’ she said.

‘Me too, even though they’re probably blaming all this on me. Stirring up the old gods. Making them angry.’

‘Is that what you’ve been doing?’

‘Not intentionally. They’ll have to look further afield for those who’ve been taking their name in vain.’

Definitely the blonde, then…

‘They’re not getting excited about the possibility of getting rich off tourism?’ she asked.

‘The younger ones, maybe. The older people don’t want to know.’

‘Oh.’

Manda’s fingers brushed against something on the floor. A bottle. Glass and, amazingly, intact. She opened it, hoping it was water. She sniffed, blinked. ‘I’ve found your hooch,’ she said. ‘The bottle wasn’t broken.’

‘Good. Take care of it.’ His voice came from above her. ‘We’re going to need it.’

She didn’t ask why, afraid that she already knew the answer.

JAGO’S foot slipped, dislodging more loose rubble that rattled down to the temple floor, eliciting a small, if quickly contained, cry of alarm from his companion.

‘Are you okay?’ he asked. The pause was a fraction too long. ‘Miranda!’

‘Y-yes…Sorry. I thought it was another aftershock.’ Then, ‘Can you see anything?’

By ‘anything’ she undoubtedly meant a way out.

‘Not a lot,’ he replied, relief driving his sarcasm.

He was prodding gently, hoping to find a way through, but having to be careful that he didn’t bring the rock ceiling down on top of them. As far as he could tell, however, the far end of the temple where his working supplies were stored was completely blocked off.

Their only escape route appeared to be up through the shaft, always assuming that it hadn’t collapsed. He couldn’t see the sky. And just for a moment he considered what it would have been like to come round, alone in the darkness, not knowing what had happened.

‘I could really do with that light,’ he said. Then, ‘Any chance in the near future, do you think?’ No reply. ‘Miranda?’

‘I’ve found my bag.’

She didn’t sound happy.

‘What’s up?’

‘Everything is soaking.’

‘You can’t expect me to get excited about a ruined bag, no matter how expensive.’

‘No. It’s just…The water bottle split when it fell.’

He just about managed to bite back the expletive that sprang to his lips. It was not good news. ‘If there’s anything left, drink it now,’ he instructed.

‘What about you?’

‘I’ll manage. Just tell me you’ve found the light.’

In the silence that followed, his mind filled in the blanks; a picture of her tilting her head back as she swallowed, the cool, clean water taking the dust from her mouth.

‘What about the damn light, Miranda?’ He demanded in an effort to take his mind off it.

In answer, a tiny glow appeared in the darkness.

A really tiny glow that did no more than light up the tips of ghostly pink fingers, shimmer off the pale curve of her cheek.

She’d said it was small, but he’d been hoping for one of those small but powerful mini-torches. The kind of sterling silver gizmo that came in expensive Christmas crackers. Women who carried designer bags that had a year-long waiting list didn’t buy cheap crackers for their Christmas parties. They bought the kind that contained expensive trinkets for people who had everything. At least they did back in the days when he had been on the guest list.

Maybe she’d gone for some kind of kitsch irony last Christmas because this light must have come out of the budget variety sold in supermarkets, just about powerful enough to illuminate a lock in the dark.

He fought down his disappointment and frustration. This was not her fault. Miranda Grenville had come out on a sightseeing trip, not equipped for a survival weekend.

‘Well, that’s great,’ he said, and hoped he sounded as if he meant it. ‘I thought it might have been ruined.’

He eased himself back down to the temple floor and carefully made his way across to her with the light as his guide.

‘Here,’ she said, handing it to him. It went out. ‘You have to squeeze the sides to make it work.’

‘Very high-tech,’ he observed, then wished he’d kept his mouth shut as she found his wrist, slid her fingers down to his hand and guided it to the bottle she was holding.

‘Here. I saved you some water. Careful, it’s on its side.’ Then, before he could take the drink that he was, admittedly, desperate for, she said, ‘Wait. I’ve got some painkillers in here somewhere. For the bump on your head.’

‘You don’t have faith in the kissing-it-better school of medicine?’ He asked, while she fumbled about in the dark for a pack of aspirin, popped a couple of pills from the plastic casing. It was extraordinary how, deprived of sight, the other senses became amplified. How, just by listening, he could tell exactly what she was doing.

‘Yes. No…’ Then, ‘No one ever kissed me better…’ she placed the pills into his hand, taking back the light so that he had both hands free to swallow them ‘…so I couldn’t say how effective it is. It’s probably wiser to be on the safe side and use the pill popping approach, wouldn’t you think?’

He tossed back the pills, swallowed a mouthful of water. ‘Never?’

‘My family didn’t go in for that kind of kissing.’

‘No?’ His were good at all that stuff. As far as the outside world was concerned, they had been the perfect happy family. ‘It’s all in the mind,’ he said. ‘An illusion. If you believe in it, it works.’

‘And do you?’ she asked. ‘Believe?’

‘If I say yes, will you kiss me again?’

‘I’ll take that as a “no”.’

Jago wished he’d just said yes, but it was too late for that. ‘It got an eight out of ten on the feel-good factor.’

‘Only eight?’ she demanded.

‘You expected a straight ten?’ he asked, clearly amused.

In the darkness Manda blushed crimson. Whatever had she been thinking to get into this conversation? Attempting to recover a little self-respect, she said, ‘Hardly ten. But taking into account the guesswork involved, the dust, maybe eight point…’

But he didn’t wait for her to finish, instead laying his hand against her cheek, brushing his thumb against the edge of her mouth before leaning forward and kissing her back.

Jago’s lips were barely more than a breath against her own-a feather-light touch that breathed life, his own warmth into her. Nine point nine recurring…

While she was still trying to gather herself to say something, anything, he saved her from making a total fool of herself and saying that out loud.

‘You said you had a phone,’ he prompted casually. As if nothing had happened. ‘I don’t suppose, by any chance, it’s the kind that takes photographs?’

Nothing had happened, she reminded herself. He was just trying to keep her from thinking about the situation they were in and she responded with a positively flippant, ‘Don’t they all?’ Then, ‘Why? Do you want a souvenir? Pictures to sell to the tabloids.’

‘Would the tabloids be that interested?’

Pictures of Miranda Grenville, one-time society hostess, adviser to the Prime Minister, now businesswomen in her own right, filthy and dishevelled in an underground hell? Oh, yes, they’d love those. But clearly he hadn’t a clue who she was and she was happy to leave it that way.

‘There’s always a market for human interest stories,’ she told him as she dug the phone out of her bag, wiped it dry on the sleeve of her shirt and turned it on for the first time since she’d arrived in Cordillera. It lit up, then beeped. ‘I’ve got messages,’ she said.

‘They’ll keep,’ Jago replied, taking it from her. ‘This is more important. Shut your eyes.’

‘Why? What are you-’ A bright flash wiped out all the night sight she’d slowly built up. ‘Idiot!’

‘I told you to shut your eyes,’ He said, looking at the image on the screen for a moment before turning slightly. ‘And again,’ he said.

This time she didn’t hesitate as she caught on to what he was doing. With the camera in her cellphone he could take pictures, use them to ‘see’ exactly what the situation was, maybe find a way out. Or at least locate anything that might be of use to them.

He stared at the third image for so long that she leaned forward to see what held his attention.

‘What’s that?’ she asked, after a moment staring at the picture and trying to make sense of the vast piece of stone that was lying at a broken angle from the floor to the roof.

‘The eagle.’

‘The one that was part of the ceiling?’ she asked, shocked. To see something that huge just tossed aside was chilling.