“Now that smile is much more hopeful,” she said, closing the door in my face.
I returned to my bed with the memory of Rowan’s body beneath mine, and erotic thoughts fighting with a good dozen or so questions for active brain time.
It didn’t occur to me until hours later that he never answered my question about what he was doing in Mrs. P’s room.
Seven
Stepping out of the Cairo airport was like going from a madhouse to a madhouse located in an oven.
I clutched Mrs. P’s arm and said under my breath, “Thank god for Akbar One. I couldn’t cope with this on my own.”
The man in question must have heard me despite the din of taxis, people, and what seemed like a bazillion cars all crammed into an extremely small strip of road. “Yes, yes, I take good care of you,” Akbar said with a flash of very white teeth. He was a young man of probably early twenties, and introduced us when we arrived in Cairo by explaining that we’d see a lot of Akbars around (and we did—there were at least three others holding up signs reading Akbar followed by a number), but that he was the best. “You follow me, I take care of you. Very nice car will drive you to your hotel. I show you pyramids, yes? You want to see pyramids?”
“Right now what I want most is a cold shower,” I answered, plucking my shirt from where it was stuck to my sweaty self.
“Hotel first, yes, then pyramids,” Akbar agreed with an amiable smile, and continued to force his way through the great herds of people that swarmed the taxi and pickup zone.
“I wouldn’t mind a good stiff drink,” a voice said behind me.
I made a face at the owner of the voice. “This is a Muslim country, Rowan.”
“That doesn’t mean one can’t find alcohol,” he answered and gestured me before him.
I took a firmer grip on Mrs. P’s suitcase handle and plowed forward, keeping her close to me so she couldn’t escape on another one of her “adventures.”
Akbar led us through the throngs, noise, and general sense of chaos to a medium-sized sedan.
“I shall sit up front with the comely young man,” Mrs. P said when I tried to help her into the back of the car. She slipped out of my grip, and before I could do anything, she scurried into the front seat where she sat with a defiant glint in her eye.
“I don’t think that’s really wise—” I started to say, but was interrupted when a somewhat breathless woman arrived and said, “Oh good, you got a car. We didn’t have time to book one, what with trying to take out the remainder of demons in Munich before we had to fly out here.”
May, the same small, dark-haired woman who was in the tea shop, brushed past me and entered the car, followed by Gabriel, the latter giving me a brief smile before he plopped himself down on the backseat.
I looked first at Rowan, who was busy typing something on his phone, then into the car. “Uh… hello again. I hate to be rude, but I don’t think there’s enough room for all of us. Mrs. P and I invited Rowan to ride with us to the Hotel Cleopatra, and this isn’t a very big car…” I let the sentence trail off in obvious significance.
“Oh, that’s all right,” May said, lurching forward awkwardly. “I’ll sit on Gabriel. He doesn’t mind.”
“Far from it,” he said with a look that I felt was intended for her eyes only.
“But…” I glanced back at Rowan, not wanting to be outright rude in throwing out these interlopers, but at the same time, I had been looking forward to spending some time with him since we hadn’t been able to talk at all during the flight from Munich to Cairo.
Rowan finished his text and tucked his phone into his pocket, looking at me expectantly.
I rolled my eyes toward the car in an attempt to get him to notice the occupants and, hopefully, have some advice about how to deal with them. Perhaps we could take a separate taxi? A glance down the taxi row left that idea dead at the start. Swarms of tourists were four deep on the sidewalk, all fighting over the available vehicles.
“Go ahead,” he said, gesturing toward the car.
Akbar hovered behind me, adding, “Yes, yes, there is much room, plenty of room for all. Your friends wish to see the pyramids, too? I shall take you to them and you will have a most excellent experience.”
Resigned, I sighed and slid into the backseat. Rowan followed, giving May and Gabriel a little nod before smooshing himself in next to me.
I had to admit that I didn’t mind being pressed up against him, especially since his hand was resting casually on my thigh, but after a few moments of enjoying that, I had to remind myself that even if I was now technically a merry widow, it didn’t mean I had to make obvious the fact that I wanted to jump Rowan’s bones right that very second.