Chapter Seven
After they returned to bed, he held her close, basking in the glow of love given and received. The reality of loving Casey blew away his fantasies of her. She was pure energy and when she made love, she focused all her being on the man she was with. He hoped and prayed that man would be him again and again.
The thought of her with another drove him mad. He wanted her, and he would keep her for as long as she let him.
But eventually, he feared, his secrets would drive them apart. It was time to share some of those secrets. To see if clearing the air would draw them closer… or drive them apart.
“We saw the Tower of Babel and the Hanging Gardens. Not in ruins. In full bloom.” He stroked her hair as she lay quietly beside him, firmly ensconced in his arms. Somehow it made it easier to talk about, though he’d had difficulties before describing the odd apparition that had forever changed him and his men. “The tower reached toward Heaven itself and shone brightly in the desert sun. We didn’t really notice anything odd at first. Saddam had his people rebuild a lot of the ruins of Babylon, so we figured it was part of that. I sent Zeke and Wil to check it out. They’re archaeologists, so they wanted to see what the builders had done to the ruins. They called us in after we secured the perimeter and showed us that this was no ordinary building. It hadn’t been rebuilt. It was in perfect, original condition. That’s when Jeff started cracking jokes about Rod Serling and The Twilight Zone. Knowing what I know now, I don’t think he was too far off the mark.”
He continued to stroke her soft hair, relishing the feel of her, solid and warm in his arms as he recalled the oddest occurrence of his life.
“We went to the top of the tower cautiously. No one appeared to be there. We stuck to procedure, leapfrogging each other, securing each position. I was the first to reach the pinnacle and for just a moment, the view took my breath away. I don’t know if the old man was there before I got distracted, but when I turned back just a second later, there was this old guy sitting in the center of the room. He was dressed in really fine robes and sitting cross-legged on a very fancy rug. He was looking right at me like he’d been waiting for me.” He shivered, thinking of that life-changing moment and was reassured by her softly stroking hand on his shoulder.
“I called Mike in. He’s our best interpreter, though we spoke a bit of the local dialect, but there was no need. The old guy started speaking in perfect English, which was unexpected, to say the least. He welcomed us in this booming voice, and we lost discipline. The rest of the unit tumbled into the room without orders. The command in that old man’s voice was hard to deny.”
“What happened then?”
“We exchanged words. He asked who we were, and I told him. He didn’t seem to know what the United States was or that the country was at war. I tried to ask him a few questions, but he was cagey. He was pretty clear on his dislike of what Saddam had done to the ruins. He spat a few times when he looked out at the rebuilt portions of the city from his tower. Then he started asking us questions—personal questions—about our beliefs and our values. It was weird. We couldn’t keep from answering. It was like we were compelled somehow. He got us to tell him about the causes for the war and the state of the world. It was like the guy hadn’t seen the news in twenty years.”
“They didn’t have a lot of TVs or a free press in that country before, did they?”
He nodded. “But it was more than that. He really had no clue what had been happening for hundreds of years. We answered questions on everything from the Cold War to the American Revolution. He kept asking and asking, and we were powerless to stop answering. It seemed perfectly normal at the time.”
“So what happened after he finished questioning you? How long did it take?”
“Well, that’s the weirdest part. It seemed like we talked to the guy for hours, but when he finally finished with his questions, I could tell by the position of the sun that only a few minutes had passed. Then he looked at each of us in turn. He came right up to us and put his hand on our foreheads, one at a time. Normally, none of us would tolerate uninvited contact of any kind with an unknown civilian, yet we stood there, letting him touch us. He spent a few moments with each one of my men then came to me. When he touched me, I felt a super head rush, like I’d just completed ten high-altitude, low-opening jumps in a row. I blinked and my vision cleared, and the old man was smiling. He called us warriors of the djinn. He said a few other things. That’s what stuck in my mind the most.”
“Holy moly. You think the old man was a djinni or something?”
“Or something. At least, that’s my theory. The other guys each heard something a little different, some in different languages.”
“What?” She seemed to be more accepting of his wild tale than even he’d hoped.
He shrugged. “I think we really were in the ancient Tower of Babel.”
“Wow.”
God bless her, she was with him every step of the way. He couldn’t measure how great that made him feel. To have her trust, her acceptance and her love meant more to him than anything else in the world.
“I know. The old dude told us to go forth and use our gifts for the good of mankind, and he’d decided against killing us for trespassing in his tower. Then he disappeared. Poof! He was gone. Freaked us out.” He rubbed his hand over his scratchy jaw, thinking back to that disconcerting moment. “That’s when I noticed that the constant dust and sand that always blew around was completely still. Everything felt eerily quiet, and I knew we had to get out of that tower. I gave the command to retreat, and we boogied out of there. Dan was the last man out. I turned to see him step over the threshold and a moment later, the entire building was gone. My men and I were safe, but the ziggurat was completely gone. Just rubble in its place.”
He shivered, and she placed one palm over his heart. It comforted him in a way he’d never felt comforted by any other woman before in his life, though she spoke not a word, letting him say what he would. Oddly that made him want to talk more, to make her understand what he’d felt and seen in that ruined city half a world away.
“That’s when we knew something bizarre was happening to us. We moved on and came upon the gardens a bit later in the day. They were incredible, Cas. Trees in full bloom. Fruits of all kinds, some of which I’d never seen before. I didn’t think too much about it at first. There were lots of foods I’d never encountered before I got sent overseas. We were kind of hungry and there was no enemy movement in our sector, so we took a break under some of the trees, getting out of the sun for a few moments. Rick found some fruits he said were edible, so we tried them. They were sweeter than anything I’ve ever eaten. We’d been in the desert for weeks and hadn’t seen any fresh food for longer than that. Just MREs and what native stuff we could scrounge.”
He was silent for a long moment, and she twisted in his arms, wrapping one leg over his and settling in to stroke his chest. Her gaze held concern when he looked down to watch her beautiful face.
“Don’t you know that in the stories of the fey, you’re not supposed to eat anything? They say if you do, you’ll be stuck in their realm for eternity.”
“Maybe that’s what happened,” he agreed after a moment, smiling to ease her tension though he could find no ease himself. He stroked her back, cuddling her close—but whether it was for her comfort or his own, he didn’t quite know. “But I have to tell you, that fruit was more satisfying than ten MREs. It fed something inside me I didn’t know was empty until that moment when the nectar hit my teeth.”
“More djinni magic, you think?”
He looked down at her, suspicion in his eyes, but she was serious. He kissed her for her faith in him and her willingness to believe.
“I don’t know. Something about that fruit was different. Knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t be surprised if that old dude had something to do with it, though we never saw him again. We ate and then moved on. When we turned back, the beautiful terraced gardens were gone and the dust was back with a fury. An unexpected sandstorm hit, and we took shelter in the ruins. We hunkered down and waited it out. It was hours before we could move and when we did, we didn’t mention the weirdness that had happened in ancient Babylon.” He pulled her over him to lie on his chest so he could see her eyes. “We got into a serious firefight and called in air support. They pulled us out and sent us to the airfield at Baghdad for debriefing. This was only a day or two after they’d secured the airfield, so things were still pretty tense there. That’s when I got shot and Rick did his magic act.”
She stroked the smooth skin over his heart. “Thank God,” she whispered, kissing his chest lightly. “If you had died, I’d have mourned you for the rest of my life.”
She spread her legs, resting her wet pussy right over his stirring cock. Unbelievably, he was hard again, even though he’d already come three times in as many hours. Sliding down his body, she took him in her mouth, stilling any words he might have spoken. She sucked him down deep and hard, just the way he liked it. She played with his balls, experimenting, using her fingers to gently probe and caress in ways that nearly drove him crazy.
Before she could finish him off, Hal dragged her up by her shoulders, placing her on her hands and knees in front of him. They hadn’t done it doggy style yet, and he was eager to feel her tight around him—especially from behind. It was one of his favorite positions, and she had a gorgeous ass that made his mouth water. She shook her booty at him, and he chuckled.
“Not eager at all, are you?”
“I’m waiting, Hal.” She pouted over her shoulder at him. “Don’t make me wait.”
He took a moment to touch her from behind, stroking deep inside her sheath with two fingers, watching her take him.
“You’re so beautiful, Cas. I want you in every way.”
“Then take me. What are you waiting for?”
He knelt on the bed behind her, joining their bodies as one.
“You’re mine, Casey. I’m never letting you go ever again. Get used to it.”