CHAPTER NINETEEN
It was difficult to see the road in the dead of night. The headlights of the jeep barely pierced the veil of darkness as Rory and Kieran sped south, away from the pursuing Land Rovers. To make matters worse, more clouds were gathering and the wind had picked up. Having spent more than a year in Nahariya, Rory knew a storm was approaching.
In more ways than one. Kieran sat in the passenger seat, his left hand over his bandaged wound, taking a pounding as the vehicle lurched over rough road. Rory knew the area well and knew that she was putting more distance between Kieran and the small hospital in the city, torn between the need to seek medical attention and the desire to be free of Corbin.
Her first instinct was to head back into Nahariya for the hospital. But Kieran wouldn’t hear of it, directing her quite firmly to return to Tel Aviv where they could catch a flight back to England. He would be fine, he insisted, once he was allowed to rest. But Rory didn’t believe him and tears stung her eyes as she struggled to steer in the darkness. To come so far and then risk losing him to an eight hundred year old wound was almost more than she could bear.
An apprehension made worse as Corbin’s fleet closed in on the old jeep with their newer cars. Rory was doing an admirable job driving over the bumpy road that wound its way around Nahariya and eventually ended up along the coast, but the pack of jackals was closing in and she knew she couldn’t go much faster. If she was bordering on panic, she never let on. In fact, she almost found herself wishing Corbin would catch up. At least then Kieran might agree to medical attention before the police locked them up and threw away the key.
Twisting their way among the hills, they emerged onto a flat stretch of land and the weak glitter of the ocean could be seen in the distance. The clouds were thickening, the smell of rain pervasive and amidst her other troubles, Rory knew the wipers of the jeep didn’t work. In the arid lands of Israel, Bud had never given the broken blades much thought. But Rory was certainly thinking of them now. Lurching over a particularly bad bump, she gripped the old steering wheel too tightly and came away with a nasty blister.
The road sloped downward, heading for the Mediterranean. Corbin’s cars were coming closer, like dogs nipping at her heel, and Rory spent a good deal of time watching the rear-view mirror as the bright lights advanced. She was so involved with the approaching high beams that Kieran’s warm, damp hand on her thigh startled her.
“Sweetheart,” he murmured. “Mayhap you should stop the car. I do not believe it wise to run any longer.”
She turned to him, noting how terribly pale he was. In fact, he looked very much as he had when she had first saw him in the grave; pallid. Refusing to fight her terror down any longer, she couldn’t help the anguish in her voice.
“Oh, Kieran,” she moaned. “We’ve got to find you a doctor. To hell with Corbin and his henchmen!”
He shook his head feebly, his blood-stained hand on her leg. “Libby, I’ve been running from Simon for eight hundred years. Mayhap I was not meant to elude him. Mayhap I should simply succumb to the inevitable.”
“No!” she sobbed, the tears coming. “I won’t let you! We’ve come too far for it to end like this!”
He smiled, touching her cheek and leaving a crimson streak. “It will never end between us, Lib. You and I are a part of one another, in this time or any other. We have accomplished our task, and now we are finished. Mayhap it is time to allow history to fulfill its destiny.”
She ran cold. “What does that mean?”
He sighed, the oozing wound draining his energy. “It means that eight hundred years ago, I defied death with the magic of an alchemist’s potion. I cheated the natural course of life so that I could finish my sworn task. Now that my duty is complete, mayhap death is attempting to claim me as it should have those centuries ago. The closer Simon looms, the more my wound bleeds. I cannot believe it to be coincidence. The man was meant to kill me.”
Rory sobbed softly, shaking her head. “You’re not going to die,” she whispered. “I won’t let you. I’ll get you far away from Corbin and we’ll find a doctor who can heal you.”
“There is no one who can heal me.”
“Don’t say that!” she slammed her hands against the steering wheel, almost losing control when it leapt over a series of harsh bumps. Gripping the steering column tightly, she wrestled for control in more ways than one. “Kieran, you’re a part of me. We’re incomplete without each other. If you die, I will too!”
He touched her face again, his expression serious. Thick fingers wiped at the tears as she struggled to concentration on her driving. “Oh, Lib,” he murmured. “Time could not keep us apart. Certainly death cannot either. I shall be waiting for you when you cross the threshold of Paradise, have no doubt. We shall spend eternity together, you and I.”
She sobbed openly, losing focus of the road. “No, Kieran,” she sputtered. “I don’t want you to die. I want you to live. I want us to get married and have children and grow old together. I don’t want you to leave me!”
He leaned over, grunting with pain and exertion, and lay his head on her shoulder. “I will never leave you, sweetheart. I love you with all that I am, all that I will ever be. Know this to be true, for all time.”
She tried to touch him but the road was too rough and she couldn’t risk letting go of the steering wheel. They were nearing the beach now, far away from Nahariya and entering Syrian territory.
The mob of Land Rovers wasn’t far behind, their headlights casting flickering light on the sloping landscape of the sea. Sobbing as Kieran weakly comforted her, Rory took a turn too sharply and the jeep nearly went over. Overcorrecting, she heard something snap and grind and the car suddenly came to a halt.
“Damn!” she screamed, beating at the steering wheel as if it would correct the problem. “Kieran, the car’s busted. We can’t…”
He smiled at her, so very weakly, his gem-clear brown eyes filled with emotion. “I know we cannot run any longer. I am not meant to run any longer,” when she started to sob again, he simply collected her hand, the crown, and opened the door. “Come along, Lib. I would show you something.”
She let him pull her from the car. The Land Rovers were just coming over the rise in the near distance as Kieran staggered across the sandy soil, heading for the ocean. His wound was bleeding profusely, trailing down the leg of his new Levi’s and staining his boots. Boots he had been so very proud of. Rory sputtered and wept, following him, having no idea where they were going. But Kieran knew.
He knew now.
The clouds over head were beginning to rumble and a light rain fell as they neared the shore. Behind them, the Land Rovers came to a halt and soldiers in fatigues spilled forth, followed by two men in suits. But Kieran and Rory ignored the cluster of antagonists, heading for an outcropping of rock overlooking the turbulent swells.
His voice was soft as he spoke, the clear brown gaze moving across the dark waters. “Eight hundred years ago I came ashore on a beach not dissimilar to this one,” he grunted with strain as he mounted the rocks. “Hundreds of men and horses bound for the Holy Land, intending to rid God’s country of the Muslim insurgents. I was one of those men and I wore the banner of England proudly.”
Rory held on to him tightly as they moved to the top of the outcropping, falling into his embrace as he sank to his knees. She was weeping so heavily she could hardly hear him, and he stroked her tenderly. His heart aching for what he knew had to be.
“It was an awesome sight,” he murmured, his cheek against the top of her head and as he focused on the rolling sea. “I came on the quest because I believed in my king, in my father, and I was determined to make both proud. And by accepting the mission that would eventually end my life, I knew there was nothing more worthwhile I could ever do with my mortal existence. At least, that is what I believed until I met you. You and I are incredibly similar, Libby. Each wrought with determination, each aching deeply to find fulfillment. And each willing to jeopardize our destiny for what we believe in.”
Rory wept into his shirt as the rain grew heavier and the army of men drew closer. She could see their features now as they crossed the sand, singling out Corbin immediately. He held out his hand to the group, silently ordering them to wait as he continued forward. A bolt of lightning lit up the sky, illuminating his evil face, and Rory raised her head from Kieran’s shoulder in fury.
“Go away!” she shouted. “Go away and leave us alone!”
Corbin came to a halt several yards away. “I’ve come a very, very long way for you, Dr. Osgrove. I won’t leave without you.”
She shook her head, laying on Kieran’s shoulder. “I’m staying with him.”
Corbin shoved his hands into his pockets as the weather worsened. “You’re both coming with me, I’m afraid. You’ve got a good deal of explaining to do.”
Kieran heard him, the familiar voice of a man who had trailed him for centuries. But he ignored him for the moment, focused on the delicious warmth of Rory in his arms. Warmth, he suspected, he would not be experiencing much longer.
“The night I sought the alchemist, there was a storm very much like this one,” he said softly, feeling Rory’s grip on him tighten. “An angry storm, cursing the fact that I was intent to defy death. Not strange that a storm has gathered here tonight to witness what I had evaded those centuries ago.”
Rory tore her gaze away from Corbin, focusing on the ashen features of her beloved knight. Tears were still pouring but the sobs had faded; in fact, she seemed to be calming in spite of everything and she forced a smile, kissing him with a painful sweetness.
“If you go, I go with you,” she said in a voice he dare not contradict. “If death is going to take you, then it is going to take me, too. You said yourself that God brought us together and I just can’t believe that He would allow us to be separated after everything we’ve been through.”
A shaking hand touched her face, Kieran’s normally even expression laced with emotion. “My sweet Rory,” he murmured. “I do not want to leave you now, not even for a moment. But I cannot deny the wound steadily draining my life, nor the odd hollowness that has plagued me since my return to Nahariya. I suspect that the two are linked, announcing the onset of my true destiny. Now that the crown has been found, there is no longer any reason for me to live. But there is every reason for you to live. You must live. You must pay tribute to this love and duty that we have shared.”
She shook her head, her composure making a weak return. “I will pay tribute by being at your side, for always. Don’t deny me my true fulfillment, Kieran. I am nothing without you.”
He didn’t have the energy to argue. The rain was coming down in sheets, lightning filling the sky. He began to kiss her, tenderly at first, but with growing passion as if knowing this would be the last he tasted of her in this world.
Corbin and his men watched, so involved with the scene before them that they failed to notice a rickety old jeep cresting the distant rise. One headlight was out, but the wipers were working. The vehicle loomed closer, eventually coming to a halt behind the cluster of Land Rovers.
“Don’t go any closer, Corbin!”
Bud was out of the car before it came to a complete stop. He and David raced across the wet sand, pelted by the driving rain. The lawyer heard the shout, turning to the source of the voice and muttering a silent curse. Bud continued to move toward him, aided by David when the man threw a punch at an intrusive Marine and sent the soldier sprawling.
“Do you hear me?” Bud shouted above the wind and rain. “Leave her alone. Leave them both alone!”
“Dr. Dietrich,” Corbin said slowly. “I am not surprised to find you here. But you must know you cannot help her any longer. I’ve come for your associate and I demand to know what has become of the corpse she stole. What secret did it possess that she insisted on breaking the law to obtain it?”
Bud paused several feet before him, the rain lashing his face. After a moment, he gestured to the huddled pair on the rocks. “You want to know what secret it possessed?” his voice was steady. “Take a good look at that man in Rory’s arms. There’s your secret, Corbin. The living corpse of Sir Kieran Hage.”
Corbin cocked an eyebrow, water dripping from his eyelashes. “Bloody Hell, Dietrich. Do you take me for a fool? Surely you don’t think I’d be stupid enough to believe such an idiotic story!”
Bud shrugged. “Foolish or not, it’s the truth. No one saw Rory carry a corpse from the hospital because Sir Kieran Hage, walked out of that morgue. Remember what the nurse said? That she saw Rory in the company of a very large man,” when Corbin shook his head, refusing to believe, Bud moved closer. “Think about it; if Rory was hiding a corpse, just how in the hell did she do it? Where did she do it? If she was so attached to the body like we’ve said all along, don’t you think she would have kept it with her constantly?”
Corbin continued shaking his head, holding up a sharp hand. “Ridiculous, Dietrich. I will not listen to any more of this!”
“Would you listen to me, then?”
A soft voice floated up beside him; Corbin glanced over to see Darlow looking rather stunned. After a moment, the embassy aid fixed Corbin in the eye. “I told you I saw the corpse. And that man on the rocks resembles the knight I saw most definitely. It’s… it’s truly amazing.”
Corbin stared at Darlow, noting the sincerity in his voice. Sincere or not, however, it didn’t erase the fact that two grown men were trying to convince him to believe in a fairy tale and his jaw ticked with irritation as he returned his attention to Bud.
“I will not listen to this any longer,” he growled. “Dr. Osgrove is coming with me and her monstrous bodyguard will be placed in the custody of the Marines.”
On the rocks, Rory and Kieran were listening to the exchange. Kieran was failing, his grip on Rory loosening as she embraced him tightly. On her knees with Kieran’s head clasped to her breast, her anguished gaze locked onto Bud as another bolt of lightning streaked across the sky.
“Bud!” she cried. “Kieran’s dying. We need to get him to a doctor immediately!”
Bud’s brow furrowed as he took a couple of steps toward the rain-slicked rocks. “What happened to him?”
Rory started to cry again, the tears falling so easily these days. “His wound,” she sobbed. “He reopened it somehow. He thinks Simon’s appearance has something to do with it.”
Bud was on the rocks before he could blink, almost slipping but managing to keep his footing. He was suddenly beside the two lovers, separating them gently and groaning softly when he saw Kieran’s blood-soaked shirt.
“Oh… Christ,” he muttered. “He’s bleeding all over the damn place, Rory.”
She sniffled in response as Bud noticed the blood-stained box between them. Kieran was holding it tightly and Bud found he couldn’t take his eyes off it.
“Rory,” he nodded his head at the small wooden case. “Dave told me about the crown. Is… is that it?”
She gazed sadly at the box. “Yes,” she blinked, tears splattering with the rain. “But I swear I’d give it back if it would make Kieran well again. It’s just not worth the heartache it’s caused, Bud.”
“There was a man who thought differently, once,” Kieran’s voice was faint. “He believed it worth dying for.”
“Well, I don’t,” Rory snapped softly. “It’s not worth your life. God, I wish you’d never found the thing!”
Bud put his hand on her shoulder in a gesture of comfort and also to prevent her from reining out of control. Now was not the time for hysterics with Kieran bleeding to death before their eyes. Tearing his gaze away from the holy treasure he had spent over a year of his life searching for, ice-blue focused on the dying man.
“How ya doin’, pal?” he asked, a ridiculous question, considering. “Looks like we’ve got to get you to a hospital.”
The knight shook his head weakly. “’Tis of no use, my lord. Now that my task is complete, I am to die as I should have eight centuries ago.”
Bud fixed Kieran in the eye, a man he should hate for stealing Rory but a man he found he could not hate. There was something in the man’s nature that provoked Bud’s respect in spite of everything. A determination and a sense of duty that Bud himself would have liked to possess.
“A doctor can help you, but we’ve got to go now,” he said, feeling his desperation when Kieran once again shook his head. He didn’t have time to argue with the man. “Look, Kieran; Rory means a great deal to me. Far too much to see her so miserable. If you die… she’ll never be the same. I’ll never be the same. No matter what we’ve been through, our differences and competition, in the end all that matters is that the woman we both love is happy. Right?”
Kieran raised an eyebrow slowly, rain coating his ashen face. “Another selfless gesture, my lord. Pity I am unworthy of such respect for the misery I have caused you both.”
“That’s not true,” Bud disagreed, casting the man a somewhat selfish glance. “Besides, I haven’t finished pumping you for information. I haven’t found out a damn thing!”
“David has served well in your stead,” Kieran murmured, licking his wet lips. “The man is as persistent as a gnat.”
Bud grinned. Even Rory grinned in spite of her tears. Bud held Kieran’s gaze a moment longer before looking to his miserable colleague.
“We’ve got to get to a hospital,” he said, wondering if it wasn’t already too late. “Let me talk to Corbin and see what I can do.”
He turned away from the drenched pair, sliding down the rocks until he reached the soaking sand. Shuffling across the grit, he focused on Corbin’s haughty glare.
“Look,” he said firmly. “Kieran is very sick. He’s probably dying. We’ve got to get him to a hospital immediately.”
Corbin drew in a deep breath. “Fine. I shall take them both in my custody now and will be more than happy to have the bodyguard escorted to a hospital,” suddenly, his right hand emerged from his pocket gripping a Baretta 9mm handgun. A porcelain gun manufactured in Germany that he had managed to get past the security checkpoints in both airports. Bud’s eyes widened.
“What in the hell are you doing?” he hissed. “Put that damn thing away!”
Corbin aimed the gun directly at Bud’s heart. “Not a chance, Dr. Dietrich. You and your associates are far too slippery for me to take any chances,” he turned to the men behind him, keeping the gun aimed at Bud. “Take them. The bodyguard goes to the nearest hospital and the woman goes with me.”
“No!” Rory shrieked, clutching Kieran tightly. “I must stay with him! I won’t let you separate us!”
Corbin turned his attention to Rory, preparing to reply. Just as he did so, Bud saw his chance and lunged for the gun, immediately receiving a butt in the face. As he landed heavily in the sand, a marine trained his own rifle on David before the man could move forward in his colleague’s stead. With Bud wallowing just above unconsciousness and David effectively stopped, there was nothing left between Corbin and Rory.
Except Kieran.
He knew he was dying. He had nothing left to lose by protecting the woman he loved. Somehow finding the strength to disengage himself from her tight embrace, he rose to one knee and faced the man who had plagued him like an evil curse for centuries. The one man who was responsible for all of his misery.
“You will not separate us, Simon,” he said weakly, feeling Rory’s hands on his shoulders. “The lady will come with me.”
Corbin stared at him, the odd sense of deja vu plaguing him again. “Don’t be a hero,” he snarled. “From the look of you, you couldn’t take a bullet wound.”
Kieran cocked an eyebrow, holding out his arms as if to embrace the world. “Is that what you wish? To kill me as you once attempted eight hundred years ago?” he shrugged his massive shoulders. “Then complete your task. Complete what you started. But know this; I have what I came for. I have the crown and my lady will see that is returned to England, as I vowed. There is nothing more you can do to me to cause me any greater pain, Simon. But you can cause the lady great pain and I will not permit it. If I am to go to this hospital, then she will go with me. And you cannot stop her.”
Corbin aimed the gun at Kieran’s head. “You have interfered for the last time,” he said with malice. “I don’t know who you are and I’ve no idea why you insist on calling me Simon. But if killing you is what it takes to accomplish my goal, then I shall. Now, I will ask this only once; will you go peaceably?”
“With the lady at my side?”
“No.”
“Then you have your answer.”
Corbin cocked an eyebrow. “Very well, hero. Have it your way.”
A gun went off. Rory screamed and screamed, her voice echoing off the rocks, the sky. But even as she continued screaming, she realized that Kieran had not been shot. He was still on one knee, his arms outstretched, watching Corbin fall face-first into the sand. Bud, David, Kieran and Rory all stared in astonishment as Justin Darlow, standing just behind Corbin, lowered the small caliber revolver in his left hand.
Darlow felt the stunned gazes as he continued to look upon the man he had just killed. When he did look up, his attention was directed at Rory.
“A man like Corbin only understands violence. I’ve known enough Corbins in my lifetime to know that. And I simply couldn’t let him kill your knight in cold blood,” his gaze found Kieran. Weakly, he shook his head. “I don’t know why I believe you are who they say you are. But I do. How did you come back to life?”
Kieran wavered dangerously, falling on his rump as Rory dropped to his side, supporting him. The disbelief, the disorientation glazing his expression, was blatant.
“Through the miracle of love,” he murmured, barely heard above the driving rain. “My… my lady and I will not be separated. I thank you for your assistance.”
Darlow simply nodded. The gun dropped in the sand beside Corbin as if Darlow no longer possessed the strength to hold it. Being a law-abiding man, he couldn’t understand what had provoked him into murder. Only that he feared for Kieran’s and Rory’s lives, for all their lives. Knowing that the evil that filled Corbin would never stop until someone stopped it. Until someone stopped him.
“You killed him,” David’s voice was filled with awe. And perhaps a bit of jealously. “By damn, Darlow, you killed him!”
Darlow turned to him. “I realize that and I don’t particularly care. I was protecting the knight from Corbin’s crazed assault and I am confident any jury will find that I did it to protect us all,” he glanced over his shoulder at the lady and her knight, once again in a tight embrace as rain and lightning exploded around them. “He’s a madman, you know. I just couldn’t stand by and allow him to commit cold-blooded murder. And he would have, too. Can’t you see that the lady and her knight cannot be separated?”
“What about that speech you gave Rory about the purity of English heritage and all that?” Bud was on his feet, a huge bruise on his cheek. “Now you’re saying that she and Kieran belong together?”
Darlow nodded faintly. “You know they do, too.”
Bud simply stared at the man who had been willing to kill for the power of love. Odd how Sir Kieran Hage seemed to provoke the strongest of emotions wherever he went. Glancing to the sand where Corbin lay, he realized that it was finally over with the man. But the fact remained that Kieran was very ill and the need to get him to a hospital took precedence over all other thoughts at the moment.
“Come on,” he motioned to Darlow and to the soldiers who had thus far stood silent and basically unmoving. Even the Marine who had been aiming his weapon at David had lowered it. “We’ve got to get him to a doctor. There’s a small hospital not too far from here, about an hour up…”
Bud never finished his sentence. A huge burst of lightning suddenly lit up the sky, a jagged bolt crashing down on the outcropping of rocks where Kieran and Rory were huddled. Chunks of rock went flying and even as Bud screamed Rory’s name, trying to protect himself from the white-hot projectiles, he knew his cries were in vain. He knew, before the smoke even settled, that she never heard him.
If you go, I go with you.
She had.