The setting for the tombs was another spectacular performance by the Cyprus Great Views Department. From the cliffs where the tombs were carved out of rock, you could stand on top and look out to sea. The tombs themselves were built around courtyards with colonnades and open to the sky. You stood on the rocks that made up the roofs and looked down into them or walked down steps that led to a labyrinth of holes and niches that served as the tombs. A person could get lost in those passageways.
The driver jerked the Maruti to a halt, and the woman jumped out.
“Move.” She pulled open my door and motioned for me to exit. “Wait here,” she said to the driver. “If anyone comes and questions you, you’re watching the sunset.
My heart sank into the tombs. I looked around for help of any kind. No guard to be seen, only cars driving away, leaving me with a mad woman.
“Hurry,” the woman said and gave me a nudge toward the most isolated of the tombs. I started walking, trying not to stumble on the uneven rock surfaces.
“Down those stairs and don’t try anything funny. I have the gun, and I will use it.”
Reluctantly, I started down the remains of a stairway into a hole in the ground. Nausea started in my gut and rose into my chest like black bile, bitter and unrelenting. Panic I could no longer keep at bay. From behind me the beam of light from her flashlight illuminated the stairs that the darkness enclosed. I yelped as a fluttery creature exited the black hole.
“Get going,” she said and shoved me. “You aren’t afraid of a little bat are you?”
“As a matter of fact, they give me the creeps,” I muttered to myself.
I picked my way down the steps the flashlight illuminated. So much for any hope of rescue. No one seemed to have seen or cared that we came in late, that two women had disappeared into the tombs.
Zachariah Lamont where were you now?
The further we descended into the tomb, the more I wheezed and fought for breath. Claustrophobia made me want to push the walls apart. I had had nightmares about places where there were thirty feet of dirt above me and no way out, trying to scream but I could make no sound. I shrank from stories of people buried alive in earthquake rubble.
“Stop,” the hateful woman said.
Like a mindless little ant, I obeyed.
“Sit down.”
I looked down at the dirty, dusty rock floor and thought of scorpions and rats. “No, I’m not sitting down. Who are you and what do you want with me?”
She flashed the light into my face, and I jerked away from the blinding beam. “I told you I ask the questions. Where’s your boyfriend?”
“My boy…” The rest of the words died on my lips. They hadn’t gotten to Zach.
“Don’t play stupid, answer the question.”
“He left while I was asleep. I don’t know where he went. Get that light out of my eyes.” My near hysteria made me bold. “I don’t know what you are involved in, but I am an innocent bystander and don’t have any information.”
“You might not have information, but you’ll make a good hostage.” She fumbled in her bag and came up with a length of leather cord.
My eyes widened. If she thought she was going to tie me up and leave me in a tomb, she was mistaken.
“Sit down,” she said.
I swung.
Between the flashlight and the leather cord, I found my opening. I had never socked anyone with my fist before, but terror put so much adrenaline and determination in my swing, I connected with her jaw before she knew what was happening. The woman careened back. The flash light ricocheted crazily around the chamber. She crashed to the floor, hitting her head against the rough wall of the tomb.
Hopefully, she was dead. The hateful woman.
I snatched up the light and her purse and ran.
Life giving air greeted me at the entrance where I gulped in great lungfuls. No sounds of pursuit followed. The island night had descended. I switched on the light and searched her purse like it would have snakes or some other hideous creature inside. A gun, some money, no identification. No make up. It would have to do since I no longer had my purse. I dowsed the light.
I crept up more stairs, my whole body shaking with the near encounter of being left tied up in a tomb. That had scared me worse than being held hostage. I peeked over the ledge at the top of the tomb. The Maruti sat in the parking lot. Using tumbled rocks as cover, I crouched and crawled as close to the Maruti as I could then ran like a banshee toward the driver’s side of the vehicle.
“Hands up,” I screamed, pointing the gun in the general direction of the driver’s seat. I was determined to get control of the Maruti and get away from these creeps.
“Don’t shoot,” said an accented, quavering voice.
“Get out and leave the keys in the ignition.”
The door opened cautiously, and the little man climbed out.
“Keep your hands in sight. I’m shaking and very nervous, and I might pull this trigger at the slightest suggestion of a wrong move.”
“Please, I have wife and children.”
“You should have thought of that before you hooked up with that ugly broad. Now walk to the front of the car.”
As soon as he cleared the front of the car, I whacked him on the back of head with the butt of the gun. It worked famously. Now I had to figure out how to drive that stupid vehicle and get the hell out. I jumped in, slammed it through its gears and didn’t turn on the lights till I was well away from where I had dropped the guy.
I was shaking so bad I could barely grip the wheel. My entire arm hurt from socking the woman and whacking the guy. But I was alive, and I wasn’t going to be tied up in a tomb for the rest of the night.
Eighteen
I drove that sorry excuse for a car, pedal to the floor the whole way back to Pafos, passing with reckless abandon any car that slowed me down, not caring what side of the road I was on. I headed for Yannis’s house. Nothing was going to stop me. I would turn myself into the police and tell them about the American couple and Zach. I couldn’t help them with where he was, but I could tell them everything.
Everything.
And I did.
After I got to Yannis’s and he had hugged me to oblivion, we called the police, and they came to his house. Inspector Polydeuces, the same cousin I had met on Sunday, listened attentively to everything I said. His assistant, a neat looking woman in uniform, made notes as I spoke.
The Inspector nodded gravely at the part about Zach being wanted for smuggling, Mr. Bellomo harboring my aunt, the American woman kidnapping me, and Berengaria’s jewels. After asking me every possible question relating to the antiquities theft, he remained in silence, looking troubled and pulling at the corner of his bushy moustache, as if that would help him think.
Finally, he said, “Miss Lowell, there are one or two facts of which you may not be aware. I need to share these with you, as you are now in our custody and under our protection.”
That gave me pause since I expected him to haul me off to jail. My heart sank into my cute little sandals which had stayed faithfully on my feet through the whole ordeal. I waited on the edge of my seat.
“You see, Miss Lowell, Zachary Lamont is a double agent. He works for the New York Police Department anti-terrorism unit but is on assignment with a consortium team through INTERPOL. They are trying to help us destroy this terrorist cell we know is forming on the island of Cyprus.”
“He’s wanted by the FBI for smuggling,” I said. “Yannis said you are looking for him.” I stared at Yannis while I was saying this. He gave me a don’t-ask-me shrug.