Return (Matt Turner Series Book 3) (14 page)

On the airstrip in Ukraine, before they’d boarded Mr. Ostrovsky’s jet, she’d whispered to him, “Are you sure you can trust these people?” to which he’d matter-of-factly replied, “I don’t have to trust anymore.”

It was such an uncanny sentence, uttered with a singular, pure intent: to reassure her that she was, indeed, safe. And it’d worked. Stepping into the plane a second later, he appeared to have moved on with a
“now that that’s behind us…”
air, but she’d stood there a beat, surprised at herself for suddenly feeling warm inside, and small, and safe.

Back in the hall outside their rooms, Markus pointed out that their luggage and personal items could be found in their respective closets, and informed them that dinner would be served on the veranda at seven. In the meantime, they were encouraged to settle in, change, explore the house, or walk down to the beach. “You’ll find assorted swimwear and other seasonal attire in your armoires. I trust the selection is ample, but please don’t hesitate to ask for anything you require.”

“Thank you, Markus,” Joss said, and he turned to leave them.

Just as Matt and Joss looked at each other to confer on their plans, a radio cracked on Markus’s hip.

A woman’s voice spoke—Greek accent, but clear enough English for Matt and Joss to understand. Her tone was disciplinary, like a teacher. “Markus, did you tell them about the kitchen?”

At this, Matt peered up at the hall ceiling, and Joss followed his gaze. They spotted the camera at the same time.

Markus spun an about face, smiling to the pair. “In the kitchen you’ll find a fully stocked pantry, refrigerator, and bar, entirely at your disposal, but you may also, at any time, ring the main kitchen to request unscheduled snacks, meals, and, of course, drinks. I encourage you to utilize the staff, despite their apparent absence. Invisibility is their standard directive.” He lifted the radio to his mouth and gazed up at the camera. “But, of course, Circe.”

“But, of course,” Circe replied.

* * *

Matt’s eyes popped opened before sunrise. He stared at the slowly turning ceiling fan, its blades of woven husks—foreign and disturbing until he recalled where he was.

Philippos. The island.

How long had he slept? It almost felt like too much, an entire day, but the wine from last night—some renowned chateau, $75,000 per bottle according to Circe—still muddled Matt’s thoughts. He and Joss had made a game of estimating the cost of a sip. The chef had personally served them their meal: a surprisingly delicious rabbit Joss took to calling “Bugs.” Later, the two had ambled down the beach, chitchatting about their contrasting Jersey childhoods, the insanely wealthy, and the Milky Way, glowing above them with depth and colors impossible to see near a city.

When he’d finally turned in, Matt hadn’t even thought to grab something to read. He’d actually gotten real sleep—probably more than five hours. This was undoubtedly a good thing, but with his brain in its current bog, he felt unsettled, anxious.

He slid out of bed, brushed his teeth in the pale light of the brightening sky, and threw on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. A jaw twitch guided his focus to the backpack on the sofa. Maybe something familiar, something small to bring with him.

“Just one quick fix, right?” he murmured. “A little hit to take the edge off?”

Matt shook his head, disgusted with himself and his addict tendencies. Shunning the artifacts in the backpack, he went to the wall, pulled aside the heavy curtain, and found a sliding glass door.

He stepped out onto a chilly, tree-covered path, stretching his legs and neck as he walked toward the beach. Once beneath the open sky—fresh air smelling of moist bark and sand, salt water, algae, stone—he broke into a jog.

* * *

Sipping her iced tea beneath the shade of a wide umbrella, Joss inhaled the delicious, late-morning air. The smell of hot sand. She peered down at her toes, week-old, sapphire-blue polish chipping away, and wondered if pedicures were part of the package here on zillionaire Fantasy Island.

She sensed movement in her periphery and glanced down the beach. Indeed, it was Matt, jogging toward her, bare-chested, sweaty, with a shirt flopping in his hand. She faced forward, nonchalant, her sunglasses facing the water and other islands in the distance, while she gave her body a quick review.

A minute later, Matt arrived beside the other lounge chair, breathing heavy and begging for water. “Should’ve brought some,” he muttered as he filled a glass from the ice-filled pitcher.

“You missed breakfast,” Joss said, still gazing out at the water.

“Sorry. I thought I was going to circle the island.”

“But?”

Still breathing heavily, he’d swallowed too fast, and coughed.

He wiped his mouth and chin. “But it’s really fricken big.”

“Well, they said when you come back from your run to just ring them up and they’ll bring it out here. Look.” She waved the walkie-talkie. “It’s like our little bell … Well,
your
little bell. Sorry, should I be
doing
something? I feel like I should be doing something. Like
work
.”

Matt plopped down onto the other chair and slurped more water. He looked intense again—that busy, distracted face. “Nah, you’re fine. Did they … Was it Markus? The Taria?” He sort of babbled, but Joss understood where he was going.

“Yes, Markus did stop by. He asked me if you were planning to read the thing out here or somewhere else.”

He put his legs up and sat back in the lounge chair. “And you said?”

“I said I wasn’t sure. That we’d let him know.”

Matt considered for a moment. Joss twirled her drink into a mini-whirlpool, watching the ice swirl around the glass. From the corner of her eye, she caught Matt glance her way.

“Here’s fine,” he declared officially. Serious business out here in the Greek Isles. Joss wondered if wine was the only way to get him to lighten up. He went on, “Shouldn’t get too hot before lunch. But if I’m into a reading, and the sun starts beating down to where it looks like I’m going to burn-”

“I should slather you with sunblock?” Joss snarked, instantly regretting saying it aloud.

Matt didn’t skip a beat, letting her off the hook by pretending he didn’t hear. “—just tap me, or maybe move the umbrella. Or have one of the people do it?”

“Sure, yeah, that’s no problem. I’ll keep an eye out.”

Christ. My contributions to this trip are a single page of notes, and straight-up sexual harassment.

She picked up the walkie-talkie. “Hi, this is Joss. Matt’s out here and ready for you.”

Circe replied instantly. “Thank you, Ms. Leland. Please clarify: ready for meal, or ready for Markus?”

Matt shrugged and held up two fingers.

“What’s that, two meals?” Joss affected dramatic confusion. She figured continuing the playful tone—sans innuendo—might defuse her last comment. “Ready for peace? Bathroom break?”

He finally smiled. Thankfully. “
Both
, please.”

“Circe, he’s ready for both.”

Alexandria, Aegyptus (Roman Province of Egypt) – 271 CE

Patra sat on the stool before her mirror, brushing her waist-length hair in long, slow strokes, her gaze floating somewhere between her reflection and the mirror’s silver frame. In her lap, she absentmindedly rubbed her thumb over her key’s smooth handle, stroking in unison with her brush.

A light, wooden tap on the wall: Unza, her servant.

“Now?” Unza’s voice queried from around the corner—one of her eleven Greek words.

“After a turn,” Patra replied in Coptic.

Patra’s tunic top lay bunched in her lap, her stola hung on the wall. She expected no visitors, and didn’t yet wish to be dressed. Unza would return in a while.

She explored her reflection, feeling old, tired. “Hello, Steward.”

The nearly forty-year-old flesh beside her mouth was beginning to sink, now keen to follow her breasts on their slow journey toward her feet. When had her passion begun this dither? She’d grown up in the Musaeum with her father, surrounded by the most brilliant thinkers in the world, learned to translate eleven languages before turning twelve, and had a knack for completing the thoughts of cogitating philosophers. She’d loved it—every moment!

Even when Father had made her study with the mathematicians, drawing diagram after diagram of cuboids, precise angles, and polyhedra, she’d found pleasure in solving the equations’ mysteries.
“Mathematics,”
explained Apollonius,
“is the infinite story, encapsulating the clues and eventual answers to every mystery of the cosmos.”

Patra still believed this to be true, and if numbers were the stairway to enlightenment, she wished to decipher every digit. Though she counted as friend every prominent mathematician at the library, she hadn’t been invited to a forum in over a decade. Her mind was no longer as malleable or absorbent as it once was. Or, more likely, their persistence and patience while simplifying theorems for her had dwindled as she’d grown. An unrelenting little girl hurling question after question—the endearing nature of this spectacle had gradually expired. Add to this her increasing partiality toward her own generation—perhaps a craving to belong, or to be the smartest one in the room, instead of the least.

In time, she’d escaped the trappings of being her father’s daughter, establishing herself with achievement after achievement, building her own philosophy atop Plato and Plotinus, combining them with the traditional Egyptian theories of the human soul. How gratified had she been by the ovation in the Great Hall? Standing there,
moved
, celebrated by intellectuals younger and elder, as she’d concluded her lecture: “…or perhaps a guide for us all, myself especially, for attaining true happiness—perfected within
this
lifetime, relished in
this
world, and to not merely await the afterlife. Thank you all.”

Given her breadth of talent, they’d elevated her to Steward less than a year later—the first woman to hold the title—and that’s who she’d remained for the past four. Could she return to philosophy? Sit down with the men now building on her work? Start anew with other areas of thought? Of course she could, but she was always so busy, anxious, head muddled by an endless list of tasks. The occasional unwelcome whisper in her head:
Could it be that my greatest ideas are behind me?

Yes, her legacy was set, and her roles as Steward would remain: facilitate
other’s
best work, recruit from abroad, grow the library’s archives. But what of true happiness? What of relishing life in
this
world? A cruel, self-inflicted irony.

Unza’s voice, beyond the curtain to the hall, “Now?”

“Now is fine, Unza,” Patra resigned.

Unza entered, her ever-present flaccid expression upon her dark brown face, droopy lower lip, apathetic left eye. She pulled Patra’s blue stola from the post on the wall. Patra stood and raised her arms in a V. Unza set the stola down, then reached past Patra to the tray. A shake of a bottle, brushings of oil, sharpening the blade.

As Unza shaved under her arms, Patra bemoaned the day ahead. She wasn’t looking forward to warning Kaleb and Philip about their planned performance. If Patra was—as everyone suggested—stubborn as stone, then Kaleb was the ultimate, unmovable mountain, and he’d never see as she did the potential repercussions. No, to him, the world was full of reasonable people, and he could always explain himself out of trouble. Philip, conversely, was capable of reason, but he wasn’t the one she needed to worry about. Philip had a family, and he lacked
Prince
Kaleb’s royal sense of entitlement. Philip, however, had no power against Kaleb’s charm. For Philip, Kaleb’s confidence and good cheer defeated basic logic every time. If there were any chance of stopping this, she needed to get Kaleb alone.

Unza pulled Patra’s arms down forcefully, turned her sideways, and patted powder beneath her breasts. On to the perfume stick—a dip in the jar and a swipe down the breastbone, a dip and a swipe arched over one hip, then the other, circle the knees, Xs on the ankles…

Patra had long since given up arguing with Unza about her strict grooming rituals (dip and a swipe behind the ear, dip and a swipe beneath the chin, a grunted cue to lift her left foot), accepting that her servant lacked the sensibilities of even the simplest of normal persons. Though, strangely, Unza had a memory like no other. Navigating from one end of Alexandria to the other, head down—though shown the course only once—she’d make all the right turns without a single mistake. The same held true of items Patra had misplaced.
“Unza, have you seen my purple thread?”
got Unza stomping straight to some box in the study and slapping the spool into Patra’s hand. Others might’ve thought her angry, aggressive, but it was not some
mood
, it was simply her way.

After helping her into the stola, Unza slid and twisted Patra’s girdle up so the key hung outside the thigh, where she preferred.

“Perfect, thank you,” Patra said, but Unza spun her around once more by the shoulders.

“No,” Unza said, grunting as she tugged at and straightened the stola’s orientation until satisfied.

When finally finished, Patra left her bungalow—one of eight private units situated behind the Library, while the vast majority of residents lived in the dormitories at the other end of the Musaeum property. Kaleb and his apprentices stayed in the dormitories, but were typically up and about this late in the morning, likely eating or on their way to a classroom.

In the lush courtyard between the bungalows and the rest of the complex, Patra eyed two cats lapping water from the fountain. The animals heard her approach and bolted to the vine-wrapped wall, which in turn sent a flock of tiny birds panicking into the air.

“Good morning, Steward,” a pair of young Musaeum girls said as they passed, baskets and trimmers in hand. They were Philip’s daughter, Theophila, and her friend, Eugenia.

“Good morning, girls,” Patra replied with a smile. “Off to collect grapes?”