I stood on the deck of Amelia's boat watching the water. This was getting out of hand. I had tried to distance myself, go back to life without her interfering in that delightfully distracting manner. I could not.
Tonight had been even worse. She had come striding into dinner, with her magnificent hair piled up on her head and that sensually cut red dress that displayed her figure to best advantage and emphasized the long line of her neck and down farther than any decent man could bear, let alone me.
Damn the woman! How could she affect me this powerfully? Who was she to reduce me to a near jelly whenever she marched into a room, eyes flashing? I barley registered the click of heels. B the time I fully realized their implication it was too late to run. She came striding up the deck, with a look I already knew well etched upon her face. I inched to the side, attempting to flee like the coward I was. I was fairly certain I could outrun her. Then, I made the fatal mistake of hesitating. She took advantage of my indecision.
"No" she said, planting herself in my path, arms folded, blocking my escape route. "Don't try to run away, Emerson, It won't do you a particle of good, for I mean to have my say if I have to shout it after you as we run about the boat." Good Gad. I must be dealing with a mad woman. I should have run while I had the chance. "Sit or stand, don't mind me. I shall stand. I think better on my feet." Her dress rustled about her as the moonlight paled her skin to an ivory and glimmered in her hair. I cleared my throat.
"I shall stand. I feel safer on my feet. Precede, then, Peabody; I know better than to interfere with you when you are in this mood." That was certainly true.
"I mean-" Her voice came out high above its normal range. She faltered and then started again.
"I mean to make you a business proposition. It is simply this. I have some means; I am not rich, like Evelyn, but I have more that I need. I may as well employ it for a useful purpose while I live, thus killing two birds with one stone. I wish to hire you as my archaeological expert. There is only one condition…"
Her hands had begun to twist the folds of her dress. She kept her eyes down, fixed as it seemed in her dress. If I did not know her, I would have thought that she was nervous. My heart hammered savagely against my chest.
"Yes? What condition?" My voice came strangely, even to my own ears.
She took a deep breath.
"I want to participate. After all, why should men have all the fun?" I stared at her. What woman could possibly think of field work as fun? I wondered, not for the first time, if she was mentally unstable.
"Fun?" I repeated. "To be burned by the sun, rubbed raw by the sand; to be bitten by snakes and mashed by falling rocks? You definition of pleasure, Peabody, is extremely peculiar."
"Peculiar or not, it is my idea of pleasure. Why else do you lead this life if you don't enjoy it? Don't talk of duty, men always have some excuse for indulging yourselves. You go gallivanting all over the earth, and expect women to sit dully at home embroidering. I embroider very badly. I think I would excavate rather well. If you like, I will list my qualifications-"
She had become irritated, her eyes flashing as she spoke with vigorous, passionate gestures.
"No" I said slowly, a kind of numbness spreading over me. "I am only too well aware of your qualifications." I reached for her, pulling her into my arms.
"Stop it" she said heatedly, shaking her head, and planting both hands on my chest and shoving feebly. I could feel her warm breath on my clavicle. "You are confusing me. I don't want-"
"Don't you?" I ask, taking her chin in my hand. Her gray eyes were wide and hot, lips parted.
"Yes!" She breathed, reaching up for me. Then I kissed her for the first time since that night in the tomb. Her lips were just as I remembered soft, gentle and yielding. Come to think of it, her body was the only part of her that was yielding. She was warm in my arms and against my torso. I could feel how small and delicate she was; two characteristics she hid well behind a passionate personality. She seem less timid that that night on the ground in El Armana, by still unsure. I took the lead, shaping her lips with mine and exploring slowly. I knew in that second that I would never be free of the desire I felt for her. Nor did I want to be.