“There’s another one!”
I leaped out of my chair at Jakob’s declaration and raced with him back to the northwest corner of the site where all our efforts were now concentrated. Not even a quarter-mile from where our first body had been found, Alex and two others were unearthing another corpse.
I ran so wildly my foot slipped at the edge of the pit and I slid down to the bottom. Jakob yanked me to my feet and tried, unsuccessfully, to wipe the muck from my back.
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” I insisted, wading over to where Alex was digging. “What did you find?”
“A leg, so far,” Alex answered, wiping his forehead on the corner of his elbow and smearing mud on his face.
I smirked. “I thought you didn’t like getting dirty.”
Alex’s face turned beet red. “It’s my dig. What else should I be doing?”
“Your dig?” I repeated, incredulous. “Since when?”
The hue of his cheeks deepened to a dark purple, but the man standing to Alex’s right sliced through the dense air.
“I’ve got an arm,” he declared.
I cocked my head, studying the depression beside the shriveled, leathery leg that Alex was exposing up to the hip. The tanned edges of the abdomen sunk back into the peat, then disappeared.
“I don’t think the left one’s attached,” I said. “You would have come across it by now.”
Alex grudgingly looked up from his work and nodded his head in the affirmative. “Go over there and look for it,” he snapped, pointing off to his left. His helpers looked up at him, then at each other, before turning their eyes back to their work without saying a word.
I opened my mouth to bite his head off, but Jakob pulled me away to hunt for the detached limb. “Come on, forget him,” he whispered.
“That arrogant bastard,” I cursed under my breath.
“I know, I know. Don’t worry about it. What do you want tonight? Indian?”
I grimaced. “I do love Indian, but again?”
“All right—burgers?” he suggested.
“Yeah. On me this time.”
“Deal. So, what will we call this one? Anglesey Man B?” Jakob asked, pulling away a chunk of peat with a hand-held trowel and tossing it to the ground behind him.
“Anglesey Man—is that what we’re calling ours?” I asked.
“What else would we call him?”
“Anglesey Man,” I repeated. “I like the sound of that.”
“Uh—how do you like the sound of Anglesey Man C?”
I turned to him, confused.
“Call me stupid, but that’s another right arm.”
A third limb hung suspended in the peat right in front of us. It was only paces away from the others.
“Didn’t find your leg,” I shouted over my shoulder. “Will another arm do?”
I lost all track of time as we carved the corpse out of the bog. He was submerged upright, like the others. The head was in slightly better shape than Anglesey Man B, but a chunk of his shoulder was caved in, and both of the legs were missing.
“Look, look!” I cried as I brought the level of excavated mud nearer to his head.
“Those don’t look like willow branches,” Jakob commented.
“No,” I said, scanning the impressions encircling the head like a halo. “They’re thick and braided, like wicker.”
“A wicker man? Seriously?” Jakob quipped.
I grinned. “You got it. I want to make a mold of this. What do we have?”
“There’s a plaster set back at the lab, I think. I’ll make a run.” He kissed me on the cheek and scrambled out of the pit.
“Thanks!” I shouted and pulled my camera out of my bag to take a dozen more shots. I felt a lumbering presence gather over my shoulder and turned around to find Alex glaring at me.
“What the hell was that?” he grunted.
“The impressions here are different from the other one. These are more woven than botanical.”
“Not that.”
“What?” I asked.
His eyes narrowed to murderous slits. Laughter bubbled up in my throat so fast I almost choked—he’d seen Jakob kiss me.
“What?” I dared him. “What’s the problem, professor?”
He remained silent—I knew he would. He would never say anything out loud, in public. Why he’d brought it up at all was a mystery.
He swiveled on his heel and rejoined his team without giving me an answer. There was no talking to him after that. On our last day, when I showed him the cargo list for what we were taking back with us, he exploded.
“Are you insane? This was our dig!”
“And we only found as much as we did because of Pryce’s help,” I countered.
“Is it Pryce, then? Did he pressure you into this, because if he did, I’ll—”
“No,” I insisted.
His eyes widened. “Then how in God’s name could you let them keep two of the bodies? Two!”
“Because I want Anglesey Man!”
“Who cares which ones we get?”
I shook my head, furious that the first honest conversation we were having about this excavation was over turf. His protests rang in my ears as someone desperate to stay relevant, to take control of a project he’d given minimal thought to. It was obvious now that he’d never expected this dig to matter at all. Why encourage me then? Why waste my time? I couldn’t wrap my head around it. But he’d left me to my own devices so long that I hated him stepping on my toes.
“Anglesey Man is the most complete—he’ll tell us more than the others will.” When he didn’t respond, I played my trump card. “It’s my name people will see first on anything published,” I reminded him, balling my hands into fists at my sides to keep the rest of me from shaking. “I made the proposal. I made this dig happen, and I’m taking the body I want back with me.” Anglesey Man was the one I wanted. His was the face that came to me in my sleep, that possessed my days and would fill the pages of my dissertation. He had had an effect on me, more than the others. Whether it was because he was the first, or because of the conditions, I couldn’t tell. But the prospect of leaving him in another team’s hands was too much of a sacrifice.
I took several deep breaths, curling my toes inside my shoes, finding any way I could to squirm in my place without letting Alex see. He stayed silent for several seconds, each tick of the clock stretching to its extremity. His face reddened with every passing moment. The animus in his eyes told me he hadn’t forgotten our publication agreement, and that his annoyance stemmed from the fact that I hadn’t either. I relaxed the pressure of my fingernails against my palms and blinked, trying to cool my own ire before either of us said something we shouldn’t. Alex caught the gesture, and thankfully followed suit.
“Fair enough,” he answered, the fire fading from his cheeks as the hard-set line of his lips upturned in one corner.
“Thank you,” I said, relieved. He came closer, standing a head taller than me and looking down into my eyes. I was afraid he would kiss me and went stiff as a statue.
Satisfied, he laughed under his breath. “Good for you.” With that, he left. I rubbed my eyes, passing my hand quickly through my hair. I groaned at the prospect of having to do that again, greasing the small wheels in my head that might just conjure a way for us to never have to work together again. At a loss, I groaned louder.
“It might be a while until you hear from me, but I promise to share everything,” Dr. Pryce said, taking my bags out of his trunk and laying them on the sidewalk outside Cardiff airport.
“I’ll do the same,” I said, extending my hand.
He laughed, bypassing my hand and opening both his arms in a jovial embrace.
“Safe journey, Miss Hayes. I hope we can work together again soon.”
“I’d like that.” I took my leave of him as he moved to bid Alex goodbye.
Jakob didn’t know what to do with himself, and simply smiled at me. He finally decided to take his hands out of his pockets as he drew closer to me and reached for my hand.
“Thanks for everything,” I said, squeezing his fingers and wishing I’d chosen to stay silent instead. It would have been more elegant. His gaze darted to the ground as he gave a subtle nod. He tugged on me, bringing us closer together, and left a tender kiss on my cheek.
“It’s been my pleasure,” he murmured against my neck.
I licked my lips, my heart quickening. “Mine too.” The corners of his mouth twitched in a smile against my skin. “Goodbye, Jakob.”
“Bye, Azi.”
Our mouths touched so lightly that I wasn’t sure if I’d felt his lips or only dreamed them. He held my fingers until the last moment. He snaked his hand back into his pocket as I looked over my shoulder and the glass door slid closed behind me.
“Let’s move it. I want to grab a drink before we board.” Alex’s voice broke my trance, and I looked at him blankly, disoriented. I stifled a hard, shuddering breath. I wanted to scream at Alex or run back through the doors. I cared more about Jakob in that moment than I did about the man standing beside me—the one I’d loved my whole life. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Settling on neither, I hauled ass to the gate.
“Here,” Alex said, throwing the slim, neatly shrink-wrapped airplane blanket off his seat and onto my lap. “After weeks in that Godforsaken dorm, you need this more than I do.”
I’d been perfectly comfortable in Jakob’s apartment for those last two, but I kept that to myself as I layered his blanket on top of my own, settling into my chair and pulling up my satchel on the spare seat to the left of me, taking out first my sketchpad, then my charcoals.
Alex surprised me by arresting my hand in his own, touching me more softly than I had let him in a long time.
“Pryce was right, Azi,” he started, examining my fingers as he folded them into his own. “Your parents would be very proud of you.” I swallowed hard, not wanting to think about Alex or my parents at that moment.
I don’t remember falling asleep, and I certainly do not remember resting my head on Alex’s shoulder. Yet that’s the position I found myself in when the captain announced our descent into Providence. I felt a cozy compression on my hair release as Alex lifted his cheek off my head, waking the same moment as me, and stretching his arms upward. He didn’t seem to care at all, going about his regular business of retrieving his carry-on from overhead and sitting alert for our departure. When I finally caught his eyes, I searched for some meaning there, some clue as to whether he was showing restraint, or that his passions had cooled. I found none. Aloof or oblivious, he disembarked without fanfare, wishing me a hollow “so long” as he headed off to claim our precious cargo.