Timeless (20 page)

The weight belt filled with lead ingots hung clunky and hard around Quinn’s waist as he fastened it in place. Gathering the six-pack of bottled water and extra sandwiches, he locked out into the diving bell. The interior of the submersible decompression chamber measured only three meters in diameter and was painted a sickly gray-green. Setting aside the food and drink, he paused to look through one of the small portholes positioned between the tanks of emergency gas fastened to the exterior of the bell. Logan and Ronald Mac Fie, another member of the crew, moved within his range of vision as they inspected the bottles.

He bent to look overhead and studied the cloud cover. The forecast was for clear and cool, but the wispy cirrus clouds promised rain. Visibility would be bad enough without a storm stirring the water and kicking up the bottom. An unexpected weather change could also make things interesting during the lowering and raising of the bell.

His attention focused on the cofferdam thirty meters to starboard. The structure blocked his view of the monoliths and the team of students and volunteers that cleaned them, but uneasiness still coiled in the pit of his stomach.

Was he losing his nerve? No. It was this place. And the stones. Something about them, the look of them, the anxiety he experienced when he was about them, made him edgy. And now he was going to bring another up out of the water and set it back in place. It felt-—dangerous.

Anger spun through him like a whirlpool. Bracing his fists against either side of the porthole, he fought the urge to punch the side of the bell. God damn the bleeding rocks. He wished he’d never agreed to come here. Wished he’d never signed the contract.

But he had a responsibility to his brothers, and to the salvage company they were building. He couldn’t walk away. Their business depended on the reputation they were developing.

Drawing a deep breath, he shoved aside his anger and growing concern. “Rob, I’m ready to go over the systems checklist.”

“Roger.”

He read off the readings on every gauge. Seventy meters beneath the cold water of Loch Maree was not the place to have a problem with equipment.

Struthers and Bruce locked into the bell behind him as they finished. Struthers stuffed his dive gloves behind one of the stainless steel seats that folded against the bulkhead of the chamber and came to stand beside him. He pulled his stringy blond hair into a ponytail and secured it with a rubber band. “Rob said you’d had a run in with one of the students from America. He said something about her stealing your song.”

Quinn raised a brow. “She didna steal it.” He heard the defensiveness in his tone and shook his head. Coira-Regan, who was he defending? “She sang the tune at the pub.”

Their voices sounded high-pitched from the helium-oxygen mixture they were breathing.

The man’s pale blond brows rose. “Why would she do that?”

Quinn shook his head. What was he to say? “I dinna ken.”

“Maybe she just hoped to gain your attention,” Bruce said from his seat.

She had gotten that before the song even came into play. As soon as she’d stepped on
Grannos
he’d been drawn to her. Because of the dreams. But what of now? The sense of familiarity and desire he experienced when they were together made it difficult for him to keep his distance. It was as though his body remembered her from another time.

Reincarnation. They had danced about the concept without ever saying it. He was a Catholic, not Hindu. What did he know of such beliefs?

“She’s a bit on the wee side for my taste. I like me girls with a little more meat in the right places.” Bruce cupped his fingers against his chest.

“I prefer a nice bum m’self. Gives you somewhere to rest your hands while you’re settling into your rhythm.” Struthers grinned. He picked up his diving gloves and, pushing the seat down, slouched against the bulkhead.

Bruce laughed, the pitch flute-like and shrill.

“This is control. Ready to begin the run,” Rob’s voice came through the speaker overhead.

“Roger, topside,” Quinn answered. He took his seat and braced his feet against the gentle sway of the bell as it was lifted from the system. Through the porthole, the deep green surface of the loch reflected the snow-covered peak of Mt. Slioch and the clouds above it like a mirror. The pitching movement intensified as the chamber swung out over the water.

They braced themselves. The bell hit the water with a jolt and bobbed, giving them a hard shake before submerging. Liquid rushed upward, covering the portholes and blocking out the exterior world.

The water went from pale green to emerald as they left the light behind.

Seven meters down Struthers’ and Bruce’s discussion about the generous attributes of one of the Irish archaeology students came to abrupt end as the insular silence of the water took effect.

Quinn’s muscles began to unknot. The pressures above seemed to fall farther and farther away the deeper they submerged. This was why he continued doing the salvage work. Knowing that he was one of a very small number of people in the world who could do this kind of work gave him a sense of pride. But standing on the bottom of a loch with millions of gallons of water overhead was a bit like taking a space walk. Nothing could compete.

The trunk hatch popped with a sharp thump as they reached their depth. Quinn shoved his hands into his gloves.

“Seventy one meter depth acquired,” Rob’s voice came over the radio.

As acting bellman, Bruce answered. “Roger, control.”

Quinn rose and reached for his dive hat attached to the fifty-two meter umbilical which supplied him with both the mixture of gases he would breathe and his communications. He switched on the light and camera assembly, put on the helmet, and plugged the hot water hose into the port at his hip. He heard the reassuring hiss of the gas and felt an immediate surge of warmth as Bruce adjusted a valve that fed the heated fluid through his suit. He gave the man a thumb up, as did Struthers. The look of expectancy and concentration on Struthers’ face had him smiling as they waited for Bruce to equalize the pressure inside the trunk with the outside water, then open the hatch.

Quinn dropped through the opening first, Struthers close behind. He moved immediately to retrieve his emergency bottle of gas from the bell’s exterior, strapped it on, and connected the hose to his hat. Grasping the emergency umbilical, he fed it back through the hatch to Bruce.

In his helmet light, the water looked a clear greenish blue, the pumps no longer shooting muddy water over the side of the cofferdam to foul it. Several underwater canister lights attached to a metal frame shone directly on the stone. Their multi-bulb structure glared, making the scene look as if a small section of the bottom lay trapped inside a dreary snow globe. A brown eel, whip thin and quick, swam before them, then slithered into the dark. Water plants dotted the bottom in sparse clumps. Long lengths of PVC pipe were stacked to one side.

“That was the grid the archaeologist laid before we came on scene. They’ve taken most of it apart.”

“Logan’s contraption seems to be working. Wonder if he’ll try and patent it?” Struthers motioned toward the metal framework.

“He might. If it continues to work correctly.”

The stone lay on its side, on an incline and propped up by the rough edge of a large sunken bolder. Despite the thick layer of algae that coated its surface, two well-defined depressions sunk deep at each end of the block where the lintel would fit atop the posts.

The gear basket rested in the mud only a few yards shy of it. Quinn grabbed a couple of Kevlar straps and hefted them to his shoulder, then grasped the long rod that would act as a guide for the messenger lines. Struthers picked up a steel shackle and a strap.

Weighted down with gear, Quinn shuffled through the mud, kicking up debris equivalent to that of a dust storm in the Sahara.

“’Tis a big bugger.” Struthers voice in his ear sounded tinny and distant over the communication device in his helmet.

“Aye. ‘Tis a twenty ton stone, but we’ve moved bigger things. There’s the drop-off we discussed right before it. We’ll have to be careful once the water muddies up good and proper. I’ll get around behind it and slide you the messenger line. We need to get a couple of straps on it to secure it, just in case.”

“Aye.”

Quinn plodded around the back of the stone. He attached the end of the strap to the rod he carried. Choosing a clear area where the lintel lay propped up off the ground, he slid the rod beneath the stone. Silt puffed up in the water like gray fog, and immediately visibility decreased.

“Got it,” Struthers said and pulled the rod from beneath the slab. With the water becoming muddier by the moment, they worked by touch rather than sight to slide straps under the three-meter stone in half-meter wide increments. Concentrating on the work at hand, their spoken communication became brief, succinct. The drag of the water against his limbs, the effort it took to push the gas in and out of his lungs, reminded Quinn to pace himself. The smallest task took twice the effort at seven atmospheres down.

“Your shift is ending team one,” Rob’s voice came over their helmet units.

Six hours had passed very quickly. “Aye, aye, topside,” Quinn answered. “I’d like to get another strap around to cross strap it better, but we haven’t time.”

“Leave some work for the others, boss,” Struthers said. His disembodied hands met Quinn’s as they both stretched to secure the ends of the two straps into a steel shackle.

“Aye, Craig and Leith will have to take care of it.”

Quinn rested a hand on the stone as a guide as he walked around one end to where Struthers waited. The two of them stayed within touching distance of one another as they followed the dull glare of the canister lights to clearer water. Quinn turned to take one last look at the site.

Gray particles of mud floated in the water, swirling in the current that flowed along the bottom. And for a moment the cloud of debris parted and a disembodied face peeked through the fog. A hand and arm appeared as the woman twisted against a snake-like line that tangled about her.

Quinn’s breathing caught and his pulse leaped to his throat. He kicked forward and took two quick steps back toward her. The image fragmented and faded like mist on the current. He stopped.

She was gone. Disappeared.

“What is it, Quinn?” Struthers asked.

Quinn listened to the heavy sound of his own breathing and tried to regain control.
Slow even breaths, don’t panic. It isn’t real.

“’Tis nothing. Let’s go.” Filled with a sense of urgency, he trudged to the bell as quickly as possible. He needed to get to the surface and send someone to check on Regan.

*****

At a tap on her shoulder, Regan looked up to see Logan standing next to her. Her heart gave a jolt. Quinn— was he all right? Bracing a hand on the stone, she rose from her kneeling position.

“Whenever you can take a break—Quinn wants to speak with you.”

Her heart settled into an unsteady gallop. She glanced at Seth Malone, their supervisor, to see his attention directed at them. He was living up to Dr. Fraser’s edict and watching them all like a hawk.

She offered Logan a smile. “We’re almost done for the day. I can come over in about half an hour.”

Logan’s frown snagged her attention.

“Is something wrong with Quinn?”

“No. He’s a bit distracted. And at seventy meters down, that can be dangerous.”

Regan’s stomach knotted at the unexpected censure in his tone and demeanor. “Quinn is a professional. When he’s at work, he’s at work,” she said.

“If you’re pumping him for information about our progress, or anything else—”

“Why would I need to do that, Logan? All I need to do is listen to the scuttlebutt around the dig.”

“Word is—you’re driven to do well here. You’ll not be using my brother as a springboard to launch your career, Regan.”

She drew a deep breath. Where was this coming from? Had she done this to herself with her enthusiasm, her need to succeed? Was she truly getting the reputation as a ladder-climbing bitch? Her throat tightened.

“I’m not sure how you think I can use your brother to further my career, Logan. I’m here cleaning the stones, and he’s there recovering one. When we’re together, we don’t talk about how much algae I’ve cleaned off the blocks that day, or what his progress has been with his end of it.” But they hadn’t shared the normal things a couple did, either. They hadn’t even had the opportunity to do that. Regan rubbed the back of her glove over her forehead. What would it be like to have this constant pressure hanging over her head and his released? To be just a normal couple.

She looked up to find Logan’s gray gaze homed in on her. “We’ve shared a dance and a meal. You’re welcome to stick around and listen to our conversations.“

“Then what’s this shite about his song?”

So that was what this was about. “I didn’t steal his song. I’d like to see him sign a publishing contract for it as much as you. I’ll be glad to help him with that in any way I can.”

The continued suspicion she read in his expression only served to tighten the muscles in her shoulders. “Look, I can see where this is going, and all I can say is that I don’t mean your brother any harm.”

After a moment’s pause he nodded, though his features remained taut. “I’ll be holdin’ you to that.” He turned on his heel and strode away.

Regan kneeled and settled back to work. When Dr. Malone came around a few minutes later to dismiss them, she rested her back against one of the support poles that held the scaffolding in place and opened her sketchpad to finish her drawing.

“Will you be going to
Grannos
to speak with Quinn before you come up to the cabin?” Hannah asked as she gathered her jacket and water bottle.

“I told Logan I would. I’ll be up to help with dinner after that.”

Hannah nodded. “I’ll see you in while, then.”

Regan sketched the markings she’d uncovered that day. The lines and dots appeared as undefined as Quinn and her relationship. Though she had taken him into her confidence—that didn’t mean it had to progress any farther.