“Hey,” Layla started, pulling her hair back in the darkness and clipping it atop her head. Her shirt pulled up to expose the tiniest amount of skin at her waist at the movement.
The bustle of the Cairo streets below came through the open safe house window, along with the waning moonlight.
Marc turned to face her from his spot on the bed. A question in his eyes.
They hadn’t said much to each other since they returned to the house. They were both mentally and physically exhausted as the last few days —chasing Harrow, finding Ammitt’s tomb, dying and being resurrected — finally caught up with them. But there was also relief. They’d done it; saved the world like it was no big deal.
Still, there was a lot left unsaid between them. A lot of reconciliation to come in the days ahead.
Layla sat cross-legged, facing him, on her side of the bed.
She rubbed rose-scented lotion on her freshly-showered skin, failing to look at Marc as she spoke again, “About what happened, back at the tomb. I wanted to sa—“
“You don’t have to say anything,” his voice was thick with exhaustion. It felt strangled in his throat, whether it was the way he was looking at her, or something else, he couldn’t quite tell. “I’m the one that’s sorry, Layla.”
“No, no. Marc, you got shot! I— it was stupid to confront you like that. I know— I knew you didn’t kill him,” she was looking at him now, pain in her eyes.
He cut her off again, his voice still quiet and strangled, “You didn’t . You didn’t know I didn’t kill him. Like you said, you don’t know me.”
She reached for his hand and clutched it in both of hers. It sent a familiar spark of electricity through him. “Marc, I want to. I want to know you .”
She laid down next to him, her head on the pillow, their faces mere centimeters apart.
“Please.”
There was a pleading in her soft voice, and her eyes searched his, begging him to tell her something, anything. He knew she would listen, he had always known she’d listen, but he didn’t know that she’d like what she heard.
He looked away from her, looking up at the ceiling instead.
He owed it to her. To tell her. To let her make up her own mind about him. Write him off as a lost cause, “unworthy of love” as Harrow had said, like so many others before her. He knew that he owed that much to her.
He looked back at her with watery eyes. “Okay,” he choked, almost too quiet to hear over the din of the city below them coming through the window.
“Okay?” Layla asked, squeezing his hand, still clutched between them. Her eyes seemed to light up when she looked at him. “Take your time, Habibi,” she soothed, settling in with her head on his chest and bringing his hand to her lips to kiss it softly.
It felt so good to have her this close after months apart, and days of arguing, seeing her through Steven’s eyes. Little did Marc know, she could stay here forever, just her and him. The sound of his heartbeat in his chest was the most comforting sound in the world to her right now, and she could listen to it forever. She’d feared she lost him, not once, but twice now. She couldn’t get the image of him lying lifeless in a shallow pool, his blood spilling, turning the water a sickening shade of crimson, out of her head. She saw it every time she closed her eyes.
Marc looked down at her, “where should I start?” He asked with a watery laugh. There was no humor behind it.
She nestled in closer. “That night… with my father… if— if you’re comfortable.” Her voice came out more questioning at the end. She truly wanted him to want to tell her.
He sucked in a deep breath, and was silent for a few minutes. He played with their hands, anxiously fiddling with one of her rings.
“That night,” he started, faintly, “I mean, I guess you know some of the details already.”
She made a noise of assent, but didn’t interrupt him.
“Bushman, my partner,” he continued, “he got greedy. He wanted everything your father and the team had excavated, wanted to sell it on the black market, for himself. That didn’t include me.”
“He, um,” Marc’s voice started to break, “he lined them all up, facedown, in the sand. And— and—“ he closed his eyes tightly, trying to stave off the mental images,” Layla. I tried to stop him. I really did. I tried .” his voice finally cracked on the last word, and the tears were coming freely now, Layla tightened her grip on him. He couldn’t see her face, but her expression was one of horror, imaging her father’s final moments, tears were brimming in her eyes.
Marc took another deep breath. “We fought. He shot me, twice. Once here,” he moved their conjoined hands to the lower part of his sternum, “and here,” to his right side, nearest to her. “I was supposed to die that night.”
“Marc,” Layla shook her head, her voice was almost like a warning, not to remind her, but she couldn’t shake the image of another time he’d been shot twice. Hot tears leaked from her tightly shut eyes, staining his shirt.
“No. I was supposed to die,” he choked on a sob, burying his face in the cucumber-scented, still damp curls atop her head. “I should have ,” he mumbled into her hair.
“Marc, no.” Her words were definite.
He laughed ruefully, looking back up at the ceiling, anywhere but at her. “Layla, I tried . I wanted to die.”
She moved so she was straddling him. Marc couldn’t look at her, not after all the things he’d done. Not that he could see her anyway, his eyes were bleary with the sobs that racked his body. Layla was crying too, her tears streamed down her face like a waterfall. She bent to wrap her arms around his neck, burying her face there too. “Baby,” she mumbled in a lost attempt to sooth him.
He sucked in breath like a fish gasping for air. Forcing the rest of the story out, he continued through broken sentences, “I somehow managed to drag myself to the ruined temple adjacent to the dig site, after Bushman left me for dead. I got to the steps of the temple, and couldn’t bring myself to go any further. I found my long-forgotten pistol, pressing hard into my hip against the hard stone steps. I was delirious with blood loss. Still, I knew I had two choices: bleed to death in some ancient ruin to some bird-god, or—“
“Don’t!” Layla cut him off. “Don’t even suggest it. I don’t want to hear anymore.”
“I should’ve died! I wanted to die! I deserved to die! I could never save anyone, not your father, not—“ he couldn’t bring himself to say the name. He continued, more quietly, “I should’ve blown my brains out on the steps of Khonshu’s temple…”
Layla sat up. Wiping furiously at her eyes. “Don’t say that!”
Marc shoved his palms into his eyes. “Why? It’s true. Khonshu made his avatar, effectively saving me. Giving me the inability to do the thing I wanted most, yearned for for years.”
She tore his hands away from his face. “What about me? We would’ve never met.”
Marc laughed darkly again. “And you would’ve been better for it. Found some better man. And I would’ve gotten what everyone always knew I deserved; death.”
He was spiraling now, thinking about how he should’ve died, countless times throughout his life. First the cave, during the years of abuse that followed, then in the marines, that night in the desert, during any number of fights thereafter, in Alexander’s tomb. He was destined for death but cursed with life.
Layla bent forward again, taking both sides of his face between her palms so she could look him directly in the eyes, her own tears falling onto his face, mixing with his. “ Never say that!” She said through gritted teeth, “Never!”
Suddenly, his expression softened in her grasp. She was no longer looking into the eyes of her husband.
She sat back, releasing him from her grasp.
“Oh bollocks, I’ve interrupted something, haven’t I?” Steven asked, concern evident on his face.
Layla wiped her tears on her bare arm. “Steven,” she acknowledged him, trying to regain her composure.
“You alright, love? Were you and Marc having a row?”
She barked a laugh, “Something like that.” She climbed off of him to sit back on her heels next to him, she knew she still sort of made Steven uncomfortable. “Can you get Marc back? I— It’s not personal, we were just… is he there? Is he okay?”
Steven sat up. “Why wouldn’t he be okay?”
Layla ran a hand through her hair, “he was— he told me what happened to my father.”
“Oh,” Steven replied thoughtfully, but his face said that he knew the weight of the situation.
“Can you get him back, please, Steven?” She sounded exhausted, “I need to speak with him. I need to make sure he’s okay.”
“Yeah, of course. Erm— he might not want to…” He trailed off.
“No— I know. I just…” she burst into tears again, getting to her feet. She paced the length of the room, her hands covering her face. She laughed hysterically, stopping short in front of Steven. “I’m sorry,” she cried, then composed herself again, “I’m sorry. This is cra—“ she sucked in a breath, “It’s a lot to take in.”
Steven watched her with concern written all over his face. “Oh, Layla. It is a lot. And you’re handling it quite well.”
She sat heavily on the bed beside him, leaning into him and resting her head on his shoulder. They say in silence for a few minutes, Layla coming down from her little outburst.
“Is he going to be okay?” She finally broke the quiet, her tone sounded desperate. Layla wanted so badly for Marc to let her in, but she feared she was just going to push him further away by forcing him to dig up these traumatic memories.
Steven rested his chin on her head, tugging her close to his side and giving her a gentle squeeze, “He’s getting there, love.”
A different voice continued, kissing her head, “We’re getting there.”