by Mary Brady
She went over the past three days in her head and found the box from the attic.
“The box. I know about the box.”
This got a full nod.
“Okay. News travels fast around here. All the cell phones must be back up. So then you know a tree fell on the house and the damage caused a box that had been hidden in the attic floor.”
“After you found the box...?”
“I gave it to Mr. Hale.” She stopped studying her fingers and snapped her gaze up. “You want to know if I peeked inside the box.”
His head tipped sideways in question. “You didn’t look before you gave it to Mr. Hale.”
His tone did not accuse, but she wondered how hard it was for him to sound neutral.
“I wanted to. I didn’t want to give it to him at all until I had thoroughly examined the contents.”
“But.”
“You’ve met the man. He sort of emits a hypnotic ‘trust me’ aura, and he walked in just after I found the thing. Frightened the wits out of me and I just gave it up without a fight.”
He softly huffed out a breath. Now he had to decide whether or not he believed her.
“Oh! The treasure. The treasure. That’s why all the privacy. Driving me here to the station instead of questioning me at Kimi’s where she or someone might overhear. Subterfuge. But do I know more than the average townsfolk about where it is? No. I’m a treasure-know-nothing. I know a pirate loved his sweetie until his death by her father’s hand. Well, I know the rumor. I know there is much speculation about the treasure and that many believe it’s gone. What do you believe, Chief Montcalm? Tell me.”
“Ah-yuh, that’s not going to happen,” he said in clear relief.
“Ah-yuh.” Addy guffawed. She couldn’t help it.
He laughed with her, as she somehow knew he would. “Chief Montcalm, I will not tell your secret. I will not tell the citizens of your town that there is a nice guy under that stern stuff you put out as your face to the world.”
He looked all stern again and Addy wondered if she had gone too far.
“There is a ban on noncitizens being in town, Miss Bonacorda, unless they have someone from the town sponsoring them and they have to be here for the purpose of assisting the town, not creating a burden on the limited resources.”
She got a sinking feeling there was going to be no one sponsoring her if the chief didn’t think she should be here. She could ask Christina or Kimi, but they had only known her briefly.
And what if the news she had to write about Zach turned out to harm the town? Would Christina and Kimi be held accountable, be sorry for helping her?
“I’ll get my things and head out.” On foot if no one would give her a ride. Maybe the brown dog would keep her company, at least until she got to the edge of town.
“I can’t bend the rules designed to keep the town safe. Wait in the lobby. I’ll have an officer drive you to the Three Sisters. You can have your car-rental company send another car.”
Addy rose slowly from her chair and turned toward the door.
This was it. She wouldn’t be reporting what she had learned about Zachary Hale, that he had a birthmark on his inner thigh, that he had a devastating way of treating a woman as if she were a precious treasure to be adored, that his lips were as soft as crushed velvet.
And though she had said goodbye, she hadn’t truly meant it. If it weren’t such a devastating thing, she’d ask to have the hurricane back, if it meant she got to spend more time in close quarters and semidarkness with Zachary Hale.
* * *
AVOIDING REMAINING chunks of debris, Zach drove down the main street toward the offices of Morrison and Morrison. He and Heather had discussed the riddle over lunch. She told him his attorney’s offices had weathered the storm with only one broken window. The old warehouse behind it, which had been tied up in an embattled estate for years, sat at a dangerous angle and would be torn down allowing the back of the law firm to face the ocean.
She had talked about other developments in town and he had listened politely though he didn’t recall a thing.
Adriana Bonacorda. Addy. He saw her face as she said his name in ecstasy. When she teased him, it made her wild hair seem even wilder. When he had surprised her with Colleen Rose’s box in her hand, she had been the most beautiful of all. She had been totally honest and he wanted to love her on the spot.
Love. There probably was never going to be a time in his foreseeable future for love. He certainly could not bring Addy into the mess in his life that could take a decade or more to clear up. If some people had it their way, he’d spend all of that time in jail.
Even if Addy said she’d wait, he’d have to refuse. The next ten years of her life were going to be great. She’d get her career restarted and who knew, maybe launch the next biggest news media outlet or get that Pulitzer she had been in line for.
She might even start a family. That thought hurt the most. She would find a man who could love her and be there for her. She deserved all the happiness she could find.
Morrison and Morrison Attorneys, a century-plus-old law firm was south on the main drag. Hunter Morrison worked with the other soon to be Morrison, his fiancé, Delainey Talbot.
A jag of sharp pain shot through him and Zach recognized it instantly. It was jealousy. Green-eyed and cruel. He was jealous of a man happily affianced to the woman he loved. Soon to have an instant family.
How much having a wife, a family, appealed to him came as a shock. He was the happy-bachelor type, a businessman glad not to have to share his day with a wife, let alone children.
He parked at the back door and let himself into the deserted offices. Almost deserted. Hunter would be there. The staff, Zach assumed, were home, tending to their families’ well-being.
“Up here.” Hunter called from the second floor.
The lobby of the old building was painted in muted hues but there was nothing subtle about the wood trim. Mahogany, shipped in at great expense, outlined the doors and windows and, he knew, paneled the walls of the conference room.
He jogged up the steps and from the landing could see Morrison at his desk, dressed for doing odd jobs rather than office work. Knowing Hunter, he’d helped with the cleanup before he came here to meet him.
He stood and shook Zach’s hand.
“You should be in Boston or New York, holed up in a hotel, not come crashing through a hurricane to get here. Not enough excitement in your life?”
“I’m afraid there’s more.”
“The reporter. Should I ask?” Hunter’s lean body fit his name and now he sat hunched over his desk in worry.
“She ran off the road into the ravine near the house. She wasn’t hurt, but she stayed with me for the three days.”
“Close quarters were a problem?”
“Not until a tree crashed into the house.” He shrugged one shoulder.
Hunter grimaced. “So really close quarters.”
“I’m afraid so.”
“How much did you tell her?”
“On the record, I told her about the house and the past residents. The usual historical information. Off the record, I told her the truth as I know it about Hale and Blankenstock.”
“Do you think she believed you?”
“At the time she seemed to, but there’s a lot to be said for who might influence her now.”
“Will she keep to the ‘off the record’ agreement or was that a ploy?”
Zach rubbed the back of his neck. Helping him be smarter was why he hired Hunter, but sometimes the man had his work cut out for him. “I believe her when she says off the record. She didn’t seem like a player.”
“Are you going to see her again?”
“I don’t think that would be wise.” It would be downright stupid, but h
e couldn’t help thinking of holding her in his arms.
“I’m glad to hear that because I have some bad news. My people have it from a reliable source, the Bureau has information about damaging files from the records department of Hale and Blankenstock.”
“Files they found in the ones confiscated? The FBI doesn’t usually show their hand so quickly unless there is something to gain. Why release information like that so early?” Zach tried to think of any files that could pose a problem for him.
“It wasn’t the FBI. It was an independent source.”
“Who? What did they have?” Not Addy. It couldn’t be Addy.
“A data processor from the Hale and Blankenstock offices had access to the files she labeled suspicious.”
Zach had known it wasn’t Addy, but he felt relief nonetheless.
“There isn’t anything in my files that would be a problem.”
“These are incriminating, and they are reportedly yours.”
“They can’t be.” This was the one thing in life Zach was certain of. He did little of the actual investment of people’s money. Mostly he found people to let Hale and Blankenstock invest their money.
“I’m having the person investigated as we speak to see if we can tie her to Blankenstock outside the normal office relationship, we might have something with which to fight back.”
Zach got a bad feeling about this person. “Do you know what she says she found?”
“Fraudulent investment transactions signed by you and communications from you to Carla Blankenstock insisting on her buying stock in several dummy corporations set up by you. Blankenstock, of course, has been quick to say she’s sorry, that she didn’t know the corporations were not real. Says she trusted you.”
“Can we get copies of these files and can we tell if they’re forged?”
“I’ve got the Chicago office working on it.”
Zach put his elbows on his knees and dropped his head into his hands. When he thought of losing everything, he thought of losing any chance of having Addy in his life. The money was only window dressing.
“Don’t start to doubt yourself, buddy. You’ve got help in your corner. We’re solid.”
Zach lifted his head. “Thanks.”
“I know a bit about what you’re going through. One day your world is spinning happily around the sun and suddenly you’re out of control, wondering if there’s any way for you to get back.”
Zach felt as if he was confiding in a friend, not just talking to his attorney. “I heard about your trouble with a stalker. Is she still under lock and key?”
“For a long time, I hope.”
“I saw Delainey at the recent weddings in town. She had a trail of hopeful admirers lining up to dance with her at both events.”
“I’m a lucky guy. I could have lost it all if I hadn’t wised up.”
“Everybody is safe from the storm?”
“We weren’t in any danger from the water, but we worried about a few of the trees ourselves. Delainey’s house is surrounded by big pines and we’re living there until the home we bought is remodeled.”
“I haven’t been any farther south than here. I hear things are bad down there.”
“The condo I rented when I first moved here had the windows blown out and water halfway up the first floor. Several neighborhoods have significant damage. The house we bought is up on the hill sheltered by trees.”
“You look happy.”
“I never thought I’d have anyone in my life like Delainey. She makes me deliriously happy. Her daughter, our daughter, Brianna, is the greatest kid. What can I say?”
Zach smiled. He was happy for the man.
When Hunter’s mobile phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID.
“I have to get this one.”
Zach nodded.
“Hello, Chief. What can I do for you?”
As Hunter spoke, Zach got up and wandered over to the window. Across the street were several police officers and a slim woman with her hair tied back under a scarf. They were all carrying bags of what looked like clothing. Then he remembered the dry cleaner’s was across the street. The owner, Monique Gardner, had been one of the brides at the double wedding. Her husband was a police officer, Lenny Gardner. That might explain the crowd of uniformed men and women helping her.
“Have her stay there in the lobby, I’ll deal with her.” He paused for a moment and then said. “It shouldn’t be too long.”
Zach turned back. “Do you have to be somewhere?”
“I do.” He put his hand out and Zach took it. “You’ll be all right. We’ll get things sorted out.”
Zach hoped so. He hadn’t been able to see a light at the end of the tunnel since the day the FBI first showed up at his office and demanded his computers and his files, froze most of his assets and told him not to stray too far.
Things didn’t seem much brighter now and the best he might wish for was that he hadn’t dragged Addy too far into his mess.
“Thanks for all you’re doing, Hunter.”
“You go back to Sea Crest.”
“Henry Markham is pumping water out of the basements in the neighborhood. I’ll go and see if I can lend a hand.”
“Where you won’t see her.”
Zach chuffed.
“You have it bad, man. I was there. I am there.” Morrison glanced at a photo of his fiancé and her daughter.
“If I can avoid her questions for right now,” he said, and kissing her and making love to her, “I might find some answers of my own.”
“Call if you need me, Zach, I’ll be checking in on the man I bought Morrison and Morrison from. He and his wife have some flooding in their basement. And don’t worry, law enforcement will keep any other reporters out of town and, for your own peace of mind, don’t go online. I’ll call you if anything else develops.”
More of the same, Zach thought as he headed for his SUV, or worse. What was in the files the data processor had seen? The person was almost certainly Addy’s sister, and did Addy know?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ADDY SAT IN the lobby of the police station swinging her feet like a bad child in time out.
The punishment seemed unfair. She shouldn’t have to leave.
She had lived through the hurricane. Who else to better tell the stories of these people?
She pushed up to the edge of her chair. Chief Montcalm had asked her to wait in the lobby. He didn’t say she had to sit quietly. There were a dozen fine citizens of Bailey’s Cove present. Each had a story.
She patted down her hair and then leaped to her feet. “Hello, everyone.”
She waited until most of the people were looking at her. “I’m Adriana Bonacorda. I’m a reporter for a Boston paper and I’m looking for anyone with a story to tell about the hurricane.”
No one said a thing. She scanned the room. If these people were seeking help from the police, there had to be a story.
“Anybody?”
Blank stares.
Tough crowd. To prime the pump, she often started with a related tale of her own experience. The only one she could think of was about Zach. No, she could not tell them about the sweetness of making love to him and being torn away because there would never be credibility for a story she reported about her lover. She had been discredited and justly humiliated once and she was not having that again.
“Ma’am.” A high voice broke through the anguish, and her eyes snapped open. A boy, five or six, aimed pleading eyes in her direction.
When she smiled at him, he gave a tentative glance over his shoulder at a woman with long dark hair sitting in a chair, her heavy wool coat wrapped around her thin body. The dark-haired woman urged the boy on with a flick of her hand.
“I’d love to hear your
story. Thank you.” She looked at the woman in the wool coat for permission.
The woman waved an okay and Addy patted the chair next to her. “Sit right in this chair beside me.”
She waited as he climbed up and situated himself.
“What’s your name?”
“Bradley Dillon,” he said and puffed out his chest.
Addy scribbled. “What happened to you in the hurricane, Bradley?”
“My pet is gone and hasn’t come back.”
“Is your pet a brown dog?”
“No. He’s a white cat named John Barleycorn and I let him go so he could find his own safe place.”
“You let him go?”
“You know, like they do the horses in the movies, in case the barn blew down, but it was a house I live in.”
“And he hasn’t come back?” Addy asked.
“Not for two days.” His hand came to his face and his eyes brimmed with tears. “I promised I’d take good care of him, so Mommy said I could have him.”
“And you’re here to tell the police so they can look for him?”
He nodded.
“Maybe these people here would look out for him, too.”
The boy faced the group in the lobby. Every one of them had been listening to his story, except for one woman huddled in the far corner.
He stared at the small crowd and smiled. “Will you help me find John Barleycorn? He got his tail got caught when he was a baby and it’s a little tail so you’ll know him.”
“I’ll help.” A dark-haired girl raised her hand.
The old gent a few chairs down nodded his willingness.
“I’ll help and I’ll get my kids to help,” said a woman on the far side of the room.
“Thank you, Mrs. Quizzenberry.” The woman looked very teacherlike in her flats and khaki skirt.
It wasn’t long before almost everyone in the lobby had agreed to participate in the search except one elderly man whom Addy suspected was hard of hearing and the woman in the far corner with the collar of her coat turned up against her frail neck.