Kiss the Moon

by Carla Neggers

  “Jeannie would be my waitress?”

  “And the co-owner with her grandfather, Ed, who only comes around to make sure she’s keeping the grill to his cleanliness standards. He was always a maniac about a clean grill.”

  He studied her. “You’re in a good mood this morning.”

  “It’s the thrill of getting into the woods. I can only stand staying in one spot so long. And it’s a gorgeous day. The brooks will be full, the water rushing over the rocks, everything melting. A good hike’s the only thing that comes close to flying.” At that remark, his eyebrows rose provocatively, and she laughed. “Well, not the only thing.”

  Jeannie, rail-thin and moving fast, flipped over Penelope’s mug and splashed in coffee. “Heard your place got broken into yesterday. Can’t be anyone from around here. We all know you don’t have anything worth stealing, except my grandfather. He’s always kind of had an eye for that moose head of yours.” Ed had been known to stop at her place with his fishing pole. Jeannie set the coffeepot on her skinny hip and leaned back, eyeing Penelope. “You okay?”

  “I’m fine. Thanks. Just hungry.”

  “Good, because I’ve got a mess of food to get rid of. I put in an extra order with all those reporters crawling around. They stayed ten minutes and went home. I sold out of pies, and that was that.”

  “I’m sorry—”

  “Not your fault. What can I get you?”

  Penelope ordered scrambled eggs, toast and orange juice, and Jeannie added an order of sausage to it and tore off behind the counter. “She never does anything at a leisurely pace,” Penelope said. “You know, if you weren’t here, she’d have interrogated me about you and Jack Dunning. Nothing happens in this town that she doesn’t know about.”

  “You seem well-informed yourself.”

  “Only by default. I don’t ask. Jeannie asks. Trust me, everyone who comes in here today will have to fill her in on what they know about you and me now that we’ve had breakfast together.”

  “You could have pretended you didn’t know me.”

  “Uh-uh. She’d have made me sit at the counter, and I really like a booth.”

  After breakfast, they took Penelope’s truck to her place. Steve had been by and put a perfunctory new lock on her side door. He left an envelope with the key inside and a note saying the slider was totaled. She examined the lock. “It doesn’t look like much, does it? It’s shiny, anyway. Of course, all anyone has to do is walk around to the deck and come in through the slider. Maybe I’ll get a big dog.”

  She and Wyatt loaded two hip packs with food, water, cell phone and her wilderness day-trip medical kit, complete with its own little instruction manual. “After Sunday,” she told him, “I’m not taking any chances.”

  As she’d predicted, the snow was melting fast, the sap was flowing, and the brooks were running high. All around were the sounds of birds and water. With the soft snow, much of it melted already, they didn’t bother with snowshoes and just trekked along in their boots. Penelope noticed that Wyatt’s hiking was smooth and strong, totally confident. She debated bringing it up and finally asked, “Have you missed hiking?”

  He glanced at her, the sunlight catching the ends of his dark hair. “Often.”

  “Will you go back to it?”

  “Not at the same level. I’m not as restless and driven as I was ten years ago, and not just because of Hal. He was my hiking buddy, and I miss him—I’ll never get over what happened to us in Tasmania. I don’t want to. I intend to remember every second of our ordeal for as long as I live.” He paused, his gaze settling on Penelope, and she had no idea if he was seeing her or his dead friend. “It’s a part of who I am.”

  “But he’s not the only reason—”

  “No. He’s not. I don’t have to keep climbing tall mountains. I don’t have to keep proving myself. For better or for worse, I’m comfortable in my own skin. I choose not to be my grandfather, or Sinclairs before him, always needing the next challenge, the next enemy to conquer.”

  “Then why did you come up here?”

  He stopped, stared at her. “Because Colt’s my uncle, and no matter how much he pretends otherwise, I know my father is still haunted by not knowing what happened to him.”

  “But Jack Dunning could have handled the situation,” Penelope said, ignoring the sense this was none of her business. “You didn’t need to get involved. Why did you?”

  He gave her a quick, irreverent, unexpected smile. “Karma. I needed to meet you.”

  She shook her head, staying on her point. “I just think you were bored.”

  With that in-your-face remark, she pushed ahead on the path. She could feel his black eyes boring into her. He hadn’t liked what she’d said—probably because it had cut too close to the bone. The man was bored stiff on Wall Street with his numbers and money. Ebenezer Scrooge he was not.

  Behind her, he said, “You’re feeling damned smug, aren’t you?”

  She turned to face him, walking backward. “You just hate it because I’m right. You might not need to climb Everest, but you needed to confront a nice, hardworking New Hampshire woman you thought was lying through her teeth.”

  “Which I was right about,” he reminded her.

  She shrugged. “As comfortable as you might be in your own skin, Sinclair, you need a little adventure once in a while.” She grinned at him, suddenly feeling energetic in spite of the grim task ahead. “You just got more than you bargained for when you headed north.”

  “And you got more than you bargained for when you lied.”

  With a rush of awareness, she remembered yesterday morning. “Checkmate,” she said, and about-faced.

  There was no sign of Bubba Johns at his hillside shack. One of his mutts charged out of the shadows, barking and panting, foam around his mouth from running. The other dog didn’t seem to be around. They checked outside, but no Bubba, no second dog.

  “I’ll take a look inside,” Wyatt said, “just in case.”

  He opened the door and, without leaving the threshold, peered inside the small shack. “Anything?” Penelope asked.

  He shook his head.

  She tried to ignore her growing uneasiness. “Bubba usually takes both dogs with him, but maybe this one’s out of sorts for some reason. Well, I’m no expert on hermits or dogs. I expect Bubba changed his mind about taking you to the wreckage or figured I would and he was off the hook.”

  “You’re probably right.”

  But she could sense his continued uneasiness.

  They made their way down the hill and crossed the brook deeper into the Sinclair woods. Although, prior to Sunday, she’d never been to the ravine where she found the Piper Cub, Penelope was confident she could find it. On her way home on Sunday, she’d thrashed around in the woods for an hour before hitting familiar landmarks. Then it was a straight shot back.

  Once they left the main trail and familiar ground, she had to stop several times to think, orient herself, remember. “It’d be a damned dirty trick if I can’t find my way back, after all.” She glanced around her. Wyatt said nothing, obviously not wanting to break her concentration, and in another second, she had it. “Left and over that rise.”

  Soon they were at the rock where she’d paused to catch her breath and wish she’d had another Nutri-Grain bar. Directly below them was the ravine. To their right and down the steep hillside was the twisted heap of metal she’d found Sunday, presumably the wreckage of Colt Sinclair and Frannie Beaudine’s plane.

  “Over there.” Penelope pointed, out of breath more from anticipation than exertion. “The sun’s not hitting it—there. I see it.”

  Wyatt didn’t. He squinted, following her pointed finger. Then he went rigid, his jaw setting hard, and he nodded. “I’ve got it.”

  Penelope’s mouth had gone dry, but she didn’t reach for her water bottle. “You can see why I didn’t risk getting close to it on Sunday. It’s rough going, and it was late, and I was already lost. The last thing I needed was to s
lip down the hill and bang my head on a rock.” She swallowed, her throat tight with tension. “Wyatt—I could be wrong.”

  “We’ll know soon. We can make our way along the top of the hill a few more yards and work our way down at an angle. It shouldn’t be too difficult.”

  “I agree.”

  He glanced at her, everything about him contained, controlled. “It must have been a hell of a thing, spotting the wreckage out here by yourself, lost.”

  “It was definitely eerie. Everything was so quiet that day. Now…” She paused, listening. “I can hear birds, and there’s a breeze. On Sunday it was as if I’d stumbled into a tomb. Afterward—I saw Bubba’s footprints. I didn’t know for sure he’d seen the wreckage or me, but it was a good bet.”

  “I wonder why he’s been silent all these years.”

  “Because it was none of his business,” Penelope said.

  “Maybe.”

  Wyatt abruptly jumped off the boulder and pushed through the tangle of brush, whiplike without its foliage. He didn’t say a word. Penelope followed, trying not to let his rigid self-control get to her. This was his uncle, she reminded herself. His family. They were on the verge of writing the last chapter on the most stubborn and mysterious Sinclair scandal of the past century. If Wyatt had to go inside himself to get through it, she could at least cut him some slack.

  The soft, wet snow was deeper on the steep, north-facing hill, and their clothes—Wyatt’s in particular—weren’t especially suitable for the conditions. Soon they were soaked to the knees. But with temperatures in the low fifties, Penelope wasn’t too worried about hypothermia. They pushed and ducked through skinny birches and evergreens, climbed over granite boulders, then made their way carefully, at an angle, down and across the steep hillside, over more rocks, ice and patches of slippery, wet leaves left by the melted snow.

  They reached the main body of the wreckage. It was in the shadows at this time of day, and Penelope could feel the isolation, as if she’d stepped into a grave.

  There wasn’t much left of the vintage Piper Cub. Time and the elements had done their work. Yet the frame was still clearly visible, rusted engine parts, sections of the wings. One wing was farther down the hill, a possible indication of how the crash had occurred. Even forty-five years ago, this would have been a tree-covered hill. The plane could have clipped a wing on a tree, on its approach, gotten hung up in another tree, then smashed into the rocks.

  Whatever happened, it hadn’t been pretty.

  Wyatt’s slow, methodical movements gave way once they were upon the wreckage. He leaped over several rocks and stood in the midst of the twisted metal. Penelope followed cautiously, giving him time. She was on the last boulder when he turned to her, his face white. A surge of adrenaline boosted her heart rate. “What is it?”

  “Penelope—my God. There aren’t any bodies.”

  She gasped. “What?”

  Wyatt remained grim-faced, in control. “No remains. Nothing. They’re not here.”

  Penelope’s stomach lurched. “Maybe animals…”

  He made no reply.

  There would have been something, Penelope realized. Bits of clothing. Bones. Evidence that two people had died here. She shuddered, feeling nauseous.

  Wyatt squatted on a small boulder and surveyed the wreckage. “It seems so damned small, doesn’t it? You get it in your head that all the questions will be answered if only you find the plane itself. Now…” He sighed, rising. “Hell, we could just end up with more questions. Tougher ones.”

  “There must be an explanation about the bodies. Maybe Colt and Frannie fell out of the plane, or jumped. Their bodies could be somewhere on the hill. We might have to wait until spring, when the snow’s melted, to get a good look.” She paused, having to catch her breath, although she hadn’t moved in several minutes. “I’m sure your family will want a thorough investigation.”

  A dog barked, startling her and Wyatt. They could see it at the bottom of the hill, staying close to a hemlock.

  “I think it’s Bubba’s other mutt,” Penelope said. “I don’t know his name. I wonder where—” She stopped when she saw a figure in the snow, partially hidden by the sweeping branches of the hemlock. “Oh, God. It’s Bubba.”

  She spun to Wyatt, saw that he’d seen Bubba, too. He said, “Careful, Penelope,” and she didn’t know if he meant be careful not to jump to conclusions or be careful racing down the hill, because she was on her way, her legs moving before she had consciously decided that was what she needed to do. Instincts, impulse, fear for Bubba—they all came together to propel her off her rock.

  She could hear Wyatt behind her, muttering, “Hell,” as he started down the hill after her. She was half slipping, half sliding, leaping over rocks and fallen limbs, branches and brush slapping her legs, arms, face. There was no caution, no careful negotiating of the terrain. She raced pell-mell down the hill.

  “Bubba!” she yelled. “Bubba, are you all right?”

  The old hermit lay on his side in the snow, his agitated mutt panting and pacing between his master’s head and his toes. When Penelope moved toward Bubba, the dog growled and snarled at her. “Easy, poochie,” she said in her most cajoling voice. The dog snapped, not letting her get close.

  Wyatt eased in next to her. “Try a piece of ham or something.”

  She dug in her hip pack and located a chunk of cob-smoked ham. She flipped it into the snow a few feet from Bubba, said a few more cajoling words, and the dog stopped barking, eyed the meat, eyed her, then pounced on the ham.

  Wyatt, who had a better position, eased between Penelope and the dog and knelt beside Bubba. He took the old man’s wrist and felt his pulse.

  Penelope could feel her heart skipping, her knees threatening to go out from under her. “Is he alive?”

  Wyatt nodded. He leaned over Bubba’s thin body and examined his face, lifting his scraggly white hair and beard. “It looks as if he took a hit on the back of his head. He could have slipped and fallen.” He glanced at Penelope. “Or not.”

  “My cell phone—” She could almost not get the words out. “I’ll get help.”

  As she fumbled in her hip pack, Wyatt stayed beside the unconscious hermit. “Bubba—it’s Wyatt Sinclair and Penelope Chestnut. We’re going to get help.”

  The dog, finished with his ham, resumed pacing and growling. He didn’t make a move on the two people helping his master, and Penelope dialed, told the dispatcher Bubba Johns was hurt, she didn’t know the extent of his injuries, but they were deep on Sinclair land. “It’s going to be tough to find us. I didn’t bring flares. Look, why don’t we do this. Get a rescue crew to follow the main trail from Bubba’s place. I’ll leave now and meet them. Don’t leave the trail. You’ll never find us if you do. We’re way the hell out in God’s country.”

  Bubba moaned, barely conscious.

  “Wait—he might be coming around.”

  Wyatt said softly, “Easy, Bubba. We’re here to help. Can you talk?”

  Bubba groaned, a foot moving, his eyes screwing up in pain.

  “What happened?” Wyatt asked. “How badly are you hurt?”

  But the old man couldn’t answer.

  “Never mind,” Penelope told the dispatcher. “Just get someone up here and let’s hope in the meantime he comes around and walks out himself.”

  She disconnected and knelt in the snow beside Wyatt for a better look. “I don’t dare move him,” Wyatt said. “I don’t know if he has any broken bones. I don’t want to end up paralyzing the poor bastard.”

  “If I start now, I should meet up with the rescue crew before they run out of trail.”

  He nodded, grim, but she could see him mentally clicking off their options. He wasn’t one to panic. “It’s impossible to get a helicopter in here. I’ll stay with him.” He turned to her, his dark gaze holding hers. “Be careful, Penelope. Whoever did this might still be out there.”

  “You don’t think he just slipped and hit his head?”

/>   “No, I don’t. The bump’s on the back of his head, which means his feet would have had to go out from under him. Otherwise he’d have disturbed more snow, taken out some brush on his way down. It looks as if he just dropped here.”

  Penelope threw up her hands. “I just don’t get any of it. The messages, my house, this. Over a missing plane! It doesn’t make any sense.” But something in Wyatt’s gaze made her pause, and she narrowed her eyes on him. “What? Wyatt, for God’s sake, tell me.”

  “Frannie Beaudine made off with ten million in diamonds the night she and my uncle disappeared.” His words were clipped, unemotional. “She stole them from the warehouse when she was helping to pull together the collection my family donated to the Met. I don’t know if Colt was involved.”

  Penelope tried to absorb this new twist. “Holy shit. Frannie and Colt had diamonds with them? That changes everything. No one ever said—”

  “I know. Even I didn’t know until last night.”

  “Your grandfather knew?”

  “Yes. He didn’t want to encourage looters.” Wyatt spoke as if this sort of thing happened among Sinclairs all the time. “He didn’t tell my father until he was dying, and he asked him to keep it a secret. Which he did, until I dragged it out of him last night.”

  “Does Dunning know?”

  “He doesn’t have the specifics. My father told him he believed there was something of value in the wreckage and wanted Jack to make sure you hadn’t changed your story because you’d tucked the goodies into your fanny pack. If you had found the wreckage but hadn’t touched anything, he was supposed to secure it before it could be looted.”

  Penelope bit the inside of her cheek to stop herself from going to pieces. Wyatt had had time to tell her this little tidbit about ten million in diamonds last night, this morning over breakfast, at any point during their three-hour trek to the plane wreck. Of course, she’d had days to tell him she’d found the Piper Cub.

  “And these diamonds—they’re not in the wreckage, either?”

  “As far as I could see they and the bodies are gone.”

  “Did you tell Jack or your father I was taking you here?”