by Matt Lincoln
She thought for a moment and brightened. “Because the pirates burned that brand into the smaller boat, so it wouldn’t have been there if he escaped right away.”
“You got it.” I smiled. “So that leaves the second most likely scenario, and the one I believe is true.”
“Which is?”
“Lord Addison joined the crew.” I nodded to myself as I completed a full-length sweep of the cave floor and moved a pace ahead to scan the next strip of land. “It was pretty common for pirates to keep captives around and use them for labor, provided they acted docile and cooperative. If the captives ended up trying to fight back later, they’d just shoot them.” I shrugged. “Chances are he was on the ship the whole time, until it went down.”
Tessa gave a delighted laugh. “That seems like a smart choice. Between ‘swab the deck’ and ‘die,’ I’d take the mop every time.”
I decided not to tell her that there were a lot less pleasant duties than pushing a mop that pirates liked to have their captive labor perform.
I’d almost reached the far side of the cave with the metal detector, and I was about to inform Tessa that the treasure hunt was being called in favor of relaxing for the rest of the day when the machine let out a little burble and the green light flashed weakly.
Tessa gasped and rushed over. “Did that just make a noise?”
“Yeah, I think it did,” I said with faint surprise as I moved the sensor even slower than before. It was probably just a metal bottle cap washed up by the tide. At best, it could be another piece of the shattered pinnace with a few rusty nails in it.
Nothing happened when I eased the detector to the left. When I swung it to the right, the light flashed stronger and the warble-beep lasted longer.
“So that’s what squidgy sounds like.” Tessa laughed.
She kept her hands on my shoulders as I moved the dish of the detector around until I pinpointed the place where the beeping drew into a solid note and the light stayed steady. I scuffed a divot into the sand with a foot, then carefully set the machine aside on the ground.
“It’s a strong signal, so whatever it is shouldn’t be too deep,” I told her as I knelt on the ground and started scraping sand away.
Tessa hunkered down beside me to watch. I dug a hole with my hands, sifting the sand through my fingers with each shallow scoop. Less than a foot down, I brushed something rough and damp.
I cleared out enough sand to uncover the surface of what I’d felt. It looked like burlap. Very old burlap.
Both of us held our breath as I dug the object out of the ground. It was a small, worn sack about the size of a sandwich bag, pulled closed with a threadbare drawstring… and it was heavy. Several objects inside it shifted and clinked together as I lifted it.
There was a cigarette burn-sized hole in the side of the bag, and something gleamed mellowly behind it.
“Oh, my God,” Tessa breathed. “Is that…?”
I couldn’t speak as I eased the drawstring opened gently, trying not to break the material any further. I peered inside and sucked in a shocked breath.
The sack was full of gold coins. Actual pirate treasure.
“I don’t believe it,” I said, a slow grin spreading on my face as I reached in and plucked out one of the coins. “Think this was Lord Addison’s retirement package or what?”
Tessa let out a joyful squeal and threw her arms around me. “It’s real!” she cried. “Oh, Ethan, this is so wonderful. You finally have proof. That ship has to be out there, and I just know you’re going to find it.”
It warmed me that she hadn’t started gushing about how I was rich or said anything about how much this little sack of metal had to be worth. She was only happy that I’d found what I’d been looking for so long.
When she drew back, I took her hand and pressed the coin I’d extracted into it. “I want you to keep this,” I said, folding her fingers around it as shock flooded her face. “I would’ve given up if you weren’t here telling me to keep going, so don’t even think about refusing, or I’ll make you swab the deck.”
The protest that had been forming in her expression melted into happiness. “In that case, I’ll just say thank you.”
“No, thank you,” I said.
Our gazes locked, and I had to fight the urge to propose cave sex. There was way too much sand here, and we still had time.
She was going to stay with me again tonight.
When the thrill of discovery died down, I collected my gear, and together, we headed back out to the beach, wandering to the shoreline. I’d stowed the sack of gold coins deep in my bag, both so I wouldn’t lose them and so I didn’t spend too much time obsessing over their existence. At the moment, I just wanted to be with Tessa.
We sat in the damp sand and kicked off our shoes, letting the warm surf wash over our toes. After a while, Tessa leaned her head on my shoulder and sighed.
“You’d better keep in touch with me when I go back to New York,” she said with a false glare. “I mean it.”
“I will,” I promised as I slipped an arm around her waist.
“I wish I could stay.” She sighed again and scooted closer to me. “Also, I wish we’d met while my father was still alive. Maybe we could’ve ended up living closer together.”
I wished that, too. “It’s not like we’ll never see each other again,” I said, though I wasn’t sure that was true. “You’re welcome on my boat any time you’re in the neighborhood.”
“Well, if you’re ever in New York, you can stay at my place,” she said, and then instantly blushed. “I mean, if you want to.”
I smiled and lifted her head gently, tracing her jaw with my fingers. “I do.”
The kiss that followed was sweet and salty, as timeless as the ocean that lapped at our feet.
Epilogue
I could still taste Tessa’s lips as I wrapped up the story. Lost in the memory, it took me a few moments to pull my thoughts together and focus on the present, and the bar in which I sat. No longer Mike’s Tropical Tango Hut, but the Rolling Thunder. My bar.
So much had changed since then, but some things remained the same.
Gradually, I picked up on the barrage of chatter that was washing over me. My audience of six twenty-somethings had grown considerably to a small crowd, and at some point, the overhead music had been turned down so they could all hear me. I wagered Mike had something to do with that.
He’d be lucky if I didn’t kick his ass when this fiasco was over.
“Okay, settle down,” I called out as I raised a hand to stem the tide of questions being thrown at me. “Yes, the coins were real. No, I didn’t marry Tessa, and no, you can’t touch Cobra Jon’s staff. That probably answers everything, right?”
Ty, the original cocky hotshot who’d goaded Mike into making me tell this story in the first place, leaned forward eagerly, all traces of his earlier antagonism gone.
“What about the Dragon’s Rogue?” he asked. “Did you ever find it?”
That was a story I definitely didn’t want to get into tonight. “Maybe,” I hedged. “Look, I wasn’t even going to—”
“What’s the deal with the old stool back there?” another young man to my right said, one who hadn’t been part of the original crowd. “There’s a bullet hole in it. Did you guys have a shootout in this place, back in the day?”
I heaved a sigh and glared hard at Mike, and he laughed. “Don’t look at me. I’m not telling ’em.”
“Alright, listen,” I said. “If you really want to know about the stool and the bullet, come back tomorrow night. I’ll think about telling you then.”
A wave of protests mingled with more questions arose, and I made a cutting gesture. “Hey, I’m all talked out tonight, okay? Get out there and do bar stuff,” I said with a chuckle. “That’s what this place is for. In fact, everyone here gets a drink on me, as long as you leave me alone for the rest of the night.”
This time, a cheer went up, and I breathed a sigh of relief as th
e crowd dispersed and patrons started filtering around the bar.
At some point, one of the girls must’ve freshened my drink because there was a frosty mug of beer behind me on the counter. I grabbed it and stood on legs that were half-numb from sitting for so long.
“Going outside for some air,” I said to Mike. “Care to join?”
“That depends.” He smirked. “Are you gonna punch me for riling these guys up?”
“Haven’t decided yet. Probably not.”
“I’ll take those odds,” he said as he reached back and grabbed his own drink.
Beyond the crowd that had been listening to me yammer on, there were at least a few dozen others in the bar, seated at tables or playing pool and darts in the back room. “When did this place get so packed?” I murmured.
“They’ve been trickling in all night,” Mike informed me. “Looks like your grand opening was a success.”
I snorted. “Except that I just took a bath on free drinks for sixty or so people.”
“Hey, you didn’t get your business sense from me. I only gave out freebies to people who got themselves shot,” he chuckled, “including yourself at least one time if I remember correctly.”
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t remind me.”
We walked out the door, hung a right, and by unspoken consent made our way down the alley which was considerably cleaner than it had been ten years ago. I’d had the old dumpster hauled out and replaced with two brand new containers, swapped the dirty yellow light with a bright halogen, and installed two pairs of security lamps at the front and back of the alley.
“Huh. Things seem a bit brighter than they used to,” Mike remarked as we settled on the stoop in front of the service door.
I nodded in confirmation. “No more shadowy ambushes back here.”
“Good call,” Mike said.
We sipped our drinks in silence for a few minutes, and I let the memories run their course as they drained slowly out of me. There was good and bad in my past, just like everybody’s, but it was time to focus on the present.
“You know,” I said casually, “I didn’t expect to actually make money on this place. I planned on running in the red for at least a few years.”
“So much for that plan, right? You’re profitable. What a bummer,” Mike joked. “You should have a good cry in your beer about it.”
I smirked. “Maybe I will.”
“Well, here’s to you and the Rolling Thunder,” Mike said as he raised his glass. “May the storms of life steer clear of your new venture, even if you’re tempting fate by naming the place after a storm.”
“That was… a very strange toast, but what the hell, I’ll drink to that.” Grinning, I clinked my mug against his and tossed back a long swallow. Cold beer tasted pretty good when it came from a bar that I owned. At least, it didn’t taste like I’d paid six bucks for a draft that was half foam.
It tasted like success, and all the stories I still had left to tell.
Author’s Note
Hey, if you got here, I just want you to know that you’re awesome! I wrote this book just for someone like you, and if you want another one, it is super important that you leave a review.
The more reviews this book gets, the more likely it is there will be a sequel to it. After all, I’m only human, and you have no idea how far a simple “your book was great!” goes to brighten my day.
Also, if you want to know when the sequel comes out, you absolutely must join my Facebook group and follow me on Amazon. Doing one won’t be enough because it relies on either Facebook or Amazon telling you the book is out, and they might not do it.
You might miss out on all my books forever, if you only do one!
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Prologue
I had to admit, with Rolling Thunder up and running for only a few weeks, I was nervous the first time I let the girls open the bar on their own. While the four young women I’d hired on full time were doing a fantastic job, I still had a hard time trusting anyone but me to get things done the right way.
It turned out I didn’t need to worry. When I got to the bar around nine, things were humming along in full swing.
I still couldn’t believe how successful the place had become in such a short time. When I’d bought the bar and started a serious overhaul of what was formerly Mike’s Tropical Tango Hut, I figured it’d be a way to pass the time. Mike had retired from the bar business, and I’d retired to it from a career that included a lot more bullets than bartending.
Though I was only in my late forties, I had my reasons for taking an early retirement. Lounging on various Caribbean beaches was the dream, but I got bored with that faster than I thought possible. After that, I ended up owning the bar. For some reason, it became a Miami hot spot overnight.
I wanted to chalk the success up to good business sense, but I knew it was beginner’s luck. However, Mike and the girls had a different theory. They decided that my bar’s popularity started on opening night when a bunch of young, rowdy military personnel had come in looking to find fault with the new place. They left in good spirits after Mike coerced me into telling the story of how I took down Cobra Jon, the nastiest drug dealer in the Bahamas.
That story spread beyond the big group that had ended up listening to it, and it supposedly made me some kind of legend among the bar and club scene. An international man of mystery, or some such nonsense. I could’ve done without the notoriety.
What the hell, though. It was obviously good for business.
The night the girls opened, I had to fight my way through the crowd just to get inside. Bar goers spilled onto the sidewalk from the wide-open front door, where rock music thumped out from the vintage jukebox. No one gave me a second glance. I sure as hell didn’t look like an international man of mystery in my faded jeans, scuffed work boots, and an old AC/DC “Highway to Hell” tour shirt.
To be honest, I didn’t mind flying under the radar. It’d been a long day that involved some of my least favorite things, finance people who wanted to tell me all the investment crap I should do with my newfound wealth. After that garbage, I wasn’t in the mood for misplaced hero worship.
I headed straight for the bar, intent on grabbing an ice-cold draft and blending into the chaos. Unfortunately, my plans were interrupted when a commotion erupted from the big, semi-open side room, where the pool tables and dart boards were set up. It sounded like a fight breaking out.
As I changed course, I was pleased to see Rhoda, one of the girls I’d hired, stride from the bar toward the uproar. With that determined look on her face, I had no doubt she could handle whoever was causing problems in there, but breaking up bar fights wasn’t in her job description.
That was my job. Hell, it’d be my pleasure.
I didn’t appreciate people starting trouble in my place.
Rhoda almost made it to the side room, and I was halfway there when a little slip of a blond college girl barreled out, sobbing and not looking where she was going. The blonde crashed into Rhoda and reeled back with a startled breath.
“I’m so sorry,” she wailed as she wiped at her streaming eyes. The girl side-stepped and looked back to the room. “I was just—”
“Jezzie! Dammit, come back here,” a male voice bellowed. A meathead kid in a college letter jacket bulldozed his way out of the side room, followed by two meathead friends in matching jackets.
“It’s not a big deal, baby,” Meathead Number One slurred. “Now get your ass back in there and quit being such a… witch.”
He put a lot of obvious effort into saying that last word instead of the one that rhymed.
“Stay away from me, Brad. You’re a disgusting pig,” the girl screamed. “I’m going home, and you better not show up there. I mean it!”
Rhoda gently shuffled the girl behind her taller, more imposing form.
Meathead took a threatening step toward my bartender. “Yo
u want to stay out of my way, sweetheart,” he sneered at her.
By then, I was three steps away from the son of a bitch. I tapped him on the shoulder, and he whirled toward me with a challenging snarl.
“Touch her, and you’re a dead man,” I growled. “You and your buddies walk the hell out of here, right now, and I’ll consider not calling the cops. Unless Jezzie wants them called, in which case I will.”
Big Brad’s expression shifted from drunken rage to smug incredulity. “You believe this old man?” he said to his friends, who sniggered dutifully on cue. “Trying to step up to me like he owns the place.”
“Actually, I do own this place,” I said in an even tone, which drew a few surprised gasps from onlookers. “And I’m officially banning you from this bar, starting now.”
“Gimme a break,” Brad sneered. “You’re supposed to be some kind of badass legend, right? Okay then, prove it.”
I sighed, glanced at Rhoda, and gestured with my head toward the bar. She took the hint and led the still-crying Jezzie away to settle her down with a complimentary drink.
“You need to leave,” I told Brad. “When a sorry excuse for a man mistreats a woman the way you just did, I take it personally. You’re not going to like how this ends for you.”
Brad stripped off his jacket and handed it to one of his friends. “Let’s go, legend.”
Then, he swung at me. The big, looping haymaker would’ve done damage if he’d connected, but I could’ve avoided this guy in my sleep, even if he was stone-cold sober. I ducked under it and came up with two quick, hard jabs that dropped him to his knees. When he gasped and looked up at me, I nailed him with a hook across the face and broke his nose for good measure.
I’d warned him I would take it personally.
Brad let out a foghorn howl, and his buddies shared a glance before they made a clumsy charge toward me. I hammered one of them in the cheekbone and then drove an elbow back at the other one, catching him in the side. The first one recovered and threw a punch that skimmed his knuckles across my arm, but I sidestepped the bulk of the momentum and planted a foot in his gut. He staggered back with a whoosh of breath.