Better Than Gold. Mary Brady

I said something like, the more I hear, the more complicated this whole investigation is getting.”

      “That’s the gist.”

      “Wouldn’t finding out a pirate was buried here be beneficial for the town, a tourist attraction?”

      “Yeeees,” she drew out the word. “The town needs the monetary boost tourists will bring. Skeletons were not part of the timeline for—well—for profitability.”

      He watched her closely, trying to figure out if there was something else behind her words. On the surface they seemed self-serving, but there was also an almost bleak tone to her voice, which made him suspect there was much more. “Earlier, you mentioned a dining room. A restaurant?”

      “That’s my goal.”

      “Are you a chef?”

      “Oh, no. Creating food takes more imagination and certainly more skill than I have. I’m a businesswoman. Can’t you tell?” She gestured to her demolition attire. “Hotel and restaurant management.”

      “Does the place have a name?”

      She gave a soft snort. “I chose it before all this got started and now I’m a bit mortified. I thought I’d be clever and call it Pirate’s Roost.”

      Her smile, though embarrassed, shined bright like the sun off the water. It was clear to see she was proud of what she was doing here, had great hopes for success.

      “So a pirate in your wall would complicate things?”

      She brushed the toe of her shoe against the concrete of the sidewalk. “I’m on a tight timeline. There have already been so many delays, and if the Roost is not finished in time to draw tourists this season it will be hard to keep things going over the winter. Plus things can get a little sketchy around here when the hopes of treasure stirs things up.”

      “So if I got out of the way, the Pirate’s Roost might have a chance to stay on schedule.”

      “It would help a lot.”

      “I’ll check out the crypt. I might only need a few days with the site, a week at the most.” She might have masked a gasp with a cough, but he wasn’t sure. “I’ll need to get the contents of the boxes examined to see what the remains can tell me.”

      He sat back and watched the goings-on in the harbor. Sometimes gathering information on a site meant letting the indigenous population say what they needed to say. He let silence ask the next question.

      “I really need to get the demo and remodeling finished as soon as possible.”

      He nodded.

      A dingy bounced against the hull of one of the fishing boats as someone on board worked to secure it to the side of the boat.

      “In a way,” she continued, “the town’s survival depends on getting the village brought up to the twenty-first century. This is, we hope, the first of many projects.”

      “And if this turns out to be a pirate who hid a treasure?” He glanced at her. “Will the whole town turn up?”

      She leaned her chin in the palms of her hands. The sun glistened golden in her hair and the wind blew the loose curling locks across her cheek, made pink by the morning breeze. He wanted to tuck the hair behind her ear. He wanted to tell her everything would be all right, but he knew he did not have that power anymore, in fact never had that power.

      “Not all of the folks here are crazed by pirate lore, but enough to make my life difficult, and maybe yours.” She nodded across the street at the two teenagers with their heads together. Their glances kept turning to where he and Mia Parker sat on the bench.

      “You’d like to toss me out of town, wouldn’t you?”

      She snapped her eyes to his face. “Yes.”

      He laughed at her honesty. “Then I’d better get started on finding out about what went on in there.”

      “Please do.” She picked up the empty coffee cups and carafe and stood.

      “I need to do the preliminary examine by myself.” And then, so there could be no misunderstanding, he added, “I’d like it if you left for a half hour or so.”

      There was a time in his life when she would have been just the type of woman he would have sought out. She didn’t have to give him any information he had not found at the university, but she did. She could have been bitchy about wanting him to get in and get out, but she wasn’t. Yet, if she had come into his life years ago, he would have hurt her, too, just as he had Mandy.

      “I have a few things to do. I’ll be back in thirty minutes...or so. My phone number is inside, on the back wall.”

      He notched an eyebrow.

      “That way my workers have no excuse not to call me when they need me.”

      She walked quickly away and he wondered how much she had invested in this project, and even more, how valuable a historical site this might turn out to be. The more significant each of these factors, the greater their problems would be.

      With a toss of her head, she flicked the hair from her face and climbed into a small green SUV.

      He wondered how she’d feel about him and the guy in the wall if she knew the state had given the university, and therefore him, the power to keep her site for as long as he deemed necessary. How she’d react if the university asserted its right to the Power of Eminent Domain. With that power, they could buy her building at fair market price, which in this depressed town would pay her only a fraction of what she had already invested in the remodeling.

      She wasn’t even a part of his life and already he could do her harm, he thought, as he went back inside the building. Flashes of old memories, the smiling face of a little boy, the feeling of proud parents when the child was born. And the pain when it all fell apart.