A Touch of Gold (33 page)

“Me too! I had to have something to think about to keep from killing Celia. Anyway, could we wait to do whatever it is until after I have a shower and change clothes?”

“I don’t see why not. I’m going to pull the truck around back to the delivery area. The gold should be safe there until we can move it.”

“Do you have some clothes I could put on that aren’t full of emotional turmoil?”

“I think we can work that out too. Follow me.”

He loaned me some of his clothes—an old pair of jeans that must’ve shrunk in the wash and a long-sleeved shirt that had seen better days. They felt safe, like Kevin, when I touched them.

I took a quick shower that I hoped was enough to get most of the black soot out of my hair. It ran off of me in heavy rivulets, which left a ring in the tub that I felt compelled to clean up when I was done. The tile shower had been so nice and clean before I’d stepped into it.

Kevin was showered and changed as well, waiting for me with three of the large, old whiskey barrels from the storm cellar. “I think these will hold all of it. I have the pickup lined up in the delivery area. That way I can fill up the barrels and move them with the hand truck into the big freezer in back.”

As ideas went, it sounded like a good one. We rolled the barrels to the side of the inn where trucks unloaded supplies. I ignored the feelings I got from the barrels—nothing too distressing beyond workers who were unhappy with their jobs anyway. At least no one had ever been buried in one of them as had happened in a few Duck legends.

Kevin had huge hand scoops that normally were used for flour and other commodities. We used them to get the gold out the truck and fill up two and a half barrels. Kevin capped them and hammered the solid wood tops in place. Then he used the big, red hand truck to move them into the freezer. My hands were freezing and I smelled like old whiskey, but at least the job was over. The sun was coming up at the orange horizon when we were finished. I pulled the delivery door shut again as Kevin closed and locked the freezer door.

“Coffee?” he asked with a yawn. “I have a delivery at seven this morning for that party tonight, and I still need brandy for the peaches. I don’t think sleep is an option.”

“Sounds good, thanks.” I forced my tired, painful body into the kitchen. After a few minutes, coffee was perfuming the air with its rich fragrance. Kevin brought in a blueberry coffee cake, and I got two cups, cream and sugar.

We’d only been sitting down for a few minutes when Gramps came bursting into the warm kitchen, demanding to know what I was doing. “Where have you been all night, Dae? Your bed wasn’t slept in—you’re wearing
his
clothes. You smell like old whiskey. Ah, honey, this isn’t the way to handle this thing with your father. And Kevin, you aren’t the man I thought you were to take advantage of her pain this way.”

I took out another coffee cup, too tired to get excited about his tirade. “I’m in pain all right, but not the way you’re thinking.” I explained about Agnes and the gold.

He sat down next to me to hear the rest of the story, managing to grab a piece of coffee cake at the same time. “That’s incredible! You know, I heard something about that on the police scanner last night, but I ignored it. Sounded like your typical road-rage situation.”

“Have they found the car?” Kevin asked him.

“Yeah. About like you’d expect—abandoned, stolen, owner in New York or some such. No idea who was driving it, and it was wrecked. Where’s the gold?”

“In the back.” Kevin nodded in that general direction.

“Want to see it?” I offered.

“No thanks. I’d rather have another slice of that coffee cake. Did you make it yourself?”

Kevin gave him a cursory recipe for the cake. Gramps nodded and continued eating. After swallowing his last mouthful, he asked, “You think someone was gunning for Agnes again, like the fire? Or were they trying to get at the gold?”

“How would anyone else know about the gold?” I asked him.

“How indeed?” Gramps chuckled. “These things have a way of making the rounds. Your friend Bunk knew about it. I’m assuming that Roger fella you’ve been going on about knows. Since Vicky and Celia found out, I’m surprised most of Duck wasn’t out there helping you dig.”

I hadn’t thought of that. Kevin and I found out accidentally they were getting the gold last night, but dozens of other people could have known.

“Everyone also knows Agnes and her daughters are staying here with me,” Kevin added. “If they really wanted them—or the gold now for that matter—there wouldn’t be much we could do.”

Gramps laughed out loud at that one. “I bet there’s plenty you could do! Don’t be modest with me, young man!”

Kevin offered me more coffee, but I declined. I was ready to float away as it was. “I’m tough,” I told him. “If you have some secret FBI counterterrorism thing you can do to end all of this, feel free to use it.”

“I’m afraid there’s no surefire way to prevent someone from getting at you if they really want to,” Kevin explained. “You saw what happened out at the island.”

“That had to be a well-trained group,” Gramps concluded. “The people who went through those security men out there wouldn’t have given up with a few smacks to Agnes’s bumper.”

“Unless whoever did it came from within Bunk’s organization,” I said. “I’d say Bunk was prepared for what happened since he got away so quickly. He knew what to expect from Roger.”

“Agnes is sitting on a lot of gold,” Kevin observed. “Enough to make anyone think about taking it from her. Even Dae and I were making plans to fly down to the Caribbean with it before Agnes’s incident.”

We all laughed at the idea, but realizing all that gold was now at the Blue Whale made me nervous and I didn’t even live there. “Be careful,” I cautioned Kevin as Gramps and I were leaving in the golf cart a little later. “I think I know what you mean about people going crazy over gold.”

He kissed me and frowned. “You be careful too. Whoever was out there this morning might have seen you there.”

“I will. I’m only going to the shop anyway. Do you need any help with your dinner tonight?”

“Not once I get that brandy. See you later.”

After showering again (would I ever get the soot out of my hair?) and changing into some of my own clothes, I bundled up warmly and headed down to Missing Pieces. The cold walk woke me up a little, but I was still exhausted. I headed to the Coffee House and Bookstore for a large mocha that I hoped would get me through the morning.

There was light ice on the water’s edge along the Duck Shoppes boardwalk. The brown water plants were crusted in it where the gray water from the sound lapped at the land.

Shayla and Trudy were both closed this morning—they were lucky they could plan for their customers with appointments.

A few stray walkers came into the shop around eleven. They were tourists from Nashville down here for a week. I’ve never seen anyone more surprised that the Outer Banks has cold weather. Apparently, they thought going toward the coast meant warmer temperatures.

They looked around but didn’t buy anything. I sat behind the counter and watched them reject my treasures. Sometimes it could be pretty sad.

Around lunchtime, Mrs. Euly Stanley called to tell me she’d found her ancestor’s diary. She was very excited because there were some things in the text that made her believe the woman from the locket I’d located for her was Theodosia Burr.

“I’m going to bring it and the pendant in around five, if that’s okay, so we can compare your miniature to what I have. It’s so fascinating, Dae, thinking we might be related to Theodosia. You know, I never believed Alexander Hamilton didn’t provoke her father, Aaron, into killing him anyway. See you at five!”

I hung up the phone with a sigh. I couldn’t think about Theo Burr’s missing heritage without thinking about Max and his favorite dream. I was frustrated that we might be closing in on that dream faster than we were on Max’s killer. Despite the chiefs and the SBI looking for evidence to link Bunk to the recent deaths, I didn’t believe he was responsible. Someone was still out there, possibly looking for another person to kill.

Given what had happened to Agnes in the last few days, it was looking more and more like Bunk was right about Max being accidentally killed in place of his wife. Or maybe the killer had wanted to get rid of them both.

Roger knew his way around Duck. Bunk said he had his spies. The attack on Agnes was proof of that. He was watching her. No doubt it was the gold that motivated him—Bunk’s
and
Agnes’s.

How long would he wait, and how far would he be willing to go? The thought made me shiver. No one would be safe at the Blue Whale while Agnes and the gold were there. I hoped Gramps was right and Kevin could take care of himself in this kind of situation. But I knew I wouldn’t feel better about it until the gold was in a bank somewhere and Agnes and the girls had their own place again.

Tim Mabry surprised me with a visit right after I’d grabbed a sandwich and fries from Wild Stallions. He was unusually quiet, even calling me
ma’am
a few times. This was odd for him on so many different levels that it was almost frightening to listen to him.

“The chief wanted to know if you’d come out with me on Duck Road and show me exactly where everything happened last night, Dae. It shouldn’t take too long. He asked Agnes and the girls, but they were kind of beside themselves still. Not much good at giving a statement.”

“Sure. It’s been pretty quiet here. Has the chief found out anything new yet?”

“Not since we located that stolen SUV.” He took off his flat-brimmed police hat. “What were all of you doing out there at that time in the first place?”

I didn’t want to lie, but the whole truth might not be best either. “Kevin and I went to help Agnes get some of her stuff from the house. I think she didn’t want people seeing her out there going through what was left.”

He brought his fist down on the cabinet top near me and made me drop a French fry. “Dammit, Dae! This is exactly why I didn’t want to see you and Brickman together. The man leads a different life than the rest of us. Look at the things you’ve been through since you started dating him—kidnapped and taken to an island, almost killed alongside the road at a time you should’ve been home in bed like other people.”

“Tim, Kevin had nothing to do with any of those things.”

“I knew you’d defend him! And I didn’t mention you were almost blown up!” His rampage continued.

“Those things would’ve happened whether I was dating Kevin or not.” I didn’t bother mentioning that Kevin and I
weren’t
dating when the museum exploded.

“They wouldn’t have happened at all if you’d been dating
me
! I would’ve made sure of it.”

I sighed. “I’d heard you were already seeing someone else.”

“It was only a few days. She’s seeing someone else now.” He shrugged. “We were too different, according to her.”

“I’m sorry. What way did she say you were different?”

“She wanted to smoke marijuana, for one thing. I told her I’d have to lock her up.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.” He cleared his throat and put his hat back on. “I always come back around to how good you and I would be together and how we’re wasting our lives on other people.”

I tossed away what was left of my sandwich. It would be better to get this over. “We don’t really have anything in common either, Tim, except that we grew up together.”

“How can you say that?” he demanded. “I love fishing. I’d like to own a charter boat one day. I like watching sports on TV, and I’d rather take my golf cart out than my patrol car.”

“With those qualifications, I think one of those online dating services would pair you up with Gramps, not me. I’m ready to go if you are.”

Tim drove us slowly down Duck Road, seeming to enjoy holding up traffic behind him. I pointed out the highlights of our trip from the Blue Whale to Agnes’s house and back again. He pulled over so I could get out and show him the black skid marks where the SUV spun around to go back and hit Agnes again. He ignored it when I told him that Kevin had gone back to help Agnes escape her car.

“This is some bad case of road rage,” he said, writing all of it down. “I’ve never heard anything like it. It’s not even summertime.”

“I know.” I didn’t go into my suspicions about the incident being more than road rage. I knew the chief wouldn’t want to hear what I had to say on the subject. No point in getting Tim in trouble for my theories.

We retraced the route from the point where we’d all climbed into Kevin’s truck. I was pretty sure I could’ve walked faster than Tim was driving. At least it wasn’t cold in the patrol car.

I caught sight of something bright pink resting in a clump of dead grass on the side of the road—Celia’s cell phone. “Stop a minute. I think I see something.”

Tim stopped, and I got out to retrieve the phone. Celia would be happy to see it, I thought, and she could talk to her boyfriend again. I was a little reluctant to touch it, but I didn’t have much choice. Besides, I reasoned with myself, it could hold a valuable clue.

When I picked it up, the phone didn’t reveal much other than the fact that it had been purchased at a local convenience store. It was one of those pay-as-you-go kinds. I saw the hand with the green-blue ring picking it up from a counter. No doubt it was Roger now.

But why would Roger buy a phone for Celia? Could he be her secret boyfriend?

I looked at Tim and wished I could tell him how important the phone might be. This could be the definitive clue that broke the case. If Celia was tipping Roger about everything that was going on, it all made sense. I couldn’t wait to tell Kevin about my find.

Tim drove slowly down Duck Road again and pulled off when we reached the Duck Shoppes parking lot. We sat in his police car for a moment while he filled out paperwork and I silently urged him to hurry. The trip hadn’t yielded anything interesting for him.