Midnight Sun (11 page)

She smiled softly and relaxed against his chest like a cat. He wrapped his arms around her and closed his eyes.

“Seventeen hours,” she murmured.

“Pardon?”

She lifted her head and brushed her lips over his. “How is it that we only met seventeen hours ago?” She left his mouth and nibbled along his jaw, the gentle scrape of her teeth triggering a low growl in the back of his throat.

“I’ve decided to stop questioning it.” He slid his hands under her T-shirt, stroking along her ribs, hardly able to believe it was his first time touching her bare skin in that particular spot. Nothing about this was normal. The chemistry, the heat between them was tangible.
 

Seventeen hours?

No way. Maybe only seventeen hours in this dimension, but his body, his mind, must have tapped into a dozen others in which they were already friends, lovers, partners.

He slid his hands higher, cupping her breasts. She purred and shifted on his lap so his erection pressed between her thighs. She slid her tongue inside his mouth and made a soft sound in the back of her throat.

“I want to make love with you,” she said against his lips.

He groaned and kissed her deeply, then pulled back. “Not here. We need to finish. Then we can go back to the house.”

She gave him a sexy, saucy smile as she undid the top button of his shirt. “I bought condoms. At the grocery store.”

He nipped at that perfect freckle on her bottom lip. “I know. I saw them in the basket.”

“They’re in my purse.” She tilted her head toward the red bag she’d dropped on the floor by the door.

He chuckled. “No. The first time I make love to you isn’t going to be on a desk in what is essentially a warehouse office.”

“When will you make love to me on a desk in a warehouse office?”

“The eighth time.”

“You’re pretty confident there will be an eighth time.”

He nuzzled her neck, loving the humor in her voice. The way she melted in his arms. “I’m confident there will be a hundred and eighth time.”
 

Her fingers threaded through his hair as she tilted back her head to give him better access to her neck. He sucked on her earlobe, then trailed kisses down to the hollow of her collarbone. “Are we crazy, Rhys?” Her tone had grown serious.

He lifted his head and met her gaze. Her eyes were dilated with arousal. She wasn’t joking, but she wasn’t upset either. Curious, maybe.

“I don’t think we are,” he said. “But I suppose it’s possible.”

W
hile Rhys called an FBI agent he knew in Seattle, Sienna got to work on the inventory. A few minutes later, he joined her.

“He said he’d review the filed manifests and let me know if Helvig arrived yesterday, before the break-in at Chuck’s house.”

Rhys’s phone buzzed.
 

“That was fast,” Sienna said.

He glanced at the screen and shook his head. “It’s the hospital.” He answered, and she saw the relief on his face as he spoke to his cousin for the first time since arriving in town last night. She turned back to a printout of the inventory. The file on the computer having been corrupted and inaccessible, she’d been lucky to find a catalogue that had been printed a few months before Jana’s death. Old and possibly out-of-date, but at least it was a starting point.

She studied the list for items that were more likely to be stolen than others. The tribe was small, but they had a proactive CRM. From the number of pages in the printout, they had over twenty thousand cultural items in storage. A large portion were attributed to several archaeological excavations, but valuable items could still be among those collections.

This would take a while. Days, most likely.

She hadn’t found a reference to the mask yet, but figured it was buried somewhere in the catalogue.

Twenty minutes later, call complete, Rhys joined her. “Chuck said the separate file on the mask—which included photos—was missing from the file cabinet and deleted from the computer. But he has backups for those in his office. We can grab them later. He said from my description, it sounds like you’ve brought back the missing mask, and he got choked up. It’s important to the tribe. He says thanks—and he’ll sign whatever the hell receipt you want.”

She smiled. One thing she didn’t have to fear: prison. Nice to cross that one off the list.

“While you were on the phone, I identified a few items that might be considered valuable to collectors. Shall we pull the inventory boxes and see if they’re present and accounted for?”

He nodded, and together they searched the boxes while he gave her a rundown of everything he’d learned from Chuck.

It was late evening—even if the sunlight lied—when Sienna announced she needed to quit for the night. “I have a headache. Climate-controlled spaces and visions of my death do that to me.”

Rhys returned a box to the stacks as she rubbed her lower back. They had identified a dozen missing items so far. “I don’t know how I would have figured all this out without you here.” He rolled his shoulders.

“Who knew my degree would be of use to an assistant US attorney?” She appreciated the way his muscles moved under his shirt, and thought of other ways to be of use to the AUSA.

The heat in his gaze said he had similar thoughts, but his words were all business. “Chuck said we should check in with Archie Wright, the owner of Wright Net—the manufacturers next door. He said in the summer Archie lives on an ancient fishing boat moored on the town pier. According to Chuck, the guy is older than dirt but still sharp and knows where all the bodies are buried. We could check in with him, then hit the Midnight Sun Festival, grab dinner, track down the guys who work for Wright Net, and watch the daylight firework display.”

She glanced at her watch. “Isn’t it late to drop in on an elderly man?”

“Chuck said he’ll be up, but if he’s not on deck, we won’t bother him.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Rhys slipped an arm around her waist and kissed her forehead. “You sure you’re up for it? It’s been a hellishly long day.”

“It’s strange, but I feel like now that I’ve given myself over to doing what the mask wants, it’s being…kinder to me. It was angry back in Washington. More stick than carrot. But since we started working together, it’s been different. You are one hell of a carrot.” She flushed and laughed at the same time. “I can’t believe I just said that. I didn’t mean—”

He chuckled. “I personally prefer being referred to as a zucchini or cucumber…”

She rolled her eyes. “Men.” She huffed out an exaggerated sigh. “As I was saying, so even though I’m tired and maybe just a tiny bit freaked out about what happened earlier, I think the mask wants us to talk to Archie Wright. I have a feeling it won’t let me rest again until we do.”
 

Chapter Seven

A
rchie Wright greeted Rhys warmly, his wrinkled, weathered face split with a wide smile, revealing he’d eschewed his dentures for the evening. “Come aboard! I’ve been expecting you after Chuck’s call.” The man squinted at Sienna. “I’m afraid my sight isn’t what it used to be. Who is this with you?”

Rhys pulled himself aboard and gave Sienna a hand as she crossed the sizable gap. It was a wonder the legally blind ninety-year-old lived on the ancient vessel. Chuck had mentioned Archie’s children tried to convince him to move into assisted living in town, but Archie had refused on the grounds that he knew the boat better than a man knew his wife’s body. He didn’t need good vision to find his way around.

“I’m Sienna Aubrey, Mr. Wright. I’m helping Chuck track down artifacts that are missing from the tribal storage facility.”

The old man nodded. “Chuck mentioned the thefts to me the day he got sick. And please, call me Archie. Have a seat.” His blank gaze turned to Rhys, his face expectant.

Rhys smiled and pressed a small bottle of scotch they’d picked up on the way to the dock into the man’s empty hand. “Only if you’ll share this Glenfiddich with me.”

The man’s grin widened. “Chuck is a good friend. My daughter, bless her heart, has convinced the owner of the liquor store not to sell to me while I live on the boat. She fears I’ll slip and fall into Kotzebue Sound. Damn waste of a retirement if a man can’t have a decent drink.” He sprang up and made a beeline for a cabinet and returned with three tumblers.

Drinks poured, Archie sat back, drink in hand and a grin on his face. As Chuck had said, Archie didn’t actually drink the scotch. He merely held the glass beneath his nose and breathed. Chuck suspected he shared his daughter’s concerns but enjoyed the artificial rebellion.
 

In the distance, there was a sharp, loud pop. Sienna jolted.
 

Rhys took her hand in his. “That one really was a firework.”

She nodded. “I know. Still startling.” She stared into her tumbler with a leery eye. “I’m not usually a fan of straight booze, but today I’ll make an exception.” She took a tiny sip, then made a face. “Eh. Maybe not.”

Rhys laughed, filing away her likes and dislikes, amazed at the amount he didn’t know about her when he felt connected to her on so many levels.

“You kids planning on going to the street dance tonight?” Archie asked. “The town spent a fortune flying in some band called Max Midnight to play the festival.”

“Yes,” Rhys said, “but not to see the band. We’re hoping to talk to your employees. I’d like to ask them about suspicious activity at the industrial park.”

Archie set down the tumbler and spat out into the water. “The Pelligrew boys? Worthless pieces of shit. I’d fire them both in a heartbeat if I could find workers to take over, but no one else knows how to use the machinery, and”—he lifted his tumbler and squinted at it as he moved it closer to his eyes—“I can’t train anyone new. Wright Net has contracts to fill, fishermen I’ve known since they were boys. I can’t let them down. But once those contracts are done, I’m closing shop.”

Rhys leaned forward, surprised by Archie’s complete change in demeanor. “You aren’t happy with them?”

“Hell, no. They’re robbing me blind. And I am blind, so there’s a special place in hell for them. When the boys arrived in town a year ago, I thought they were the answer to my prayers. Instead, they’ve been nothing but nightmares.”

Rhys’s nerves hummed, not triggered by the mask but by a hunch based on timing. “The Pelligrews have only been working for you for the last year?”

“Yeah. I was in a bind and about to close shop when the Pelligrews came along. They’d worked down in Washington for a competitor and knew the machinery. I hired them on the spot. It took me months to catch on to what they’re doing—making nets on the side, using dummy invoices, pocketing the cash.” He spit again.

Sienna sat forward. “Do you think it’s possible they’ve been stealing from the tribe as well? Being in the same building with the storage facility, they must have noticed how rarely anyone visited.”

Archie nodded. “Boys who’ll steal from a blind man will steal from anyone. All they’d have to do is cut a hole in the wall between the net shop and tribe storage. It used to be one large room, but when I downsized the shop eight years ago, I had the wall constructed so I could rent out the other half of the building. Easy peasy to cut a hole when the wall isn’t structural.”

“Wouldn’t we have noticed a hole in the wall?” Sienna asked.