“What about your staff?” I knew he’d hired about fifteen people, some full- and some part-time.
“I had to lay a few off for the winter, but I kept most of them.” He came around and opened the truck door for me. “But tonight’s Wednesday and no one’s here except us. I made lasagna for you.”
So we would be totally alone in the old place. I got out of the truck. The smell of the ocean was strong here, much stronger than on the Currituck side even though it wasn’t that far away. I could hear the waves breaking on the shore. Wind chimes rang out in the constant breeze that kept our trees dwarfed.
As we walked up the stairs, I suddenly felt another attack of nerves. Despite the fact that he was dressed up too, or maybe because of it, I was uncertain. What if this went badly? Was this the time to do something that might lead to disaster? Kevin and I were friends. Did I want to jeopardize that relationship?
“Something wrong?” he asked as he unlocked the front door. “You seem a long way off all of a sudden.”
“I was thinking that I meant to water my begonias tonight.” Okay, it wasn’t the best excuse. It was all I could think of and better than “I have to go home and wash my hair.”
He smiled and held out his hand to me. “Let’s eat first. You’re going to love my new dessert. The begonias will probably survive until you get back. Are you—nervous?”
I licked my lips, torn between being careful and being honest, always a mayor’s dilemma. “Yes,” I finally admitted with a husky laugh. “I guess I am. It’s been a long time . . . since I, uh, ate dinner.”
“Me too.” He laughed. “But they say it comes right back to you. It’s like riding a bike.”
“There’s one other thing I have to get straight.”
“You’re procrastinating, Dae.”
“Not anymore.”
He closed the front door and I leaned against him, kissing him gently on the lips.
“That’s what I thought,” he whispered as he put his arms around me and drew me closer.
“What?” I murmured with what felt like a permanent smile on my face.
“We’ve wasted a lot of time.”
We talked and laughed through salad, lasagna and a very good wine served in the vintage bar off the huge dining room. There were candles on the table, and the French doors stood open a little to catch the scent and sound of the sea.
“What’s the first thing you ever found for anyone?” he asked as he dished up his new dessert, a raspberry version of tiramisu.
“I don’t know. My mother always said I walked around finding things when I was a baby. A toddler, I guess. Keys, change, you name it. Gramps lost his pocket watch in the basement once, and I led him right to it even though I’d never been down there.”
“You have an amazing gift.” He smiled at me as he sat back down. “I’m surprised you never tried to exploit it.”
“I did a little in college. I used to take five dollars from my friends to find things for them. That’s as close as I ever came to making money that way. My mom and my grandfather drummed it into me that my gift was only supposed to help others. They said it would go away if I did anything bad with it.”
“It has to belong to the person,” he quoted me, “and it can’t be illegal.”
“That’s right. So I hope your missing wine fits my rules.”
“You won’t know until you try.” He sobered and held both his hands out to me. “Will you try?”
I was a little tipsy from too much wine and too happy to protest. If he needed to find some wine, I wanted to help him. I stripped off the gloves and took his hands.
Immediately I felt the normal (for me) sensations of being in someone else’s mind. I shook all over and felt a kind of cold detachment as I searched for the cask of wine he was missing. My fingers tingled holding his hands.
It was a lot like walking through someone’s personal attic, looking at everything they found precious and some things they wanted to keep hidden. I’d done it for so long that it was second nature to me.
I opened my eyes when I clearly saw the old wine cask. “It’s in the root cellar around back. The man who delivered it got confused and left it there.”
Kevin smiled and didn’t let go of my hands. “You’ve still got it!”
I considered his words. “I do, don’t I?” I didn’t tell him I already knew my gift was still there.
“Let’s go see if we can find it!”
We walked around back, the quiet night well lit by the moon. Kevin brought a flashlight anyway. “Have you been back here before?” I asked as an owl called from the trees.
“A lot while I was working on the floors. They were in really good shape. Some things were built to last forever.”
“No bones from previous owners?”
“No. If Bunk Whitley is entombed here, I couldn’t find him. Neither could the parade of building inspectors who passed through.”
Bunk Whitley was a legendary figure in Duck. He was the original owner of the Blue Whale. His exploits, and sudden disappearance, were all the stuff of lore. People had speculated that he was killed by one of his enemies and hidden in the old inn somewhere. With the place abandoned for so long, it was easy to imagine it was true. Still, if he wasn’t here, he had to be somewhere. He might wash up someday.
Kevin opened the doors to the root cellar and walked carefully down the stairs until he was swallowed by the blackness below. I followed him, my feet sliding a little on the moss-covered steps.
“There it is!” He panned the flashlight beam across the area. “You’re good, Dae.”
“Thanks.” I wasn’t expecting it when he leaned over and kissed me, but I can’t say I didn’t welcome it—kissing Kevin was a lot more fun than looking for a missing cask of wine.
He handed me the flashlight (made at a factory in China where they employed small children), then hoisted the cask on his shoulder before we started back out of the damp cellar.
“You know, this place might not be too bad for storing a few things,” he said.
“Maybe. If you don’t mind it being flooded occasionally.” The place was filled with roly-poly bugs, spiders and probably a snake or two I didn’t see. Not exactly the romantic spot I’d expected to be in.
The flashlight beam shone on something stuck against the side wall of the cellar. I reached for it without thinking and the touch exploded in my brain.
Chapter 8
It was a gold coin, a cousin to the one I’d given Chief Michaels. It was from the same chest that had washed up on the beach all those years ago. The one Max claimed to have found and donated to the museum.
But this time I had a clear vision of the man who’d actually found the gold. I saw him as he walked down the beach to retrieve the chest. I knew who he was. I recognized him from the old microfiche versions of the Duck Gazette that had been stored at the museum. Gone forever now, except in some of our memories.
“Dae?” Kevin called my name with a fierce concern that brought me back to myself.
“It was Bunk Whitley who found the gold.” I realized I was sitting on wet ground that was oozing moss and other things I didn’t want to think about. “My dress!”
Kevin pulled me to my feet. He must’ve left the wine cask outside already because it occurred to me that he had two free hands. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” I brushed the sand and soil from the back of my dress, the dress I wanted to keep forever as a reminder that sometimes you just needed to take a chance.
I showed him the gold coin I’d found in the wall. “It’s like the ones at the museum.”