Kevin offered but I decided against any more wine. My head was starting to ache. He drove me home in the moonlight, the back roads without streetlights strangely illuminated. Shadows of the past played in the darkness, refusing to come out where they could be seen and understood. Duck’s sometimes strange past would always haunt this place, even if someday people finally forgot Rafe the pirate.
Kevin kissed me good night at the door to the house. “Lunch tomorrow? I can’t make breakfast. I have a delivery.”
“Sure. I’ll call you if anything comes up.”
“Be careful, Dae.” He touched my face and smiled. “I don’t want to lose you.”
“You won’t,” I promised before I went inside. I locked the door and faced Gramps. He was grinning like a Jolly Roger as he played with his white beard.
“So? You’re awfully late, young woman. What have you been up to?”
“Like you weren’t watching through the peephole!” I hugged him, glad to be home despite the excitement of the evening. “What a night.”
“Care to share over some hot cocoa?”
“Not tonight.” I smiled and headed up to my room. “It’s been a long day and I’m too tired to think. Can we talk in the morning?”
“Sure, honey. Sleep well.”
But I didn’t sleep, at least not for a while. I crept up to the old widow’s walk on the roof and looked out over the sound. From here, above the trees and most of the other houses, I could even glimpse the moonlit ocean.
Widow’s walks were designed for ship captains’ wives who watched for their husbands to come home. Many times they were already widows who wouldn’t know for months, sometimes years, that their husbands had been taken by the sea.
The rooftop walk was a very quiet, kind of moody place that had always enchanted me. I was brought up on tales of shipwrecks and legendary pirate figures that made death at sea almost romantic. Even in the summer when I had to fend off bats who liked the spot as much as I did, I loved to come up here.
I could imagine those poor women waiting for their men. As a child, I always wondered why they didn’t go to sea with them. Gramps told me it was because women weren’t welcome on ships back then. It seemed to me that I would’ve found a way. There were female pirates who captained their own vessels. I would’ve been one of them.
But tonight my rooftop walkway was too full of sorrow and the ghosts from the past. I went back to my room and finally fell asleep dreaming that I was wearing the red lace dress, waiting for Kevin to come home.
The next day was busy at Missing Pieces. Not so much with people buying my stuff as with people stopping in because it had begun to trickle out that I had been hurt when the museum exploded. Everyone wanted to know what had happened, play by play.
I explained what I could, then told them all to come to the meeting that night. I hoped the chief had thought about what he was going to say to the anxious citizens of Duck. I was still working on my piece.
More than a few people asked about the pirate curse. I tried to assure them that Rafe hadn’t blown up the museum, despite what they might have heard. I had the feeling most of them didn’t believe me. It was almost like a “poor Dae” kind of thing. They smiled and patted me on the head or the arm as they looked at my gloved hands. I could almost hear them talking outside the shop: “Poor Dae hurt her head and now she doesn’t know what’s going on.”
Tim stopped in before lunch to ask me to eat with him. When I told him I already had plans, he shrugged and said, “I have some new information about the museum.”
He was obviously dangling a carrot in front of me. I decided to bite. “Okay.”
“I thought I could tell you what I found out over lunch. The Rib Shack has a special today.”
“Thanks.” Why did he always invite me to go to the Rib Shack with him? He knew I didn’t like eating there. “I can’t today. But I’d love to know what’s going on with the investigation.”
“It’s Kevin, isn’t it? Old Man Sweeney said he thought he saw him drive you home late last night. You two have finally hooked up, haven’t you? What about us?”
It was bad enough to know Gramps was looking out the peephole when Kevin kissed me good night at the door. It was another thing to know Mr. Sweeney was reporting my movements to Tim. “You recently dated Betsy Marlin, that accountant from Kill Devil Hills. Before that, it was Shayla, and before that it was Trudy. Why can’t I date someone?”
His face lightened. “You mean like sowing your wild oats out before we settle down? I didn’t think of that!”
“I don’t think I have any wild oats.” I didn’t like the turn of the conversation.
“Just tell me you don’t love me, Dae O’Donnell, and I’ll go away and never darken your door again. Look me in the eyes and tell me.”
I put my hands on my hips, stood close to him and looked him squarely in the eyes. “I know we’ve known each other all our lives, Tim. But I don’t love you, not that way. You’re like the brother I never had. Happy now? What else do you know about the museum?”
He frowned. “You don’t mean it. You’re infatuated with Kevin right now. You’ll get over it. I’ll be here waiting.”
“Great. Museum? Spill it.”
He looked over his shoulder. “I shouldn’t tell you—”
“Go ahead before someone else comes in.”
“Chief Michaels had the cannon at the Corolla Historical Museum picked up this morning for testing. Ballistics is going to take a look at it in Manteo. And they can’t find Sam Meacham. They want to question him, but he’s disappeared.”
“Disappeared? Where?”
“Duh! Now who’s the dummy? That’s the nature of disappearing, Dae.” He goaded me. “No one can find you.”
“Thanks for explaining.”
“This proves Sam is guilty of killing Max,” he went on. “No one runs unless they’re guilty.”
Despite his logic, I didn’t agree. I managed to get him out of the shop, then went to meet Kevin for lunch at Wild Stallions, a little bar and grill tucked into a corner of the boardwalk. I told Kevin what Tim had said, and we talked about it over sandwiches and homemade chips.
“Why are you so sure Sam is innocent?” Kevin asked. “You know they argued earlier that day. A cannon is an unusual choice of weapon for people who aren’t historians or museum caretakers. I agree with Chief Michaels on this.”
“It might make sense in a computer/law enforcement kind of way.” I knew what he was getting at. I’d grown up with Gramps working as the sheriff of Dare County. “But even though Max and Sam argued, they were really good friends. Sam wouldn’t get so mad after all these years that he’d drag a cannon down from Corolla to kill Max.”
“Sometimes even the best of friends go too far. Maybe Max finding a DNA match to prove his theory about Theodosia Burr was too much. We all have breaking points.”
I sipped my water and thought about it. “Even if he was that mad, Sam would never destroy so much history. I might be convinced that he could do something to Max, I guess, but never blow up the museum.”
He shrugged. “Only one way to know for sure.”
“Find Sam. I know. He’s gotta be around here somewhere. Maybe I should drive out there this afternoon. If I can find him, he might talk to me.”
“You’ll be stepping into the middle of an active police investigation,” he reminded me. “Need some help?”
“Sure! Can you spare the time?”
“Let’s see, waterproof some windows at the inn or go with one of my favorite people to Corolla on a beautiful, sunny afternoon. Tough choice.”
“One of your favorites, huh?” I grinned. “When you put it that way—”