Blood, Ash, and Bone

CHAPTER Twenty

When I got back to the hotel, I found Trey at his desk. He’d sent me a text asking if I were okay. I’d told him I was, that I’d explain later. Now he was looking at me, the question in his eyes.

I sat on the edge of the desk. “I guess you heard.”

“About the body? Yes. Dee Lynn explained.”

“You went to the Expo?”

“I did, but you’d already gone to give an official statement.” He put his work aside and looked at me seriously. “Do they have cause of death?”

“Not yet.”

They’d found the old man’s body in the shipping channel. Shrimpers going out for the day had spotted it. No boat, however. Mrs. Simmons, now a widow, had insisted she and her husband didn’t own a boat, then collapsed on the officer and been taken away. Another officer had escorted me downtown and grilled me for an hour, although without much enthusiasm for my guilt, unlike every other police interview I’d ever endured.

I put my bag down inside the door. “And on top of everything, Mrs. Simmons filed a restraining order against me.”

Trey rarely looked surprised, but that comment did the trick.

“On what grounds?” he said.

“That I threatened to hurt her if she turned over the evidence implicating me to the cops. She’s the one pulled a freaking gun on me! That sweet old lady. I could kick her ass.”

“You’ll need to explain.”

So I did. As I told the tale, he pulled out a fresh yellow pad and made notes, lots of them. I went to the mini-fridge to get a soda.

“Dee Lynn says I need to make myself scarce at the vendors’ meeting tomorrow, and she’s probably right. No sense causing a confrontation.”

“Restraining orders don’t take effect that quickly.”

“No, but rumors do. And my reputation as a purveyor of shady goods is spreading fast. Dee Lynn says I need to appear docile and cooperative and respectful to Mrs. Simmons in her time of loss. She says I’ll do this better from a distance.”

I kicked the fridge door closed and flopped myself on the sofa. “Besides, that frees up some time for me to figure out what the hell is going on here. Which reminds me—the Savannah police want the security footage from the night Hope came here. Can you send that?”

“Of course.”

“Good. Kendrick says that’s an important part of my defense, that I’m a victim of identify theft. He said I need to start collecting evidence to prove it. Apparently, this is the one time the police actually encourage a civilian to investigate.”

Trey tapped at the keyboard, and the image of him and Hope in the elevator formed on the screen. She looked at the camera—smug, satisfied, deliberate. He tapped out more instructions, and the footage began downloading.

I glanced at his notebook, noticing that except for a precise diagram of the conference center, his afternoon at the Expo had netted him little information. I knew the Armani had worked against him. When death and treasure were on the agenda, people shut down the information corridors fast, especially around official-looking people in suits.

He gave me a sharply inquisitive look. “Do you really have the map?”

“I have this thing I scribbled based on what Emmy Simmons told me. But it’s not the map.” Then I frowned. “Wow. Hard to believe that information got around that fast.”

“Did you do that on purpose?”

“No. But it means treasure fever has gone viral.” I stretched my foot out and massaged my instep. “What are you doing here? Don’t tell me Marisa let you have the night off?”

He tapped his phone. Marisa’s voice leaped from the speaker. “You’d better be on your way to the mayor’s reception, do you hear me? And why the hell aren’t you answering your phone? I told you—”

He switched it off. “There are two other messages in a similar vein.”

He sat in his chair, legs stretched out in front of him, fingers steepled across his stomach. He and Marisa had made a deal—he continued to work for her, and she got him for charts and data, not glad-handing and show pony work.

But Marisa could manipulate Trey very easily—putting things in writing, giving direct orders, evoking the hierarchy. He gave in to these machinations and did what he was told. Most of the time.

“Are you okay?”

He exhaled. “I’m confused.”

I shoved myself off the sofa and went to him. “You can go off grid for one night, you know. Tell Marisa you’re tired of being pimped out to the highest bidder.”

He stared at his desk. It was a collage of maps, mostly aerial shots of golf courses. But he also had a map of the Savannah waterways. I ran a finger along the edge, following the flow of the Atlantic, its blue fingers spreading inland among the green. Land and sea, sea and land.

I tilted the map and examined it again. “You wanna know what’s bugging me most? Why would a man going digging in graveyards be out on the water?”

I pointed to where the body was found, then drew a line from that point backwards, following last night’s current. “He got caught in the storm, no doubt. The boat was swamped, sank somewhere. They assumed the map was lost with it. But they couldn’t explain why he was in the middle of the channel in the first place.”

“You have an idea?”

“Maybe.”

He arched an eyebrow. “And it is?”

“Remember, this is a total shot in the dark.” I pulled out my little faux map. “Okay, so his wife finds a piece of deciphered code. One word—boneyard. She assumes he meant a cemetery. But look.”

I pointed to the map. “Here’s where his body was found. But consider the flow, factor in the tides, and I’m guessing he was somewhere in this vicinity when he went in the water.”

I pointed further up the map. Trey peered closer.

“Wassaw Island. Is there a graveyard there?”

“No. But there is a beach littered with driftwood logs and dead pine trees. Locals call it the Boneyard. And the only way to get there is by boat.”

“But he didn’t have a boat.”

“I’m still working on that part of the theory.”

Trey cocked his head. “Have you shared this theory with the authorities?”

“I’m coming into this theory as we speak. But I’m willing to call it in, see what happens.”

We both knew what would happen. It would go onto someone’s desk and they’d see it in the morning. But that was what law-abiding citizens did—they followed official channels, washed their hands of the responsibility. Trey was one of these citizens.

Except that Trey wasn’t picking up his phone. And his finger was tapping the desktop.

His eyes met mine. “All right. We alert the authorities, share our information. And then what?”

I sat on the edge of the desk. “Normally I would say, let’s go check out the island and see for ourselves. Unfortunately, it’s almost dark. There’s no getting on Wassaw Island legally after dark. And normally I would say screw that, let’s chance it. But it’s a National Wildlife Refuge, which makes trespassing a federal crime, and the ATF does not look upon those favorably. Inspector Cranky-Pants would snatch my federal firearms license in a heartbeat.”

Trey listened, very intently. “Go on.”

“So while I’m usually the run-around-sneak-over kind of girl, not this time. But believe me, if this rumor’s spreading, and if anybody else makes the connection I just did, that island will be crawling with treasure hunters in the morning.”

“And the scene will be destroyed.”

“Definitely, especially if that next storm flares up tonight like they’re predicting. Because nobody’s getting on without a special permit, and those are scarce as hen’s teeth.”

Trey eyed me, arms folded. “Why would he have gone at night?”

“Because his wife described the map as having strange symbols on it, including a moon. And last night was the full moon.”

“Wouldn’t he have been afraid of getting caught?”

“Not if he had treasure on the brain.”

Trey looked at me, his eyes catching the light like a scalpel. “And there’s only one way to Wassaw Island?”

“Only one way—by boat. And during the day, Dee Lynn would be pulling in the dock lines and heading over. But at night? Like I said, that’s a no-go.”

He pulled out his phone. “Dee Lynn owns her own boat, correct?”

“Yes. But like I keep saying, there’s no way…who are you calling?”

He held up a finger. A crisp formal voice at the other end of the phone answered. Trey reached for a pen and yellow pad.

“Hello, Grace, this is Trey Seaver. Is the senator available? Yes, I’ll hold.” He covered the phone’s mouthpiece with three fingers. “There are certain benefits to…how did you put it? Being pimped out?”

***

Within five minutes, he had a Department of Natural Resources special permit waiting for us at the ranger station. Trey didn’t excel at small talk, but no matter—he’d apparently done duty for the senator during his dignitary protection days with Atlanta’s SWAT team. And the senator remembered. And was grateful.

Trey made one final notation on the paper. “Thank you. I appreciate this.” He looked up then, his eyes on mine. There was a sexy little crinkle at the corners. “No, Senator, it’s nothing official. Simply a favor for my girlfriend.”