He grinned. “Taking charge, are we?” Pulling out a chair at the table, he plunked down on it and stretched out his long legs.
She worked in silence, and Bane couldn’t think of carrying on a conversation. Leia finished the meal preparations and set it in front of him. “See what you think.”
He took a bite. “It’s better than I expected,” he admitted. He dropped a bite on the floor to Ajax, who snatched it up. “Ajax agrees.” He began to shovel the food into his mouth. “Do you think we’re really going to find anything at the fishpond?”
Her shoulders tensed. “Not really, I guess. I wish we would. I’m ready for this all to be over.”
Maybe it was all over. Between them anyway. He clenched his teeth at the thought. No, he wasn’t ready to let it go. He loved Leia, and he was going to have to figure out a way to make this work.
Eva peered out her window into the moonlight. She felt funny tonight, like there were bugs crawling on her skin. When the bad dream woke her, she wanted to go find her mother, but Mama got mad when Eva told her about her dreams. She said to think nice thoughts and go to sleep, not wake her up. It was hard to think nice thoughts when there had been a monster under her bed.
The scary part was that the monster seemed to want to eat Leia. Eva hugged herself and tried not to cry. It was very late so she knew she couldn’t call her sister. Leia wouldn’t care, but she might wake up T?t?. Eva wanted her sister though. Leia was the one person who never made Eva feel stupid. She couldn’t let anything happen to Leia. Eva looked at the phone again. She had to call her sister.
The moonlight whispered around Leia and Bane as they retraced their steps to the grove where they’d found the fishpond. The moonlight illuminated the clearing like a giant lamp. “Do you think we’re going to find anything?” Leia asked Bane, who was holding back a large frond to allow her to pass. He carried a shovel in his other hand.
He shrugged and let the branch fall back into place. “Maybe. At any rate, we’ll have an adventure.”
She stopped. “Listen. Do you hear something?” It almost sounded like someone chopping something. A rhythmic thwack resounded in the forest.
“I hear it. It sounds like it’s coming from the fishpond area.” He put his hand on her forearm. “Hang on, let me check it out.”
“I’ll go with you.” She fell into step beside him.
“I know better than to argue with you.”
She couldn’t hide her smile. “Smart man.” He took her hand, and she let him keep it a few minutes. The warm pressure of his fingers made her forget all the reasons she couldn’t be with him, all the things she’d told herself in the night about why she could never marry. She made a show of moving a branch out of the way so she could pull her hand out of his grasp. He didn’t try to take it again, and she wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or not.
The sound was just beyond the last stand of trees. Bane held out his arm. “Wait, let’s not just bust through and startle whoever it is.” He parted the branches to look into the clearing.
Leia peeked through the leafy window with him. A man with a shovel bent over the ground. Holes had been dug all over the clearing, and some still gaped open while others had been back-filled. “What’s he doing?” she whispered.
“I’d say he’s looking for the treasure.” Bane’s voice was grim.
“How would he know where to look?” Leia had visions of someone skulking outside the house listening to all their conversations.
“Maybe he got it out of Koma.”
She’d rather believe that. “Can you tell who it is?”
“He’s too far off. Let’s go around to the other side and see if we can get a glimpse of his face. Try not to make any noise.”
She nodded, and they crept through the jungle, moving north. “At least he’s not digging where T?t? told us to,” she whispered when they finally stood with the ocean to their backs. She could hear the sound of the surf in the distance.
“Listen! Someone else is coming.” Bane grabbed her arm and dragged her down into the foliage.
Leia held her breath as someone passed by. She peeked out from behind the fronds and saw a familiar form. She tightened her fingers on Bane’s muscular forearm. Bending close, she whispered in his ear. “It’s Jermaine.” He nodded, and they stood and crept forward again. Peeking through the leaves again, she watched as Jermaine approached the figure in the clearing. The two spoke in tones too low to make out words.
She was beginning to think it was an accidental meeting until the man they’d seen digging stepped back and lifted his shovel. Before they could react, he whacked Jermaine in the neck with it. Even from here, she could see the blood spray out from Jermaine’s neck. “He’s severed his carotid artery.” She didn’t bother to lower her voice.