5. Chapter 4
Serena
“Wake up, sleepyhead.” Liam waves a plate of sausage and pancakes over my face. I reach for them, but he pulls them back.
“You’re cruel.” I groan, stretching the aches out of my back from where I must have fallen asleep on the couch researching last night.
He leans over the back of the couch, his face hovering over mine. “I never said I’d be nice.” He presses a kiss to the hollow of my neck, and I shiver and turn my head, exposing more of my neck. But he only nips at my jaw before pulling back.
“Let’s go on an adventure, beautiful.”
I sit up. “Food first.” I snag a piece of sausage and devour it.
“Is your grandfather coming?” We FaceTime Henry once a day.
He’s healed well from his kidnapping, though it might have something to do with the sweet neighbor who promised to look after him.
Henry couldn’t help himself from flirting with the woman and is determined to wear her down. He informs us of his progress daily.
“He’s taking Maria to brunch but will be around later to help us ‘uncover the treasure,’” Liam says.
“Good, I can’t wait to see him.”
Twenty minutes and a plate of food later, I’m in the driver's seat of Liam’s Lamborghini. I run my hands over the smooth wheel.
“Will you kill me if I crash it?” I ask.
“It’s just a car. And I'd never try to kill you.” He smirks.
“That felt very pointed.” I turn on the car, revving it up. Liam doesn’t even flinch.
“You’ve tried to kill me fifteen times.”
“But I never succeeded. You’re welcome.” I shoot him a smirk and speed out of the driveway. The world passes by in a blur of color and motion. The London I used to love is coming back to me slowly but surely. I can’t stop the grin from covering my face as adrenaline courses through my veins.
“You can slow down,” Liam says casually.
“Can’t handle it?”
“You know I can. You know I will. Always.” Liam grabs my hand, and the warmth in his voice, his touch, eases my foot on the gas.
I’ve gone to therapy, thanks to my boyfriend and my partner conspiring against me—the one and only thing they’ve ever agreed on.
I’ll admit, I needed it. I’ve worked through my past, but sometimes I still can’t kick the feeling that I’m running, waiting for someone to catch me. It’s a hard habit to break.
Last night we decided we’d first visit the home Lydia Hale grew up in since it was closer.
“What are we going to say? ‘Can we dig some holes on your property until we find a long-lost treasure?’” I ask, my hands growing sweaty against the steering wheel. What if this doesn’t work?
“That’s not what I was going to start with.” Liam chuckles, looking far too relaxed. I don’t know how he can be. What if the treasure is on that property? Then we have no claim to it. And this whole thing will have been for nothing. Except to say we found it, of course.
“Then what?” I ask.
“Well, I was going to ask their names.”
“Their names? Really? That’s it?”
“That is usually where one begins a conversation.”
We’re screwed.
“Relax.” Liam places a hand on my leg. “I have a good feeling about this.”
“You say that about everything.”
He lifts a shoulder. “And it’s worked so far. Especially about you.” He winks.
“Such a charmer. Now stop it and come up with a real plan.”
“It will be fine.”
“Your optimism is really annoying sometimes,” I mutter as I turn down the private lane. What if these are gun people? Not that I’m judging since I’ve got my Glock on my hip, but what if they want us off their property? This treasure isn’t worth getting shot over.
I pull the car to a stop in front of an old shed thirty feet from the front door of the small cottage.
Liam opens the door and steps out, straightens his suit coat, and looks around.
Then he promptly dives back inside the car.
I narrow my eyes at the man curled up in the passenger seat, panting. “What is wrong with you?”
“They have chickens!”
“Are you kidding me?” I laugh at his seriousness and look outside to confirm three plump chickens strutting around the car. “You’re still afraid of them? They are birds, Liam.”
“Serena.” Liam mirrors my condescending tone. “One does not forget nearly being chicken food as a child.”
I drop my head back against the seat, laughing. “They barely pecked your toes.”
“Your grandmother’s hens were as nasty as her, and they nearly took my pinky toe off! I have a scar.”
“You’re so dramatic. Be a big boy and get out of the car.”
“You can take this lead. I’ll wait here.” He crosses his arms like a defiant child.
“You’re really willing to risk losing this treasure because of chickens?” He can’t be serious. This treasure is all he’s been talking about–obsessing over–for the last six months. Just wait till we find this treasure, Serena. It’s going to change everything.
Liam looks out the window at the chickens and sighs. “Only for you will I face my greatest fear.”
“When your greatest fear is a chicken, it’s hardly romantic.”
He scoops my hand off the middle console and brings it to his lips. “You already helped me face my father. Nothing else in this world scares me except for losing you.”
I pinch his cheeks. That fear has plagued me on more than one occasion as well. “No losing each other. Got it?”
“Got it.” He grins. “Seal it with a kiss?”
I lean over and press a kiss to his lips, but he captures the back of my neck, keeping me close for more. His kiss is hungry and wild. It tastes like now and forever.
Knock knock.
Liam and I spring apart so fast I ram my head into the headrest. An older woman stands outside my window scowling at the two of us beneath bushy gray brows, and I hesitantly roll the window down.
“This isn’t a make out spot,” she snaps.
“It is quite romantic.” Liam flashes the woman a flirtatious smile and… the woman scoffs. She’s immune! I’ve yet to see it happen, and this brings me so much joy.
“I’m so sorry. My boyfriend got scared of your chickens and needed comforting. I can’t bring him anywhere.” I push open my door and step out next to the woman. I extend my hand. “Serena Cruz.”
The woman stares at me, then my hand, and raises her eyes slowly back to mine. “Betty Powel,” she says, without shaking my hand.
I slowly lower mine. “Nice to meet you. I actually wanted to ask about a woman who lived here many years ago.”
Betty raises an eyebrow. “And who was that?”
“Lydia Hale.”
At the name, the woman’s face softens, and she turns around. “Come on then. You can leave your pansy boyfriend in the car.”
Pansy? I bite back a laugh and glance at Liam, who is fuming. This day keeps getting better and better.
“It’s safer out here, sweetheart.” I talk to him like he’s a baby. “I’ll be back soon.” He narrows his eyes as I hold up the key fob and lock him in the car. “Sucks doesn’t it?” I say, then spin, following Betty to the house.
She doesn’t wait for me and walks straight through the front door. “I’m assuming you’re here for the treasure.”
I stumble over the threshold. “Uh, excuse me?”
“You and everyone else before you.”
I didn’t realize we were that late to the game. “May I ask who they were?”
“Didn’t catch names. Not the most civil. One was a real looker though—tall, broad and tan.”
I swallow. There’s no other way to describe my ex, Sebastian. But he’s in prison, so if he came here, it was at least a year ago.
“The last one that came was the worst. Self confident jerk. Always yapping and trying to flirt with me.”
I swallow. Liam’s dad.
“What did they want to know?”
The woman stops in the library and runs her hands over a row of books.
“Where the treasure was, of course. But I don’t know. As if I’d still be living in this blasted cottage with wealth like that.” She tips a book out of its spot on the shelf and walks over to me. “There are some journal entries written throughout this book. I never could make sense of them though.”
She holds out the book and I reach for the old, worn copy of Romeo and Juliet.
“Keep it. I don’t want it in my house anymore.” She releases it and I barely catch it from falling to the floor.
She can’t be serious. “But it's a limited edition book. This alone is worth a couple thousand.”
“Not with all that blasted writing in the margins.” The woman rolls her eyes.
“It’s only been worth thousands in suffering.
My grandfather moved into this house when he was a boy.
That’s when he learned about the treasure.
He became obsessed, but he never found it.
Neither will you. But at least I’m done worrying about it. ”
I clutch the well-worn and well-loved book to my chest. I worked in a museum for two years. This book is a treasure, and if she truly wants to get rid of it, I’ll take it.
“Are you sure?” I ask, but the words are barely out of my mouth before her lips turn down and her eyes narrow.
“Stop asking questions, girl. And get out of here with that weird boyfriend of yours.”
“Will do.”