Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
Dean
The last of the adrenaline drains out of me somewhere around midnight, leaving my hands shaking on the wheel as I pull the boat into my slip.
Doug’s asleep in his nest. Captain mutters something foul and goes back to dreaming.
The radio’s been quiet for twenty minutes.
Both treasure hunters, found. Both alive.
Both stupid enough to merit the hypothermia they’re currently being treated for at the clinic.
My clothes are soaked through. Salt’s crusted in my eyebrows.
I haven’t slept in thirty-six hours and the cot in the forward cabin is the only thing in the world I give a damn about when my phone rings.
The screen glows blue in the dark cabin. Her name.
I pick up. “Scarlett.”
Her breath comes fast on the other end. Too fast. The kind of breathing that happens before words, when your body’s already decided something and your brain’s still catching up.
“Someone was on my balcony.” Her voice is thin. Raw. The sound of a woman who’s been holding it together and just ran out of grip. “They were watching me through the glass. I woke up and they were just standing there.”
The exhaustion evaporates. Just like that. Gone. My body’s already moving before my brain finishes processing what she said. I’m on my feet, grabbing my jacket off the hook, checking my pocket for my keys.
“How long ago?”
“Just now. I called you right— Dean, they were just standing there. They wanted me to see them.”
“Are your doors locked?”
“Yes. I checked. The slider’s locked.”
“Stay on the line. I’m coming.”
“I’m okay. I’m—”
“You’re not okay. Stay on the fucking line.”
I’m already down the dock, boots hitting the planks hard enough to echo.
The harbor’s quiet. Most of the boats are dark.
A few cabin lights burn through portholes—night people, insomniacs, the island’s usual suspects.
None of them matter right now. What matters is the sound of her breathing in my ear and the five minutes between here and the Tidewater.
“I’m getting in the truck,” I say. “Don’t hang up.”
“I won’t.”
The truck starts on the first try. Small mercies.
I back out of the marina lot with the phone wedged between my shoulder and ear, headlights cutting across empty asphalt.
The road to the Tidewater runs along the waterfront, past the Driftwood and Brine & Bean and the cluster of shops that should be dark at this hour but aren’t.
Lights on in Wick & Wave. A group of tourists still out with flashlights, scanning the beach below the boardwalk like the treasure’s going to wash up with the tide.
Scarlett’s quiet on the other end. I can hear the hotel room around her—the hum of the air conditioner, the faint creak of the building settling.
She’s sitting on that bed. I know exactly how she’s sitting.
Back straight. Hands in her lap. The way she holds herself when she’s scared and trying not to show it.
“Talk to me,” I say.
“There’s nothing to talk about. Someone was on my balcony. Now they’re not.”
“Did you hear anything? Footsteps? The railing?”
“No. Nothing. I just woke up and they were there.”
“Could it have been—”
“Don’t.” Her voice sharpens. “Don’t tell me I dreamed it. I didn’t dream it.”
“I wasn’t going to say that.”
The Tidewater’s parking lot is half full.
Tourists’ vehicles, mostly. SUVs with out-of-state plates, roof racks loaded with gear.
A drone case sits on the hood of a Range Rover, lid open, the machine itself nowhere in sight.
I park in the fire lane because I don’t give a shit about parking etiquette at twelve-thirty in the morning when the woman I—
When Scarlett is scared.
The lobby’s got lights on. A night clerk behind the front desk, head bent over a phone. He looks up when I come through the door. Doesn’t recognize me, or doesn’t care to. I take the stairs two at a time. Her floor. Her hallway. The carpet’s too thick. My boots make no sound.
I knock on her door. Three sharp raps.
She opens it before the last knock finishes.
She’s standing there in my sweatshirt, hair coming loose from its knot, eyes wide and too bright.
No makeup. The dark circles I’ve gotten used to seeing have deepened into something that looks like bruising.
Her hands are steady. That’s the worst part.
She’s got herself so locked down she’s not even shaking.
I step inside and close the door behind me.
“Show me.”
She points to the balcony. The sliding glass door stands closed, curtain pulled back. Beyond it, three feet of concrete and a metal railing and the harbor spread out below, dock lights strung along the water like dropped matches.
I check the lock first. It’s engaged. The handle doesn’t wiggle. The track is clean—no scratches, no marks where someone might have forced it. I slide the door open and step outside.
The night air bites. Cold salt wind off the water.
The balcony’s empty. The concrete’s dry—no dew, no footprints, no scuff marks on the railing where someone might have climbed over.
I run my hand along the top rail. Nothing.
No grease, no salt, no trace that anyone’s been here in the last twenty-four hours.
I step back inside and close the door. Lock it. Check the lock again.
“There’s nothing here,” I say.
Her face doesn’t change. She was expecting that. “I know.”
“But you saw someone.”
“Yes.”
I believe her. I believe her the way you believe the barometer when it’s falling and the sky’s still blue. The evidence isn’t there, but the thing is coming anyway, and pretending otherwise gets people killed.
I search the room. Under the bed. Behind the curtains. The closet’s empty except for her clothes—neat, organized, the way she does everything. The bathroom door stands open. White tile. Empty shower. A towel folded on the rack.
Nothing.
I sit on the edge of the bed and look at her. She’s standing by the desk, arms crossed, watching me like she’s waiting for the part where I tell her she’s being hysterical.
I don’t.
“Pack your stuff,” I say. “You’re not staying here.”
“I’ve paid for the room.”
“I don’t care.”
“Malcolm will—”
“Malcolm can go fuck himself.” I stand up. “This is the third time, Scarlett. The drone over the farm. The vandalism at Piper’s. Now someone standing on your balcony in the middle of the night. This isn’t coincidence. This is escalation.”
She doesn’t move. Her jaw sets. I recognize the look—the same one she wore on the boat when I told her we were riding out the storm. Stubborn. Scared. Refusing to admit either.
“I’m not running,” she says.
“Nobody’s asking you to run. I’m asking you to sleep somewhere that isn’t owned by the family that’s been trying to bury the truth for a hundred and thirty years.” I grab her suitcase from the closet and set it on the bed. “Five minutes. Or I pack for you.”
She packs. Not gracefully. She yanks clothes off hangers and folds them with more force than necessary, shoves her laptop into its case, gathers chargers and toiletries from the bathroom. I help. I’m not gentle about it. We work in silence, two people doing a job that doesn’t need discussion.
Her journal sits on the nightstand. Evangeline’s journal.
The leather cover’s worn soft from handling.
I pick it up. The pages fall open to the entry she must have been reading before she fell asleep—March 24th, 1893.
I don’t read it. I don’t need to. I know what’s in it.
Scarlett told me on the beach, her face against my chest, the bonfire at our backs.
Charles Fairchild. What he did. What Thomas Haven was willing to do about it.
I close the journal and slide it into her backpack.
Five minutes later we’re in the truck. She sits in the passenger seat with her arms crossed, staring out the window at the Tidewater’s lit facade receding behind us. The journal’s in her lap. Her fingers rest on the cover like she’s keeping it from flying away.
I drive. The road to the B&B cuts through the north end of town, past Saltbox Hardware and the Driftwood and the stretch of waterfront where the bonfire burned three nights ago. The ashes are probably still warm. The memory of her in my arms on that beach feels like it happened to somebody else.
“Those treasure hunters,” she says. “Are they really okay?”
“Hypothermia. Mild. They’ll live.” I keep my eyes on the road. “Two guys from Portland who drove up yesterday. Rented a dinghy from Merrick Marine Tours to go out to No Name. NOAA issued the small craft advisory at eleven. They either didn’t check or didn’t care.”
“The Merricks rented them a boat knowing the forecast?”
“They don’t give a shit about forecasts.
They give a shit about one-hundred dollars an hour.
” I turn onto the gravel drive that leads to the Haven B&B.
The tires crunch. The headlights sweep across the front porch, the rocking chairs, and the potted geraniums Shea insists on decorating for each season.
Right now, they sport bunny ears for Easter.
“Bodhi’s filing a complaint with the harbor master tomorrow.
Not that it’ll do any good. Malcolm’s on the board. ”
The B&B’s porch light is on. Shea’s waiting at the door before I kill the engine.
She’s in sweatpants and a tank top with a worn wool cardigan thrown on over it, hair pulled back, no makeup.
She looks like she’s been awake for a while.
Knowing Shea, she probably has. The woman runs on four hours of sleep and large quantities of caffeine.
She takes one look at Scarlett’s face and doesn’t ask questions. That’s Shea. She reads a room faster than anybody I know.
“Room three’s open,” she says. “Bathroom’s down the hall. Towels in the cupboard. Kitchen’s yours if you’re hungry.” She steps aside to let us in. The foyer smells subtly of cedar and warm spices. Nothing like the headache-inducing lavender perfume the Tidewater pumps into their air.