Whiskey Beach Part 113

For the next two hours he read, calculated, checked dates, cross-referenced from household accounting to business accounting.

When his head throbbed, he rubbed his eyes and kept going. He'd studied law, he reminded himself. Criminal law, not business law, not accounting or management.

He should pa.s.s this to his father, to his sister. But he couldn't let go of it.

At three in the morning he pushed away. His eyes felt as though he'd scrubbed his corneas with sandpaper, and a toothy vise clamped over his temples and the back of his neck.

But he thought he knew. He thought he understood.

Wanting time to process, he went downstairs, dug aspirin out of the kitchen cabinet. He downed them with water he drank like a man dying of thirst before walking out onto the terrace.

The air glided over him like a balm and smelled of sea and flowers. Starlight showered and the moon, waxing toward full, pulsed against the night sky.

And on the cliff, above the rocks where men had died, Whiskey Beach Light circled its hopeful beam.

"Eli?" In a robe as white as the moon, Abra stepped out. "Can't sleep?"

"No."

The air rippled her robe, danced through her hair, and the moonlight glowed in her eyes.

When, he wondered, had she become so beautiful?

"I have some tea that might help." She came to him, automatically reached up to rub at his shoulders, seek out tension. When her eyes met his, her look of concern turned to one of curiosity. "What is it?"

"A lot of things. A lot of big, unexpected things in one even more unexpected bunch."

"Why don't you sit down? I'll work on these shoulders and you can tell me."

"No." He took her hands, held them between his. "I'll just tell you. I love you, too."

"Oh, Eli." She gripped his fingers with hers. "I know."

Not the reaction he'd expected. In fact, he thought, it was a little irritating. "Really?"

"Yes. But G.o.d." Her breath caught as she wrapped her arms around him, held tight with her face pressed to his shoulder. "G.o.d, it's so wonderful to hear you say it. I told myself it would be okay if you didn't say it. But I didn't know it would feel like this to hear it. How could I know? If I had, I'd have hounded you like a wolf to drag those words out of you."

"If I didn't say it, how do you know?"

"When you touch me, when you look at me, when you hold me, I feel it." She looked up at him, eyes drenched. "And I couldn't love you this much without you loving me back. I couldn't know how right it is to be with you if I didn't know you loved me."

He brushed at her hair, all those tumbled curls, and wondered how he'd ever gotten through a single day without her. "So, you were just waiting for me to catch up?"

"I was just waiting for you, Eli. I think I've been waiting for you ever since I came to Whiskey Beach because you're all that was missing."

"You're what's right." He laid his lips on hers. "What's just right. It scared the h.e.l.l out of me at first."

"I know, me too. But now?" Tears spilled out of mermaid eyes and sparkled in the moonlight. "I feel absolutely courageous. What about you?"

"I feel happy." Struck with tenderness, he kissed the tears away. "I want to make you as happy as I am."

"You do. It's a good night. Or day, I guess. Another really good day." She pressed her lips to his again. "Let's give each other lots more good days."

"That's a promise."

And Landons keep their promises, she thought. Overwhelmed, she wrapped around him again. "We found each other, Eli. Just when, just where we were supposed to."

"Is that a karma thing?"

She drew back to laugh up at him. "You're d.a.m.n right it is. Is this why you couldn't sleep? Because you suddenly accepted your karmic path and wanted to tell me?"

"No. Actually, I didn't know I was going to say it until you walked out here. One look at you, and it blew through me, all of it."

"We should go back to bed." Her smile was full of promise. "I bet I can help you sleep."

"There's another reason I love you. You always have really good ideas." But as he took her hand, he remembered. "Jesus, I got caught up."

"A habit of yours."

"No, I mean I forgot why I came out here in the first place, why I couldn't sleep. I went up and started working on the books-the ledgers, the accounts."

"All those numbers and columns?" Instinctively she reached up to rub at temples she imagined ached. "You should have nodded off inside five minutes."

"I found it, Abra. I found Esmeralda's Dowry."

"What? How? My G.o.d, Eli! You're a genius." She grabbed him, circled and swayed. "Where?"

"It's here."

"But here where? And do I need a shovel? Oh, oh! We have to take it to Hester, to your family. It needs to be protected, and ... There must be a way to trace Esmeralda's descendants, make them a part of the discovery. Hester's museum. Can you imagine what this means to Whiskey Beach?"

"Talk about running with it," he commented.

"Well, Eli, think of it. Treasure unearthed after more than two centuries. You could write another book about it. And just think of all the people who'll be able to see it now. Your family could lend pieces to the Smithsonian, the Met, the Louvre."

"That's what you'd do? Donate, lend, display?"

"Well, yes. It belongs to the ages, doesn't it?"

"One way or the other." Fascinated by her, he studied her glowing face. "Don't you want it? Even a piece of it?"

"Oh, well ... Now that you mention it, I wouldn't say no to one tasteful piece." She laughed, spun in a circle. "Oh, just think of the history, the mystery solved, the magic uncorked."

She stopped, laughed again. "Where the h.e.l.l is it? And how fast can we get it and secure it?"

He turned her, gestured. "We've already got it. It's already secured. Abra, it's Bluff House."

"What? I don't understand."