Pirate Gold and Murder Read online

  “No problem.” Mr. NoticeMe stuck out one hand in an aggressive show of the kind of masculine bravado that made me want to sigh and eye roll just to vent some of my anxiety. “You must be Turner.” Crew’s natural politeness kicked in and he shook the guy’s hand, though I was more hesitant when he turned to me and offered the same courtesy. “And that makes you Fleming.”

  “And you are?” I glanced at MC and noted her continuing unhappiness as the man, still grinning like he was having the time of his life, slipped one arm around her shoulders and squeezed in a clearly false show of comradery.

  “Gregg Brown,” he said. “Your new partner.”

  ***

  Chapter Three

  Um. What?

  I wanted to protest. Fishlipped, I’m sure of it, my denial that this stranger—arrogant and instantly unlikeable or not—thought he could muscle his way into our treasure hunt without our permission making my stomach knot into a ball of intense need to shove him off the end of the dock.

  I didn’t. I behaved. Only because I was literally held in place by shock. If I’d been better prepared? Yeah, no promises he’d have survived the splash.

  “Allow me to explain.” He had to use that smarmy TV host tone of voice, that fake let me take care of everything, honey, there’s a good girl kind of condescending attempt to get his own way, didn’t he? Just when I was starting to despise him.

  Snarl.

  “Please,” Crew said at his most dry, a sure sign he was about to implode or explode or something that would do damage to the still smiling man in front of us. “Do.”

  But it was MC who cut in, who growled a soft, guttural protest of a sound before taking the bull by the horns—or, more appropriately, my husband by his temper—and filled us in on what Chantal had called troubling news.

  “Gregg’s company owns the sonar equipment we rented.” She bit out each syllable like they caused her pain, a deep toothache of acceptance. “He insists on joining our expedition.” She flashed him a glare. “Apparently, taking part is in the small print of the contract.”

  “We didn’t agree to anyone else joining us.” I’d been John Fleming’s daughter my whole life, that mountain of a former sheriff and master of intimidation without saying a single word well rubbed off on me. But it was clear this Gregg person wasn’t aware of my lineage and nor did he give a crap about the dueling scowls worn by every single person in our little huddle.

  Everyone, that was, but the man who hovered at his elbow, still looking contrite about the whole thing.

  “Gregg.” He spoke up, voice low and tense. “Maybe we should—”

  Whatever Dude#2 was going to say, it was clear Gregg was the boss because a single dismissive motion with one hand while the smile vanished and the cold, calculating snake underneath made an appearance cemented the nature of their relationship pretty effectively.

  “My equipment,” Gregg snarled, “my rules.” His smile flashed into view again, perfect and unnaturally white teeth too bright against his tanned face. “You don’t like it? Find another set of sonar.”

  Sounded like he already knew that was going to be difficult. MC’s scowl and head shake told me I was right.

  “We booked a month ago,” she said.

  “So you did.” Gregg laughed. “Gave me enough time to poke around into what you were looking for, MC.” He tsked at her, glanced at the man behind him. “Right, Martin? Tortuga should have expected this, considering.”

  Huh? “Considering what?” Great. Had I missed something? Maybe my detective skills weren’t anything to write home about after all.

  Gregg’s demeanor turned to transparent modesty. “Why, only that where she fails, I never do.”

  MC glared and if she could have killed him with that look? Oh, he’d have been dead so many times over he’d have run out of reincarnations in about ten seconds flat.

  “You’re a treasure hunter, I take it.” Crew was at least keeping his head, even if I was still in a bit of a flabbergasted state. Or maybe I was just taking in this new information and processing it so I could make a logical and informed decision moving forward. Right, Fleming. Lying to myself at that moment seemed like a good idea so I didn’t lose my freaking mind. We were so close. Why did we have to run into problems now? I did my best not to blame MC while Gregg answered my husband’s flat question that wasn’t really a question.

  “I am,” he said, spreading his arms wide, bumping Anja who snarled her protest at his touch. “With a better record than Tortuga, I can assure you.” He winked at me. “If anything, I assure you, my presence is an asset to this hunt. And I am only here to help.”

  Chantal snorted but didn’t speak. No, that was MC’s job.

  “Just because you’ve scooped some of my finds—”

  Gregg cut her off with an extravagant sigh. “That old complaint.” He turned to the man behind him and laughed. “Tired of hearing it, aren’t we, Martin?”

  Martin just shrugged.

  When Gregg returned his attention to us, I had a sudden connection of memory. And, as was my brain’s MO when it came to such instances, I blurted out what I remembered. “You were here, years ago.” I jabbed a finger in his direction. “You were one of the hunters who debunked the treasure. Made Olivia a laughingstock.” Not that I had all that much sympathy for the former mayor of Reading. Olivia Walker’s attempts to lure tourists to what she’d dubbed the cutest town in America had succeeded, but I hadn’t always agreed with her tactics. Still, here stood one of the very treasure hunters who’d made her life miserable and, while she might not have been my favorite person—or me hers—she was local, damn it. Defending her was a matter of pride.

  Gregg shrugged. “I did,” he said, simple and frank.

  “So, if you don’t believe in the treasure,” I said, vindication giving me a burst of justified argument that felt in the moment like the winning blow, “why do you even want to be part of our hunt?”

  Gregg’s smile returned, though this time tight, hungry, without any sort of filter to hide his clear greed and determination. “Because of this,” he said.

  And showed me the doubloon.

  My doubloon.

  Grandmother Iris’s doubloon.

  My. Head. Exploded. Good thing my darling, loving, caring husband was standing right next to me, because if I’d been alone with Gregg Brown in that moment?

  I might have discovered twelve dead bodies over the last few years. But his would have been my first murder.

  For one single instant I caught the startled shock in his blue eyes, though it was gone in a flash and I may only have imagined it. But his smirk disappeared and he tossed the coin to MC as if divesting himself of my property would wash clean his filthy act. How dare he touch my treasure?

  “Unless you want to wait for new equipment,” he said, now brusque and sharp, amusement gone, “and trust me, there’s nothing available,” that made his good humor return, if only for a moment, “you can either break the contract and I’ll take my sonar and go. Or.”

  “Or,” MC said, voice low and angry but filled with enough acceptance I knew we’d lost, “we let you join us.” She met my eyes. “We need to talk.”

  Did we ever.

  Gregg didn’t try to follow us as I grasped MC’s elbow and guided her away, down to the end of Crew’s SUV where we huddled with Anja and Chantal, Martin speaking in a low, quiet voice to his boss while Gregg scowled and shook his head. I chose to ignore them, taking the gold coin from MC. She looked startled then a little hurt before rubbing both hands on her thighs in a quick, angry motion.

  “The truth is, he has a stellar record,” she said, quiet enough her voice wouldn’t carry. MC looked like she was choking on that truth and even her team, as angry as they still visibly were, didn’t argue so I had to take her statement at face value. “If he wasn’t such a jackass about it, he’d actually be a good addition to the team.”

  “That’s going a bit far, don’t you think?” Chantal seemed to want to say m
ore, but held back while MC seemed to wait for the words that didn’t come.

  “You have history,” I said, knowing I wasn’t coming across as nice or polite or anything else that could be construed as positive work relationship building. Like I gave a crap at the moment. “Tell me it’s not going to come back to bite us in the ass.” I glanced behind me at the pair now whispering heatedly to each other. “And who’s this other guy?”

  “Martin Faller, Gregg’s documentarian.” Anja made a face like she was feeling ill. “Seriously, the man has an ego he needs an extra 7mm wetsuit and set of oxygen tanks just to carry it around with him.”

  Diver humor. I was still learning, though the context wasn’t lost on me.

  “He’s been a pain in my ass for years,” MC finally admitted, leaning against the back of the black truck, her face falling, anger draining away. It was in that moment I knew we’d lost and if we wanted to proceed today, we’d have to do so with Gregg’s help. And hated it.

  The dark sedan that pulled into the parking lot, coming to a halt next to the quiet, watchful driver in the matching one, disgorged the petite but always commanding form of Special Agent Elizabeth Michaud. She strode toward us after a quick nod to the watchful Darius, her happy expression switching instantly to flat G-woman on a mission as she took in our glum attitude. And, the moment she looked up and caught sight of Gregg? Well. I’d never seen Liz’s temper. Crew’s former partner had always come across as level, collected and professional, even when she was happy.

  At that moment she laid eyes on the unwelcome treasure hunter? Wow. I thought MC’s glare had been deadly.

  Liz came to a halt next to her friend, grasping MC’s arm in one hand, her thin body quivering inside her perfectly pressed FBI standard issue suit.

  “What. The. Actual.” She let MC go then, not missing a stride, covering the distance between us and the now watchful Gregg and Martin with her comfortable shoes barely touching the ground.

  MC looked like she wanted to stop her, but it was Crew who went after his former partner, the Tortuga team leader finally following, while I grasped firmly onto my desire to fall into blame, fury and a hissy fit of gargantuan proportions before ordering Darius to toss Gregg into the center of the lake.

  Big girl panties.

  “Tell me I shouldn’t be worried.” I looked back and forth between Anja and Chantal while the two reacted in their own way. The tall brunette sighed heavily, looking out over the water like she didn’t have the heart to answer while her counterpart seemed to pull herself together, faint smile returning, warmth to her eyes.

  “MC is right about one thing,” she said. “Gregg has an excellent track record. And while he’s a risk taker, he’s known for getting the job done.” Her returned calm actually made me feel better, even more when she reached out and touched my arm in that reassuring way of hers. “We all hate to admit it, but having him as part of the team just increased our chances of finding what we’re looking for.”

  “If it’s out there to find,” I said, hating my doubt but voicing it at last.

  Chantal’s good humor only increased and even Anja grinned. “That’s the fun, Fee,” she said. “Right, Anja?”

  “Exactly.” The glitter of excitement in the young woman’s gaze finished off the last of the tension and let me release my homicidal need to put an end to anything that might come between me and the hoard. Wow, was I really that possessive of a heap of maybe gold and possibly jewels that I’d kill for it?

  Nope, not the treasure. The history, our town. And the fact I really, really didn’t like Gregg Brown.

  “So he has a history of taking MC’s jobs?” I let Crew and Liz deal with the mess, knowing it was kind of a coward’s way out but happy to regain some semblance of myself.

  Anja nodded, earnest expression sad all of a sudden. “Not just MC,” she said, keeping her voice low, glancing over as if worried he might hear her. “He has a terrible reputation for scooping other teams.”

  Chantal seemed uncomfortable enough I felt for both of them.

  “Why do people let him get away with it?” Seemed like someone might have contemplated a brief walk off a short pier for him along the way.

  The girls shrugged in tandem. “He gets the job done,” they said, also together. Like this was an old argument they’d shared enough times it had its own rote response.

  Crew returned, Liz following with her firm grip on MC dragging the treasure hunter away from her conversation with Gregg. He was grinning again, so clearly the FBI agent had lost the battle she’d waged on her friend’s behalf. It was obvious she knew exactly who Gregg was and, when the three rejoined us, her huffing fury emanated from her like the corona of the sun.

  “You had to know this was coming,” she snapped at MC who just looked tired.

  “What do you want to do?” Crew’s quiet, level tone seemed to cut through everything. I reached out and took my husband’s hand while Liz tsked but relented, the Tortuga leader and her divers all exchanging glances as Crew went on. “We hired you,” he said, “not Gregg Brown. If you think we should wait for new equipment, we wait. But if you trust him to help…”

  MC’s expression settled into her more familiar confident command. “A delay looking for replacement equipment could cripple us,” she said. “Our rental costs are depleting our budget. Everything is in place now, today. And while my funders are patient, our resources aren’t unlimited.”

  Crew nodded, squeezing my hand when I inhaled for one more protest. “How do we keep Mr. Brown over there from making off with our treasure if he finds it?”

  So my darling was on the same page as me? Good to know.

  MC’s face twisted into savage promise. “Oh, he won’t try to cheat you,” she said. “He just wants the credit and a small cut for his trouble. Trust me, Gregg Brown doesn’t care about the treasure.” She shook just a little, a tremor running under the crust of her forced collective calm. “All he wants is the fame.”

  “That’s correct.” Gregg chose that moment to interrupt, Martin hovering behind him. “And since I know how close you are to tapped out, MC,”—she what?—“I’m happy to share the find—and the fame—and even take on the rental bill for the sonar equipment. Just to make things equitable.”

  So there were things she was hiding from us. I really wasn’t that great of a detective, it turned out. As for MC, she looked like she wanted to throw up.

  No way was I letting Gregg have the last word, or take over this hunt. Before anyone else could speak up, I let my inner redhead out to play.

  “Fine,” I said. “But I’ll tell you one thing, Mr. Brown. If you try to cheat us?” I jabbed a finger at the waiting water. “They’ll never find your body.”

  ***

  Chapter Four

  I had no idea anyone could throw up as much as Darius did that day. In fact, I was certain the giant bodyguard would eventually wither up and float away in a pile of dust. Surely he didn’t have a drop of moisture left in his hulking body, though, as he sank to the floor of the boat with a groan following one more go at letting his insides see the light of day, the greenish tint to his skin and the heavy beaded sweat on his face was clear indication he wasn’t going to stop any time soon.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to go back to the dock?” I’d been asking him the same question for the last three hours, three torturous and horrific hours while the black-suited and primly tied, polished shoed tower of typical stoic silence moaned a protest.

  “I’m fine, Miss Fleming.” It’s all he’d uttered. And no, he wasn’t insulting Crew. I’d kept Fleming, though I did wonder at the correct use of Miss vs. Mrs.

  Fee. Darius was dying and I was thinking about social niceties.

  “You should have told me you get seasick.” I crouched next to him, the others firmly ignoring him as they had since he’d begun his little voyage into personal suffering not ten minutes after we’d set out across the crystal lake to the head of the Minute River, the feeding point at th
e base of Black and Ember Mountains. At least he’d distracted me from the nail-biting process of scanning the bottom of the lake for anything viable. I was almost grateful for the chance to focus on something other than the muttering and indecipherable shorthand even my beloved Crew participated in while the Tortuga team, Gregg and my husband tucked close, hunched over the small screen that delivered the sonar scans back to the surface one agonizing update at a time.

  Exciting at first? You bet. Three hours later? Despite the canopy over the flat-decked boat, the heat was getting to me. Redheads and hot sun don’t exactly mix. And the impatience that was my normal operating system wanted answers now.

  Okay, so I was bored. Nursing Darius—about as stubborn as they come, considering he was on board a boat in a full suit in the middle of a July day when he knew he couldn’t handle open water—at least gave me something to do.

  I glanced up as we passed the two boats in the distance, my jaw tightening. We’d had a lovely—insert sarcasm here—encounter with Geoffrey Jenkins about an hour in, when we’d drawn near the Patterson dock. Two small boats had hurried toward us, the accountant at the head of one, his typical shark’s smirk firmly in place.

  “You don’t have permission to search this part of the lake,” he’d said. And while I wanted to argue, we all did, the presence of Sheriff Jill Wagner at his side, her unhappiness apparent, told me we weren’t going to win if we decided to fight.

  “Sorry, Fee,” she’d called across to us. “They have the support of the council on this.”

  Whatever. So we were cut off from a small portion of the lake. So what if Captain Reading’s ship was under that particular stretch of water and the treasure long gone. So what?

  Argh. Hard not to let it get me down.

  Crew joined me, patting Darius’s shoulder, the first real show of friendliness he’d offered the big man since Malcom ordered his main bodyguard to look after me. Maybe seeing Darius was human warmed my crime fighting husband’s heart. Or maybe he just needed a distraction of his own.