“I plan to move here to Titusville, and with Rebel’s help, build a house for Tash and me. Tash will have both me and his uncle with him much of the time, and all his new friends, especially you, Autumn. Tash, you will stay here with Rebel when I’m in Philadelphia and attend school here. What do you think?”
Tash jumped to his feet and threw himself against Archer’s side, hugged him as hard as he could. Archer leaned down and pressed his face against his son’s hair.
Archer looked over his son’s head at Rebel. He knew he’d never be able to repay him, but he’d try.
Everyone spoke at once. Autumn beamed pleasure at Tash, her thoughts clear as a shout in his ear.It’s going to be amazing, Tash. Amazing.
Chapter Seventy-One
Clapper’s Ridge, Virginia
Three weeks later
On a bright sunny day in August, Rome, Savich, Sherlock, and Elizabeth drove into Clapper’s Ridge, a charming small town nestled in a hollow of hills and forests, its cobbled main street lined with clever boutiques and cafés. According to Siri, Clapper’s Ridge boasted ten thousand souls and swelled to twenty thousand in the summer. The air was fresh and sweet. At the town’s elevation and under its thick trees, it wasn’t even August hot.
They wove through thick traffic on Main Street to Bigger Lane. Elizabeth glanced down at her phone and said, “Turn here, Dillon. Serenity Cemetery is up this hill about a quarter mile.” She grinned. Dillon already knew that, he’d entered the precise polar coordinates Wilson Ballou had hidden in his shoe and in his class ring into MAX’s geocoding tool, and MAX had homed in on three adjacent graves at the Serenity Cemetery, all of them visible from space. It boggled her mind.
They walked up a graveled path toward the graves, all silent now, Rome carrying a shovel. There were no burials today, only the distant sound of a backhoe digging a grave off to their right.
As they walked along beautifully kept rock paths past the graves, Elizabeth put away her mobile and wiped away a tear.
Rome stopped, lightly touched her cheek. “You all right, sweetheart?”
“It’s so beautiful here, I can’t help it. Look.” They stood on a gentle uphill rise and looked at Clapper’s Ridge through a veil of thick oak and maple trees. She swallowed. “It reminds me of Tommy’s grave at Darlington Hall. Remember how it overlooks a valley, too, with century-old oak trees?” And Elizabeth again saw her mother’s face, white and drawn, as if all hope had been sucked out of her, and how her father had pulled her mother close, bowed his head, and whispered to her. So much pain, crippling pain. As they’d spoken quietly to each other, she’d wondered if the tragedy of what had happened had finally brought them together. Elizabeth had stood flanking them along with Rome, Savich, Sherlock, and John Eiserly, and felt deadened with grief and shock—her brother had wanted her dead. How to ever reconcile that? Now, as she looked through the summer leaves, she saw Tommy as a little boy preening when he kicked a soccer ball, high and sure, to their father. It was only when he’d gone up to Oxford that everything changed, or had it really?
Elizabeth’s grief still bowed her. And her guilt? Had he come to hate her because she’d given him the money that had kept him in his pit of addiction, dependent on her? Or had it been about her inheritance and her money all along? She didn’t know, and now she’d never know. And did it really matter that much now?
She thought of John Eiserly’s belief that her mother’s attempted kidnapping was a ruse, designed to bring Elizabeth rushing back to England, where she’d be vulnerable again, after Adara’s recruiting Aboud had failed in the States. He believed Tommy had arranged for the alarm to be installed in his mother’sBentley only to make it plausible her mother would escape the kidnapping. And what did that matter now?
As they walked past the hundreds of graves, tears still blurred her eyes. She felt Rome’s arm around her. Throughout the days and weeks, he’d stayed close, comforted her, held her in the night when her tears broke through, just as he was doing today. She swiped away her tears, smiled up at him.
She heard Sherlock say, “There it is, the grave of Florence Torrence, Ballou’s grandmother.”
The grave was a bit sunken, but the grass was thick and green over it, the marker beautifully carved with her name,Loving Wife and Mother,and the dates of her birth and death. Another time, another life, with its own happiness and grief, like every life. Like Tommy’s short life.
Elizabeth lightly laid her hand on Rome’s arm as they looked down at the grave, and felt a spurt of excitement. “If you hadn’t been such a bulldog, Rome, and woke up thinking Wilson Ballou’s class ring might be the key, what Wilson Ballou hid here all those years ago would have stayed hidden in his grandmother-in-law’s grave forever. I’m still betting it’s uncut diamonds, ten million pounds’ worth.”
“Nope,” Sherlock said. She patted her stomach. “Beau and I discussed this, and he thinks it’s bearer bonds.”
Savich said, “Are you sure it wasn’t Felicity?”
She shook her head, gave him a smile. “Nope, it was Beau, loud and clear.”
Elizabeth could only laugh at the ongoing joke between Dillon and Sherlock about the sex of their child. Bets were running high in the CAU, most going with Sherlock, the reasoning being she was the one doing the heavy lifting. She should know. Elizabeth was one of the few who believed Savich, since he always seemed to know things no one else did.
Rome and Savich took turns digging. They didn’t have todig far before the shovel struck metal. Rome went down on his hands and knees and swiped away the soil. He pulled out a small metal box bound with duct tape and grinned maniacally. He cut through the duct tape and paused, looked at everyone. “Sherlock, you told us what Beau thinks. Elizabeth, what do you think?”
“A long-lost Shakespeare manuscript with handwritten notes in the margins about stage directions and costumes. That would be priceless. On the other hand, it could be diamonds, lots of diamonds.”
“Okay, I’m with you. Diamonds. We’re all in, five bucks, right? Savich, do you want to do the honors?”
Savich said, “Since you’re the only reason we’re here, Rome, have at it.”
Rome slowly pulled the box open. He peeled away a bundle of thick cloth and a layer of soft black wool covering a waterproof plastic bag. Inside it was a layer of bubble wrap he couldn’t see through. He carefully removed the wrap and saw a small, flat walnut box.
Rome slid the hasp aside, lifted the wooden lid. He pulled away a folded sheet of paper and looked down at a very old single red stamp.
Sherlock studied the strange stamp. “Well, look at that. No five bucks for any of us.”
