He picked up his phone and rang Brandon.
“Hi, Arthur.” Amy.
His attention was ripped away from the map. “Ames.” Shit, he wasn’t prepared for her. “I’m, ah, just going through your notes.”
“What do you think?”
“They’re meticulous.” Easy praise. Their father would have been impressed. “How far is it from the coast to the Ridge on horseback?”
“Takes a couple of hours.”
So quite the distance if they’d needed to get to the treasure in a hurry. But maybe they’d kept a few pieces on hand in the cellar in case. “Would they have kept the treasure close?”
Amy was quiet for a moment. “The mutiny sounds awful. If I’d been her, I would have kept it as far away as possible to keep my family safe.”
His heart twinged at the word family. Did she include him? “The only others who knew about it were the pearl divers, right?”
“As far as we know.”
“If they did steal the original Dutch journal, it might have taken them awhile to get it translated.”
“Yeah, they wouldn’t have trusted many, and the police were looking for the journal.”
It could have taken them months or years to return to Retribution Bay. He tapped his pen on the map. “OK.” He hesitated. “Ah, you’ve done a great job with your notes.”
“Thanks.”
What should he say now? He didn’t want to get into anything personal over the phone. He should look her in the eye when he tried to patch their relationship. “Bye.”
He pressed the hang up button milliseconds after he heard her say, “Why—”
Damn. Should he call her back?
His finger hovered over the button, his heart racing. What had she been about to ask? Was he ready for her questions?
He’d never be ready, but he had to face them. Not over the phone though. He’d speak to her on the weekend. He placed his phone onto the table and went back to work.
***
The weekend arrived far too quickly for Arthur’s liking. He kept himself busy on the boat, interacting a little more with the passengers as they motored along, but in the back of his mind he knew he would be seeing Amy tonight. But he still hadn’t figured out the words he needed.
Georgie picked him up from the marina.
“How was your day?” she asked as they drove out of town.
“Nice.” He glanced at her. She was the only one who’d stated conditions on her acceptance of him and he appreciated her loyalty to Amy. “I’ve been reading the journals.”
“Find anything new?”
“No. I’d like to look at the plaque with the names on it.”
“We might get a chance to go down to the gulf this weekend.”
Great.
“If not, I’ve probably got a photo of it somewhere.” Georgie sighed. “I want to strangle Lilian some days. She hid the treasure so her ancestors had help when they needed it, but a fat lot of good that is if we can’t find it.”
The frustration in her voice made him frown. “How badly do you need it?”
