The ashes spilled out on the floor, my father’s ghost wafting under the bed and around Jack’s filthy feet. Fresh grief throttled me. I felt sick to my stomach, my throat closing in.
“Dickhead!” Hunter crossed the room in the asshole’s direction. Garry grabbed Hunter’s shoulder, but he shook off the hand. Wrenching the urn out of Jack’s hands, Hunter kneeled and cautiously scooped ashes with his palms. He dropped what he collected inside the vase, then rose to his full height and placed the urn on the desk. “You touch it again,” he said to Jack. “You’ll lose your second testicle.”
Jack’s face tightened with irritation, and his hand went for his gun.
A single shot went off to my left. My hands flew to my ears as I hunched down, a horror unfolding in my mind. For the second time today, the guns had become extremely real. There was a hole in the wooden floor near the table. My chest hurt as if a panic attack had taken up residence there. Hunter and I were going to die.
“Can we go back to the business?” Tom snapped, bringing everyone’s attention back to him. His hand held the pistol.
“Sydney, are you okay?” Hunter unpeeled his back from the bookshelf, his chest rising and falling as fast as mine. I gave him a curt nod and straightened on my shaky legs.
“The Treasure of Lima is worth hundreds of millions of dollars. What you showed me isn’t worth that much. Explain to me the pins. The red one is where we have already been. What about the rest?” Tom asked.
There were ten pins. The purple, pink, white, black, orange, and light blue marked places that had all turned out to be a bust. But the red pin was the cave, the blue was the grotto, and green was the fishing lagoon, but its real meaning was the snakes’ spot. The yellow was Johnny the Skeleton. This was our chance to try again to lure them into the trap. Hunter’s gaze flickered to mine, communicating that the show was about to start.
“And before you come up with a lie, tell me where you found these?” From under the journals, Tom withdrew the bag with coins and gems that I had buried in the sand.
WTF!
I swallowed, the spit scraping my dry throat.
“Where did you get it?” Hunter said, the stiffness in his body unmistakable. I, too, froze to the point my muscles ached.
Tom sneered. “Jacko found it earlier today when the black cat dug at something. And he found a kitchen knife buried there, too.” Tom’s eyes cut to me, and he tsked. “I assume that was yours, Sydney?”
Goddamnit. Tuesday, the traitor, had utterly screwed us.
“Do not take me for an idiot!” Tom slammed his fist on the table again and the lantern rattled, making me jump. “I knew all along you were both lying. The gold is here. No one is leaving the island until?—”
“We tried to take you there this morning,” Hunter raised his voice, “but you didn’t listen.”
Tom’s arm was casually draped over the back of the chair as if we were just having a friendly chat. “Because I assumed you fed me bullshit, but now I’m ready to listen.”
“I told you they lied to us,” Jack said.
“Shut up, Jacko!” Tom waved his hand with the gun at Hunter. “How much is there?”
“Four trunks,” Hunter said. “Take us to the main island. Tomorrow, you’ll get it yourself.”
“Hunter, do you hear yourself? Take us to the main island… get it yourself,” Tom said in a mocking tone. “I’m the one who has the boat. I’m the one who has a gun. I say who goes where and when. Why isn’t the location marked in the journal?”
I wiped my nose on my shoulder, the sand scraping my skin. “Because that’s where the gold is. And there isn’t any need to mark it in the journal if we both know where it is.”
“Okay. Let’s take a look now.” Tom scratched his scalp and got up. “Garry, find something to tie her up.”
My thoughts became turbulent, a whirlpool of horror and uncertainty. My eyes jumped from Hunter to the open door to Tom. No one was supposed to be tied up, especially me.
“This is unnecessary.” Hunter walked around the table and inserted his body between them and me. “Tom, Sydney walks with us.”
Tom shook his head. “She stays here. Garry, you and I are going to check it out. If everything is good, we’ll all go to Rarotonga.”
“What about him?” Hunter asked, nodding at Jack.
“Jacko returns to theNauti Guyand waits for my signal.”
There went our plan to steal the boat.
“What signal?” I clung to Hunter’s arm like he was my lifeline. Everything was going against us.
