Lacey frowned at my tone.
“Please.” Why did I always forget that part?
“No problem. Go on before you miss your flight.”
So I did. No hug. No kiss. Not even any waving, because my hands were full, and because that wasn’t how we did business. There was a possibility every time I left for a job that I might not come back, and acknowledging that with a demonstrative display of any kind would have embarrassed us both and accomplished nothing. So we bit our tongues and parted in stoic silence. Like goddamn adults.
As the heavy glass door leading into the terminal slid open, Rusty’s engine hummed behind me. I looked back as Lacey turned her down the first aisle toward the exit, rap music pounding from the twelve-inch sub-woofers he’d installed the month before, without my permission.
He was reprogramming my radio buttons again, setting them all on classic rap stations. Last time, it had taken me two weeks to get them back the way I liked them.
Shaking my head more amused than irritated, I stepped over the threshold and stomped into the terminal.
During my connecting flight from Newark, I sat next to a troll posing as a child traveling alone. In public, trolls always took their human child form. Their alternative appearances—ranging from green-and-scaly to brown-and-blistered—would have caused mass panic. This particular troll looked about six years old and had the most disarmingly adorable chubby cheeks and wide hazel eyes. I fell for his act completely—until I noticed that his iPad, complete with a PAW Patrol-themed case, was playing, um…adult content.
Evidently, he could tell I wasn’t human, strictly speaking, because the little bastard spent the first half of the flight trying to sweet-talk me into getting him a tiny bottle of scotch, and the second half trying to toss his honey-roasted peanuts down the neckline of my blouse. When he finally succeeded, then tried to fish the nut out with his chubby little fingers, I wrapped my hand around his wrist and threatened to break every bone in his arm if he didn’t “nap” for the rest of the flight.
Unfortunately, I didn’t see the flight attendant coming toward us from the back of the plane. But the troll did. He made with the tears and sobbed something about wanting his mommy. The attendant glared at me, scolded me for mistreating little Brian, and promised she’d “keep an eye” on us for the remainder of the flight. Then sheaccidentallyspilled my whiskey and Coke in my lap.
Little Brian laughed as she walked off. Then he tried to help me blot my crotch dry.
At Halifax International, I rented a compact car and snatched a free map of Nova Scotia. Yes, my phone had a map app, but I’d lived long enough to know that technologywilllet you down when you need it most.
I’d decided to start at Oak Island, to get a feel for the case and to speak to some of the workers involved. Since Devich didn’t actuallyseethe box pulled from the pit, I needed a good firsthand description of it from a crew member. I was also hoping to verify that the box was actually loaded onto the cargo plane, because I wasn’t completely satisfied with Devich’s insistence that it went down in the crash. Heavy stone boxes don’t just disappear. More likely, it never made it into the air in the first place.
Luggage in hand, I stepped out of the airport into the rental car lot and got the surprise of my life: snow. Lots and lots of snow, reflecting a pale, eerie glow from the security lights and the crescent moon high above. And underneath that was a serious layer of ice—a deadly slick sheet of glass my traveling boots didn’t stand a chance of finding purchase on.
I should have been expecting it; I knew how far north Nova Scotia was. Yet I hadn’t given the weather so much as a thought, as my slick-soled boots and thin leather coat showed. Fortunately, I’d spent most of the nineteen seventies in Scandinavia and had gotten quite accustomed to dealing with winter weather. Hopefully it was like riding a bike.
Which I’d never actually tried, come to think of it.
After tossing my bags into the narrow back seat, I wound my way through the parking lot slowly, cursing both the snow and the strange car. The roads weren’t clear yet. Fortunately, the rental car came with snow tires, and by the time I got to Walmart, I was accustomed to the slush and ice.
As I stood in the short, early-morning cashier line at the all-night superstore, I used the number Devich gave me to call Mike Bowman, his project foreman, to tell him I’d be on Oak Island in about an hour, barring any weather-induced catastrophes.
Bowman had been instructed to answer all my questions and give me unrestricted access to the dig site. To my surprise, he sounded wide awake and eager to help, even at three in the morning. Devich must have done some first-rate threatening to put his employee in such an accommodating mood despite the early hour. Or maybe the people in Nova Scotia were just nicer than what I was used to.
I walked out of the store with a new crowbar and a flashlight, as well as a bag of Doritos, a box of Twinkies, and a six-pack of Coke, all of which were necessary to get me through a fifty-four-mile drive on packed snow and ice.
The freeway had been cleared for more than thirty miles, so I made good time until I pulled off the highway onto less well-traveled roads. But when I turned the rental car off the road to face the causeway, my headlights flashed on an aluminum gate blocking the path, secured with a chain and a padlock. Ten feet away, I shifted into park and sat staring over the gate at the long gravel road. On either side, the narrow path sloped down into a bed of rocks rising from the water. Ahead lay Oak Island and the infamous pit, until recently, home to a prize mysterious enough to attract some of the world’s most notorious treasure hunters.
All I could see of it so far was a stand of trees—oaks, naturally—lit by a string of streetlights stretching the length of the causeway and onto the island.
Where the hell was the foreman? Without his key, I was stuck there twiddling my thumbs in the cold.
Or was I?
Leaning over the steering wheel, I squinted at the gate in the glow of the rental car headlights. It looked flimsy enough: just two thick poles held together with a thin chain and a padlock.
Should I?It wasn’t like I was driving my own car. And since Devich was paying, I’d gotten full coverage on the rental. When you buy insurance, they practicallyexpectthe car to come back scratched up. Right?
I’ll give the foreman five more minutes, then I’m driving through the damn gate.
Three minutes and thirty-two seconds later, my patience expired. I shifted the car into reverse and backed up about twenty feet. Then I shifted into drive again and stomped on the gas. The gate burst open against the grill with almost no resistance, rusty joints and a deteriorated lock succumbing to the modest power of the late-model Corolla.
It isn’treallybreaking and entering when you have permission to be there. Right?
EIGHT
