Relic

by Bill Noel

  Wine, beer, and bourbon flowed freely. There was an ample supply of iced tea for Laurie since her doctor said she shouldn’t drink alcohol until her concussion subsided. The appetizer was shrimp with cheese, and little pieces of something red stirred in the sauce. Grace tried to explain what it was but, considering my culinary skills, she would have been as successful explaining to me the Big Bang Theory in Hungarian.

  I explained to Stanley, whom I hadn’t seen since Dean’s arrest, how Sal had been instrumental in catching the person who torched the food truck. Sal beamed when Stanley patted him on the back. Sal thanked him without cracking a joke. I don’t know why it took me this long, but I realized that Sal had used jokes to feel needed, or wanted. Perhaps there was hope for him.

  After we’d finished a fantastic steak and lobster entrée, Grace said that she wanted to say a few words. In her lovely, albeit fake, Jamaican accent, she praised Theo for accepting her and for the financial backing of the restaurant.

  Theo choked back a tear and said, “That’s what family is for. Teddy would be proud.”

  Grace wiped a tear from her cheek. “Yes, he would.”

  I could tell that she wanted to say more, but she shook her head and rushed to the kitchen. I suspected that she didn’t want us to see her crying.

  Stanley leaned across the table and said, “One thing confuses me. Did anyone find the treasure? What happened to the map?”

  Laurie looked to see if anyone was going to answer. No one did, so she said, “We didn’t find anything. Anthony thought he’d figured it out but, when we got to the spot where he thought the map indicated it should’ve been buried, the ocean had eroded most of it away. He thought he’d been reading the map wrong, but also thought he knew where we should go next. That’s why we were out there, regardless of the weather.”

  Stanley said, “What happened to the map?”

  Laurie shrugged. “Anthony had it when we went out there. The police didn’t find it, so I figured whoever killed him took it.”

  Stanley said, “What did Dean do with it?”

  Laurie said, “Don’t know. Don’t care. If there’s treasure, it’s cursed. I never want to hear about it again.”

  Captain Gant had been silent most of the evening, so I was surprised when he said, “Remember when someone broke into Dean’s car?”

  I doubted most of the people in the room remembered. After the police arrested Dean, his car was left in Laurie’s drive. With everything going on, and Laurie suffering a concussion, no one seemed to pay attention to the vehicle.

  Two days later, Chief LaMond went to Laurie’s house to ask her more questions when she noticed the car’s rear passenger’s window had been smashed. Laurie didn’t know anything about it. The chief had it towed.

  Charles and I nodded. Laurie said that she remembered.

  Gant sat up straight, took a sip of beer, and looked around the room. “The past must remain in the past. There is no map.”

  Laurie said, “There was.”

  “No more,” Gant said, grinned, then took a sip of his drink.

  About the Author

  Bill Noel is the best-selling author of seventeen novels in the popular Folly Beach Mystery series. Besides being an award-winning novelist, Noel is a fine arts photographer and lives in Louisville, Kentucky, with his wife, Susan, and his off-kilter imagination. Learn more about the series, and the author by visiting www.billnoel.com.