Deadly Gift

by Heather Graham

  He started with an area by the south face of the rock, digging industriously. However long it took, he was going to keep digging until he found something.

  Caer started working alongside him, but he was so preoccupied that he didn’t realize how hard the going was until she set down her shovel and let out a sigh. “I’m sorry, but my muscles aren’t accustomed to this. This is hard work,” she said. It wasn’t a complaint, just an observation.

  “I shouldn’t have brought you. I’m sorry. This is real labor.” He was developing blisters himself, he realized.

  “I don’t mind. I just need to stop for a bit.”

  “Go ahead, take a break,” he told her.

  “I’m going to walk around a bit, see the island.”

  “All right. Stay within yelling distance.”

  “Zach, we’re the only idiots out here.”

  He leaned on his shovel, indicating the dug-up area of the beach. “Someone else has been here—and they could come back.”

  She stared at him, then at the previous dig, and shivered. “Good point. I won’t go far.”

  She walked off, and he started digging again. After a while, he realized that even though he was in good shape, his muscles were aching, too. Time to take a break himself.

  “Caer?”

  He couldn’t see her.

  “Caer?”

  He dropped his shovel and walked north, toward a copse of trees, skeletal and forlorn in winter.

  He still couldn’t see her, and he looked out toward the water with a sense of rising unease. The Sea Sprite was still drifting at anchor just off shore, and no other boats were near.

  A screeching caught his attention, and he looked up.

  Birds. More birds. And not gulls. Gulls would have belonged.

  They were black birds.

  “Caer?”

  His unease became an inexplicable fear for her, and he hurried into the copse of trees. Barren branches, pathetic in the winter air, brushed his shoulders. He looked up and realized that the sun was already beginning to set.

  “Caer!”

  Then he saw her. Her back was to him, and her head was bent over. She was staring at something in her hands.

  For a moment he thought she had made a discovery in the sand, but then he realized that she had taken her letter from her pocket and was reading it.

  He approached slowly. She was studying the words as if disturbed by whatever they said.

  “Caer?”

  She jerked, hearing him at last, and looked up.

  “Is something wrong?” he asked her.

  “Oh, no.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “Just…my friend. He’s here. In the States. I have to figure out how to meet up with him somewhere along the line, that’s all.”

  She quickly folded the letter and shoved it back into the pocket of her jeans. “I’m sorry. I was just distracted.”

  He knew he generally had a good poker face, but it must have failed him then, giving away his suspicions, because she quickly smiled and rose. “I’m sorry. I should have been digging, not reading my mail.”

  He nodded, but he held his arms still by his sides as she came closer and pressed the full length of that glorious body against him.

  The wind picked up. He heard that wild screeching again and looked up to the sky.

  It was a scene out of an Alfred Hitchcock movie. There were birds everywhere.

  Black birds.

  High above the winter-barren trees, they swooped high, then low, circling and making that terrible noise.

  Caer obviously didn’t like them, staring up with what could only be dread in her eyes.

  The sun was well and truly setting, he saw. It was time to abandon their efforts for the day and get back to the wharf. And since he hadn’t managed to find anything on his own, he needed to speak with Morrissey.

  “Want to help me pack up?” he asked her.

  “Of course,” she said, looking embarrassed by his unresponsiveness, and moved away.

  She headed back toward where they’d been working. Zach pulled out his cell phone, keeping an eye on her and praying that he would get a signal this far out.

  He was in luck, and he punched in Morrissey’s number, wondering if the detective might be regretting the fact that he’d given Zach his own cell number. Apparently not, because he didn’t sound upset when he picked up and heard who was calling.

  “I need help,” Zach said. “I’m out on Cow Cay, and I think I’ve figured out something important. I think Eddie was killed because of a discovery he made. I think he figured out where a bunch of historical documents and a good-sized treasure were buried out here, and someone killed him for it. They’ve been digging for it, but they haven’t found it yet, and neither have I. I can’t exactly stay out here, though. Any possibility of sending an off-duty officer or two out to keep an eye on the place? I’ll see that they’re paid.”

  Morrissey wasn’t that easy. He thanked Zach for sending Jorey to him, though he admitted nothing he’d said had helped much, then asked a lot of questions. Zach answered them honestly—this wasn’t the time to be evasive.

  “I’ll make some calls,” Morrissey promised finally. “The island is actually under the jurisdiction of the Park Service, so it’s a little complex.” As the other man talked, Zach watched the birds warily. “And where are your funds coming from?”

  “Sean O’Riley. But I want the whole thing kept secret. I want guards here to see who comes out here and tries to dig again.”

  “Okay, I’ll get right on it,” Morrissey said. “Cops are always underpaid, always looking for some extra cash. I hope you’re on to something. We’re doing everything by the book, and we haven’t got a clue. So getting you someone to guard a sand pile and a big old boulder shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “You’ll need guys with boats who aren’t afraid of a little weather.”

  “This is Newport. Like I said, shouldn’t be a problem,” Morrissey assured him.

  “As soon as possible.”

  “You want them there twenty-four/seven?”

  “Yup.”

  “Okay, I’m on it,” Morrissey said, then hung up.

  Zach finished packing up with Caer, toted their equipment back to the boat and helped her aboard. The weather had taken a turn for the worse. There were no storm clouds in the darkening sky, but the wind had picked up, and the temperature had dropped.

  And the damn birds followed them all the way back.

  When he brought the boat into her berth at the dock, the streets were empty.

  The O’Riley’s office was closed.

  But the birds still circled overhead, letting out their horrible cries.

  Zach wasn’t as disturbed by the birds as he was by Caer. She tried not to let him see her, but she kept glancing toward the heavens and the night sky.

  And the birds.

  The black birds.

  Circling.

  14

  Gary Swipes was sixty, but still in excellent shape, a big, muscled guy, nearing retirement—and embittered by that fact.

  He had lived here all his life. He’d watched people come and go from mansions so self-indulgent that no one person should ever have had the bucks to live in them. He’d watched the yacht owners come and go—modern-day men who had the money to own massive three-masted vessels with state-of-the-art fixtures and electronics and multi-person crews kept on retainer.

  It was a money town, but somehow he’d managed to be born to a maid and a gas station attendant. No great schools in his life, no frat parties and cushy career in Daddy’s company. Just work.

  He’d been a cop most of his adult life, and just because he’d acted like a cop now and then, he’d gotten nowhere.

  Once he’d been reprimanded because of the way he’d treated a batch of drugged-out high-school kids. Hell, their pockets had been full of ecstasy, but somehow he’d still gotten in trouble for being too brutal.

  As if they would have hande
d over the drugs without a little…convincing.

  Then there was the matter of the money.

  There hadn’t even been all that much of it. He’d found it in the back of the car driven by a guy high on cocaine who’d hit a kid in the street. Drug money. He’d forgotten to turn it in right away, and he’d almost faced charges.

  So he had a temper. Big deal. He’d become a cop to uphold the law, and he had never meant to break it. Teachers couldn’t discipline kids these days, and parents didn’t—and cops had to jump through hoops to arrest perps. It sucked.

  He’d been married, once. She said he had too much of a temper, too. He didn’t get women, either. It was okay for them to get mad, slam a fist against a guy’s chest, but if he so much as pushed her an inch away, he was an abuser.

  Job, life, women, they all sucked.

  At least Morrissey had offered him this chance to make some extra cash.

  He didn’t mind the cold. And he’d indulged in an iPod, so he didn’t mind being alone out on the island. The wind might be blowing like a mother, and the temperature at night dropped like a stone out here, but he didn’t mind. He’d sailed all his life—crewing on rich guys’ yachts just because he loved it so damned much—and the wind and cold motoring over here hadn’t mattered a damn to him.

  He liked his solitude, too, and what was the difference whether he was alone at home or alone here on Cow Cay?

  He had a blanket with him for extra warmth, and a thermos of coffee—spiked coffee. Why the hell he was guarding a barren island and a big rock, he didn’t know. Someone had been sniffing around. Digging up the place. The Park Service didn’t even give a damn.

  But if O’Riley wanted to pay him to watch a rock, hell, he’d watch a rock.

  He found a place by Banshee Rock and sat down on the blanket, setting up his lantern and his thermos, and flipping through his iPod. Not a bad gig. He’d asked for a bonus because of the cold, and no one had even questioned it.

  He leaned back against the rock and turned up the volume. The blanket below him kept his ass from freezing, and his parka did the rest.

  Not bad, he thought.

  There were some stars, and the moon was a crescent. Over on the main island of Newport, Christmas lights were flickering everywhere. Colorful.

  Only the thatch of trees on Cow Cay seemed to be really creepy. They shifted in the wind, like something from a Halloween fantasy. He could imagine the skinny damned things picking up their skinny damned roots and starting to walk, waving their bony little branches around in an attempt to snag the hair of some high-school girl balling her boyfriend in a bedroll.

  Then there were the birds, big black things screeching overhead.

  Man, it seemed like they’d been around all day. Creepy as hell, watching the stinking birds swoop around those trees.

  He hated birds. All of ’em.

  Gulls, terns, seahawks—hell, he hated canaries.

  Birds were messy. They were loud. They were always hanging around the docks, wanting handouts, and their shit was everywhere.

  But birds like these, flying around as if paying homage to something in those trees, something awful, something that demanded a literal flock of subjects…they were unusual.

  Screw the birds.

  He had a bunch of old comedies on his iPod. He was going sit there and laugh all night, collecting the big bucks without having to do squat.

  And his thermos was next to him, filled with nice hot coffee. Well, half-filled with nice hot coffee. There was some good old American bourbon in there, as well. He took a long swig.

  The bourbon went down with a pleasant burn. Another swig, and he was warm all the way through.

  He didn’t drink on duty. Not real duty.

  For off-duty jobs…

  He’d done a stint in the service; he’d been a hunter. He could listen. But screw this. He was on a freezing island in the dead of winter, on a ridiculous job. Who the hell was going to come out here tonight and dig?

  As a matter in fact, who the hell was going to come out here tonight, period?

  There was only one way to get through the long hours: his way. Lots of bourbon and a very small-screen TV.

  He swore and got up, thinking he would relieve himself against one of those scrawny, creepy trees before settling in to wait and watch.

  The good thing about being all alone on an island, he thought, was who the hell cared what you did? He took a piss in full view of the beach, and then, that taken care of, he belched loudly and settled down again.

  Not bad. All the money he was going to make, and all he had to do was sit here, drink and laugh.

  Money. It was all his ex-wife wanted, and for some reason the courts had decided she deserved it.

  She was a bitch.

  Work was a bitch.

  Life was a bitch.

  Life sucked.

  And that was that.

  But he was a man’s man, tough, smart and not about to take any shit. Even if the whole world had gone over to the pansies and the P.C. crowd, he wasn’t going to take any shit.

  After a while he settled into his show, drinking steadily all the while. He would probably doze off soon enough, but even if he did, who the hell would know? Or care?

  He was laughing at one of his shows when, with an awful thud, it landed on the blanket, almost in his lap, and his laughter became a scream.

  “Anything on those blueberries?” Zach asked Morrissey over the phone.

  It was nearly ten, and he was alone in his room at last. He and Caer had joined Amanda, Kat and Sean at a seafood place down by the wharf. Cal and Marni had come in on their own, and they had all laughed awkwardly over the fact that not only did none of them want to eat at home, they had all been drawn to the same restaurant.

  Because, Zach realized, it was a buffet.

  Whatever they ate was also being consumed by the dozens of other people eating there that night.

  Only Clara, Tom and Bridey weren’t there. Clara had cooked for the three of them and then sat with Bridey.

  Kat had talked about going out to a club, and she’d tried to convince him to come along, but he’d decided against it. He was too consumed with the mystery of Eddie’s death and the treasure, examining the charts in his mind, trying to figure out if he was misunderstanding or missing something.

  Meanwhile, Sean was worried that Bridey didn’t seem to be getting any better and wanted her to go to the hospital, but she was refusing, so now one of them was sitting with her nearly all the time.

  Zach reflected now that somehow, during dinner, they had managed to keep the conversation light. They hadn’t talked about Eddie or the sabotaged blueberries, or anything evil.

  Even Kat and Amanda had managed to be civil to each other.

  They had all talked about the birds, though. Except for Caer.

  Caer didn’t want to talk about the birds. She was quiet for much of the meal, pleasant when spoken to, but her mind was elsewhere.

  Maybe on the letter? The letter that had clearly upset her earlier?

  Back at the house, he’d put her out of his mind and called Morrissey.

  Zach had been relieved to hear that the detective had gotten a man out to the island. “Gary Swipes. An old cop—guy’s been on the force since he was a kid, nearly forty years. He was glad to head on out, especially when I told him I was sure you’d pay a bonus on account of the cold. Big guy, tough guy. He’ll stay on until morning, and then there’s a kid, a new officer but a good one, relieving him.”

  With things on Cow Cay well in hand, Zach had asked about the blueberries.

  “I don’t have anything. Not yet. We’ve got no prints other than those of a stock boy, and those are smudged—looks like the jars were taken off the shelves, tampered with and returned. We’re looking through all the video from the last week or so. They track their stock well there, so we know the jars in question came in during that period. The thing is, the video shows the cash registers, not the aisles. Still, we’ll kn
ow who came in and out. It’s just slow, tedious work, and there are only twenty-four hours in a day.”

  “I’ll head out by myself to Cow Cay again tomorrow and play with the metal detector some more,” Zach told him.

  “On parkland. You know that’s illegal.” Morrissey laughed. “Don’t worry. I’m not looking and my man won’t be, either. And if you get the urge, come on down to the office—we can use some help staring at those tapes. At least the newspapers are full of articles about the blueberries. Hopefully no one else will wind up involved.”

  Involved? Zach thought.

  Innards cut to ribbons.

  Dead.

  Yes, hopefully no one else would wind up involved.

  There was a tap at his bedroom door, light and hesitant. He frowned and quickly finished his conversation with Morrissey, then flipped his phone closed, walked to the door and opened it.

  Caer was standing there, a strange, wistful look in her eyes.

  “Hey,” he said. “Is anything wrong?”

  She shook her head.

  “Sean—is he all right? Where is he? Who is he with?”

  “Sean is out with Tom and Kat, seeing that jazz trio she was talking about. Amanda is locked up in her suite, and Clara went back to the cottage.”

  “Bridey?”

  “Sleeping peacefully. I just checked on her,” Caer said.

  He studied her with a frown.

  “Are you going to ask me in?” she asked him.

  He stepped back, stunned, realizing for the first time that she had prepared for bed. She was in a soft flannel gown and robe; small white roses fell lightly upon a creamy beige background, and there was lace around the collar and cuffs. Her hair was loose, falling like blue-black waves around her shoulders.

  “Come in,” he said.

  She entered and closed the door, and there was nothing coquettish in her manner. She rushed against him, burying her face against his cotton T-shirt and slipping her arms around his waist.

  “Is this too terrible?” she asked quietly. “I feel…I feel time slipping away, I guess….”

  Was what they were doing right? Wrong? He had no idea. But it was impossible not to welcome her. Everything about her was the ultimate in sensuality and seduction. Not contrived, not artificial. He remembered opening his arms, drawing her to him, feeling the rush that swept through his muscles and into his blood whenever she was close and the curves of her body were flush against his. He stretched his shirt to the ripping point, he was so eager to get it over his head and discard it. He was slightly more circumspect with the little buttons on her gown, seeing as at some point she would have to return to her own room.