by Nora Roberts
“I’m afraid of nothing.” Terror was an icy ball in his belly. “They won’t keep me in prison. I have position. I have money.”
“You have nothing,” Matthew murmured, “but years to think about what you did, and what in the end you couldn’t do.”
“I’ll get out, and I’ll find you.”
“No.” This time, Matthew smiled, sharp and fast. “You won’t.”
“I’ve already won.” He came close, wrapped his fingers around the bars until they were as white as his face. His breath came fast, and the eyes that burned into Matthew’s held the bright edge of madness. “Your father’s dead, your uncle’s a cripple. And you’re nothing but a second-rate scavenger.”
“You’re the one in the cage, VanDyke. And I’m the one with the amulet.”
“I’ll deal with you. I’ll finish the Lassiters and take what’s mine.”
“She beat you,” Matthew repeated. “A woman started it, and a woman ended it. You had it in your hands, didn’t you? But you couldn’t keep it.”
“I’ll get it back, James.” His lips peeled back. “And I’ll deal with you. You think you can outwit me?”
“I’ll protect what’s mine.”
“Always so sure of yourself. But I’ve already won, James. The amulet’s mine. It was always mine.”
Matthew backed away from the bars. “Stay healthy, VanDyke. I want you to live a long, long time.”
“I won.” The shrill, furious voice followed Matthew as he walked away. “I won.”
Because he needed the sun, Matthew walked outside the station house. He scrubbed his hands over his face and hoped Tate wouldn’t be much longer giving her statement.
The air was hot and still, and he had a deep craving for the sea—for something fresh and scented. For Tate.
It was nearly twenty minutes later before she came out. He thought she looked exhausted, all pale skin and haunted eyes. Saying nothing, he held out a bouquet of vivid pink and blue flowers.
“What’s this?”
“They’re called flowers. They sell them at the florist down the street.”
That made her smile, and when she buried her face in them, her spirits lifted. “Thanks.”
“I thought we could both use them.” He ran a hand down her braid. “Rough morning?”
“Well, I’ve had better. Still, the police were very sympathetic and patient. With my statement, yours, LaRue’s, the tapes, they have so many charges I’m not sure what they’ll do first.” She lifted a shoulder. It hardly mattered now. “I suppose he’ll be extradited eventually.”
With his hand linked with hers, Matthew walked her to the rental car. “I think he’s going to spend what’s left of his life in a padded cell. I just saw him.”
“Oh.” She waited until he’d climbed into the driver’s seat. “I wondered if you would.”
“I wanted to see him in a cage.” Thoughtfully, Matthew put the car in gear and pulled away from the curb. “I guess since I couldn’t pound his face in, I wanted to have the chance to gloat at least.”
“And?”
“He’s right on the edge, and I might have given him a little shove to take him closer to it.” He glanced toward her. “He tried to convince me—or maybe himself, that he’d won.”
Tate lifted the flowers to rub the fragrant blooms over her cheek. “He hasn’t. We know that, and it’s what matters.”
“Right before I left, he called me by my father’s name.”
“Matthew.” Concerned, she laid a hand over his on the gear shift. “I’m sorry.”
“No. It’s all right. It seemed just somehow. Like a closure. Almost half my life, I’ve wanted to turn the clock back to that day, do something to change what happened. I couldn’t save my father, and I couldn’t be him. But today, for a few minutes, it was like standing in for him.”
“Justice instead of revenge,” she murmured. “It’s easier to live with.”
As he turned the car toward the sea, she let her head fall back against the cushion. “Matthew, I remembered something when I was talking to the police. Last night, when I was on deck with VanDyke, I had my hand on the amulet and I told him I hoped it gave him the life he’d earned.”
“Twenty or thirty years locked away from everything he wants most. Good call, Red.”
“But who called it?” She let out a long breath. “He doesn’t have the amulet, Matthew, but he certainly has Angelique’s Curse.”
It felt good to be back at sea again, back at work. Warding off all suggestions that she take the remainder of the day to rest, Tate closeted herself with Hayden and her cataloguing.
“You’ve done a top-notch job here, Tate.”
“I had a good teacher. There’s still so much to do. I have miles of film to be developed. We already have the videos, of course, and my sketches.”
Briskly, she ran a finger down one of her lists. “We desperately need storage space,” she continued. “More holding tanks and preserving solutions. And now that we’ve made the announcement, we can start bringing up the cannon. We couldn’t risk using inflatables and cranes before.”
She blew out a breath and sat back. “We need the equipment for handling the rest, and of course, for preserving and reconstructing what we can of the Isabella.”
“You’ve got your work cut out for you.”
“I’ve got a great team.” She reached for coffee, smiled at the vase of cheery flowers beside her monitor. “Even better now that you and Lorraine are signing up.”
“Neither one of us would miss it.”
“I think we’re going to need a bigger boat, certainly until Matthew can build one.”
But it wasn’t that which preyed on her mind while Hayden muttered over her notes. Tate braced her shoulders and screwed up her courage.
“Tell me honestly, Hayden, when the reps and other scientists get here, am I prepared for them? Are my notes and papers organized and detailed enough? Without being able to use outside resources, I’ve had to guess on so many of the artifacts that I—”
“Are you looking for a grade?” he interrupted.
The amusement in his eyes had her squirming. “No. Well, maybe. I’m nervous.”
He took off his glasses, rubbed the bridge of his nose, then replaced them. “You spent last night fighting a madman, all morning talking to police, and giving a presentation to colleagues makes you nervous?”
“I’ve had more time to think about the colleagues,” she said dryly. “I’m greedy, Hayden. I want to make a huge splash with this. It will be the foundation for the Beaumont-Lassiter Museum of Marine Archeology.”
She picked up the necklace that lay on the table. She’d needed, for reasons she no longer felt required analysis, to keep it close.
It was cool in her hands now. Beautiful, priceless and, she thought, quiet at last.
“And I . . . well, I want Angelique’s Curse to have the home it deserves after four hundred years of waiting.”
“Then I can honestly tell you in my professional opinion, you have a very strong foundation.”
Very gently, she laid the necklace back in its padded box. “But do you think that—” She broke off, glancing toward the window at the sound of clanging and motorized hiccoughing. “What the hell is that?”
“Whatever it is, it sounds bad.”
They went on deck together where Matthew and Lorraine were already at the rail. Ray and Marla bolted out of the galley.
“What an awful noise,” Marla began, then her eyes widened. “Oh my God, what is that thing?”
“I think it’s supposed to be a boat,” Tate murmured. “But don’t take my word for it.”
It was painted a virulent pink, which clashed interestingly with the heavy rust. The flying bridge shuddered each time the engine belched. As it drew alongside, Tate estimated that it was forty feet of warped wood, cracked glass and corroding metal.
Buck stood at the wheel, waving wildly. “Ain’t she something?” he shouted. He cut the engines, whic
h showed their appreciation by vomiting a spew of smoke. “Weigh anchor.”
There was a horrible grinding sound, a shudder and screech. Buck shoved up his shaded glasses and grinned.
“Going to christen her Diana. LaRue says she was a hell of a hunter.”
“Buck.” Matthew coughed and waved at the smoke carried cheerfully by the breeze. “Are you telling me you bought that thing?”
“We bought this thing,” LaRue announced and strolled out on the slanted deck. “We are partners, me and Buck.”
“You’re going to die,” Matthew decided.
“Just needs some paint, little sanding, some mechanical work.” Buck started down the steps to the deck. Fortunately, it was the second riser from the bottom that snapped under his weight. “Some carpentry,” he added, still grinning.
“You gave someone money for that?” Tate wondered.
“She was a bargain.” LaRue tapped the rail cautiously. “When she’s shipshape and our work is done here, we are off to Bimini.”
“Bimini?” Matthew repeated.
“There’s always another wreck, boy.” He beamed at Matthew. “Been too many years since I had a boat of my own under me.”
“How’s it going to stay under him?” Tate murmured under her breath. “Buck, wouldn’t it be better to—”
But Matthew put a hand over hers and squeezed. “You’ll make her shine, Buck.”
“Coming aboard for inspection,” Ray called out. He stripped off his shoes and shirt and plunged into the water.
“They do love their toys,” Marla decided. “I’m making lemon tarts if anyone wants a snack.”
“Right behind you.” Lorraine grabbed Hayden’s hand.
“Matthew, that boat is a mess. They’ll have to replace every board and spur.”
“So?”
Tate blew her bangs out of her eyes. “Wouldn’t it be more practical to put their money into something in better condition? Into something in any kind of condition?”
“Sure. But it wouldn’t be as much fun.” He kissed her, and when she started to speak, kissed her again, thoroughly. “I love you.”
“I love you, too, but Buck—”
“Knows just what he’s doing.” Matthew grinned over the rail where the three men were busy laughing and examining the broken step. “Charting a new course.”
Bemused, she shook her head. “I think you’d like to go with them, bailing all the way to Bimini.”
“Nope.” He scooped her into his arms, spun a circle. “I’ve got my own course. Straight ahead full. Want to get married?”
“Yeah. How about tomorrow?”
“Deal.” The reckless light came into his eyes. “Let’s dive.”
“All right, I—” She squealed when he carried her to the rail. “Don’t you dare throw me in. I’m still dressed. Matthew, I mean it. Don’t—”
She gave a scream of helpless laughter as he leapt out into the water.
River's End
Roberts, Nora
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
RIVER’S END
A Jove Book / published by arrangement with the author
All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2000 by Nora Roberts
This book may not be reproduced in whole or part, by mimeograph or any other means, without permission. Making or distributing electronic copies of this book constitutes copyright infringement and could subject the infringer to criminal and civil liability.
For information address:
The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Putnam Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
The Penguin Putnam Inc. World Wide Web site address is http://us.penguingroup.com
ISBN: 1-101-14610-9
A JOVE BOOK®
Jove Books first published by The Jove Publishing Group, a member of Penguin Putnam Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
Jove and the “J” design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Putnam Inc.
First edition (electronic): August 2001
To Mom and Pop
Thanks for being mine.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
—Robert Frost
Table of Contents
prologue
olivia
one
two
three
four
five
six
seven
eight
noah
nine
ten
eleven
twelve
thirteen
fourteen
fifteen
sixteen
the forest
seventeen
eighteen
nineteen
twenty
twenty-one
twenty-two
twenty-three
twenty-four
twenty-five
twenty-six
the monster
twenty-seven
twenty-eight
twenty-nine
thirty
thirty-one
thirty-two
thirty-three
prologue
The monster was back. The smell of him was blood. The sound of him was terror.
She had no choice but to run, and this time to run toward him.
The lush wonder of forest that had once been her haven, that had always been her sanctuary, spun into a nightmare. The towering majesty of the trees was no longer a grand testament to nature’s vigor, but a living cage that could trap her, conceal him. The luminous carpet of moss was a bubbling bog that sucked at her boots. She ripped through ferns, rending their sodden fans to slimy tatters, skidded over a rotted log and destroyed the burgeoning life it nursed.
Green shadows slipped in front of her, beside her, behind her, seemed to whisper her name.
Livvy, my love. Let me tell you a story.
Breath sobbed out of her lungs, set to grieving by fear and loss. The blood that still stained her fingertips had gone ice-cold.
Rain fell, a steady drumming against the windswept canopy, a sly trickle over lichen-draped bark. It soaked into the greedy ground until the whole world was wet and ripe and somehow hungry.
She forgot whether she was hunter or hunted, only knew through some deep primal instinct that movement was survival.
She would find him, or he would find her. And somehow it would be finished. She would not end as a coward. And if there was any light in the world, she would find the man she loved. Alive.
She curled the blood she knew was his into the palm of her hand and held it like hope.
Fog snaked around her boots, broke apart at her long, reckless strides. Her heartbeat battered her ribs, her temples, her fingertips in a feral, pulsing rhythm.
She heard the crack overhead, the thunder snap of it, and leaped aside as a branch, weighed down by water and wind and time, crashed to the forest floor.
A little death that meant fresh life.
She closed her hand over the only weapon she had and knew she would kill to live.
And through the deep green light haunted by darker shadows, she saw the monster as she remembered him in her nightmares.
Covered with blood, and watching her.
olivia
A simple child that lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death?
—William Wordsworth
one
Beverly Hills, 1979
Olivia was four when the monster came. It shambled into dreams that were n
ot dreams and ripped away with bloody hands the innocence monsters covet most.
On a night in high summer, when the moon was bright and full as a child’s heart and the breeze was softly perfumed with roses and jasmine, it stalked into the house to hunt, to slaughter, to leave behind the indifferent dark and the stink of blood.
Nothing was the same after the monster came. The lovely house with its many generous rooms and acres of glossy floors would forever carry the smear of his ghost and the silver-edged echo of Olivia’s lost innocence.
Her mother had told her there weren’t any monsters. They were only pretend, and her bad dreams only dreams. But the night she saw the monster, heard it, smelled it, her mother couldn’t tell her it wasn’t real.
And there was no one left to sit on the bed, to stroke her hair and tell her pretty stories until she slipped back into sleep.
Her daddy told the best stories, wonderfully silly ones with pink giraffes and two-headed cows. But he’d gotten sick, and the sickness had made him do bad things and say bad words in a loud, fast voice that wasn’t like Daddy’s at all. He’d had to go away. Her mother had told her he’d had to go away until he wasn’t sick anymore. That’s why he could only come to see her sometimes, and Mama or Aunt Jamie or Uncle David had to stay right in the room the whole time.
Once, she’d been allowed to go to Daddy’s new house on the beach. Aunt Jamie and Uncle David had taken her, and she’d been fascinated and delighted to watch through the wide glass wall as the waves lifted and fell, to see the water stretch and stretch into forever where it bumped right into the sky.
Then Daddy wanted to take her out on the beach to play, to build sand castles, just the two of them. But her aunt had said no. It wasn’t allowed. They’d argued, at first in those low, hissing voices adults never think children can hear. But Olivia had heard and, hearing, had sat by that big window to stare harder and harder at the water. And as the voices got louder, she made herself not hear because they hurt her stomach and made her throat burn.
