A Sparkle of Silver

by Liz Johnson

  “Me? I didn’t tell anyone. Who did you tell?”

  “Why would I tell someone?”

  “You told me.”

  She gasped. He had not just thrown that at her. “I had to tell you. You were going to get me kicked off the property. Besides, if I hadn’t, you wouldn’t know about any of this.”

  “So it stands to reason that if anyone else was threatening your chance to search the property, you’d tell them too.”

  Squaring her shoulders, she turned to face him full on. “Well, you’re the only one who’s threatened to have me fired.”

  “And I wouldn’t have if you hadn’t been in the library on the other side of the velvet ropes.”

  “So you’re saying this is all my fault.” Something bubbled in her chest, something she couldn’t name and didn’t really care to. It was unsettling and a bit annoying. Because they were fighting—and she couldn’t remember the last time she’d had such a good time.

  Maybe this wasn’t really fighting. Maybe it was just a squabble. There was something serious at its root, but all she could focus on was the crinkle at the corner of his eye. It always did that when he was smiling. Or about to smile. Or thinking about smiling. That was something she knew about him.

  And also that he’d stayed with her. When he had every right to walk away, he’d stayed.

  And she knew he was a good man, a kind man, a hero. Villains didn’t hold your grandma’s hand while she had a complete break from reality. Villains didn’t hold you and tell you they would stay by your side until it all worked out.

  If her life were written in the pages of a book, one thing would be abundantly clear. Ben was the hero. Whether she was the heroine was still up for debate.

  “What about your friend from the library?” she asked.

  “My boss, Carl?”

  She nodded and crossed her arms so they landed with a resounding thump.

  “Yes, I told him. I’d also trust him with my life. But he already knew about the rumors of hidden treasure anyway. He’s known for years. Why would he wait until now to tell someone else? Besides, he wouldn’t know how to post in a forum if you paid him.”

  She hadn’t met Carl, and she had absolutely no picture of him in her mind, so it was easy to fabricate him to fit her story. “Maybe he’s been waiting for the diary, and now that he knows we have it, he’ll be after us both. First he’ll cut the brake lines on your car so you go careening off a cliff and die in a fiery crash. But that’s okay with him because you didn’t have the diary anyway. Then he’ll be after me, stalking me at my house, only he’ll miss the C on the street address and think that I live in the big house too.”

  Ben’s eyes grew bigger with each word, each wildly concocted scenario. He opened his mouth as if planning to refute her story, but instead he laughed. Booming and full, the sound echoed around them, bouncing off palm trees and stone archways alike. “Just what kind of books have you been reading?”

  “What?” She pinched her lips together, bracing every ounce of her being against the smile that wanted to escape. True, that brake-line plot had appeared in one of the books she’d borrowed from the library. It had involved embezzled money and an angry lawyer. It hit too close to home to really enjoy, but she’d gotten a giggle out of the ridiculous villain nonetheless. Just as she’d hoped, Ben had too.

  “There’s one flaw with that plan.”

  “Oh?”

  “If Carl killed me, he’d have to do all the grunt work at the library. No way would he willingly get rid of me before lining up a replacement.”

  “Oh.” No matter how hard she pursed her lips to the side, she could feel the smile breaking loose. “Then maybe not Carl.”

  “Decidedly not Carl.” His grin matched her own.

  Resting her head against the wall at her back, she watched the hanging moss play in the wind. Even the leaves got in a good rustle or two between the night birds calling. “But then who? If neither of us have said anything . . .” Suddenly her stomach clenched, and she pressed both hands over her middle.

  “Grandma Joy.” She could only whisper the words, and Ben leaned closer, his brows knitted together and his features tight.

  “Huh?”

  “Grandma Joy. What if she told someone? She might not even remember that she did. But it would have been so easy to just . . .” She waved her hand, and his eyes followed it, understanding lighting them.

  “It could be anyone. It could be that administrator at the home.”

  “Virginia Baker.”

  He nodded quickly. “Or one of the nurses. Or a cleaning person. Or even a guest.”

  “You think the guy that broke in here tonight has been to the assisted living home?”

  With a sharp shake of his head, he rejected her premise. “No. But someone who has been there told the world. Milo—the guy who climbed the fence—”

  “How’d he get over the wall?”

  “Ladders. A metal one on the outside and a rope one on the inside.”

  She motioned for him to keep going.

  “Milo said he was trying to beat the rush. He thinks there’s going to be a rush. In fact, he offered me a fifty-fifty cut if I’d give him unfettered access to the grounds.”

  She tried to chuckle, but it came out arid and tired. “I might have liked this guy.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “You certainly have something in common.”

  “When will the others get here?”

  “Soon.”

  Despite the humidity that made her skin sticky with sweat, she shivered at the very thought. They were about to be inundated by people looking for the same thing they were. And not just anyone. These people might be amateurs. They might be pros. Either way, they knew more about finding treasure than she and Ben combined. And without Ruth’s other diary, they were fishermen without lines.

  “Speaking of the grounds—”

  “Were we?”

  “Yes. Before. Whatever.” She flapped her hands in front of her to clear away the conversation in her mind. “The security manager knows now.”

  He nodded.

  “Things here are going to get a lot tighter, aren’t they?”

  He nodded again.

  “Like tonight.”

  One more nod.

  “What are you supposed to be doing right now?” she asked.

  “Officially I’m searching the grounds for any signs of other intruders.” He pushed himself off the floor and rose to his feet. “Speaking of which, I guess I should get to that.”

  “So we’re not going to check out Ruth’s favorite spot?”

  He reached out his hand, and she slipped hers into it. The muscles in his forearm bunched, and suddenly she was standing in front of him. Right in front of him. She had to put her free hand up to keep from bumping into his chest, and all of a sudden she could feel the lean muscles there, the ones she’d only glimpsed before.

  Glancing up into his face, she could feel his breath in her hair. Slowly—so slowly, as though he was asking permission—he wound a finger into a curl that had escaped that night.

  She wanted to lean into his hand, to press her cheek to his fingers and feel his touch. But the only thing she could see was his mouth, his perfect lips, firm and sure and entirely kissable.

  She’d gone over the edge. She’d turned into one of those heroines in her books who swooned over a man. But she didn’t care one bit.

  Or maybe . . . maybe she was more like her great-grandma than she wanted to admit. Ruth had swooned over Claude, without question. Maybe in this very hallway they’d stopped for a short embrace. Maybe they’d kissed and sighed and whispered sweet nothings.

  In this moment, that’s all she wanted to do with Ben. All she could see were his lips and all she could think about were those lips on hers.

  “Millie.”

  The lips in question said her name. It wasn’t so much an inquiry as an urging. She just didn’t know what he was urging her to do. She didn’t actually care. As long as it
meant they could be closer, as long as it closed the distance between them.

  Beneath her hand, his heart beat steady, while her pulse pounded a wild tattoo at her throat. He leaned an inch closer to her. Or maybe she’d pressed into him. It didn’t matter. It only mattered that they were there—well, almost there.

  “Millie?” This time it was definitely a question, and she managed to raise her gaze to the same emotion reflected in his eyes. He wanted to know that this was okay. That this was all right. That she wanted this as much as he did. That—

  “Ben? You still out there?” The walkie-talkie on his belt crackled with the call, and Ben froze. Then he leaned back, his smile filled with regret.

  “This is Ben.”

  “You see anything out there?”

  “No, sir. The beachfront is clear. I’m on my way to the north wall now.”

  His supervisor gave him the go-ahead, and he squeezed her hand before dropping it. “Next time we’re working together, we’ll check Ruth’s favorite spot.”

  “But where is it?”

  “Where would Devereaux think it was?”

  fourteen

  He’s not here today,” Millie said.

  “Well, I can see that. But he should be. He’s such a handsome young man.”

  Millie rolled her eyes at her grandma’s clear matchmaking attempt and leaned back a few inches. Grandma Joy’s eyes were bright, her cheeks pink, and her gaze focused today. Too bad Ben wasn’t here to see it.

  Yeah, that’s why you want Ben here.

  Oh, be quiet.

  Her mind had been telling her all sorts of things, poking and prodding about what might have been, what almost had been.

  But that’s all it was. An almost. Anyway, maybe it would have been terrible. What if there were no sparks?

  Oh, there were sparks when you were five feet away from him.

  Pipe down.

  What if he was a slobbery kisser? What if she was a slobbery kisser?

  You’re never going to know if you’re a good kisser or not if you don’t actually do it.

  Seriously. Be quiet.

  What if they kissed and it was so bad that they couldn’t even look at each other?

  Really? You think that kissing him could be bad?

  Well, maybe not for her, but what about for him? What if he thought it was so bad that he never wanted to kiss her again, and then they were stuck working together, but it was completely awkward and he felt obligated to keep helping her?

  How come the heroines in her books never wondered if they were good kissers? How come they just kissed and it was always perfect and wonderful and magical? How come there were always fireworks in the books? What if there were never fireworks in real life?

  Her hands clenched into fists at her stomach, and she fell back against her grandma’s pillows, wrinkling the previously made bed.

  “What are you thinking about, sweetheart?” Grandma Joy rocked back and forth, her eyes closed but somehow fully seeing.

  “Nothing.”

  Creak. Creak. The chair announced each movement. “I thought you came here to make me my favorite soup. Sounds like you’re just telling me stories instead.”

  Millie pushed herself up and took a deep breath, hoping it would wipe Ben and whatever had almost happened—good or bad—from her mind. It did not. She tried to fake it anyway.

  “Of course I’m here to make you soup.” She was there for information too, but Grandma Joy didn’t need to know that was the heart of the reason.

  Walking over to the kitchenette—the standard two burners and four cupboards in each resident’s room—Millie took a long look at her grandma. She still looked lucid and thoughtful.

  As she pulled a small cutting board from a cupboard and carrots from her own grocery bag, she took a quick breath. “Grandma, we can’t find Ruth’s other diary.”

  “Mama’s diary?”

  Oh no. Already? Grandma Joy sounded distant, fading into the past—or a murky version of it.

  Millie swiped the peeler over the length of the carrots harder than was necessary, already seeing where this conversation was going. Nowhere.

  “You found my mama’s diary.”

  “Yes, but there is another one.” She wanted to ask if her grandma remembered. She wanted to beg her to recall what they’d already talked about. But it would do no good. With each whack of the knife against the carrot, she imagined dementia could be cut and destroyed just as easily. She wished it was so.

  “You told me that already.”

  Millie jumped and turned around. Grandma Joy’s eyes were wide open. “Yes. I did tell you that.”

  “Where do you think it is?” Her features turned thoughtful.

  “I don’t know. We found a note that makes it sound like Ruth thought someone was reading her diary, so she moved it. But I don’t know if it was the first or the second. And I have no clue where she would have moved it to.”

  With a nod, Grandma Joy asked, “What does your handsome young man think?”

  Millie tried not to focus on the reminder of handsome Ben or the implication that he was hers. Instead she thought about what he’d said the night before. “He thinks it might be in her favorite place on the grounds.”

  “And he knows where that is?”

  “Well, we found some letters from—” She slammed on the brakes nearly too late. She couldn’t very well drop the name Claude Devereaux to her grandmother. Especially not when it was entirely possible that Joy had been the one to leak word about the treasure to the rest of the world. Accidentally, of course. But remembering to keep secrets required remembering. Not Grandma Joy’s strong suit.

  Her stomach twisted at the thought of not telling the whole truth—or even what she guessed was the truth. But this was too important to do wrong. And letting word slip out to the rest of the world that there might be another heir to Claude Devereaux’s fortune was doing it wrong. She needed proof. No court would call for a DNA test if she didn’t have probable cause. That family likely received a hundred fake claims on their money every day. She didn’t want to be just another huckster begging for a handout.

  She wasn’t prepared to fight the court of public opinion. Not until she was ready to fight in a court of law. Of course, she hoped it never got to that level. She prayed that the family would see her plight, understand that Claude’s own daughter was in need, and offer a lump sum that would care for Grandma Joy until her dying day.

  But first Millie needed more than a scrap of evidence that he had been her great-grandfather, that Ruth hadn’t married him but had still given birth to his child.

  Millie looked at her grandma and tried to see in her the dark hair and olive complexion of the Devereaux family. But all she could make out were stooped shoulders from a lifetime of hard labor and eyes that, when focused, told of losing the love of her life.

  Pouring chicken broth and water into a saucepan, she tried to pick up where she’d left off with fewer details, grateful that her grandma was prone to long silences and hadn’t bothered asking a follow-up question. “We found some letters that Ruth had saved. One of them, from another guest at the Chateau that summer, identified her favorite spot on the grounds. We thought we’d check there.”

  “Oh, I know her favorite spot. She talked of it often. The very southeast corner of the estate, where the ocean meets the creek. She loved to put her feet in the water. It was cold. She said that when she was pregnant with me, she would put her feet in to keep her ankles from swelling and to listen to the sound of the wind through the moss of the trees.”

  Millie opened her mouth to argue. The estate didn’t have a piece of land like that. The southernmost point along the beach was just a typical beach. No inlet. No copse of trees. Maybe the estate had covered more ground back then.

  Or maybe Grandma Joy was remembering wrong. That wouldn’t be the first—or last—time.

  Her soup base boiled, and she dumped her chopped vegetables into it, stirring slowly, watching the bubbles
pop and the steam rise.

  There was no point in telling Grandma Joy that she was wrong, so instead Millie diced rotisserie chicken and measured rice and tried to think of something encouraging to say. But before she could come up with a full phrase, Grandma Joy dropped a bomb.

  “So they’re going to make me move.”

  Millie spun around, the wooden spoon in her hand at the ready. “Who told you that?”

  “My nurse. She’s a silly little girl, always giggling when she gives me my medication.” She sounded completely detached, like she didn’t fully comprehend what she was saying, but it didn’t stop her from going on. “She said I’m too much of a handful, but I’ve been behaving myself. I didn’t even point out when that Mrs. Baker had her skirt tucked into her tights.”

  With a snort and giggle, Millie covered her face. Her shoulders shook until her laughter couldn’t be contained and pealed through the room.

  “Well, I didn’t.” Grandma Joy looked nearly offended. “They don’t rightly like it when I correct them, so I let her go on out the door with her fanny flapping in the breeze, bless her heart.”

  Gasping for breath, Millie said, “Please tell me you didn’t.”

  “I most certainly did.” Hands on her hips and rocker still going back and forth, she nodded. “It was either that or get a full tongue lashin’ for speaking my piece. Why would I want that?”

  When Millie finally got her laughter under control, Grandma Joy looked at her, arms folded across her stomach. “Are they really going to make me move?”

  Sometimes the questions were easy to answer. Lately they were hard. All of them.

  Lying would be easier than telling the truth. And Grandma Joy might not remember. They might have to have this conversation a hundred times. Did it really matter if she told one little white lie?

  Yes. It did.

  If she was willing to lie to the woman who had raised her as her own, who wouldn’t she lie to? She wouldn’t start with Grandma Joy.

  “It looks like it. They . . . they say that you deserve more specialized care. And they can’t give you that attention here.”

  “So where am I going to go?”

  “I’m not sure.” Millie turned back to the simmering soup, anything to keep from admitting that she had exactly zero plans and twenty days to make one happen.