Nods all around. Heartened that everyone properly valued my baking skills, I tiptoed back to the door with Lake silently in tow. I crouched down and slipped Jordan’s phone through the door’s gap, making sure to prop it securely against the wall. Then using my own phone, I called her.
My ringtone jingled out into the room beyond the door. Jordan and Kyle stopped arguing. “What the hell is that?”
A lifeline, that’s what.
Jordan was slow to respond as she absorbed what must be happening. “It’s my phone. I must have dropped it. I’ll just go shut it off.”
Lake squeezed my hand tight. This rescue could be easier than we’d hoped.
But no. “No, you stay right there. No funny business, see? I’m in charge here.” Footsteps approached the door, and Lake melted back into the shadows down the tunnel. Kyle’s shadow crossed the beam of his flashlight as he bent down to pick up Jordan’s phone. To my surprise, he answered it. “Hello?”
I am Petra Smythe, bold and uniquely skilled. I don’t even fear the dead. “Give me back my friend,” I said, nice and loud.
The door flew open, and Kyle shined his light in my eyes. I could barely make out his shocked expression behind the bright glare, but I stared fiercely at him anyway.
“The bed and breakfast lady? What the hell are you doing here?”
“Saving the day, obviously. Let Jordan go.”
His laugh was ugly. “Ain’t happening.” He glanced down the dark tunnel and snorted. “You really walk in here all by yourself? Well, I could use an extra pair of hands. Over there with your friend, lady, and start searching.”
I glanced at Jordan, who stood partway into the thirty-foot-diameter room on the far side of a cluster of old whisky barrels. Her forehead had a nasty bump, and a trickle of blood ran into her eyebrow and down her temple. Despite her injury, her brows were drawn together, and her eyes locked on to me.
My teeth clenched. I am Dieter Pike, intrepid time traveler. I wait for the opportune moment to act. And this ain’t it. I raised my hands and eased into the room, making sure I kept Kyle in my sights. The young cameraman had already killed two people. I didn’t want him making any unpredictable moves behind me. When I got close enough, I clasped Jordan’s hand tightly. She squeezed back.
“I said search! That painting is in here. I know it. Find it, and maybe I’ll let you live.”
I gulped and nodded. The circular room I’d entered was cluttered with a dusty combination of building materials, damaged debris, and booze. A concrete staircase led up around the curve of the far wall, but it was sealed off by a horizontal, heavy steel door. I eased past the barrels. If they still contained whisky, that stuff was probably priceless by now. Or worthless. Jordan was giving me her are-you-completely-crazy look.
“It’ll be okay,” I whispered to Jordan.
Her eyes flicked to the door then back to me. I gave her the tiniest of nods.
“Find me that treasure!” Kyle boomed. The ocean crashed against the side of the cliff, echoing his emphasis. “Or I’ll leave your bodies down here to rot and find it myself!”
I am Artemis Bellisi, a fearless prince of New York’s underground, and I laugh in the face of death threats. “Sure, if you want to risk searching this mess for three days without food or water. Come on Jordan, let’s start looking through these boxes over here.” I led her to a stack of apple boxes and started halfheartedly pawing through the random contents in the top one, hoping Kyle would turn his back to the door. Instead, he moved to flank us, keeping the door and us in sight. His gun hand continued to aim in our direction.
Gritting my teeth, I started digging. Slices of drywall, an old Ball canning jar, a yellow envelope that fell apart the second I touched it, spilling rusty nails across the floor. Oh goodie, tetanus. Maybe I can throw these at his eyes if I get a chance. No hint of a painting or the case Graciela had probably brought it in. I glanced around as I set the box down on the floor, hoping for some kind of useful weapon, but everything around me was old, dank, and heavy. With frustration, I started checking the next box in the stack. Jordan did the same with another box down the row.
I tried to catch her eye, but her hands trembled, and she was too focused on the box in front of her. For the first time, I worried about how hard she’d been hit in the head. In hopes of deflecting his attention off of her, I said, “How did you know the treasure was real, Kyle? Even here in Seacrest, almost everyone believed it was a myth started by Moore’s novel, not the other way around.”
He shot me a manic look and brandished his gun at me. “Family secret.” He swiveled to aim at Jordan. “You are not the only descendant of Fabrizio ‘The Hammer’ Nicolosi, cousin.”
“What?” In utter shock, Jordan dropped a glass jar, and it shattered on the dusty floor.
Kyle’s bitter laughter echoed in the room, followed by another hollow boom of the sea. “The other LA crime families shot the Hammer dead in the street. Like a dog. They divvied up his enterprises, poached or killed his men, and destroyed his legacy. The greedy bastards owe me. I’m gonna find that treasure and bankroll the Nicolosi comeback. I’m gonna own that city and all the mobsters in it. That’s why I need that painting—for my legacy. So you keep looking!”
I set the second box aside and dug into the third one. Jordan, kneeling amid several boxes, shot me a disbelieving look that clearly said, “That guy is crazy, and I am not related to him.”
“So let me get this straight, Kyle,” I said, trying to keep my voice level and struggling to remember a mostly forgotten conversation in my kitchen, “you’re a Nicolosi, and Jordan’s a Nicolosi, but, uh, Devin isn’t?”
He lifted his chin and gave us both a feral smile, all teeth and no warmth. “That’s right. Fabrizio Nicolosi is my great-great-grandfather. His firstborn son was born before the mob wars got brutal in Los Angeles, but the doctors botched things, and his wife died. He was heartbroken, so her family took the baby back to Sicily and raised him there. Then, during the height of Prohibition, the Hammer met Graciela.” Kyle dipped the barrel of his gun toward Jordan.
“Who was she?” Jordan asked. “Daughter of another Italian mob family?”
Kyle’s smile was sharp. “The only Italian you have is your Nicolosi blood. Graciela was the daughter of a Mexican cartel leader who supplied the Nicolosi family with booze.”
“What? I’m Mexican?” Jordan seemed almost comically shocked by this realization, considering she had a gun pointed at her. “My dad’s gonna freak.”
Of course! Geneva Laine was insistent that she could distinguish Italian from Spanish. And she was right. Pushing aside my amazement at Jordan’s sudden heritage shift, I hurried through my box, finding nothing. The one under it held only mildewed 1930s instruction booklets for everything from an Argus camera to Woolcraft knitting. I glanced around for something else to search that would maneuver Kyle back toward the door and spotted a large cabinet lying on its side behind some two-by-fours. “Shall I check in there?” I pointed.
Kyle, suspicious, swiped the potential wooden weapons out of my reach and backed toward the door to avoid them landing on his feet. I bit my lip and knelt in front of the sideways cabinet, halfheartedly pulling on its handles. They flopped open and kicked up a thick cloud of dust that made me sneeze. Kyle was closer to the door now, but he hadn’t turned his back to it—he could shoot anyone who barged in. “How did you convince Devin he was Nicolosi’s heir?” I asked.
Kyle smugly waggled the gun. “Didn’t have to. I found him online, claiming Nicolosi blood in his film school bio. At first I was pissed. I was pretty sure I was the only living heir. I even checked him out with my grandpa back in Sicily to make sure. And it turns out he knew a story about a nightclub dancer who had a crush on the Hammer. Her name was Flora, and Nicolosi wouldn’t give her the time of day. So she ran to the nearest Prohibition agent and
started spilling secrets—and tripped into his bed. By the time she had his baby, both Graciela and Fabrizio Nicolosi were dead, so she put it around that Fabrizio was the father of her child, hoping for a little taste of power. Ended up run outta town.” His tone made it clear he considered Flora and her descendants—including Devin—less than awesome.
“Not the smartest plan,” I said, hoping to keep him talking. I rummaged through the cabinet, making noises, but there was little to search through inside it. “How did you get Devin to believe you were a camera operator?”
“I legit learned how to operate a camera. Not, like, overnight or anything. But I got skills. And the world will see more of them once I get this treasure in my hands. Are you even looking?” he shouted suddenly. His pistol veered toward my head.
I raised my dusty palms and held very still. “It’s, uh, mostly empty in there, but I was checking the back panel for a hidden compartment. You got kind of a temper there, don’t you? Is that why you killed Cecil? He wasn’t giving up the goods on his dad and you lost it, didn’t you?”
“No.” Kyle’s reply was pouty. “Stupid old man thought the story of the treasure was dumb, and he hated his dad and everything the guy stood for. He had no respect for where he’d come from. Not like me. I respect my elders. I honor my ancestors.”
“The elders who did things you like, you mean. Not everyone else,” I said through clenched teeth. “Not Cecil French.”
“Hey, that old fart deserved what he got, keeping my own family secrets from me. If he’d been any kind of competent boat guy, he’d have fixed the steering on that thing, and he and that hero pilot of his would’ve been lost at sea.”
My curiosity froze, entranced. “Hero pilot?”
Kyle gave me an ugly smirk. “Smart-ass thought he could save his boss by jumping me. How was I supposed to know he was sleeping on the boat? Who does that? Loser. I managed to get in a quick shot with the bat, and he went down, too. I thought I was rid of the both of them until I saw him in your parlor. But—whaddaya know—he didn’t remember me.” He gave me a smug look. “It was like what I did never happened. I took it as a sign that I was meant to succeed in my search for this treasure, that it was all meant to be.” His beatific smile was beyond creepy. I had to resist the urge to make a wow-can-you-believe-this-guy face at Jordan.
I have to get us all out of here alive somehow. I nodded like he’d convinced me. “You know, this priceless painting won’t be lying around in the open. Graciela would’ve brought it in a protective case. Maybe the case itself is hidden.” Kyle squinted suspiciously at me, but I merely nodded toward the large whisky barrels near the door.
“Check these barrels here!” Kyle jabbed his gun toward the barrels.
I moved closer to him, and he backed away, gun toward my head, until we stood on opposite sides of the barrels. I stifled a shudder of relief—his back fully faced the door.
Jordan and I struggled to wrest the bung out of the side of the nearest barrel, but it was impossible without a tool. I spotted a short length of metal rod in the debris.
As I reached for it, Kyle said, “No sudden moves with that.”
I glared at him and slowly retrieved the small rod, grumpily wishing I’d ended up with a completely incompetent bad guy, one who wouldn’t see a quick whack to the head coming. I jammed the rod against the bung and tried to pry it out. Eventually, the thick plug popped free, and aged Canadian whisky poured out over my feet and Jordan’s. We both leaped back, and Kyle twitched his gun hand up as he skittered away from the expanding, aromatic pool of booze.
“Now!” I cried, pulling Jordan down behind the barrels for cover.
Directly behind Kyle, the old oak door burst open, and a cluster of growls and flailing limbs—and one chair leg—tackled him and pinned him to the dusty floor. “Get the gun!” Paul cried.
“No! Get off me. Get off!” Kyle howled, struggling.
The pile of men wrestled violently, kicking barrels and boxes as well as each other. The gun skittered off into the room’s clutter.
“We need to get back into the tunnel.” I grabbed Jordan’s hand and glanced around the barrel toward the door. On the far side of the fight, Skylar gestured for us to join her, but I couldn’t see a way to get around the pile of combatants without getting us pulled into it.
The sea boomed against the cliff, followed immediately by a different banging, more metallic and urgent. Confused, I searched for its source. It would be just my luck if the ceiling caved in at that exact moment.
Caved up, more like. At the top of the concrete stairs that led nowhere, the horizontal steel door shivered then lifted away. Officer Mallory Tavish stalked down the stairs, aiming her service weapon with one hand and resting the largest bolt cutters I’d ever seen across her other shoulder. She had dirt, soot, and plaster dust on her uniform, in her hair, and smudged across large swaths of her face.
My jaw dropped of its own accord. Holy crap. That is badass.
Her expression was carved in flint. “Everyone in the room, stand up now and raise your hands, and I maybe won’t shoot you. I just ruined my new Frye boots sloshing through about seven decades of muck up there, and I am not a happy camper. Do not test me.”
The knot of men untangled. Paul and Al stood up and raised their hands, but Lake slammed Kyle over the top of a full whisky barrel and put his arm in a lock. Strong, decisive, and willing to defy his ex-wife the cop in order to pin down the man who threatened us? Swoon.
Mallory stumped down the stairs, her gun never wavering, and slammed the bolt cutters across the top of the whisky barrel that was emptying itself onto the floor. Her newly empty hand brought out a pair of handcuffs, and she tossed them to Lake.
Mallory, Lake, and handcuffs. I winced. More information than I wanted to envision, thanks.
Lake snapped the handcuffs into place, and Mallory holstered her gun and took custody of her perp. With one hand on the handcuff chain and the other on the back of Kyle’s collar, she nodded at the rest of us. “I’ll take it from here, you guys. I’d thank you for your help, but I’m too exasperated by the way you put yourselves in danger.”
Jordan ran a hand through her hair. “Actually, they came to rescue me. This guy kidnapped me right off my own front porch. If they hadn’t all snuck down the tunnel and stormed in when they did, who knows what he would’ve done to me? I owe them all my life, especially Pippa. She walked in here with nothing but a plan while he had a gun trained on us both. And it worked.”
With what seemed to be extreme reluctance, Mallory gave me a subtle chin lift of respect. “I’ll be sure to mention it in my report. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to book this guy, take a long, hot shower, and order a new pair of boots.” She manhandled Kyle toward the stairs, and I enjoyed every one of his pained protests.
The rest of us stood around in the lighthouse’s secret basement, blinking at the sudden end to our life-and-death conflict.
Jordan, made entirely of cool cucumber, swiped a finger through the amber liquid around our shoes and licked it. “Wow, that’s smooth.”
“Really?” I dipped and licked my finger. “Ooh, yeah.”
“Did you see that?” Skylar asked in a reverent fangirl tone. “How she just took over and expected everyone to comply?” She touched the set of enormous bolt cutters. “I’m totally rethinking my main character right now.”
Lake put his arm around my shoulders, but his eyes lingered on the concrete steps. “I told you she was good at her job.”
“Yes, you did, Hero Pilot,” I said. “You may never recover the memories of that night, but at least now you know what happened. And you know it’s true because that guy kind of hates you, and he still called you a hero.”
Lake’s chest swelled. “Yes. Yes, he did.”
The sea boomed again, and the walls hummed. Lake and I
kept staring at each other, grinning goofily.
Skylar lifted the bolt cutters, but they were heavier than she expected. “Whoa.” Her balance shifted, and she dropped them onto the barrel top where Kyle had been handcuffed.
A funny, echoing thump came from inside the fat barrel. She frowned and tilted her head, then rocked the half-full barrel again. A slosh of whisky spilled from the bunghole. “Guys, did you hear that?”
I had to throw myself between the guys and the barrel to save it from their frenzied excitement. “No smashing! If you crush this thing, you could crush whatever’s in it.”
“She’s right, guys,” Lake said.
Al picked up the metal rod. “Let’s try to jimmy this metal ring off.”
Skylar and I escorted Jordan to the concrete steps Mallory had just departed on, and had her sit down. Behind us, the guys energetically smacked a large brick against the end of the rod in an attempt to lever the metal ring up off its staves. Skylar pulled a packet of tissues from her pocket and handed me one. I dabbed at Jordan’s cut.
“I think you’ll live,” I told her. “You were great.”
She shook her head gingerly. “No, you were.”
I chuckled. “No, you.”
Her smile reassured me that she really would be okay. “No, y—”
“Yes!” the men cried. A metallic clang signaled that the upper barrel ring was free. Lake and Paul lifted the barrel’s lid off, and Al plunged his hand inside without looking first.
“Eureka!” he crowed, lifting a leather cylinder dripping with whisky. “Ha ha, seriously, do you guys have any idea how long I’ve been waiting to say that?”
Lake took the container and examined it in the light. A long leather cap sat over one end, its edge covered in a pale, smeared substance. “Looks like it’s sealed with some kind of wax.” He gave it a shake. “I don’t think any of the whisky got inside.”
Smugglers & Scones Page 24
