The Reef (27 page)

Of course, LaRue was a bit of a nuisance with his periodic demands for bonuses. VanDyke smiled to himself and swirled brandy. Then again, he, too, would be dealt with, after his usefulness had passed.

The ultimate termination of an employee, he thought with a low, long chuckle. And that would be a small but sweet pleasure.

The man had no ties, no family, just as VanDyke preferred his tools. No one would miss a middle-aged French Canadian ship's cook.

Ah, but that little diversion was for later. The real joy would come from disposing of the Lassiters, and their partners. He would use them first, let them dig and dive and work. The effort would give them a sense of satisfaction, the belief that they were deceiving him would delight them.

Oh, he could imagine their laughter, their excited meetings discussing their cleverness. They would be so smug and self-congratulatory that they had had the patience to wait so long when they had known just where to strike.

Matthew had worked eight years, VanDyke mused, in bone-chilling water, doing the kind of salvage work true treasure hunters scoffed at, certain his nemesis would lose interest. To be fair, VanDyke had to admire him for his efforts and long-range view of the prize.

But the prize would never belong to anyone but Silas VanDyke. It was his legacy, his property, his triumph. The owning of it would shove every possession he'd ever had into the shadows.

Once they had the amulet, held the prize in their trembling hands, were filled with the elation of success, it would be so much more satisfying to destroy them.

Chuckling to himself, VanDyke polished off his brandy. In one sharp strike, he shattered the delicate crystal on the rail and let the shards tumble glittering into the water. Not because he was angry, not because he was violent, he mused.

Simply because he could.

 

The storm came in hard, with sheeting rain and howling wind. Ten-foot seas buffeted both boats and made diving impossible. After a debate and vote, the Lassiter-Beaumont team opted to ride it out. Once she'd accustomed herself to the movement of the boat, Tate settled down with her computer and a jug of hot tea.

There would be no midnight rendezvous tonight, she mused. It surprised her how much the lack disappointed her. Perhaps the storm was a lucky break, she decided. Without realizing it, she'd let herself get entirely too used to having Matthew beside her.

It wasn't wise to become used to anything that included Matthew.

After a great deal of internal debate, she'd convinced herself it was all right, at least safe, to care about him. Affection and attraction didn't have to be a dangerous combination. However much they clashed, however much
he tended to irritate her, she liked him. They had too much in common to remain truly at odds.

At least her heart was her own this time around. For that, she was grateful. To care and to want were a far cry from being in love. Logically, practically, sex was more satisfying when a woman felt affection, even friendship for her lover. Just as logically, practically, only a fool loved when the end had already been written.

Matthew would take his share of the
Isabella
and go. Just as she would take hers. It was a pity that what they wanted from that long doomed ship was so diverse. Still, it didn't matter as long as neither interfered with the other's goals.

Frowning, she switched documents so that the article she was drafting out on Angelique's Curse popped on screen.

Legends such as the one surrounding the Maunoir amulet, also known as Angelique's Curse, often have their roots in fact. Though it is illogical to ascribe mystical powers to an object, the legend itself has life. Angelique Maunoir lived in Brittany and was known as the village wise woman, or healer. She did indeed own a jeweled necklace such as described above, a gift from her husband, Etienne, the youngest son of the Count DuTashe. Documentation indicates that she was arrested, charged with witchcraft and executed in October of 1553.

Excerpts from her personal journal relate her story and her intimate thoughts on the eve of her execution. On October the tenth of that year, she was burned at the stake as a witch. Limited available data indicates she was sixteen. It is not indicated that, as was often done to show mercy, she was strangled first rather than burned alive.

On reading her words written the night before her execution, one can speculate on how the legend of Angelique's Curse grew and spread.

NOTE: transcribe last portion of diary.

A deathbed curse, from a woman distraught and
desperate? An innocent woman grieving over the loss of her beloved husband, betrayed by her father-in-law and facing a horrible death. Not only her own, but her unborn child's. Such truths lead to myth.

Dissatisfied with her own take on the matter, Tate leaned back and reread. When she reached for her thermos of tea, she saw Buck in the doorway.

“Well, hi. I thought you were battened down with Matthew and LaRue on the
Mermaid.
”

“Damn Canuk makes me nuts,” Buck grumbled. His yellow slicker ran with water, his thick lenses were fogged with it. “Thought I'd come over and hang out with Ray.”

“He and Mom are up in the bridge, I think, listening to the weather reports.” Tate poured the tea, held up the half filled lid of the thermos. She could see that it wasn't just LaRue that had Buck nervous. “The last I heard, the storm was blowing herself out. We should be clear by midday tomorrow.”

“Maybe.” Buck took the tea, then set it down without tasting it.

Reading him well, Tate pushed back from the monitor. “Take that wet thing off, Buck, and sit down, will you? I could really use the break and the company.”

“Don't want to mess up your work.”

“Please.” With a laugh, she rose to get another cup from the galley. “Please mess up my work, just for a few minutes.”

Reassured, he stripped off his dripping slicker. “I was thinking maybe Ray'd be up for some cards or something. Don't seem to have a lot to do with my time.” He slipped onto the settee, drummed his fingers on the table.

“Feeling restless?” she murmured.

“I know I'm letting the boy down,” he burst out, then flushed and picked up the tea he didn't want.

“That's just not true.” She hoped her basic psych course in college, and her understanding of the man beside her, would guide her instincts. No one spoke of the fact that he didn't dive. Perhaps it was time someone did.
“None of us could get along without you, Buck. Not diving doesn't mean you're not productive or an essential part of the team.”

“Checking equipment, filling tanks, hammering rocks.” He winced. “Taking videos.”

“Yes.” She leaned forward to lay a hand over his restless one. “That's as important as going down.”

“I can't go down, Tate. Just can't.” He stared miserably at the table. “And when I watch the boy go, it dries up the spit in my mouth. I start thinking about taking a drink. Just one.”

“But you don't, do you?”

“Guess I figured out just one'd be the end of me. But it doesn't stop the wanting.” He glanced up. “I was gonna talk to Ray about this. Didn't mean to hit you with it.”

“I'm glad you did. It gives me the chance to tell you how proud I am of the way you've pulled yourself together. And that I know you're doing it more for Matthew than for anyone else, even yourself.”

“At one time, all we had was each other. Some wouldn't think so, but there were good times. Then I cut him off, or tried to. But he stuck by me. He's like his dad was. He's got loyalty. He's stubborn, and he keeps too much inside. That's the pride working there. James always figured he could handle whatever came, that he could do it on his own. And it killed him.”

He lifted his eyes again. “I'm afraid the boy's heading the same way.”

“What do you mean?”

“He's got his teeth in this, nothing's going to shake him loose. What he brings up day after day, oh, it's exciting for him. But he's waiting and wanting just one thing.”

“The amulet.”

“It's got hold of him, Tate, just like it got hold of James. It scares me. The closer we get, the more it scares me.”

“Because if he finds it, he'll use it against VanDyke.”

“Fuck VanDyke. Sorry.” He cleared his throat, sipped at the tea. “I ain't worried about that sonofabitch. That the boy can handle just fine. It's the curse.”

“Oh, Buck.”

“I'm telling you,” he said stubbornly. “I feel it. It's close.” He looked out the window at the lashing rain. “We're close. Could be this storm's a warning.”

Struggling not to laugh, Tate folded her hands. “Now listen to me, I understand the seafaring superstitions, but the reality here is that we're excavating a wreck. This amulet is very likely an artifact of that wreck. With luck and hard work, we'll find it. I'll sketch it and tag it and catalogue it just the way I do every other piece we bring up. It's metal and stone, Buck, with a fascinating and tragic story attached. But that's all it is.”

“Nobody who ever owned it lived to see a happy old age.”

“People often died young, violently and tragically during the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.” She gave his hand a squeeze and tried another tack. “Let's say, just for argument's sake, that the amulet does hold some sort of power. Why would it have to be evil? Buck, have you read Angelique's diary? The part your brother copied down?”

“Yeah. She was a witch, and she put a curse on the necklace.”

“She was a sad, grieving and angry woman. She was facing a terrible death, convicted of witchcraft and of murdering her husband, a man she loved. An innocent woman, Buck, helpless to change her fate.” Seeing he was far from convinced, she blew out a breath. “Damn it, if she'd been a witch, why didn't she just disappear in a puff of smoke or turn her jailers into toads?”

“Don't work that way,” he said stubbornly.

“Fine, it doesn't work that way. So she put a spell or whatever on the necklace. If I read correctly, she cursed those who condemned her, those who would take her last link with her husband through greed. Well, Matthew didn't condemn her, Buck, and he didn't take her necklace. What he may do is find it again, that's all.”

“And when he does, what'll it do to him?” Desperate concern made his eyes glossy and dark. “That's what eats at me, Tate. What'll it do to him?”

A shiver raced through her. “I can't answer that.” Surprised at how uneasy she'd become, she picked up her cup and tried to warm her suddenly chilly hands. “But whatever happens, it will be Matthew's doing, his choosing, not an ancient curse on a piece of jewelry.”

L
ONG AFTER
B
UCK
had gone off to find her father, his words and his worries haunted Tate. She couldn't dismiss them as absurd or mildly hysterical. She understood that the belief itself, the reality of it was what created legends.

And she'd believed once. When she'd been young and softhearted and ready to dream, she'd believed in the possibility of magic and myth and mystery. She'd believed in a great many things.

Annoyed with herself, she poured more tea, tepid now as she'd forgotten to close the thermos. It was foolish to regret a loss of naïveté. Like childhood games, it was something that was set aside with time and knowledge and experience.

She'd learned the reasons behind such legends as Angelique's Curse. Indeed that was part of her fascination for her work. The whys and hows and whos were as important to her as the weight and date and fashion of any artifact she had ever held in her hands.

Innocence and wide eyes were lost perhaps, but her education hadn't diminished her curiosity or her imagination. It had only enhanced it, and given it a channel.

Over the years she, too, had gathered information on Angelique's Curse. Bits and pieces of research she had
eventually filed away on disk. More, or so she had thought, out of a sense of organization than curiosity.

It didn't have the renown of the Hope Diamond, or the cache of the philosopher's stone, yet its story and travels were interesting. Following the trail of any artifact gave a scientist facts, dates and a glimpse of the humanity of history.

From Angelique Maunoir to the count who had condemned her, from the count after his death to his eldest daughter, who had fallen from her horse and broken her neck on the way to a tryst with a lover.

Nearly a century had passed before it had turned up again in verified documentation. In Italy, Tate mused, where it survived a fire that had destroyed its owner's villa and left him a widower. Eventually it had been sold, and traveled to Britain. The merchant who purchased it committed suicide. It came into the hands of a young duchess who apparently wore it happily for thirty years. But when her son inherited the necklace, along with her estate, he drank and gambled away his fortune and died penniless and insane.

And so the necklace had been purchased by Minnefield, who had lost his life on the great Australia reef. The necklace had been assumed lost there, buried in sand and coral.

Until Ray Beaumont had found an old, tattered book and had read of a sailor and an unknown Spanish lady who faced a hurricane aboard the galleon
Isabella.

Those were the facts, Tate thought now. Death was always cruel, but rarely mysterious. Accidents, fires, illnesses, even poor luck were simply part of the cycle of living. Stones and metal could neither cause nor change it.

But despite all the facts, the scientific data, Buck's fears had translated to her, and had that well-groomed imagination working in overdrive.

Now the storm seemed eerie with its keening wind and lashing waves. Every distant flash of lightning was a warning that nature continued to thrive on possibilities.

The night seemed to warn that certain of those possibilities were best left untapped.

More than ever she wanted to contact Hayden, to call
on a fellow scientist to help her put the
Isabella
and its treasures, all of its treasures, back into perspective. She wanted someone to remind her just what it was they had. An archeological find of significant importance. Not a witch's curse that seduced.

But the night was wild and full of voices.

“Tate.”

She had the unpleasant experience of discovering just what it felt like to jump out of her skin. After she'd knocked over her cup, spilled lukewarm tea into her lap, she had the presence of mind to swear as Matthew laughed at her.

“Little jumpy?”

“It's hardly a night for visitors, and you're number two.” She rose to grab a towel from a storage cabinet to mop up the spill. “Buck's probably upstairs, trying to wrangle a card game. What are you—”

She looked at him for the first time, saw that he was soaking wet. His shirt and worn jeans clung to him and dripped water heedlessly on the floor.

“You swam over? Are you insane?” She was already grabbing more towels as she berated him. “For Christ's sake, Lassiter, you might have drowned.”

“Didn't.” He stood cooperatively as she rubbed the towel over his hair and muttered at him. “I had an uncontrollable urge to see you.”

“You're old enough to control your urges. Go to Dad's cabin and get some dry clothes before you catch a chill to go with your insanity.”

“I'm fine.” He took the towel, looped it around her neck and used it to pull her to him. “You didn't really think a little squall would stop me from keeping our date?”

“I had the mistaken belief that common sense would outweigh lust.”

“Wrong.” His lips curved as they met hers. “But I wouldn't turn down a drink. Got any whiskey?”

She sighed. “There's brandy.”

“Good enough.”

“Put a towel on the bench before you sit,” she ordered
as she turned into the adjoining galley to locate the bottle and a glass. “You just left LaRue alone on the
Mermaid?
”

“He's a big boy. The wind's dropping some anyway.” Pumped up by the swim and the storm, he took the brandy, and her hand. “Want to sit on my lap and neck?”

“No, thanks very much. You're wet.”

Grinning, he tugged her down and nuzzled. “Now we're both wet.”

She laughed, and found it amazingly easy to give in. “I guess I should consider the fact that you risked life and limb. Here.” She angled his face with her hand so that her lips could fit nicely over his. On a little murmur of approval, she sank into the kiss. “Warming up?”

“You could say that. Mmm, come back,” he muttered when she lifted her head.

When he was satisfied, he cuddled her head on his shoulder, smiling as she toyed with the silver disk on the chain around his neck.

“I could see the light in here from the
Mermaid.
I kept thinking, she's in there, working away, and I'm never going to get any sleep.”

Finding it lovely to be snuggled in his lap, she sighed. “I don't think anyone's going to get very much sleep tonight. I'm glad you're here.”

“Yeah?” His hand slipped nimbly up to cup her breast.

“No, not because of that. I wanted to . . . mmm.” Her mind slipped quietly out of gear as his thumb teased her nipple through her dampened shirt. “How is it you always know just where to touch me?”

“I've done a study on it. Why don't you turn off that machine of yours, Red? We'll go lock ourselves in your cabin. I can show you a terrific way to ride out a storm at sea.”

“I'm sure you could.” And it was ridiculously easy for her to envision them tucked into her bunk, riding the waves, and each other. “I need to talk to you, Matthew.” Greedily she angled her head to give his busy mouth freer access to her throat. “I never realized I had such a hair trigger sex drive.”

“Looks like you needed my finger on your trigger, sweetheart.”

“Apparently.” Because that idea was more than a little unnerving, she shifted and rose. “We do have to talk.” Determined to remember her priorities, she took a steadying breath and tugged her shirt back into place. “I was going to try to find a way to get you alone tomorrow.”

“That sounds promising.”

“I think I'll have a brandy, too.” It would give her a minute to compose herself, she decided. At a safe distance, she poured a second glass, easily adjusting to the sway of the boat. “Matthew, I'm worried about Buck.”

“He's getting his balance.”

“You mean he's not drinking. Okay that's good, that's important, even if he is facing his problem for you instead of for himself.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Take the blinders off.” She scooted onto the bench from the opposite side. “He's here and he's dry because of you. He feels he owes you.”

“He doesn't owe me jack,” Matthew said flatly. “But if it helps keep him from drinking himself to death, that's fine.”

“I agree, to a point. Eventually, he'll have to keep himself sober for himself. That's not going to happen as long as he's so worried about you.”

“About me?” With a half laugh, Matthew sampled the brandy. “What's he got to be worried about?”

“About you finding Angelique's Curse, and paying for it.”

Annoyed to have the recklessly cheerful mood that had driven him into a stormy sea shattered, he dragged a hand through his wet hair. “Look, as long as I've partnered with him, he's wanted that damn necklace. He worried about it, sure, but he wanted it. Because my father wanted it.”

“And now you do.”

“That's right.” He knocked back more brandy. “Now I do.”

“And for what purpose, Matthew? Underlying it all, the
nonsense about spells and witches, I really think that's what's eating at Buck.”

“So, now it's nonsense.” He smiled a little. “You didn't always think so.”

“I used to believe in the Tooth Fairy, too. Listen to me.” With some urgency, she closed her hand over his. “Buck's not going to feel easy in his mind or his heart as long as the amulet is an issue.”

“Don't ask me to forget it, Tate. Don't ask me to make a choice like that.”

“I'm not.” She sat back, sighed again. “Even if I could convince you, I have to work on my father, probably LaRue. Even myself.” With a restless movement of her shoulders, she glanced over to the monitor. “I'm not immune to the fascination, Matthew.”

“You've been writing about it.” Intrigued, he nudged at her to get a better look. “Let me read it.”

“It's not finished. It's rough. I was just—”

“Let me read it,” he repeated, “I'm not going to grade you on it.”

Huffing a bit because she felt exactly like a schoolgirl facing a quiz, she sat back out of his way.

“How does this thing work?” he asked after a moment. “I never had much use for computers. How do you turn the page?” Absently, he glanced down as her fingers quickly tapped. “Got it.”

Thoughtful, he read from beginning to end. “Pretty cut and dried,” he murmured, and put her back up.

“It's a paper,” she said testily, “not a romance novel.”

“Until you read between the lines,” he finished, and looked back at her. “You've been giving it a lot of thought.”

“Of course I have. Everyone has, though nobody talks about it.” With a few expert taps, she saved her file and shut down. “The fact is I want very much to find the amulet, see it myself, examine it. It would be the find of any professional lifetime. Truthfully, it's been playing on my mind so much that I've revised my entire thesis around it.”

She turned back with a weak smile. “Myth versus science.”

“What are you asking me, Tate?”

“To reassure Buck, and I guess to reassure me, that finding it will be enough for you. Matthew, you have nothing to prove. If your father loved you even a fraction of the amount that Buck does, he wouldn't want you to ruin your life on some useless vendetta.”

Torn between comforting and convincing, she framed his face in her hands. “It won't bring him back, give you the years you lost with him. VanDyke's out of your life. You can beat him if that's still important to you just by finding the necklace. Let that be enough.”

He didn't speak for a moment. The war inside was so familiar he barely registered the rip of battle. In the end it was he who broke contact.

“It isn't enough, Tate.”

“Do you really think you could kill him? Even if you managed to get close enough, do you really believe you're capable of taking a life?”

His eyes glinted as they sliced to hers. “You know I am.”

She shivered as her blood chilled. There was no doubt in her mind that the man looking at her now was capable of anything. Even murder.

“You'd ruin your life? And for what?”

He shrugged. “For what's right. I've ruined it before.”

“That's so incredibly ignorant.” Unable to sit, she shoved out and paced the room. “If there's a curse on that damned thing, this is it. It blinds people to their better selves. I'm calling Hayden.”

“What the fuck does he have to do with it?”

“I want another scientist here, or at least I want to be able to consult with one. If you won't find a way to reassure Buck, I will. I can find a way to prove to him that the amulet is just an amulet, and that if and when it's found, it will be treated as a relic. With the scientific community backing me, that necklace will be put in a museum where it belongs.”

“You can toss it back into the sea when I'm done with
it,” Matthew told her, and his voice was cold and final. “You can call a dozen scientists. They're not going to stop me from dealing with VanDyke my way.”

“It always has to be your way, doesn't it?” If it would have done any good, she would have thrown something.

“This time it does. I've been waiting half my life for this.”

“So you'll waste the rest of your life. Not just waste,” she said furiously. “But throw it away.”

“It's still my life, isn't it?”

“No one's life is theirs alone.” How could he be so blind? she wondered bitterly. How could he turn the beauty of these past weeks into something as ugly as vengeance. “Can't you stop and think, for just a moment, what it would do to other people if you manage to succeed in this insane idea? What would happen to Buck if you get yourself killed or spend the rest of your miserable life in prison for murder? How do you think I would feel?”

“I don't know, Tate. How would you feel?” He pushed away from the table. “Why don't you tell me? I'm interested. You're always so goddamn careful not to tell me anything you feel.”