Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 84102 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 421(@200wpm)___ 336(@250wpm)___ 280(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84102 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 421(@200wpm)___ 336(@250wpm)___ 280(@300wpm)
It hadn’t existed when Eddie was born.
Why would he have lied?
She followed David’s lead and let the question go for now. For now she was David Hawthorne’s lady, and that seemed like such a nice thing to be. She would worry about the job later.
Chapter Eight
David studied the poem he knew so well. It was the one that all the treasure hunters claimed Montez had written as a siren call to them.
Life begins in the forest where water rushes toward the sea
The green ceiling gives us cover and it was here I buried our treasure
Our greatest gift to the world
But my life began where music plays, where I met with the lamb and the people spoke clearly
Four by four by two
He went back to his notes. The poem was several pages long, but most of it didn’t matter. The key was in the first stanza and the last. Montez liked to play around, to bury the important clues inside the noise.
Not noise, exactly, but most of the poem was a restating of his life principles.
The numbers were interesting, though. What he’d discovered in the notebooks was lots of playing around with numbers.
Playing. He glanced at the clock. The sun had gone down a while ago. Could he get them out of dinner and back into their bedroom, where he intended to play with her for the rest of the night?
He needed to focus. This was supposed to be the easy part—the studying.
“Can you grab the blue one?” David asked. Luis was sitting closer to the big stack of notebooks Eddie had discovered.
“Sure.” Luis hopped up and had the correct book in his hand. “You got something?”
“I don’t know.” He took the notebook and flipped through it. “How much do you know about the treasure hunters who come here?”
He forced himself to not look back to where Tessa was sitting, reading a murder mystery and probably thinking about how she would take down the killer.
“A little. I’ve been following a couple of blogs. Most of them think the actual hunt begins in Buenos Aires, since that’s where Montez was born.” Luis took the seat in front of him. “They make some pretty farfetched connections. The hospital he was born in is a couple of blocks over from a bar where many of Argentina’s great singers played. He lived for the first several years of his life close to it, and his mother worked there as a server for a few years. There’s a classic juke box in the club, and if you play the song numbered thirty-two, it’s an old Madonna song. ‘La Isla Bonita.’”
He rolled his eyes. “I suppose that’s what sends them to the island. That’s bullshit. First, Montez hated all pop music, especially American pop, and second, it wouldn’t be so easy. Four by four by two might equal thirty-two, but it’s not a math problem. At least not that easy of one.”
Great treasure waits for the one who sees the possibilities, who finds the door and opens it
The truth of my life revealed to the one who searches for it
It wasn’t great poetry, but then Montez hadn’t been known for creative writing. His political discourse had changed the landscape in some places.
The truth of my life…
The truth of his life hadn’t been back in Buenos Aires. He hadn’t truly become the man he’d wanted to be until he’d come to this island. This was where he’d lived.
“So you don’t think this thing starts on the mainland,” Luis prompted.
The annoyance in his assistant’s tone made him wonder how long he’d been silent. He’d probably been pretty quiet since he’d gotten back from town. He’d danced with Tessa and then they’d sat on the roof and talked a while. He’d told her it was about giving her some cover for walking away without a word, but he’d wanted that time with her. He’d wanted to pretend they were just another couple enjoying a vacation together.
He glanced over to the window seat where Tessa sat, her e-reader in her hands. She hadn’t wanted to go back to their room. She’d walked right in here with him as though she wasn’t going to let him out of her sight.
The light from the lamp made her skin a tawny gold, her ebony hair caressing her shoulders. She was the real treasure.
He had so little time with her, and she’d proven that she could walk away.
Something was playing around in her head, but she wasn’t ready to talk to him about it yet.
“I think this island was everything to Ricardo Montez,” he mused, forcing himself back to the problem at hand. “He had a home in Buenos Aires, but not once did he set up a hunt for Eddie there. It was only here. This was where he lived, where he was happiest.”
“What kind of treasure are we talking about?” Tessa had put her tablet down and swung her legs over so she was facing him. “You’ve mentioned it a couple of times, but I still don’t completely understand it. Is there an X marks the spot? Are you looking for a map?”