The stand mixer sat on the center of the kitchen table, its wire whip moving the chocolate cake batter round and round in the enormous stainless steel bowl. Sitting on the table next to the mixer was a large bag filled with gold coins. Danielle sat at the table and watched the batter for a moment before dipping her hand into the bag and pulling out a handful of coins. She dumped them into the bowl and watched as they went round and round with the batter until it turned bright gold.
Just as she grabbed another handful of coins, she heard a beeping sound. She paused a moment. It beeped again. Persistent and irritating, another beep.
Danielle reluctantly opened her eyes and yawned. Another beep came from the alarm clock on her nightstand. Half awake, she reached over and swatted the top of the clock. It stopped beeping.
Rubbing the sleep from her eyes with the back of her hand, she looked up to the ceiling and wondered if Walt was awake yet. It was in that moment she remembered he had proposed the previous night. She smiled at the thought and tugged her blankets up and under her chin, holding them tightly.
“I can’t believe I’m not telling Lily,” she said aloud, yet didn’t for a moment consider changing her mind. For some inexplicable reason, she felt she and Walt needed this time alone—this time together to explore their relationship without being scrutinized by those closest to them.
Before heading downstairs, Danielle quickly dressed for the day, selecting jeans and a pullover sweater. As she zipped up the jeans, she thought about how Walt often referred to them as farm pants. She laughed at the thought but didn’t consider wearing something else. I love Walt, she thought, but I’m not giving up my jeans.
She found him downstairs sitting at the kitchen table, with a cup of coffee and a cinnamon roll. He was already dressed for the day.
“Good morning,” Walt greeted her as she walked into the kitchen.
“Morning! I could smell the coffee when I was coming down the stairs. So glad I taught you how to use that coffee maker.” Danielle headed toward the counter to pour herself a cup. Before she reached it, the glass coffee pot floated up from where it sat and poured coffee into an empty mug sitting on the counter. Danielle stopped in her tracks and stared at it a moment and then looked over at Walt.
“Here, let me pour you a cup,” Walt said with a chuckle as he remained seated. He leisurely pulled off a hunk of cinnamon roll and popped it in his mouth.
Danielle laughed and said, “That is both sweet and lazy of you.” She watched as the pot floated back to the coffee maker.
“You might want to do your own cream,” Walt suggested. “Not sure about my aim; I might overfill the cup.”
“You crack me up,” she said under her breath as she added cream to her coffee.
Walt watched Danielle walk to the table. “How did you sleep last night?”
“I slept okay. My alarm clock woke me up in the middle of a dream. I was baking our wedding cake.” Danielle took a seat at the table and then reached over and snatched a portion of Walt’s cinnamon roll.
“What flavor?”
“Chocolate and gold.” Danielle took a sip of her coffee.
“Gold?” Walt frowned.
Danielle shrugged. “It was weird. But it did make me think of something when I was getting dressed this morning. Maybe Aaron Michaels could make the gold rings—or at least, he might know who can.”
“I don’t seem to recall who that is.”
“He’s a jeweler in Astoria. We could stop at the bank before we leave today. I can take out some of the gold coins, and after we get the marriage license, we can stop over at his store and talk to him. If he can make the rings, then we can just leave the gold coins with him.”
“Rings?” Walt asked.
Danielle took a sip of her coffee and then said, “I think we should have two wedding bands made—one for me and one for you.”
“You don’t think people will find that odd, us wearing matching rings?”
“You don’t have to actually wear yours—maybe keep it in your pocket. Or on your key ring. But if I have a wedding band, you should have one too.”
“Alright—of course, I don’t actually have a key ring to put it on,” he reminded her.
“You need one. Every grown man has a key ring. Anyway, I need to give you a key to the house and a key to the car.”
“I don’t think it would be a good thing if people see me driving your car.”
Danielle shrugged. “Okay, then we buy you your own car.”
“One thing at a time,” he told her.
Zara glanced down the driveway and spied a vehicle backing up, coming in her direction. She stepped into the bushes along the sidewalk, out of sight, and watched as it pulled onto the street and then drove away. There was a man and woman in the vehicle; the woman was driving. After the car disappeared from sight, she stepped back on the sidewalk and walked about fifteen feet, until she was standing in front of the house. If she wasn’t mistaken, this was Marlow House, the bed and breakfast the two women in the café had been discussing last night.
When researching Chris Glandon online, she had come across an article about a murder at Marlow House, where one of the guests, a Chris Glandon, was initially implicated as a possible suspect. She was fairly certain it was the same Chris Glandon she was looking for, because after that incident, the Glandon Foundation opened its office in Frederickport. But then he disappeared again, leaving the foundation under the management of someone named Chris Johnson. If she wasn’t mistaken, that was the man whom the women were discussing in the restaurant last night.
“Are you lost?” a woman’s voice asked.
Zara turned toward the voice. It was a woman wearing a dark blue jogging suit, her black hair pulled up on the top of her head and twisted into two knots, and a terrycloth headband wrapped around her forehead to catch her sweat. She was slightly out of breath and just stepping up onto the sidewalk as if she had come from across the street.
“Umm…no. Just doing a little sightseeing. This is a really cool house. Is it yours?” Zara nodded toward Marlow House.
The woman looked up to the house in question and back to Zara. “No. That’s actually the first house ever built in Frederickport. It’s a bed and breakfast now, Marlow House.”
“It’s impressive. Well, I’d better get going. I parked my car down at the pier, and I have some friends waiting for me,” Zara lied.
Susan Mitchell watched as Danielle Boatman entered the bank on Thursday morning. She was with Walt Marlow. Susan wondered briefly if Walt was here to deposit more of Danielle’s money into his account. A few minutes later she discovered the real reason Danielle was at the bank—to get into one of her safe deposit boxes.
“That’s the one with the gold coins,” Susan said as she led Danielle back into the vaults, leaving Walt sitting alone at her desk.
“Yes, it is.” Danielle trailed behind Susan.
“Does this mean you’ve found another buyer for the coins?”
“I’m not really in a hurry to sell them anymore.”
When they reached the safe deposit box, Danielle handed Susan her key. After Susan opened the box, Danielle said, “I don’t need to take this in the room alone. Let me just take a few out, and you can put it back.”
Susan watched as Danielle quickly removed one coin at a time. She would inspect each coin before returning it to the safe deposit box or dropping it in her purse. It only took her a couple of minutes. Susan resisted the temptation to ask Danielle what she was going to do with the coins.
“I always get the feeling I make her uncomfortable,” Walt told Danielle after they returned to the car.
“You mean Susan?” Danielle climbed into the driver’s side of the vehicle and slammed her door shut.
“Yes.” Sitting in the passenger seat, Walt fastened his seatbelt.
“I think she was dying to know what I was going to do with the coins.”
“You didn’t tell her?”
Danielle shook her head. “No. But I did what you suggested. I only took coins that were well worn.”
Walt’s cellphone began to ring. “I’m getting a phone call,” he said with surprise.
“Well, answer it.” Danielle started the car.
Walt looked at his ringing phone and said, “It’s Ian. I must say, it’s convenient knowing who’s calling before answering it.”
“It’s going to go to voicemail if you don’t answer it soon,” Danielle warned.
Walt accidentally hit speakerphone after answering the call and then said, “Hello, Ian.”
“Hi, Walt. Where are you? I went over to your house, and no one was there,” Ian asked.
Danielle glanced briefly to Walt. She could clearly hear Ian’s side of the conversation.
“Danielle and I are on our way to Astoria,” Walt told him.
“What are you going there for?” Ian asked.
Walt looked over to Danielle, who sat in the driver’s seat, steering the car down the road. “We’re going to see a jeweler.”
Danielle glanced briefly over to Walt again and arched her brows inquisitively, but didn’t comment.
Before Ian could ask why they were seeing a jeweler, Walt said, “Danielle wanted to see about making some of the gold coins into a ring for her—using a few of the well-worn ones.”
“I don’t know much about coin collecting, but are you sure she couldn’t get more for the coins, even the worn ones, by selling them instead of melting them down?”
“I told her that, but you know Danielle, when she gets an idea, there’s no talking her out of it.”
Danielle furrowed her brows and flashed Walt a frown. He resisted the temptation to laugh.
“So what did you need?” Walt asked.
“I just got off the phone with my agent. He loved your manuscript.”
“Didn’t you just send it to him?” Walt asked.
“Yes, yesterday, after I talked to you. I emailed it to him. He told me he stayed up all night reading it. He couldn’t put it down. I have to say I’m a little jealous; I haven’t heard him this excited in a long time.”
Danielle’s frown turned to a smile. She listened intently to Ian’s every word.
“What does this mean, exactly?” Walt asked.
“He wants to talk to you. I think you have an agent—if you want one,” Ian told him.
When Walt got off the phone, Danielle said, “I think that is amazing about the agent—but what was that all about, it was Danielle’s idea, you know how once she gets an idea, blah, blah, blah…”
“I did it for you,” Walt told her with a grin.
“For me?”
“You were the one who wanted to keep this a secret for a while—even from Lily. If Lily and Ian think it was my idea for you to make a gold band from what was once my gold coins, you don’t think they might figure it out?”
Danielle considered his suggestion for a moment and then let out a sigh. “I suppose you’re right.”
“Of course I am,” he said smugly.
Unable to suppress a smile, Danielle said, “I’d tell you not to get so full of yourself, but dang, you got yourself an agent! Jon Altar’s agent! Woo-hoo!”