Saturday was postcard perfect. Cloudless, vivid blue sky, mercury barely above seventy, and just a hint of a sea breeze. Were it not for The Weather Channel’s steady flow of hurricane updates, I’d never have guessed a two hundred and fifty-mile-wide destructive monster spiraled our way. The Weather Channel had send reporting crews to locations along the entire strike zone and they alternated live reports of current conditions, warnings, and survival tips. In the lower latitudes, a television meteorologist explained, hurricanes traditionally gained speed as they approached land. Not only had Hailey gained speed, but she’d also gained strength and it was predicted that she’d soon be upgraded to a category four storm. And like a bullet headed for a target, this storm had Rumton in its sights. It hadn’t bothered to zig-zag across the ocean like many hurricanes did before making landfall.
Pop returned from Millie’s house, where he’d boarded windows and helped move patio furniture inside. “I’ll say it again, Lass. You really need to leave. Drive back to the city. But you need to go now. You can’t wait until the weather turns foul to get on the road.”
I rinsed out Flush’s water bowl in the kitchen sink and refilled it. Bandit stood by, waiting, while I did the same with hers. I looked at Pop. “I appreciate your concern, I do. But I want to stay with you. I’m here for the duration. Besides, it may not even hit here.”
“Or it might,” Pop said. “If it does, it’s going to do some serious damage. You won’t want to be ‘ere.”
“Are you leaving?” I challenged, though I already knew he wasn’t.
He shook his head no.
“What if the governor orders a mandatory evacuation? They’re saying she will, later today, for everybody east of Highway 17 and east of the waterway.”
He shook his head again. “I won’t leave. But that doesn’t mean you ought to follow suit. A storm of this size is deadly.”
“So why don’t you evacuate, then?”
“I ne’er do. I’m stubborn. Or stupid. Not sure which.”
Pop said if Hailey continued on her current path, probably half the townspeople would evacuate and some already had. Others packed up and were prepared to go. American Red Cross chapters were in the process of opening shelters at schools and churches in neighboring cities, but they were a good drive away. Shelters were to be avoided if at all possible, Pop said, unless you enjoyed sleeping on a hard floor with an untold number of strangers and restless kids.
“But the other half will stay?”
“Like me, they’re stubborn. Or stupid.” He smiled. “We’re far enough away from the ocean to give us a false sense of security.”
Somebody knocked on Pop’s back door. “Jaxie? You here? I got your birth control, Sugar.” Gertrude ambled in before Pop could answer her knock. “I heard you were back in town, and wasn’t sure if you’d be needin’ these, or not. Jane said she saw your car here.”
I took the prescription refill and thanked her, no longer self-conscious that everybody in Rumton knew I was on the pill. That was old news. “You always deliver door to door?”
“Only if somebody’s out of sorts sick, and during hurricane watches. It’s my way of doin’ community service. Now come, tell. Who is it? Is he here?” Gertrude scanned Pop’s place, figuring I had to be bopping someone. Disappointed at not spotting the male in question, she shrugged and headed out the back door, stiff from arthritis, when Justin strolled in. What was he doing here?
The pharmacist squinted up at him as she passed, and gave him the once-over, clucking her approval. “I figured it might be you!” she told Justin, patting his arm. “You’re all set, dear. She’s good to go.”
We watched Gertrude wobble-walk to her car with a side-to-side motion, as though her knees wouldn’t bend, off to make more drug deliveries.
“What was she talking about?” Justin said, dropping luggage on the floor.
“You don’t want to know.”
The men hugged. “You shouldn’t have come,” Pop told him.
“Figured you could use some help, since you have absolutely no intention of evacuating.”
“True.”
Justin turned to me. “Since you’re still here, I assume you’re not leaving, either?”
“You already knew I was here?”
He shrugged. “Sheila.”
“I’m going to kill her. So much for secrets.”
“I’d have told him, anyhow, Lass,” Pop confessed.
Before I could argue, Justin hugged me tight. He took my face in his hands, so I had to meet his eyes. “You’re not my type either, Jaxie Parker, but I can’t quit thinking about you.”
He let me go just as quickly and my body warmed all the way to the tips of my bare toes. Looking around, Justin stopped in place when he noticed the disarray. Pop and I had repaired and cleaned what we could, but damage from the break-in was still evident. After grilling Pop for details, Justin checked to see that the shotgun was loaded. Satisfied, he propped it back in the corner. “Your .45 automatic where you normally keep it?”
“Aye.”
“Loaded?”
“Aye.”
“Where would that be?” I wanted to know.
Pop nodded toward an antique piece of furniture in the den, on which the television sat. “In the slide-out, where a VCR is supposed to go. Just beneath the squawk box. Whoever came through ‘ere didn’t look in there. Probably would’ve taken it, if they ‘ad.”
“You know how to shoot?” Justin asked me.
“I can make a tight pattern in the center of a paper target from thirty feet with a short-barreled .38 Special automatic.” Both men looked at me, astonished. I shrugged. “Sheila and I took a gun safety course for self-defense. Instructor said we were naturals.”
“Well then,” Justin said. “Let’s get to work.”
He pulled pieces of pre-cut plywood from the attic. They’d been used before, and Hailey was the fourth major storm they were meant to protect against. The boards custom-fit all the large windows and they were numbered with spray paint, so it was just a matter of attaching them on the outside of the house with a cordless drill. Next, they moved patio furniture and outdoor plants into the garage. Justin placed the grill near the garage door and disconnected the propane tank to refill it.
“I’m feeling kind of useless here,” I told them. “What can I do?”
“First, you can rinse out and fill up all the water jugs you can find. They’re plastic milk jugs, but they’ve already been washed out,” Pop instructed. “After that, you can get started on some dinner for us tonight. Pull the steaks out of the freezer to thaw. Probably lose power anyway, so we need to eat what we can.”
“Bourbon and Coke okay for the marinade?” It was all I knew.
“Rather drink me bourbon, but go ahead, I’ve got plenty. Pull out some of those frozen rolls you bought too. We’ll let them thaw this time before you put them in the oven. And see if you can make us a salad or some such. Just don’t do anything that requires using heat. Me and Justin will do the actual cooking.”
I made a face at him. “Ha, ha.”
“Twasn’t joking, Lass. Those are the last four steaks.”
When they’d finished prepping the old house and it was time to go shopping, I offered to drive. I couldn’t cook, but two things I could do well were shop and drive.
People buzzed jovially around Billy’s store, talking and filling their carry baskets as though Hailey were an upcoming social event instead of a natural disaster. Batteries, jug water, canned goods, and Bud Light were in high demand, as were Slim Jims and Moon Pies. Billy gave away propane free, and a short line of people waited to fill tanks outside the general store. Others waited to fill their cars with gas at the single pump, and several filled gas containers to use for their generators.
Equipped with a full propane tank for the grill, groceries, and dog food, we headed to the Chat ‘N Chew to see if Bull needed any help.
“Justin! Good to see you,” Bull said. “Hey, Pop. Y’all help yourselves to some coffee and a slice of pound cake, on me. And Jaxie, nice job at the council meeting. I heard what you did. Sorry I missed it!”
Justin gave me a sharp look. “What did you do?”
“Tell you about it later,” I said.
“Stopped Lester in his tracks, that’s what she did!” Bull said. “Gladys told me all about it.”
I shrugged. “I simply provided the council with some information they were not aware of. They decided to postpone their vote on selling to Lester.”
Festive as the general store, Bull’s place buzzed with animated conversations while people watched Hailey updates on a single wall-mounted television. We settled onto swivel stools at the counter for coffee and pound cake. I gave Justin a nickel version of the information I’d obtained on Lester.
He frowned. “So your gut feeling about Lester was right all along.”
“Yes, it was. But that didn’t come through as a genuine pat on the back,” I said, feeling shortchanged. He should have been impressed by my initiative. He should have congratulated me. He should have apologized for doubting me.
“You need to tell Aaron.”
“I did it on my personal time. And I’ve proved Lester was truly hiding something. What’s the big deal?”
Justin did the frown thing again. “They know each other. Aaron and Lester.”
“What? How?”
He slowly chewed a bite of cake and swallowed before speaking. “I don’t know how. But Aaron’s assistant took some calls from a man named Lester in the past few months, before you were ever sent to Rumton. Chances are, it’s the same person. Too coincidental not to be.”
“I don’t get it,” I mused. “Why didn’t Aaron just tell me he knew Lester?”
“Don’t know who knew what, but right now we’ve got more important things to worry ‘bout.” Pop pointed to the television, where a weatherman delivered the latest Hailey update. “She’s a cat four now. Justin, I want you to take Jaxie and get out of ‘ere.”
We studied the small screen. The funnel of projected landfall had tightened as Hailey closed in on the coast. Rumton still sat at the center of it. Sixty to one hundred miles of coastline would get battered, but we would take a direct hit if the storm continued on its current path.
“I’ve never been through a hurricane before,” I mused.
“No reason for you to start now,” Pop said. “You both did what you came to do. It’s time to head on back.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said stubbornly. “I’m taking Monday as another vacation day. I already called the office and got approval from HR.”
Pop looked at Justin. Justin shrugged. “Can’t make her go, if she doesn’t want to. And if she’s staying, I am, too.”
We both looked at Pop.
He sighed, relenting. “Lord Almighty.”
Walking by us to deliver an armload of plates loaded with fried chicken, Bull dropped a cordless phone on the counter in front of Pop. “Avery’s lookin’ for you.”
Pop took the phone, listened for a minute, and green eye sparkling, passed it to Justin. Justin listened, asked a few questions, and passed the phone back to Pop, who assured Avery that all was well before disconnecting.
I felt left out. “What was that all about?”
Pop stirred some cream into his coffee. “Danger aside, Avery thinks Hailey could turn out to be a good thing for us.”
“What?” I said. “That’s crazy.”
“If we take a direct hit, especially at high tide, Mother Nature might open up Devil’s Tail for us,” Justin explained, excitement causing him to stand. “The storm surge could be huge. Maybe twenty-five feet, even thirty feet. But we’d need to help her along. Get the shipwreck remains out of there, so more than a trickle of water is flowing between Skirr Creek and the ocean, before Hailey hits.”
“So the shipwreck is like a giant plug that has stopped up the inlet?” I asked.
Justin sat back down to think. “Something like that. If we get the wreckage out of there, it would allow for a bigger flow of water. At which point, theoretically, the storm surge could completely open it up.”
“It’s a major powerful storm,” Pop said. “Could happen. Heck, it happened at Hatteras in 2003 with Hurricane Isabel. That storm opened up enough of a channel to get small boats through.”
Energized, they discussed the possibilities and envisioned what Rumton would be like as a water town.
“We don’t have enough time. We’d have to get the proper approvals to dig up the ship’s remains. Army Corps of Engineers and no telling who else. Plus a permit to get heavy equipment out there. Not to mention we’d need manpower. Lots of manpower.” Frustrated, Justin shook his head. “All we’ve got is one day. Tomorrow. There’s no way.”
“No way what?” Bull said, retrieving her telephone.
Justin relayed Avery’s phone call.
“You mean we’d have a way for boats to get directly in an’ out of Rumton, like they used to?”
“Well, theoretically, it’s possible according to Avery. But realistically, there’s no way we can get that wreckage out of there in one day.” He sighed and I could almost see his enthusiasm disappear with the heavy breath he expelled. “Even if we didn’t ask permission—you know, forgo the permits and beg forgiveness later—there’s not enough time. Not to mention, we’d destroy any historical value by randomly digging the ship out of there.”
“The Aldora was my ancestor’s. We have proof of that. Way I see it, she belongs to me now. What’s left of her, anyway.” Pop pointed to his head. “And I’ve got all the historical value I need right up here.”
Justin’s head snapped around. “Your ancestor’s? How do you–”
“Jaxie found a letter. And a poem.”
His head snapped the other way to look at me. “Written by whom?”
I removed the thick glasses from his face and stared straight into the green eye. “Your ancestors. Aldora, and her lover, Emerald Eye.”