It was long past midnight, and the Mediterranean waters looked like ink as they lapped against the W. W. Hale’s white hull. The lights of places like Saint-Tropez and Nice were tiny diamonds in the distance, and it felt to Kat as if she and Hale were closer to the moon than any other living soul or thing.
“You didn’t hear her today, Hale. She’s so…good.”
“You said that.”
“She’s seen everything. She’s done everything. Hey”—she pointed at him—“maybe a Catherine the Great? You know, Uncle Felix posed as a curator at the Cairo Museum one year, and—”
“For a while there, it looked like you were giving up on this,” he whispered.
“I know, but I thought that if we—”
“Kat…”
“Yes?”
“Stop thinking.”
Of all the things that had been asked of Kat in her fifteen years, that was perhaps the hardest. But she tried—she really did. To forget about the lapping waves and deep blue water. To ignore the ticking clock, the mounting odds, and the tiny voice in the back of her mind saying, I kissed you. I kissed you. I kissed you.
And you left.
“You’re the only friend I’ve ever had, Hale. You know that, right?”
“Don’t lie—”
Kat shook her head. “If I were lying, it would sound a lot better than that.” She saw Hale draw a breath and ease toward her, but Kat talked on. “In my family, we take our cons seriously, you know? Like Grandmother’s pearls, or the good china. They’ve been handed down for years. Centuries. Someone taught Uncle Eddie, and Uncle Eddie taught my mom. And Mom taught Dad, and Dad taught—”
“You.”
“Yeah,” Kat admitted while Hale inched closer.
“And you taught me.”
Kat laughed and turned back to the water. “Sorry about that.”
But Hale wasn’t laughing when he said, “I’m not.”
Standing there in the moonlight, Kat saw him set his jaw and turn toward her.
“Someone did them first, Kat. Don’t forget that. Someone, somewhere did them first.” He shrugged. “So we’ll do something first. Who knows? Maybe a hundred years from now, two crazy kids will be debating the merits of the Kat in the Hat.”
“Really? That’s the name you’re going with?”
He laughed and gripped the rail. “It’s a work in progress.”
Out on the water, without the heat of the sun, Kat’s breath fogged in the chilly air.
“Do you think it’s real?” he asked.
“I know it’s real. I’m the one who carried it out of the heating duct, remember?”
She shivered, and Hale placed his arms around her, gripping the rail on either side, pressing her tight between the cool rail and the warmth of his chest. “Not the Cleopatra—the Antony. Do you think it’s out there somewhere?”
“Do you think that two thousand years ago there was an emerald so big you could cut it in half and get two stones that size?”
“Do you think there was a love so big it could curse anyone who went against it?”
“It’s just a story, Hale.”