late 1700s, into the early 1800s. I’ve been going through them, pretty carefully, and I’ve come to some interesting conclusions.”
“Such as?”
“I’m hoping you have time to look them over yourself, and we’ll see if your conclusions jibe with mine.”
“You don’t want to give me a clue?”
Boy, he really wanted to. But . . . “I don’t want to influence you. Maybe I went off some shaky ledge.”
“You’ve got my attention. I’d love to play with them.”
“How about I scan you a few pages, just to give you a start? I should be able to come in, maybe the end of the week, bring the ledgers to you.”
“You could. Or Max, the currently time-outed Sellie and I could come up Friday evening, have a weekend at the beach and I can play with them.”
“Even better. But there’ll be no strawberries if they cause this reaction.”
“Usually she loves them, but girls do have their moods. I’ve got to go unshackle her, get us out of here. Send me what you can, and I’ll take a look.”
“Thanks. And . . . good luck.”
Following his morning agenda, he went up for his laptop. He sat out on the terrace, in view of Sandcastle, his trusty Mountain Dew on the table, as he scanned through his e-mails.
He opened one from Sherrilyn Burke first, began to read her updated report on Justin Suskind.
The man hadn’t spent much time at work since the last report, Eli noted. A day here and there, a handful of out-of-office meetings. The most interesting, Eli found, had been to a law firm where he met with an estate specialist. And stormed out, obviously angry.
“Didn’t get the answers you wanted,” Eli sympathized. “I know just how you feel.”
Through the report, he followed Suskind as he picked up his kids from school, took them to the park, to dinner, then home. His brief visit with his wife hadn’t gone any better than his meeting with the lawyer, as he’d left in visible temper to speed away.
At ten-fifteen the night before, he’d left his apartment with a suitcase, a briefcase and a storage box. He’d driven north out of Boston, stopping at an all-night supermarket for a pound of ground beef.
He’d made a second stop an hour later, veering off the highway to a twenty-four-hour box store where he’d purchased a box of rat poison.
Ground beef. Poison.
Without reading further, Eli surged to his feet.
“Barbie!”
He had a moment of sheer panic when he didn’t see her on the terrace. Even as he raced forward, she scrambled to her feet from where she sat at the top of the beach steps. Tail happily wagging, she trotted to him.
Eli simply went down to his knees, wrapped his arms around her. Love, he realized, could sometimes come fast, but it didn’t make it any less real.
“Fucker. The fucker.” Leaning back, Eli accepted the adoring licks. “He’s not going to hurt you. I’m not going to let him hurt you. You stick with me, girl.”
He led her back to the table. “You stay right here with me.”
In response she laid her head in his lap, sighed in contentment.
He read the rest of the report, then e-mailed back his own, which started with:
The bastard plans to poison my dog. If you’re in Whiskey Beach, don’t come here. I don’t want him wondering who you are. I’m done waiting around for him to make the next move.
He gave her an overview of what his research had unearthed, and the basics of what he’d done, and planned to do.
Planned to do rather than what he wanted to do right that minute—go straight to Suskind and kick the living shit out of him.
Temper still raw and ripe, Eli took his work and his dog back inside.
“No more going out by yourself until this bastard’s behind bars.”
He pulled out his phone when it rang, unsurprised to see Sherrilyn’s name on the display.
“This is Eli.”
“Eli, Sherrilyn. Let’s talk about this idea of yours.”
He heard the unsaid “stupid,” shrugged. “Sure. Let’s talk.”
He wandered the house as they spoke because it served to remind him what he was fighting for. And it had come down to a fight for him, even if he was denied the satisfaction of physical blows.
He walked to the third floor, and the curved glass of the gable where he imagined writing one day, once the fight was done and won, once he’d secured safety for all he loved, and his own self-respect.
“You’ve got some valid points,” he said at length.