Better Than Gold by Mary Brady Page B

getting.”
    Mia blew out a breath. “Of course it is.”
    She might have to gag that angel on her shoulder.
    * * *
    W HEN D ANIEL GLANCED at the woman beside him on the bench, she looked deflated, as if she were tired of shouldering the bravado necessary to keep a project this size on schedule.
    “Was it something I said?” he asked quietly.
    “Yes, it was.” Her light blue eyes reflected the morning sky and for an instant he thought he might be able to gaze into them over a cup of coffee or even a glass of wine. Something he never thought he’d do again—stare into a woman’s eyes.
    He quickly changed his thoughts. “I think I said something like, the more I hear, the more complicated this whole investigation is getting.”
    “That’s the gist.”
    “Wouldn’t finding out a pirate was buried here be beneficial for the town, a tourist attraction?”
    “Yeeees,” she drew out the word. “The town needs the monetary boost tourists will bring. Skeletons were not part of the timeline for—well—for profitability.”
    He watched her closely, trying to figure out if there was something else behind her words. On the surface they seemed self-serving, but there was also an almost bleak tone to her voice, which made him suspect there was much more. “Earlier, you mentioned a dining room. A restaurant?”
    “That’s my goal.”
    “Are you a chef?”
    “Oh, no. Creating food takes more imagination and certainly more skill than I have. I’m a businesswoman. Can’t you tell?” She gestured to her demolition attire. “Hotel and restaurant management.”
    “Does the place have a name?”
    She gave a soft snort. “I chose it before all this got started and now I’m a bit mortified. I thought I’d be clever and call it Pirate’s Roost.”
    Her smile, though embarrassed, shined bright like the sun off the water. It was clear to see she was proud of what she was doing here, had great hopes for success.
    “So a pirate in your wall would complicate things?”
    She brushed the toe of her shoe against the concrete of the sidewalk. “I’m on a tight timeline. There have already been so many delays, and if the Roost is not finished in time to draw tourists this season it will be hard to keep things going over the winter. Plus things can get a little sketchy around here when the hopes of treasure stirs things up.”
    “So if I got out of the way, the Pirate’s Roost might have a chance to stay on schedule.”
    “It would help a lot.”
    “I’ll check out the crypt. I might only need a few days with the site, a week at the most.” She might have masked a gasp with a cough, but he wasn’t sure. “I’ll need to get the contents of the boxes examined to see what the remains can tell me.”
    He sat back and watched the goings-on in the harbor. Sometimes gathering information on a site meant letting the indigenous population say what they needed to say. He let silence ask the next question.
    “I really need to get the demo and remodeling finished as soon as possible.”
    He nodded.
    A dingy bounced against the hull of one of the fishing boats as someone on board worked to secure it to the side of the boat.
    “In a way,” she continued, “the town’s survival depends on getting the village brought up to the twenty-first century. This is, we hope, the first of many projects.”
    “And if this turns out to be a pirate who hid a treasure?” He glanced at her. “Will the whole town turn up?”
    She leaned her chin in the palms of her hands. The sun glistened golden in her hair and the wind blew the loose curling locks across her cheek, made pink by the morning breeze. He wanted to tuck the hair behind her ear. He wanted to tell her everything would be all right, but he knew he did not have that power anymore, in fact never had that power.
    “Not all of the folks here are crazed by pirate lore, but enough to make my life difficult, and maybe yours.” She nodded across the street at the two teenagers with their