Page 10

Chapter Nine

“I have bad news.” Andrew returned from the hotel desk dangling two keys in his hand. “They only had two rooms.”

We’d found a small hotel three towns away from the San Sierra—best to keep a good distance from a crime scene. It was an old Spanish colonial home with uneven wood floors and plaster walls. If it wasn’t so rundown, it’d be charming, but the hotel was in need of some serious TLC. Still, it was what it was, and I’ve spent nights in much worse places than this. All I needed was a clean bed and a hot shower.

“Adriana, you can have your own room.” Andrew handed me a key. “William and I can share the other. It has a bigger bed.”

I was touched that Andrew was trying to be a gentleman and let me have some privacy. And I liked that he didn’t mind spending a night in the same bed with another man—a man who hadn’t sobered up during our thirty-minute ride. Judging by the alcoholic fumes wafting off of him, William needed a longer shower than I did.

“No worries.” I pressed the key back into his palm and snatched the other one. “William and I shared a double mattress until he went to Emory. We don’t mind splitting a room.”

I would have bet money that mattress was in the same shitty trailer my mom was still living in, and that the Toy Story sheets hadn’t been washed since the day I left for college.

Andrew’s confused face begged for an explanation, but I had no energy to share details. William’s and my miserable upbringing always brought up many questions, turning simple answers into a wearisome and dreadful story.

“We were dirt poor and had to share everything.” William pulled up the handle on his suitcase. “I’m hungry and in the mood to celebrate whatever you guys discovered today. Let’s meet there in a few.” He pointed at a restaurant and bar adjacent to the hotel lobby.

“Does our room have an en suite?” I asked.

“Sort of.” Andrew hoisted his bag onto his shoulder and took two of William’s suitcases while I picked up mine and another of William’s. “It’s shared with the neighboring room, but there’s a lock. Remember to unlock it when you’re done and lock your door when you return to your room.”

Yikes .

Our room was bleak but clean, with yellow walls, a chair, a double bed, a stack of clean towels on top of it, and a nightstand with a lamp. A window, covered with threadbare curtains, looked out on the street where we’d parked our Jeep. The bathroom had a basic shower, a small rusted-out sink, and a toilet that at some point in its life had been white.

William quickly washed, changed into a bright Hawaiian shirt and grey shorts, and skedaddled to the bar. A warm shower was god’s gift to me to scrub off the crypt’s dirt, cobwebs, and dead man leftovers. As I ran a bar of soap over my body, the memory of Andrew’s arm pressed hard against my torso made my pulse beat harder in my throat. I shouldn’t think about it, but my lascivious brain couldn’t help itself. I pictured Andrew’s hands and what they could do. I closed my eyes, and my hand slid over my breasts, down my stomach, and finally reached?—

Nope.

If I let my mind wander in a valley of sexual fantasies, it might journey into a territory of why don’t you find out ? And I didn’t need that. This was strictly a business affair.

With my hair wrapped in a towel, I did my best to save my dress. I applied mascara and burgundy lip gloss, and changed into yesterday’s floral dress with a sweetheart neckline, a fit-and-flare skirt, and cutouts on each side of my waist.

The hotel’s pub had a homely atmosphere, dimly lit with decorative hanging lights here and there, its walls covered with vivid artwork, and twinkling tea candles on the mirrored bar amid the bottles. I found William and Andrew in the furthest corner, a small chandelier dangling over their table.

William was scrolling on this phone while sipping from a glass containing brown liquid, and Andrew held one of the newfound letters in one hand and a pencil in his other. His sleeves were rolled up and his hair was wet from the shower. Oblivious to the loud pop music, clatter, and shouting around them, Andrew looked lost in his thoughts. With his eyebrows pulled together and mouth in a flat line, he wrote something in his notebook, then read more. He flipped the paper over and glanced up, his eyes immediately locking with mine. His face relaxed, and the corners of his mouth turned up as he lowered the paper. And there it was, the look he had had this morning when he’d seen me. A warm spring burst into my heart and my chest expanded as if a million flowers had bloomed inside of me.

“Any new interesting discoveries, Dr. Jones?” I slid into a chair beside him.

“Yes.” He placed his journal on the table and pointed at his last note. “In one of the letters to Augustine, Jorge mentions his return from a construction site, but it’s not clear where it was.”

“Another church?” I asked, scooting my chair closer to him.

Heat radiated from Andrew’s body, and his citrusy bergamot and powdery coumarin scents beguiled me. Was that how his bed smelled after he slept in it? Had sex in it? A hum went through my body, pooling low in my core. Some people you just knew would be amazing in bed. I bet Andrew was a master at using his fingers and his sultry mouth to unravel women and make them come undone…

“Judging by the details,” Andrew said, yanking me out of his bed and back into the present, “this space should be cathedral size.” He peered at me half-amused. “You okay? You look flushed.”

“It’s a little hot in here,” I said with as much conviction as I could muster, pressing my hand to my cheek. “What about the book?”

“A collection of short stories. It was specially bound for Jorge Pérez since it has his monogram.” He planted the tome before me.

Gold flowers and vine swirls on both sides decorated the black leather-bound book. In the center was a circle with the same motif that was on Jorge’s crypt. The interwoven JP and a cross above it. Five raised bands divided the spine into four compartments, each crowned with a different image: sun, cross, ship, and star. The inside pages were printed in two columns, with blue chapter initials three-lines high, embellished with red ornamentations. Notes, markings, and doodles in someone’s handwriting annotated passages.

I brushed my hands on my skirt to get rid of sweat, then traced my finger over the penciled inscription. “What does all this mean?”

“I’m not sure yet. But we have tonight to figure it out.” Andrew smiled. “Would you like to see the letters we found today?”

We . He said it as if we were partners in this venture.

I nodded like a sugar-high child, beside myself with excitement, though over what I wasn’t sure about yet.

Andrew slid the book aside and set the letters in its place. “Some of them don’t make much sense to me.” He picked one up and laid it flat on top of the others. “They start with the usual family greetings, and then list these.” He ran his finger over a sheet that looked like a page from merchant trade records. It had two columns. One with strings of numbers separated by periods, and the other with words.

“What are the words?”

“Description of goods. And this one is especially perplexing.” He took a paper out of his journal. “Dr. Garcia thought this note from his archive might be helpful. It’s from Augustine to his son and it has one line similar to these.” Pictographs of vegetation and fragments of architectural plans dotted the sheet. The bottom had a line with three numbers and one word.

“Do you know this word?”

“Horse.”

I looked at Andrew. “Horse?” He shrugged. “That’s not very helpful.”

Andrew passed me the next letter. “This is a drawing of a security system Augustine designed.” The page had ground plans and elevations of some apparatus, with pulleys and cog-wheel mechanisms, with accompanying notes. “Here he talks about the great device, which came to him in a dream. Also, something about him wanting to bring a skillful carpenter from Portugal.”

“Where was he planning to build it?”

“He doesn’t say.”

“William.” I glanced at my brother. “Do you want to look at these?”

His eyes flicked to the letter I held, then to his phone. “Not really.”

Smitten with today’s events, I had forgotten about the strange mood William had fallen into this afternoon. Guilt squeezed my heart. I should’ve spoken to him earlier in the room and figured out what was wrong. We were on a treasure hunt. He should be happy. I could ask now, but he wouldn’t be honest in front of Andrew.

The server stopped by our table to take our order. William and I ordered corn flour arepas stuffed with beef and vegetables, and Andrew asked for ajiaco , a chicken soup made with four different kinds of potatoes and guascas . When the dinner arrived quickly—thank goodness—Andrew hid the book and letters in his backpack. At first, we wordlessly dug into the food, then with our hunger sated, Andrew told us more about Augustine Pérez’s life.

“During his first successful robbery of a Portuguese ship,” Andrew said, pushing the empty plate aside, “Augustine spared one officer’s life. Francisco Ferreira was a cryptographer for the Portuguese military. He and Augustine became friends, and he taught Augustine code writing and helped him develop new codes, which Augustine used in his letters. Unfortunately, seven years later, his friend died.”

“What happened to him?” William gulped the remains of his rum and coughed, then lifted a hand, signaling to the server for another round. I was glad he was finally getting his curiosity back. Over dinner, while Andrew talked, I had watched emotions shifting across William’s face, from indifference to sadness to finally interest.

“He drowned in a shallow puddle of water.”

My hand went to my chest. “Did he pass out drunk?”

The server collected dirty dishes and cleaned our table with a wet rag.

“No. He was drugged with daturas by a thief.” Andrew wiped the table dry with the paper towels the server had dropped off earlier, and I couldn’t help admiring his sculpted forearms as they moved. He unrolled the protective canvas and placed his journal and the letters on it. “The drug comprises all the parts of the flower Datura. It stuns and disorients its victims. In high dosages, it induces a state of psychotic delirium, amnesia, and a burning thirst. Many drown as they try desperately to kill their thirst.”

A chill ran over my body, and I shivered despite the warm room. “That’s awful.”

“Yes,” Andrew said, dropping his notebook, the letters, and the book back in front of us. “Shall we continue?” He arched an eyebrow, his lips pulling into an inviting smile.

Even though I was tired, I wanted to stay for a while. I hadn’t contributed anything helpful, but nevertheless, I was having fun. “I was afraid you wouldn’t ask.”

* * *

Apart from the three of us, there was hardly anyone else left in the restaurant, the servers having cleaned all the tables but ours. From time to time my knee would knock Andrew’s, and eventually, it stayed pressed against his. Andrew’s shoulder flattened into mine as we sat close, looking over the sheets we’d found. Or maybe I ended up leaning against him? At some point, we huddled so close Andrew wrapped his arm around my back but quickly corrected his mistake and rested his hand on the back of my chair instead. Working with him as if I was his true partner and feeling the warmth of his body next to mine made me realize how lonely I had been for a while now. My entire adult life, really.

“Have you noticed how Augustine’s handwriting is different in some of the correspondence?” I reached over to take a letter from Augustine to Simón, leaning into Andrew and stealing as much of his touch as I could. My hair was in his face and he inhaled deeply, and I had a sudden urge for him to move my hair aside and trace his lips slowly over the back of my neck.

I returned to my seat and opened the letter. “You see how some words starting with M or S have more swirls.” I pointed at the sheet in front of me with a much-rigged capital M. Every spot of my body tingled where our knees, thighs, arms, and fingers were touching. I sure as hell knew half of my brushing against him was on purpose, and I couldn’t shake off the feeling that his was too. “And compare these Ds and Ls. His handwriting is the same in all of these except for some initial letters. And only,” I said with a triumphal grin, “to his sons.”

Andrew hummed, his gaze tracing words, then his mouth parted, and his eyes locked on mine. “You’re a diamond, my dear.”

Time slowed as we looked into each other’s eyes, and even though we came from different backgrounds and our lives would never fit together, the soft breeze in my chest turned into a gale as we shared an unmistakable connection. I wasn’t sure what to do with the longing that flared inside me. I didn’t want it, but it was there. I resisted the need to run my fingers across his stubbled cheek, to feel the fullness of his lower lip. There was a glint of challenge, an unspoken question in his eyes, which made me wish he would kiss me, made me want to mouth please .

Andrew blinked and leaned away to root around in his backpack. He must have realized that acting on our attraction would only lead to complications. He pulled out a gilt brass ring with letters and handed it to me.

“This is…” Andrew cleared his throat. “This is a broken cipher, but it’s likely useless to us. The top dial is missing.”

My pulse seemed to echo in my throat. Swallowing my relief and regret, I asked, “Where did you find it?”

“The cipher arrived with the rest of the items my trusted friends sent to me in Costa Rica. It belonged to Simón, and it was most likely used for these letters.”

I turned the heavy brass, examining it, then passed it back to Andrew. “Well, then we focus on these numbers and their meanings.” I gestured at the sheets in front of us.

“It’s probably like the Arnold cipher used in the War of Independence,” William slurred. His elbow was propped on the table, his cheek leaning heavily on his palm, eyes half closed.

“What?” I said, twisting in my seat. William was so quiet all this time, I nearly forgot he was with us. No, I actually did forget.

“Gosh,” he sighed, “for someone with such great memory, you sometimes surprise me. To find an encrypted word, you need a page number, a line number, and a word number on that line.” William waved his hand in my direction. “Remember you watched National Treasure with Rai and me? Well, the Ottendorf Cipher they mentioned is pretty much the same as the Arnold.”

A wave of sadness passed over me. This was why William’s enthusiasm had dimmed, and why he’d drunk so much since we’d arrived in San Sierra. This trip reminded him of the one who got away. William’s love of treasure hunts and his ex’s love for history had brought them together. When their four-year relationship ended, it destroyed William.

“Rai loved that goddam movie,” William said in a whisper almost to himself, looking away. He finished his rum and set the glass down with more force than was necessary, stood up, and swayed.

Time to go.

I pulled my lips into a kind smile and calmly said, “Honey, we should probably go to bed.”

It was a few minutes before ten, and I wanted to stay with Andrew, but my brother needed me.

* * *

I led William up the stairs and through the corridor, his arm thrown over my shoulder and mine around his waist, supporting his drunken body. I unlocked our room, and the two of us wobbled to the bed where William crashed face first on the pillow. Andrew waited in the hallway, holding my purse.

I walked out, quietly closing the door behind me. “Tonight was fun.”

“I enjoyed it too,” he said, handing me my bag. Tingles cascaded down my spine at the brush of our fingers. “Thank you for your invaluable help. You’re a natural at this.”

That was an absurd statement.

“Whatever.” I laughed, rolling my eyes good-naturedly.

“And I’m very sorry about your dress.” He wore a shy smile and rubbed his neck. “You looked beautiful in it.”

My heart did the same jolt from this morning, only this time stronger, and it vibrated somewhere in my core. The small hallway we stood in seemed to shrink in size, and the surrounding air went up several degrees. Heart pounding, I stared intently at him. I watched him swallow, his Adam’s apple bobbing. Andrew’s smile vanished, but his eyes were full of invitation. We were back to that moment earlier at the restaurant.

“Adriana,” Andrew said, his voice uncertain. His eyes swept over me, and my pulse turned into wild drumming. Something fierce and determined flashed over his face, and he wetted his lips. And I swear that was the sexiest thing I have ever seen. My stomach twisted with anxiety and hope.

“Yes?” I swallowed too. My whole body hummed with need. I wanted Andrew to haul me into his arms and kiss me. Not gently. Hard. Could I throw myself at him?

My back pressed the door and pushed it open, making me stumble back. The universe was giving me a sign to back away, not to muddle this trip.

The phone in Andrew’s palm rang, and a picture of the attractive blond woman hugging the little girl filled the screen.

“I’m glad we cleared up that you don’t have a wife.” I backed into my room.

“Me too. Good night, Adriana.” He inclined his head politely and brought his phone to his ear. I liked how my name sounded when he said it; smooth and seductive, like lazy morning sex.

With a last hungry glance at Andrew, I shut the door and pressed my back to it. My heart pounded so hard its sound vibrated my body. This morning Andrew was a smart, intriguing, and heartbreakingly handsome, unavailable man, and now he was a smart, intriguing, handsome, sweet man with a kind heart that stirred emotions inside of me I had no business having.