“Anything else you want to tell me?” he asked the young psychopath in front of him.

“Just to stop wasting your time. It’s not like you have the budget.”

“Thank you for the advice,” Will said with deliberate mildness.

Kyle’s face tightened a fraction before he turned to stare back out at the water.

“By the way, Kyle.” He waited until Vincent’s brother turned toward him before he finished what he had to say. “Perhaps you should talk to Anahera about her failures.”

Walking away before Kyle could ask him any questions on the topic, Will allowed himself a faint smile. It faded in the next wave of wind, the sand gritty in his -teeth… and the ghost of a -three--year--old boy whispering in his ear.

22

The rain began to pound down around four that afternoon. It still took an hour for everyone to return to the fire station, the toughest of the tough staying out till the last possible moment. Despite having been gone for eight years, Anahera recognized pretty much everyone from before she left.

The only exceptions were three outsiders who’d moved in during her time away. Strangely enough for a -self--absorbed and pretentious ass, Shane Hennessey had joined in the search, pairing up with a local who knew the area like the back of his hand. The soulful, -moody--eyed novelist straight out of a gothic drama was drenched to the skin when he came in.

Anahera passed him a mug of hot coffee, having become Matilda’s assistant in the task. The other woman had rallied and was once again making coffee and ensuring everyone logged their searches on the map Nikau had put up.

“Thank you,” Shane said with a smile, Ireland rolling through his words so thickly that Anahera could almost see the velvet green hills. “It’s pissing down, isn’t it? But that’s the rage of the wild for you.”

“You don’t strike me as the outdoors type.”

“I grew up walking over some green hills of me own.”

If he laid on the Irish any thicker, she’d be drowning in shamrocks. But Anahera played along. “Do you know Miriama?”

His smile deepened to reveal dimples in both cheeks. “I’m guessing you mean in the biblical sense.” Dancing eyes. “She’s too clever for me, alas. Not that I didn’t try to rob that particular cradle.”

Amused despite herself, Anahera was about to tell him to grab a towel when Shane shoved back his dripping hair again and said, “She knows what and who she wants, does Miri. And it isn’t a -washed--out novelist drinking himself to a slow death on some excellent whiskey.”

“The doctor, you mean?”

Shane lifted one shoulder in a move that could mean anything. “Doc’s only been around for a year. Pretty girl like that, I don’t think she was sleeping alone before he came along.”

“Shane!”

Looking up at the sound of his name, Shane said, “I’ll be off, then. Seems you’re too smart for me, too.”

“Wait.” Anahera put a hand on the -rain--soaked sleeve of his jacket. “Do you know who she was dating before the doctor?”

“No, but she had a watch with a platinum band that she started wearing a couple of months after she turned eighteen.” He absently tapped his wrist. “Most people took it for a pretty fake with colored stones, but I was born in the ‘right circles,’ as my sainted mother used to -say—-that watch is real and those stones are pink and blue diamonds.”

As Shane went to join the group that had hailed him, Anahera thought about what might lead a man to give a woman such an expensive -gift… and was hit by the memory of the diamond pendant Edward had given his mistress two months before he simply dropped in the street and never again moved.

The insurance documents for the pendant had been in his desk drawer, a drawer she’d had to empty after his death. He’d also bought the other woman a car around the same time, and begun to pay the rental on her home. The mistress had said it had all been done out of love. Maybe it had been, but Anahera wasn’t so sure it was for his mistress that Edward’s heart had beat.

Miriama, -though… she was as bright as a star. A shining creature who could make a man fall so deep that he’d lay treasures at her feet.

“The watch?” Matilda frowned when Anahera asked after the item of jewelry Shane had mentioned. “Yes, I remember it. She told me she picked it up at a market, but I knew it was a gift from that man she dated before settling with Dr. de Souza, the one she used to go to Christchurch to see.”

“Does Miriama still have it?” It should be simple enough to confirm if Shane was right about its value.

“I haven’t seen her wearing it lately.” Matilda poured another mug of strong black coffee. “But I don’t think she would’ve got rid of it. She loves that pretty thing, used to wear it all the time before she and the doctor became a couple.”

Not wearing one lover’s gift while with another? It was a sensitive thing to do. “Do you think you could look for it for me?” Anahera asked. “I want to show it to the cop, in case it helps him track down the Christchurch man.”

Matilda’s jaw firmed. “My girl wouldn’t just have gone off with him and left me to worry.” The words were censorious. “But I’ll look for you, Ana. You make sure you give it back for when Miriama’s home again.”