Paradise Island: Complete Edition (20 page)

“Oh, Jack,” I said, tears in my eyes, though I did not hold them back now. “If I make you tell me your darkest secrets, I’ll have to tell you mine, and I’m not sure I’m ready.”

Jack moved closer to me and put an arm on my shoulder. “It’s okay, Sophie, we don’t have to talk about it ever if you don’t want to. I’m just telling you some of the things I’ve been told. Maybe sometimes it’s best to ignore our demons than face them. I don’t know. I really don’t know.”

I moved closer to him as well and I let him put his arms around me as I put my head to his chest, listening to the sound of his heart beat, feeling that warm feeling of safety again. I didn’t know why I trusted him, or felt so safe around him. Perhaps it was because we both had secrets we had kept hidden for so long. Maybe we were kindred souls. Two broken people, that after finally finding each other could make one another whole.

But such thoughts were foolish, weren’t they? The kind of thoughts only a heroine in a novel could get away with, not anyone living in the real world.

We didn’t say anything for the longest time and I just basked in the warmth and smell of him. I never wanted to let go, but in the end I did. Tomorrow we’d continue our search for Josie’s remains and that was enough. I held her last journal close to my heart as I laid down in bed. I thought about what her last thoughts must have been, whether it was horrific surprise or resigned acceptance.

The next day I got up early and the whole process started again. We got something to eat, and after not much conversation, just a meaningless word here or there, we stood by the sliding door and looked upon the view outside. There were clouds up in the sky, which meant rain wasn’t too far away.

“We better get this done before the storm comes,” Jack said and I agreed.

Today’s digging session was a bit more resigned than yesterday’s. Yesterday I was excited by the prospect of unearthing something, but today my mind was filled with doubts, and each shovel full of dirt was hard work. But I kept on digging despite my reservations, letting every muscle in my body work hard despite my desire to give up. It was only the second day, and it’s not like we had unearthed the whole of the surroundings. I just hoped she wasn’t buried under the church.

After a particularly grueling session I had to stop and sit on a patch of untouched land. I breathed hard, sweat pouring all over me, which was now cooling pretty fast because of the chilly wind. Before, the wind didn’t bother me because I was busy working, but now that I was still, the chilly wind hitting the moisture of my sweat made me shiver a bit. I wiped away the sweat from my face with my shirt and hoped that would help a little. Jack joined me pretty soon and handed me a bottle of water. I gratefully drank from it.

I asked Jack if he knew anything about the foundations of his house, whether the old church/house had a basement, because his current house did not.

“Not as far as I know. I remember when I first came here. It was a pretty run down house, and now that I know that it used to be a church, it makes sense why it looked so peculiar. But there was no basement when I came here. Only stone floors. If those were there with the church originally I highly doubt that anybody could be buried beneath them easily. Our best bet is the surrounding land. If indeed she was buried somewhere around here. Maybe the killer took her somewhere else. Out to sea maybe? In that case, we’ll never be able to find her.”

“If indeed she was murdered,” I said as an afterthought. “What if I’ve been wrong about everything?”

I laid back in the sand and looked up at the sky above. The dark clouds, moving slowly up above, confirmed my fears. A storm was coming, and with it all our work would be ruined.

I got up reluctantly after awhile, every muscle hurting like hell itself. I looked at the land before us with new eyes, pretending that I was seeing it for the first time. I tried to imagine a church there instead of this modern, sleek structure in front of me. I tried imagining what Josie must have seen as she entered that church. In my mind, a shadowy figure strangled her, and as she fought for oxygen, she clawed at the bastard’s hands until he bled.

We had dug up almost half of Jack’s property when the sound of footsteps made us both look up suddenly. It was a man I hadn’t seen before. He was older, in his fifties perhaps, and he walked up the hill. By the time he stood before us, he was breathing hard.

“I’m not as youg as I used to be,” he said after catching his breath. He breathed in slowly again. “You must forgive me.”

Jack and I got up and Jack took charge. I stood back behind him, wondering what all this was about.

“I am the mayor of this fair island of ours, Mayor Jude Weatherbee to be exact,” another slow deep breath. “I have come here to tell you to stop this foolishness at once.”

“Whatever do you mean, Mr. Weatherbee?” Jack asked in a British accent. He was still playing the part of the local.

“This travesty. This digging you are doing, it must stop. It does not look good for our community.” Weatherbee took out a handkerchief and coughed into it. I wondered if he was sick. He really shouldn’t have traveled here all by himself. Then I looked downhill and saw a car in the distance. It was a small one, looking like it was on its last legs, but at least it was something.

“With all due respect Mr. Weatherbee, this is my property and I have the documents to prove it. If you wish me to stop, you’ll have to draw up proper documents stating why I should.”

“Mr. Stark, I was hoping there wouldn’t be need for that. I was hoping you’d see reason.”

“And what am I supposed to see? Please enlighten me. I await with bated breath: why cannot I dig up my own yard?”

Mr. Weatherbee seemed at a loss for words. It did not look like he expected such resistance, such insolence from lowly home owners. After all, he was the mayor of our fair island. I had to stop myself from thinking such thoughts. Sophie, I told myself, you are being foolish. The man is just doing his job. But how did he even know we were digging here? We’d only started yesterday.

“Did Lucy send you?” I blurted out without thinking.

The look on Weatherbee’s face told me everything I needed to know. He was blushing, and looked mighty guilty. I wondered what favors she had offered in return for his loyalty. It didn’t take much imagination to figure it out. I only hoped for her sake that the favor would be due after he accomplished his mission, which wasn’t likely to be today.

“I, uh, such insolence! And for foreigners such as yourselves! That accent doesn’t fool me Mr. Stark! My mother is a huge fan of yours and always goes on about this and that. You should consider yourself lucky I haven’t told her you are living in our very midst! Do what I say or I shall have no recourse but to draw up the necessary papers and stop you by law.” Mr. Weatherbee turned to go, obviously very angry that he wasn’t getting his way, and that I could see right through his shenanigans.

“Do come back when you have the proper papers drawn up, Mr. Weatherbee!” Jack yelled after him in his natural American accent. “Until then I’ll continue digging on my own goddamn property!”

Mr. Weatherbee quickly squirted away. It was quite amusing seeming him flee as such, for he looked like he was going back to the hole he crawled out of.

“I guess we better hurry,” Jack said in a calm voice, much different from the one he used against Mr. Weatherbee.

“First the storm,” I said as I looked up at the sky. “Now this? Why does Lucy even care?”

“Maybe she’s just mad because you two had a fight?”

“No, there’s more to it than that. I did find it strange when I found her rifling through those journals. She knows something she isn’t telling, and I’m thinking she doesn’t want us to find out the truth, whatever that may be.”

“But how could she know anything about what happened sixty years ago?”

“Good question,” I said. “And I intend to find out the answer.”

I went back to the house, with a mission in my head. I was going to get dressed good and proper and I was going to confront Lucy about this.

“What do you plan on doing?” Jack followed me into the house.

“I’m going to confront her Jack and ask her about what’s really going on. I’m sick of all the secrets and lies on this island. I nearly lost my life because of them.”

Jack put his big strong hands on each of my shoulders and looked me straight in the eye. “This isn’t a good idea and you know it. The most useful thing we can do right now is finish what we started before all hell breaks loose. If we find nothing, fine. But if we do find human remains, they won’t be able to shut us up. I’ll call the proper authorities myself, and I’m not talking about the useless coppers that roam this island.”

“But I have to confront her about this. I want to know what the hell she’s thinking.”

“And do you really think she’ll tell you the truth?” Jack asked, an angry look on his face.

And he was right. Even if Lucy was involved or knew anything about it, she was hardly going to tell me anything.

“You’re right,” I said. “Let’s just continue digging and hope we find something.”

So that’s what we did, though every so often I had to glance down the hillside, in fear that somebody else was coming to stop us.

Sadly, after an hour or so it was impossible to continue because the dark clouds above had finally started what they came here to do. It started with a light rain, and then a sudden downpour. Then I saw lighting light up the sky. I stood frozen in fear and I threw the shovel down.

“Let’s get inside!” Jack yelled through the sound of thunder, wind, and rain.

I followed him into the house, both of us absolutely soaked. We took off all our wet clothes. Well, Jack took off most of his, dressing down to just his underwear, while I kept my shirt and pants on and ran into my room to get some dry ones on. The storm outside was absolutely raging and I could see it destroying all our hard word from my room. The holes we had dug up were filling up with rain. And the earth we had unearthed was settling back on the ground. A flash of lightning made me close my eyes and look away from the window. I put my hands over my ears for good measure to drown out the sound of thunder.

I waited, and waited, and when it finally came the force of it, not just the sounds, made me sit down on my bed pretty quickly. It felt as if the whole house was shaking. I wanted to hide beneath the covers, but now I had a safer place to go: Jack. I quickly came into the living room and found Jack by the stove. He had made hot tea for the both of us. We sat huddled together on the couch. Jack had thankfully gotten some dry clothes on. We held each other as the thunder roared on. I made him close the shutters before coming to sit down. Not only because of how depressing it was to watch all our hard work go to naught, but because the very sight of lightning made me freeze up with fear and dread. Compared to me, Jack seemed pretty calm.

“You aren’t afraid of thunder?” I finally managed to ask after a particularly loud one had stopped.

“No,” he said. “This house should be pretty secure against such things, but even if it wasn’t, being afraid wouldn’t really change anything, would it? Either the lightning hits you or it doesn’t. And thunder, that’s just the sound that comes after lightning, which is what you should really be afraid of.”

“You’re very rational about it all. And while I agree with you, I can’t help but be afraid.” Just as I said those last words I saw lightning flash outside through a small opening at the bottom of the shutters. I huddled closer to Jack, whose breathing was calm and serene, and covered my ears again. I felt safe in his warmth, his smell, his strength and his calm. The roaring thunder came and I breathed in slowly trying to relax.

“That’s it,” Jack said. “There’s nothing worth worrying about.”

Despite my reservations, after relaxing a bit, and not waiting frozen for the terrible sound, it seemed a bit more bearable. I wasn’t going to be walking around willy nilly without any cares in the world, but I could be sitting here being a little less afraid, and that was enough.

“Thank you, Jack,” I finally said. I wasn’t just thanking him for the advice about thunder and lightning, but for everything really.

“It was my pleasure,” he said and smiled. “Do you want to try watching the storm now? Should I open the shutters so we could enjoy the view?”

“I hope you’re joking.” I said and hit him in his arm.

He laughed and nodded. “Sorry, I’ve been told my sense of humor was a bit off.”

It took about an hour for the storm to pass, though it was still quite windy and rainy outside. I watched as Jack opened the shutters so we could see what the damage was. It was hard to see what was what, since it was pretty dark outside.

I turned off the lights and waited for my eyes to readjust themselves. Then I saw the terrible damage that had been done. It was muddy and wet, and everything was a mess. The holes we dug up were a lot less deep now and filled with rain water and wet muddy earth. My heart sank when I saw the terrible sight, and by the time the rain stopped, it would be even worse than it was now.

I sighed in frustration. “I guess all that work was for nothing,” I said.

Jack was awfully calm as he surveyed the scene. Not only was all our hard work almost undone, but his property looked like a mess as well.

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that. Nature has a way of revealing things that are meant to be hidden. Just like the sea washes up some of its secrets, I believe this rain will help us find anything that has been hidden here.”

I looked at him quizzically. “You’re joking, right?”

“Sorry,” he smiled. “That was Detective Morecock speaking, not me, Sophie. But who knows, maybe he’s more right than we know?”

“Who’s Detective Morecock, and why does he have that ridiculous name?”

Jack laughed. “That’s one of the reasons I like you so much, Sophie. I’m glad you don’t know who he is. But to answer your question he’s a detective I played in a miniseries. It was quite popular here.”

“I guess you can tell I’m not such a big fan of TV.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty obvious. Anyway, when the rain stops we can go out and take a look before the ground dries again. It should make our search a bit easier. Sure, it’ll be messier, but that’s half the fun.”