Cider Brook Read online

  She hoped she was being paranoid, because she cringed at the idea that Justin Sloan had her personal notes and musings about Benjamin Farraday.

  Gritting her teeth, Samantha adjusted her backpack and started back down the narrow road toward Knights Bridge. Maybe she would get lucky and find her journal in a ditch before she reached the spot on the town common where Caleb had dropped her off. But she didn’t think she would. She kept glancing back at the Sloan farmhouse, and by the time it was out of sight, she was pretty damn sure that Justin had her journal.

  Ten

  Samantha was out of sight by the time Justin headed back to the building site on Grace Webster’s old property. It was the place where he’d spotted Samantha that snowy March afternoon—no idea who she was, no idea he would ever see her again. How fast everything could change, he thought as he made his way to the construction trailer. He hadn’t liked leaving her to trek into town on her own, but except for getting tired of the weight of her backpack, she would be fine.

  She wouldn’t find her journal, of course, but she would eventually figure out he had it. He was confident of that. And when she did, she’d come find him and no doubt want to throttle him.

  That could be interesting. Smart, feisty Samantha Bennett trying to throttle him.

  He did feel mildly guilty about not returning her journal to her. He’d planned to tell her he had it, but while he was poking around inside the mill, he’d received a text from Dylan letting him know that Loretta Wrentham had called. She had more information on their treasure hunter. Dylan had ended the message succinctly: We need to talk.

  A cold wind blew fallen leaves across the driveway and whipped the tarp still covering the lumber. The crew was making good progress on the framework for the house. Justin stepped into the small trailer, used mostly for storage of tools and supplies and occasional shelter from the weather.

  Dylan was standing inside looking at the plans for his house and barn that were taped to the wall, marked up here and there in pencil and ink. “When I was playing hockey for a living,” he said, “I never thought I’d own a house. I lived in rentals. Loretta talked me into buying in Coronado.”

  “Olivia says it’s nice out there,” Justin said. “All that Southern California sunshine would get on my nerves after a while.”

  Dylan grinned at him. “Loretta feels that way about New England’s changeable weather. She likes her Southern California sunshine. One ice storm, and she’d be on a plane west.”

  Justin knew Dylan’s first trip to Knights Bridge early that spring had involved ice—and a testy encounter with Buster, the stray who had adopted Olivia. Justin hadn’t met Dylan until a later visit.

  He unfolded a brown metal chair and set it next to a box of nails but didn’t sit. “What did Loretta have to say about Sam Bennett?”

  “She worked for my father briefly. He fired her after you told him about her coming here. Samantha is the granddaughter of Harry Bennett. I’m not that familiar with him. He was an explorer and adventurer—”

  “Antarctica,” Justin said. “Harry Bennett led a near-fatal expedition there about fifty years ago. I watched a documentary on Antarctica while I was painting woodwork one night.”

  Dylan sighed heavily. “Then you know more about him than I do. Loretta says he died a few months before my father died. His wife died way back. They had two sons.” Dylan glanced out a small window. “Samantha’s father is the older brother, Malcolm, an underwater explorer and salvage expert. His wife’s a marine archaeologist. Samantha’s their only child. She spent her early years on their research vessel.”

  “Not quite Knights Bridge.”

  “Not quite.”

  Justin could hear the guys working outside. In his mind, he’d shirked his duty that morning by charging off to the mill with Samantha, but they wouldn’t see it that way. Normally he was the first on the job in the morning and the last off in the afternoon, and the circumstances were unusual—the fire, the woman camping out on his property without his knowledge or permission.

  Daredevil Harry Bennett’s granddaughter.

  No wonder she refused to believe she’d been in serious danger yesterday.

  “Is Samantha an expert in pirates or did she make that up?” Justin asked.

  “She didn’t make it up,” Dylan said. “Loretta said she told my father that old Harry got her interested in pirates and undiscovered sunken pirate ships.”

  “Especially ones that sank with treasure on board, I bet.” Justin plopped onto the chair, stretched out his legs, pictured Samantha’s ashen, soot-smeared face. Her big eyes. She’d been genuinely shaken, but she’d also bounced back quickly from her ordeal. A fast thinker. Good in a crisis. A Bennett, he thought, gritting his teeth. “Does Loretta know what Samantha’s been doing since your father let her go?”

  “Loretta checked out what she was up to right after my father fired her but hasn’t since. She was in Scotland helping her parents explore for sunken World War II ships and submarines in the North Atlantic. They have a long-term grant, but it doesn’t look as if Samantha continued working for them.”

  “I asked her what she does,” Justin said. “She gave me some vague answer about researching, curating and archiving.”

  Dylan went over to the open doorway, as if he needed air. “It could be true.”

  Justin got to his feet. “Did your father know the Bennetts?”

  “Not personally. Loretta says he knew their work. He got into treasure hunting in his fifties. It was a second career for him. A passion. It’s not like Samantha comes from a family of bartenders. He would have wanted to know about them. He would have wanted her to tell him.”

  “But she didn’t, and he found out the hard way.”

  “Loretta told him.”

  “That would be the hard way,” Justin said.

  It was a halfhearted attempt at levity—maybe not even that much—but Dylan seemed to appreciate it. “She says she didn’t pull any punches with him. She told my father that Samantha had to go. No choice. Not telling him she was a Bennett on top of sneaking out here was too much.”

  “How did Samantha explain herself when your father confronted her?”

  “I don’t know that she did. He might not have given her much of a chance.”

  Justin shrugged. “I’m not sure I would have, either. What would you have done in his position?”

  “I’d like to think I wouldn’t have been caught off guard in the first place, but you’ve met her. You see what she’s like. She doesn’t come across as someone with a lot of secrets.” Dylan zipped up his jacket as the wind picked up again, blowing more leaves, flapping the tarp on the lumber. “Maybe she’s figured out it’s easier not to get into her background. Being a Bennett comes with a certain amount of baggage. Maybe she just wanted to carve her own path.”

  Justin pictured Samantha fishing his padlock out of her jacket pocket and handing it to him. She didn’t strike him as a woman who had any issues carving her own path.

  Dylan glanced back, his gaze narrowed on Justin. “Does Samantha know you’re the one who told my father she’d been out this way?”

  “Not that I’m aware of, but I think she’d have said something if she knew.”

  “She’s alone here, and outnumbered by the rest of us.”

  “Doesn’t seem to bother her.”

  “We’re not that threatening,” Dylan said with a grin.

  “Neither is she.”

  “Loretta says my father liked Samantha and looked forward to working on pirate-related projects with her, but he couldn’t take the chance that the Bennetts were up to something that would blow back on to him.” Dylan stepped out of the trailer and looked back inside at Justin. “Do you have any idea why she’s in Knights Bridge?”

  “Pirates.”

  “She wants to make a pitch to me to help her find a pirate shipwreck?”

  Justin joined him outside. “I don’t know about that,” he said, then told Dylan about her journal, addi
ng, “I haven’t given it back to her yet.”

  “But you didn’t read it?”

  “Not the type.”

  “I’ve never heard of Benjamin Farraday,” Dylan said. “Have you?”

  “No, but I’m not up on my pirates. I was going to tell her I have her journal, but I held off once I got your text that you’d heard from Loretta.”

  “You weren’t sure if Loretta had given me good reason to check out this journal. No, I’m not the type, either, to read someone’s private research notes and musings.” Dylan grinned suddenly. “Damn, though, it’s tempting.”

  “No argument from me,” Justin said.

  “Where is it?”

  “At my place. I’ll return it to her, then. No rush. I have plenty to do around here this afternoon. Samantha isn’t going anywhere until she gets her journal back. What about you?”

  “Olivia called right before you got here. Jess is at the house.”

  The sister with the wedding on Saturday. Also Olivia’s only sister. “Any problems?” Justin asked, not sure he really wanted to know.

  “Olivia didn’t sound too concerned,” Dylan said. “She says Jess is having her requisite nervous breakdown about the wedding. Maggie’s there, too.”

  Justin gave a mock shudder. “Stay here, then. I learned in sixth grade never to get in the middle of any combination of the O’Dunn sisters and the Frost sisters. It’s a rule I live by.”

  Dylan laughed. “I have a feeling you’re not exaggerating. I probably should grab a hammer and get you to put me to work. It’s what you’d do in my shoes.”

  Knowing Dylan, Justin figured he was perfectly capable and would do fine helping out. “What’s Jess freaking out about? Anything in particular?”

  “I gather that her anxieties boil down to whether the plumbing at Carriage Hill can support the number of guests. If it doesn’t, Jess says she’ll hear it from her grandmother. Why, I don’t know. I didn’t ask about that part.”

  “Audrey Frost hates old houses,” Justin said, matter-of-fact. “She remembers Carriage Hill when it still had an outhouse.”

  “That was a while ago, I assume.”

  “Not in Audrey’s mind. The plumbing’s fine, by the way. The previous owners planned to turn the place into a bed-and-breakfast themselves and renovated accordingly. I can reassure Jess if it would help.”

  Dylan shook his head. “It wouldn’t help. Her anxiety doesn’t really have anything to do with the plumbing. That’s just what she’s hanging it on.”

  Justin agreed but said nothing. Dylan had to know by now that the two Frost sisters were prone to anxiety, although Jess less so than Olivia and neither one of them as much as their mother. Over the years, Louise Frost had gone from an occasional case of nerves to suffering from full-blown panic attacks. Over time, she’d gotten to the point where she was hardly able to leave town by herself. She wanted to take trips with her husband of thirty years but couldn’t manage to go shoe-shopping in Northampton. She finally entered therapy, and a couple of months ago, she and Randy had headed out to California, one of Louise’s dream trips.

  Dylan was frowning, looking preoccupied. An anxious future sister-in-law and a disgruntled former Duncan McCaffrey employee would do it. Then Olivia walked up the driveway, waving at him, and Dylan smiled.

  “Jess just left,” Olivia said, joining Justin and her fiancé on the patch of grass between the trailer and the stack of lumber. “Maggie distracted her by talking about adventure travel. Jess thinks it’s right up your alley, Dylan, after your years playing hockey and swimming with the corporate sharks.” She hooked her arm into his. “You’ve had a hockey stick to the teeth a time or two. Whisking adventurers off to Newfoundland should be simple by comparison.”

  He pulled her close to him, his mood obviously lightening with Olivia here. “I got out of the NHL with all my teeth intact, thank you.”

  “Good,” Justin said, “because my nephews are looking forward to playing hockey with you this winter. We’ll be filling the ice rink on the common before we know it.”

  “A New England winter,” Dylan said. “Can’t wait.”

  “You’ll love it,” Olivia said, grinning.

  Justin winked at them. “You two could always go on a long honeymoon.”

  “It’s a good thought,” Dylan said, “but Buster would miss us.”

  “I don’t know.” Olivia leaned into his arm, obviously at ease with him. “Buster might like Southern California. Can you see him getting loose at your house and charging through the Hotel del Coronado?”

  “I can, yes. He’d have a blast and cost us a fortune—or get us thrown in jail.”

  “He did just fine when we were in San Diego. Maggie doesn’t mind looking after him. He liked Loretta when she was out here. Maybe she can come dog-sit.”

  Dylan’s eyebrows went up. “Loretta? Dog-sit?”

  Olivia kissed him on the cheek. “Kidding.”

  Soul mates, Justin thought. The pair of them. “All set for the wedding?” he asked.

  Olivia nodded. “Maggie’s meeting me here soon. We need to run into Hazelton’s for a few things. Is Samantha still in town?”

  “As far as I know,” Justin said, keeping his tone neutral.

  “You’d know. There are Sloan spies everywhere.”

  Justin grinned at her. “It’s true.”

  Olivia looked at him with amusement. “You all wish you struck fear into the hearts of everyone in Knights Bridge, but you don’t. You never did.”

  “I’m crushed.”

  Dylan lowered his arm from Olivia’s waist and nodded to the trailer. “I need to talk to you before Maggie gets here.”

  “Is something wrong?” Olivia asked, frowning.

  “Loretta called.”

  “Oh. I see. And not about dog-sitting, I take it.” Olivia sighed, serious now. “I’m guessing she called with more information about Samantha. That must explain the dour looks I noticed when I came up the driveway.”

  “Dour, Liv?” Justin made a face, wanting to lighten her mood. Samantha wasn’t her problem, either. “What the hell’s a dour look?”

  “Troubled? Irritated? Preoccupied?”

  “More like all of the above,” he said with a grin. “So, Liv, if you lost your personal journal, and I found it and told you I hadn’t read it, would you believe me?”

  “You? Yes, not because you wouldn’t like to read it but because you’re not particularly introspective yourself. You wouldn’t be that curious about someone else’s personal ramblings.” Olivia paused a moment, then added, “Your brother Eric, though. He’d have read it in a heartbeat.”

  “Probably true. If it wasn’t a diary but research notes—”

  “Research notes? On what? Justin, are we talking about Samantha?”

  He wished he hadn’t brought up the journal. Wasn’t even sure why he had. “Never mind. I’ll let you and Dylan talk. I need to get back to work, anyway.”

  Olivia hesitated but said nothing as she followed Dylan into the trailer.

  Justin was relieved when the door shut behind them. Dylan’s presence in Knights Bridge had already changed the town. His friend Noah Kendrick’s would, too, when he and Phoebe returned from California. There was no question in Justin’s mind that Phoebe wouldn’t be moving full-time to San Diego or that Noah wouldn’t be coming back East with her.

  Samantha hadn’t met Dylan or Noah when she’d worked for Duncan—Dylan would have remembered—but she must have heard about them. What if her reasons for slipping into Knights Bridge two years ago and again now had nothing to do with pirates and instead had to do with two wealthy, single men?

  Seriously, Justin thought—what were the odds the gold coin he’d found at the cider mill had anything to do with an eighteenth-century pirate?

  * * *

  Fifteen minutes later, Justin had sorted out a routine problem with the framework and taken a call from the electrician and was back by his truck when Christopher texted him that Samantha
had made it into town. Spies everywhere, indeed, Justin thought, but his humor was short-lived when Maggie O’Dunn Sloan, his sister-in-law, pulled up in her van, jumped out, slammed the door and pointed at him.

  “You, Justin,” Maggie said, her red hair pinned up, a flour-covered apron tied over dark jeans and a sweater. “Over here.”

  He ambled over to her. “What’s up, Maggie?”

  “You have to be careful about what you say to Mark right now. He repeats it to Jess, and then she gets into a state.”

  “Mark and I didn’t talk about anything that should worry Jess. Dylan said she was concerned about the plumbing at Carriage Hill. Mark and I didn’t discuss the plumbing, Maggie. Trust me.”

  Maggie didn’t back down. “You two discussed septic tanks.”

  Justin settled back on his heels, trying to remember. “Oh, yeah. We did. So?”

  “Jess had visions of the septic tank overflowing in the middle of her wedding.”

  “Even if it did, the leach field isn’t anywhere near where people are going to be standing—”

  “Justin.”

  He sighed. “The septic tank isn’t going to overflow, Maggie. Mark and I were talking about options for up here. We were taking into consideration zoning and the different ideas for using the barn as well as the house. Then we thought about the septic system at Carriage Hill as things get busier there. No big deal.”

  “Maybe not to you two.” Maggie pulled a pin out of her hair, then shoved it back in again, tightening things up some. “I know it was something for Jess to focus on because she was having a case of the jitters, and she’s fine now—but you can’t be talking about septic tank capacity and such right before our very first wedding at Carriage Hill.”

  “You sure Jess is the one with the jitters?”

  Maggie flashed her turquoise eyes at him. “I’m cool as a cucumber. Calm as ice. Always. I don’t get the jitters in my work.”

  He grinned at her. “Right, Maggie.”

  “I don’t, but you can think what you want to think.”

  “You and Olivia are partners now. The success of this wedding is important to—”