With a renewed sense of urgency I raced to the cottage, retrieved the shovel from the basement, and sped over to the east side of the island. I ran into no one. Thank heavens.
The café had been dark when I passed, and Adam’s compound felt empty when I drove by. I wondered where everyone was. At the same time, I was relieved I had no need to explain my presence on the island to anyone, especially not to Adam. After finding the note, my defenses were down. If I saw him today, and he asked me to come back, I knew I would never have the strength to say no.
As I approached the entry point to the access road, I put the Navigator in low gear and proceeded with care. The road—barely qualifying as a passable hiking trail even in the best of circumstances—was in worse shape than ever. The vehicle continually bottomed out, and the tires spun, seeking purchase. Most of the snow had melted, but the mud was giving me even worse trouble. I certainly didn’t care to get stuck, so I gave up at about the halfway point. Putting the SUV in park, I said to myself, “Here goes nothing.” And then I hopped down from the Nav.
An owl hooted somewhere in the distance, and I jumped and cried out. Stupid bird. Tromping through the mud, I grabbed the shovel out of the back. And then I started down the road in the hopes of finally locating the spot where I’d seen J.T. that fateful October day.
An hour later, I’d walked down to the end of the road and back. But like before, when I’d ventured down with Adam and Max, every section of the forest looked the same as the next. I would spot a clump of scraggly brush along the tree line, sure that I remembered crouching by it when trying to hide from J.T, but then another ten feet later, I’d see an almost identical patch of gnarled weeds. Needless to say, things were beginning to look bleak.
At wit’s end, I began to break the forest into quadrants to make searching simpler. As I maneuvered around trees in each “section,” I kicked around at soggy piles of leaves and haphazardly pushed aside fallen timber, using the shovel. There were small drifts of snow here and there, and I circled around each, wondering if the small mound of dirt J.T. had created could be hidden under any. Next to an unusually high drift, I stepped on a waterlogged branch. It snapped in two, launching one end of the branch into the drift beside me.
I glanced down. And that’s when I saw it—a wet piece of black fleece material snagged in the crook of the broken branch. The material felt waterlogged and heavy as I peeled it away and lifted it. I recalled that J.T. had worn a black hoodie the day I’d seen him here. Could this piece of material be from the same article of clothing? It had to be, and there was one way to be sure.
I backed up to the tree line, using the drift as a marker. I crouched down as I had that autumn day. It certainly appeared as if this could be the same area. I estimated where J.T. would’ve been standing, walked to that spot, and with the shovel, started moving aside clumps of wet leaves. My impatience soon mounted, leading me to work faster and faster.
Suddenly my shovel hit into a raised mound of earth. A raised mound of earth. It was smaller than it had been in the fall, but I felt confident that this was the right spot. I was so happy I squealed with delight, did a little happy dance in the mud. I’d found it—the place where J.T. had buried the lockbox. And in a few short minutes, I would know what Ami Hensley had wanted buried at sea.
I angled the shovel into the ground and pushed with everything I had. Uh-oh. I encountered a problem I’d not counted on. Beneath the cover of leaves, beneath the muddy top layer of soil, the earth was frozen solid. The shovel was useless; nothing short of a backhoe would get through this dirt.
“Dammit!” I yelled, my voice echoing in the forest.
That damn owl hooted back, closer now, and I just about jumped out of my hide once again. Normally I would’ve laughed at my skittishness, but not this time. I felt utterly dejected and just stood quietly.
I obviously wouldn’t be finding out what was in the lockbox today. I’d have to wait until things really began to thaw to dig up Ami’s secret. But who knew how long that would take. Thwarted again, this time by nature, I had no choice but to give up and turn away.
Chapter Nine
Before I left the area where J.T. had buried Ami’s lockbox, I scoured around for rocks at least the size of a pack of playing cards, some even bigger. And then I used what I’d accumulated to build a ring around the mound so I’d easily find it again. My ring of rocks looked pretty good, kind of like an ancient burial ring, but I was worried they might get dislodged and scattered by animals. Now that I’d located the right spot, I wasn’t taking the chance of it disappearing back into the landscape again.
I needed something more substantial, so I headed over to the parked Navigator and began to search in the back for something I could use. There were a few of those triangular reflectors, but they’d stand out too much. The bright orange and reflective edges would surely draw Max’s attention if he were to venture down here. No, I needed something more subtle. Substantial yet subtle. What to use, what to use. I continued to paw through car stuff,
