“You were trying to do the right thing,” Randy said.
Lewis nodded. “You were. How could you not take in your own father?”
“The prison official who called said he was dying, and he is. But he wasn’t as poorly off yet as he pretended to be. I should have known. The bastard’s lied to me all his life. He never cared about me, or my mom. Only himself.”
“And now he’ll spend what time he has left alone.” Michaela shrugged. “That’s not what I’d call a successful life.”
“No, it isn’t.” He looked at the ruins again. “All I ever wanted was to have a decent business, build a decent retirement. I wasn’t even certain I would ever get married. I’m still not. What kind of genes would I be passing on to my children?”
“Good ones,” Michaela said. “Because you’re a good man. You know that everything comes down not to what’s in the blood but what’s in the heart. It’s all in the choices you make.”
“Well, yeah.” Then he got a look that told her he hadn’t, until just then, really thought of it that way. “Thank you.” Then he turned his gaze toward the back of the property and the people gathered there.
“What’s going on?”
“They’re about to put shovels to earth. Want to watch?”
“I…look, my dad lied to me all my life. I don’t want you to tear up your tree based on anything that came out of his mouth.”
“We’re not,” Lewis said. He nodded to the truck. “Hop in.”
Randy got into the back of the truck with Terry. Lewis was careful as he drove the vehicle over the slightly bumpy terrain. Faces watched as they approached.
Clint Parrish, Adam and Jake Kendall, and Matthew Benedict surrounded Sean Kendall, who was operating a piece of equipment she’d never seen before. Apparently, it had the capacity to detect what lay beneath the ground. Sean had his company ship the device from Wyoming.
Lewis introduced Terry to the people he didn’t know. Michaela thought if she didn’t already love those two Benedicts, this would have done the job. They’d each been man enough to recognize their opinion of Terry had been based mostly on jealousy and were both able to find human compassion for the man.
They were, beyond doubt, the perfect men for her.
Everyone gathered around Sean. “There’s something down there, all right. It’s not very deep, either. There’s only one root that might be a challenge for you.”
By getting a glimpse of the screen, she saw lines and images that she was certain were exactly what the geological expert in their midst, Sean Kendall, was saying they were.
“We need to take it slowly,” Clint said. “There may still be human remains in that coffin. If there are, we’ll have to stop and wait for a team to arrive from Waco. I have them on alert, just in case.”
“Understood,” Adam said.
“Can you show us where to dig?” Randy asked.
Sean did just that, and then her guys and Matthew Benedict began the shovel work. They dug slowly, carefully, and Michaela wrapped her arms around herself as she waited.
“This feels strange,” Terry said. “A body? You think there might be a body in there?”
“I found some letters in a safe in the foundation of my house, letters left by my grandfather. His grandfather witnessed Ezra Powell, his brother, and Devlin Gowan, your great-great-grandfather, dig a hole and but a coffin in it.” Michaela shrugged.
“That’s what Lewis meant when he said y’all weren’t doing this based on my dad’s words.”
Michaela looked at him. “It is. And you’re right. This feels strange.”
The men continued to dig. They made one pile of loose dirt that slowly grew.
“I’ve got something. Right here.” Lewis indicated where his shovel had hit an obstruction. Randy and Matt flanked him, and together they began to remove the dirt from around an object that hadn’t seen the light of day since it had been placed there, all those years ago.
“The wood is mostly intact,” Terry said. “I thought it would have rotted.”
“Me, too,” Michaela said.
Enough of the lid was uncovered that Lewis got down on his knees and touched the wood.
“Intact, but very punky feeling,” he said. “I doubt we can lift the damn thing out, whole.”
“Understood,” Clint said. “See how much more you can unearth. Then we’ll see if we can pry it open.”
The men worked more carefully, using hands when they thought the shovels might do too much damage. Finally, the entire top was exposed. The small root Sean had mentioned ran through the narrow end of the box.
The men all brushed off their hands and stepped away from what indeed was a wooden coffin. Clint Parrish moved in and examined the box. Rusted hinges on one side told them which side of the lid would lift—maybe. A crowbar in hand, Clint knelt on that side and used his fingers to find a place to insert the thin metal edge of the tool. Adam took to his knees beside him and helped.
The eerie groan of rusted metal sent a shiver down Michaela’s spine. But it wasn’t the hinges that gave. It was the wood around them. When they began to lift the lid, wood and hinges separated.
“Oh!” No body, thank God. Apparently, there had been no remains interred on Powell land. That was Michaela’s first thought.
“Holy hell!”
Yeah, Terry’s words were her second thought. Gold coins, hundreds of them it looked like, lay within the confines of their grave, glistening more purely than she’d imagined they possibly could after all this time.
Sean stepped closer and looked down. Then he met Michaela’s gaze. “Congratulations. You’ve found the treasure of a lifetime.”
Despite what had been said the day before at Jenny’s, Michaela couldn’t quite wrap her head around what she was looking at.
“Me? But…”
“You. Your land. Your treasure. Finders Keeper’s. It’s a real thing, and it’s the law,” Terry said. “Well, unless there are markings that reveal the origin of the gold.”
“The man’s right.” Adam’s smile accompanied his words.
Michaela hadn’t
