George was a friend of Tessa’s who I had met while I was in New York and had directed me to the Virginia museum in the first place. When the journal turned up, the old man directed me to a colleague of his, Percy, in New Orleans. There, I found out that I didn’t actually have Grendel’s journal after all.
I went on to tell Tessa the whole story about Holm’s and my trip to New Orleans, how we had taken down the drug lords there, found Lafitte’s ship, and rid the world of the Haitian zombie drug that had popped up on our previous mission once and for all. And, of course, how Percy had told me beyond a shadow of a doubt that the journal sent to me by that mysterious stranger in Virginia was a fake.
“Well, I’ll be,” Tessa sighed when I was finished with my tale. “That’s even crazier than I was expecting!”
“Crazier than the last one?” I asked, referring to Holm’s and my trip to Haiti, where we had first discovered the strange drug that had been at the center of both our missions before Birn was taken.
“I don’t know about that,” Tessa chuckled. “I’m not sure anything’s crazier than that, to be honest. But this one gives it a run for its money, that’s for sure.”
“Alright, then,” I laughed. “I’m glad that my job is at least somewhat entertaining.”
“Somewhat?” Tessa repeated, incredulous. “I swear, Ethan, you should write a book. Or more than one. People would pay good money to hear all this stuff. I should know. It’s kind of what I do for a living. And what I write about still has nothing on you.”
“I don’t know about that,” I chuckled, shaking my head. “I wouldn’t even know where to begin writing a book. That’s your strong suit, not mine.”
“I could write it for you, then!” she cried, latching onto this idea. “Yes, that’s a great idea. We could sit down, and you could tell me all your stories from start to finish again, and then I could convert them all to prose. I’m telling you, you’d be a real hit, Ethan. I bet Oprah would even put you on her book list or whatever.”
“Uh, why don’t we put a pin in that for now?” I asked, not sure how much I liked the idea of telling the world my life story. Even just telling Tessa was enough to get my heart racing, apparently, though I thought that that might have more to do with her than it did with me.
“Sure,” Tessa chuckled. “So, man, the journal is a fake, huh? I’m not sure how I feel about that. On the one hand, the fake one’s all messed up with so much stuff redacted that it wouldn’t do us any good, anyway. On the other… well, you still aren’t any closer to finding the real one.”
“Yeah, I had a similar reaction,” I admitted, thinking back to how panicked I’d been when I thought that it was the real journal that someone had ruined. “But I think I’ve settled on it being a good thing. Like Percy said, the fake one is ruined. At least now I know it’s possible that the real one is still out there and could do me some good, as you said.”
“I guess that makes sense,” Tessa murmured. “So what have you been up to since you got back from New Orleans? Resting, I hope. Oh, you didn’t go to Virginia without me, did you?”
“No, I’m not one to go back on a promise,” I assured her. “But I haven’t exactly been resting, either…”
I then proceeded to tell her all about Holm’s and my trip to the Keys, and the whole mess with Birn, and how it all seemed to tie in with New Orleans and Lafitte’s ship.
“Seriously?” she said when I was finished. “I missed all that? You’ve got to be kidding me. To hell with the Yukon. I wish I’d flown down there to hang out with you. Talk about a story!”
“I wish you had been there, too,” I chuckled, silently thinking that I wished we were always in the same place instead of dancing around each other across the continent. “But I seem to have a bit of free time on my hands, so I was wondering if you’d still be interested in accompanying me to Virginia?”
“Free time?” Tessa repeated. “Don’t you have to track down these Holland people?”
“I wish,” I sighed. “But we’re having trouble tracking them down. We have a lot of feelers out with airports and other agencies, and the like. But it’s been a couple of weeks already without anything, and these things can take time. Even if that is infuriating.”
I glanced down at the still open file resting on the round kitchen table between my elbows, its numerous pages scattered about and with Chester Holland’s overly-enthusiastic picture staring up at me in black and white with an altogether forced smile on his tanned face.
Yes, perhaps getting out of here and focusing on my other obsession would clear my head to help with the Holland case. It wasn’t like I was actually going to lounge on a beach somewhere. Even if I tried, I probably wouldn’t even last as long as Muñoz.
“Well, as sorry as I am to hear that a couple of crime lords are still running loose on the world, I couldn’t be happier to have an opportunity to see you again,” Tessa gushed, and I felt my own stomach flip a bit at the prospect of seeing her again. “I’ll hop on the next flight I can find. Should be sometime tomorrow.”
“That’s great news,” I said, all of my previous concerns about leaving Diane alone at the office while we were looking for the Hollands evaporating on the spot. “I’ll do the same.”
“I’ll let you know as soon as I get a flight,” she said. “It’ll probably
