Page 85 of Moonshine and Magnolias
Good. It was much easier to work in solitude. Rob scanned the article on his laptop, looking for locations and dates.
His brother barged back in a few minutes later and dropped a couple of plastic grocery bags next to Rob’s computer. They landed with a smack, the vibrations shaking his stack of notes. Some of the papers Rob had carefully laid out drifted to the floor and he slammed his hand on the rest to keep them from falling.
“Can’t you just leave me alone?” he asked.
Hal sat down again, a tumbler with an amber liquid in hand. At least this time he kept his feet on the floor. “A present for you.”
Rob eyed the glass. “Please tell me you bought that whiskey on your way here.”
“Nope.” Hal took a sip. “Vintage brew, this stuff is. I had it in the trunk about two days after we found it abandoned in the office. Brought it to an alcohol expert, and he estimated the bottle to be about twenty-five years old. Offered me five hundred dollars for it, too. My insides are worth it.” His brother held out the drink. “Want some?”
“No.” Rob eyed one of the bags suspiciously and poked it with a finger. The hard objects inside didn’t give. “What’s in here?”
His brother shrugged. “I had a hunch nothing would end your obsession until you had all the answers, so I smuggled those out of Fountenoy Hall.”
Rob opened the bag. Inside lay several of the smaller archive boxes that held the journals Eulalee had let them look through. The ones he had kept in his room. The ones he had left behind.
“How did you get these?” He tore his eyes from the contraband to his brother. “Loïc searched our stuff. Since you got into the car without a black eye, I’m assuming you didn’t have them in your luggage.”
When Rob had run into Sebastien’s bodyguard outside his room, the last remaining hope that he could talk to Wendy had vanished and been replaced by an aching void in his chest. Her hurt was so great that she’d posted a guard dog to make sure he left.
Not that he blamed her.
“Remember before we got in the car I told you I had to get the clothes I threw out the window?” Hal took a swig of beer. “I said I didn’t want that hulking beast’s hand on my favorite shirt?”
“You threw century-old books out a window?” Rob snatched up a bag and studied its contents with more attention. Thankfully, nothing looked damaged beyond normal wear.
“No. I threw something my brother needed out a window. He was too damn noble to do it himself.” Hal wiped his arm over his forehead. “Look. I’m sorry for what I did. What I told Wendy. I could see that you liked her. And she might have listened to you if I had let you reveal the reason we were at the Hall. So maybe what’s in those books will help you, I don’t know, win her back or something.”
Rob blinked to hide his surprise. Maybe Hal had done some growing, too. Rob loved his brother, but thinking about someone else had never been his strong suit.
“Thank you.” He removed a storage box from bag, then opened it and took out one of the journals, the musty odor of old pages and his uncle’s neat script bringing him back to the library when he first saw them. “But you’re not to blame for my situation. I knew going in that what we were doing was wrong.” And he’d done it anyway. To please his family. To appease his own historical ego. To bring an end to the obsession of each generation of Upshaws to find something that didn’t even belong to them.
“Yeah, but you didn’t expect to find something with Wendy. And after listening to you ream into Dad for the absurdity that is our lives, I realized that youwere right. We missed out on a lot of stuff because of this. It ends with us.”
Rob had to keep his jaw from gaping open at the resolve his brother’s voice “Wow, Hal. I’m impressed. I don’t know what to say.”
Hal shrugged and then looked at Rob dead on. “Say that you’ll do what you need to do to get Wendy back. You deserve her. And she deserves you.” He rose from the chair and shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “Sure I can’t convince you to hit the bar?”
“Drink one to my success.”
“Okay.” Hal recapped the whiskey bottle and shuffled to the door. “I’m keeping your spare key.”
Once his brother left, Rob went into his office and lugged his field kit out of the closet. He rummaged inside for a pair of cotton gloves, then returned to his spot on the sofa.
The bags sat on the table, folded over and hiding the contents inside. It was hard not to visualize an end to the treasure hunt. Him, holding whatever gemstone or rare plant or gifts from George III had been lost, and presenting it to Wendy. Her, clear green eyes wide with delight, taking it from him. Before throwing it at him with her pitcher’s arm and stomping away.
He settled into the silence of his small apartment. Regardless of what she thought, he had to see this through.
The first journal was a plain, burgundy book, similar to the others owned by his Uncle. Hal had looked through all of them, but Rob hadn’t yet had a chance to read it in depth. He placed it next to him on the sofa to cushion the old pages, and reached out to open it.
His hand hovered over the cover, pausing as if on its own. Just a half inch more. The chances of him finding the answers were so small.
Rob opened the journal.
The story needed an ending.
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